When Jack saw their wagon stirring dust at the prairie’s edge, he knew they were coming for him. No one ever came so far from town, and he was the only thing out there that anyone considered special.

If he’d known what the visitors would bring, he’d have sprinted into the browning corn stalks or jumped on the family’s stringy horse to gallop into the territories. But at that time misfortune was as foreign to him as the sea. So he only waited in the shade of the sod house, eager for whatever came. The black marble he’d been levitating in elaborate loops over the yard, like the tip of a calligrapher’s pen, collapsed to the dirt, forgotten.

“People coming!” he called.

Ma shuffled out, wiping grime from her face with a soiled apron. Pa followed, squinting in the sun as he thumbed his suspenders. “The town stagecoach?”

Ma crossed her arms. “Get the rifle.”

“Come now.” Pa’s Scottish brogue quivered with unease. “Whoever could afford that wouldn’t want anything we have.”

The wagon rumbled nearer, sending chickens squawking out of the way. At the reins was the stocky, foul-mouthed driver from town. He drove the horses too hard, jerking them to an abrupt stop before the family, stirring up enough dust to make them cough.

The carriage door opened, and an elegant man hopped down, beaming a bright smile before offering his hand to a lady with coiffed red hair who emerged behind him. She flicked his fingers away.

“Good day.” Pa stepped between the visitors and his family. “What business brings you this far out?”

The man dusted his impeccable brown suit, though it showed no wear. “You must be Horace Driver. We’ve been hunting for you.” