Gabriel. The one my parents were afraid of, the one Katherine warned them about, the one whose men tried to kidnap me, and ultimately the one who is responsible for my mother's death. I feel my grief twist and harden into something darker, more ominous. Disgust, loathing, and lust for revenge battle inside my heart. He is the one I who killed my mom. Therefore I will make him pay.

"Where is he?" I ask cooly.

"What?" Chase asks.

"Where is Gabriel?" I specify. "I want to find him. So I can kill him."

He looks at me in surprise and some amusement. "Get in line. We all have a score to settle with Gabriel Anderson."

I bite my lip and look down, my blood still hot with rage and pain. "Who is he? What does he want?"

Chase's eyes seem to get darker. "Gabriel believes that the humans are to blame for the near extinction of our race. He believes that we are superior and deserve to rule over all humans. The other thing is that he's a politician. His plan is to make it to Governor of Virginia before he starts his insurgency. The idea is to take down the US from the inside, using men he has holding positions up in DC. He has his claws in every agency and every court."

"How would you know that?" I ask him, confused.

"He told us."

"What? I don't understand." I look at him with a skeptical expression. Evil masterminds don't just give away their evil plans, unless in monologues. Just watch any sifi/action movie ever.

Chase deliberates for a moment, looking at his watch. "Well, I would explain, but I wasn't really born yet, and Garret will tell it better anyway. Besides, if we aren't careful we're going to miss the plane."

"Plane?" I ask.

"Yes, plane. We're flying to Paris in two hours."

"What? Why?"

He runs his hand through his hair, staring at my face as if gauging my reaction. "Because that's where your father is waiting for us."

*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•

I sit in one of those annoyingly uncomfortable airport chairs, trying to shift around to find an agreeable position. We've been waiting here for about an hour, and I'm starting to get sick of watching planes leave and take off.

The younger redhead, Kara, apparently, sits on my right, playing some sort of game on her phone. Matthew sits on her other side, and his brother stays on mine. The others sit opposite us, either on their phones, talking quietly, or eating airport lunches. Garret, the middle-aged Shift with shaggy brown hair, introduced me to all of them on the drive over here. Morgan, the older redhead, is his Flyer wife, and Kara is their Shift daughter. Matthew is dating her, it seems, who, by the way, is a Flyer. Margot is a Shift. She was the eagle I saw at the hotel. Annalise, the blond, is a Flyer, and her brother Jonathan is a Mage, like Chase. Last but not least is the strongest Mage in the clan, aka Joshua. He's the older Asian man with the walking stick.

"So, Haven," Kara starts. "Have you ever flown in a plane?"

"No, actually. I've always wanted to, though."

Kara's face lights up like a Christmas tree. "Ohmygosh! I love planes! Taking off is a little freaky at first, but the cabin is so cool, and the refreshment carts are great too! Oh, and on overnight flights like ours they give you these little pillows! They turn off all the lights and everything to make it look like 'night' so that people can sleep. And then, like four hours later, they slowly turn on the lights to make it look like it's morning. And the meals! Ohmygosh the meals are in these cute little foil containers and they give you a little menu to choose what you want from, like, three options. The last time I was here I ordered this pasta with beef broth that was really good, surprisingly. And you can watch all the movies you want on the little TV screens on the back of the chairs in front of you! Oh, they also have European music! In a bunch of different languages. The French stuff was so good. . ."

I am struck speechless by the overbearing force of her sudden speech. She spits out words and phrases and "Ohmygoshes" like cannon fire, barely pausing for breath. Her hands animate every word she says, waving around her in a wild tornado of expression. It's like someone suddenly flicked a switch and opened the floodgates. Kara is so passionate about plane rides it's like she wants to convert me into the worship of them. But based on the rather amused, calm faces around me, I'm guessing that Kara is just one of those people who get obsessed with everything. She acts like she's a seven year old on sugar, even though I know for a fact she's eighteen on the dot.

After a while she burns out and goes back to taking with Matthew. Chase chuckles a little from my left.

"What is it?" I ask.

He shakes his head. "Nothing. It's just that we told Kara to go easy on you. Of course, being Kara, she didn't. As you can see, she can be quite. . . Overwhelming."

I nod and stare out into the vast airport, watching all the people run by as they fight to get to the right gate. It's a perfectly normal day in a United States airport. And that's why it's so strange. After all that's happened, I feel like I've been transported into an entirely different dimension, where the Gifted don't exist and my mother is still alive. And to think that none of these people know that there are ten non-human beings walking among them that are perfectly capable of morphing into giant animals, throwing lighting bolts, and flying just as fast as the planes. They have to idea. And there's no way to tell.

"Chase?" I ask.

"Yeah, Haven?"

"Are there any. . . Physical differences between humans and the Gifted?"

"Yes, actually, but we hide it very, very well."

"What do you mean? What's the difference?"

"Well, our eyes are different," he says matter-of-factly. I stare at his deep brown irises, trying to find a discernible difference. There is none. His eyes, despite the warm color, are relatively normal.

He laughs. "See what I mean? I'm hiding it."

"What am I supposed to see?" I ask, not joining in his mirth.

Chase blinks, hard. Suddenly there are little swirling flecks of gold in the brown, as bright as little stars. They actually reflect the dim light, sparkling like little jewels in the depths of his irises.

"Whoa!" I exclaim, the novelty and beauty shocking me out of my depression for a moment.

"Cool, right? It's an evolutionary advancement. Because we can hide the flecks, humans are less likely to find out that we're different. It's as easy as blinking. The problem is, the flecks are also really easy to let go. Sometimes they change without us realizing it." He blinks again and they're gone.

"But how?" I ask.

"Not magic, actually. You know how camels have a second eyelid? We have a film in the back of our irises that we can slide in or out of view. It's a little like being double jointed. We don't really think about changing it, we just do."

I continue to stare at his eyes, waiting for them go change back. He smiles and blinks them back. Then away. Then back again. I actually let myself crack a tiny smile.

"So, please tell me more about Gabriel. I have to know!"

He hesitates for a moment.

"Please? I think I have a right to know."

"I guess so. Umm. . . Let's see, " he seems at a bit of a loss as to where to start. "So after the Nation wars, skip six centuries to the 1900s. Garret was born to the Shift Sarah Anderson and human Richard Anderson sometime in the seventies. A year later Gabriel was born, but he wasn't Joshua's child. Sarah insisted that he was, but Richard didn't believe her. It was confirmed when Gabriel turned out to be a Mage when he was seven. That's about when our "Gifts" come out. Richard beat his wife and children ever since the day Gabriel was confirmed as a Mage. One night, when the boys were thirteen and fourteen, his father came home drunk. Gabriel said something that set his dad off and he attacked him. Richard nearly nearly killed him. Sarah got in the way, so he hit her across the face. She fell down the brick stairs and died instantly. While Richard was distracted, Garret carried his brother out of the hall. He set him in his room and locked both of them in before calling the police. Richard was arrested, tried, and found guilty of his wife's murder."

"What was his sentence?" I ask.

"Life. The brothers never saw him again, and had no will to. Garret and Gabriel bounced around foster homes until they were eighteen. Then they both went to William and Mary, Gabriel to study law, Garret to study market research analysis. That's where he met your dad. And Morgan, too. At the time she was studying to become a school administrator. They started dating after a few months and got married the year after Garret graduated. In the meantime, Gabriel started a successful law firm called "Anderson Law Offices." They settled Domestic Relations cases mainly, because of Gabriel's past.

"The brothers sometimes went months without seeing each other because of their busy working schedules. After one particularly long period of absence, Gabriel appeared at Garret and Morgan's house. He started ranting about how Humans were inferior and how the Gifted should rule supreme. He asked Garret to help him with this revolution he had planned. When Garret refused, a bunch of Gifted stormed the house and pretty much kept them all captive in his basement. He was determined to show them what he called, 'the truth.' After three months Garret organized an escape and led the others out. Gabriel nearly caught them, but they made it off the property and lost him. Ever since then, Gabriel's been trying to gain followers and Garret's been trying to stop him."

"Whoa whoa whoa! Wait. What does Gabriel have against humans?" I frown, not entirely sure I understand.

"Garret says that it's because of his dad. The beatings affected him more than he previously thought, and his dad was a human. He told me that his brother was always angry, particularly towards your race because of his father killing their mother. I guess he sort of just snapped. We're not entirely sure why. You see, once Gabriel is elected, he can influence the government from the inside. He has a very extensive network of followers, larger than we previously thought. If he succeeds, the Gifted will be like the Nazis, and the humans will be the Jews. His problem? His army is outnumbered by a ridiculous ratio. He's banking on the fact that you humans have no idea who we are. Without the eye trick, the government can't tell a human from a Gifted person. We had to find a way to stop him."

"Who's 'we?'" I interrupt.

"Us. Garret's clan. After he escaped with Morgan and your father, he founded this clan. There are very few left in the world. There are about one hundred of us, all enemies of Gabriel. Our goal is to destroy Gabriel and his group of followers. He approaches people he knows are Gifted and lures them into his clan with promises of wealth and glory. We try to intercept those people and convince them to join us against him. Hey, he is a politician. But his strength is also his weakness: the size of his network makes it easier for us to put our spy's in."

"What happened to my dad being in the clan?"

Chase gives me a hesitant look. "He married your mom and decided to leave after she got pregnant. He knew that the baby had a fifty fifty chance of being human. He wanted you to grow up safe from Gabriel. After all-"

"What?!" I interrupt. "Fifty fifty?"

"Yes. Your mom is human and your dad is a Mage. You knew that, didn't you?"

I clutch the arm of the chair for support, breathing quickly. I wondered why my dad was with the Anderson's, but I didn't even allow for the possibility that he was anything other than human. "It's- it's not possible. I would know, wouldn't I?" He couldn't keep something like that from me? Could he? Suddenly I'm not so sure. He was involved in all of this. It would only make sense. . .

"Haven! Please calm down. Relax!" Only now do I realize that my vision had narrowed and I was getting ready to black out. A panic attack. I nearly laugh out loud. It's absolutely hilarious, for some unfathomable reason.

"I'm okay," I say distantly. "But I don't understand. He. . . He's my father! I've known him my whole life! There's no way he could be. . ."

"I'm sorry Haven! I thought you knew! If I keep making you freak out like this I may have to avoid you completely!"

I grace him with a weak smile, not reaching my eyes. This is insane. Absolutely impossible. But the problem is, it's not. I really don't know anything real about my parents' past. It's entirely plausible that they would hide something like this from me.

"You're sure?" I ask. "He's a Mage?"

Chase nods, crushing all of my lingering doubts. I take a shaky breath, trying to accept this. He lied to me about who he was. That's how he put me to sleep that day. I feel myself nearing tears again. "Just. . . Go on." I croak out. "Talk about something else."

"Oh. . . kay." He agrees tentatively. "So, this woman named Katherine, who your dad met and warned when Gabriel was after her, hid from Gabriel so he never found her.Then, a few days ago, she came out of hiding, approached your parents, and gave them a letter. Do you need water or something? Are you sure you're okay?" I wave him off, wanting, no, needing him to continue.

"If you're sure. So the letter claimed that the Amulet still existed, and told Samuel's version of history. Apparently Samuel Green was one of her ancestors. Brandon called us and told us everything but what the clue was. He wanted to tell Garret in person. He was right to. One of our people, Glen Hunter, had bugged the phone. He ran to Gabriel and told him immediately. The traitor. Garret found out and told your dad to run. He took off with the clue while you and your mother ran in the other direction. Meanwhile, Garret organized the group of us he trusted the most and ran to you guys at the hotel. We didn't think that they would find you that quickly. Anyway, after that we contacted Mr. Webber, who's a member of our clan, but isn't all that involved. We're going to meet up with your dad to get the clue. Then we're going to solve it, go there, and ultimately get the Amulet before Gabriel does."

I take a second to absorb this. My father. A minute ago I would be practically crying tears of joy at the prospect of a familiar face. But now I find out that he's just like one of them: Gifted or whatever. He lied to me my whole life. And what would have happened if I had been a Mage? The prospect is stunning. To be able to control energy by will? That's just. . . Unimaginable.

I take in a deep breath through my nose. This is all so overwhelming. My life is falling apart. I don't know what to think anymore. Suddenly I just don't want to deal with this. I shouldn't have to deal with it! I'm seventeen! I should be worried about boys and parties and college, but now I've been tossed into this world of cults and magic and these warring groups of supernatural beings that look so human and yet can do these extraordinary things. It's all so ridiculously impossible. I feel like I'm watching it all from afar, and yet drowning in it at the same time. Now I understand why characters in books always think that that they're dreaming

"Okay," I say, quietly letting the helplessness fill me up and consume me. However, the emotion must be written on my face because Chase tentatively reaches an arm around my shoulders, his touch careful and light.

"Hey," he says gently, "I know that this is coming really fast, but we've all been there. Maybe we all knew about the Gifted world beforehand, but we've all lost things, and people, because of Gabriel and his followers. Maybe I can't remember a time when I couldn't manipulate energy, but you are one hundred percent human. This is completely new to you. It isn't always like this, you know."

"What do you mean?" I ask, half leaning into him. The contact is soothing.

"Most of us live relatively normal lives, just with a little extra ability and secrecy. But this clan, we've been in hiding since before I was born. You are involved in this, whether you like it or not, but I'll do my best to protect you the whole time. We all will."

I give him a small smile, a real one. "Thank you, Chase."

"Of course," he says, pulling away and standing up. "But before we get to the trials, we have to get to your dad."

*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•*•

All right, thanks soooo much for bearing with me as I moved around chapters and scenes! As of today (4/4/15) there shall be no more additions to this chapter. Thanks for following, voting, and, of course, reading! Luv you guys!

-iambibliophilic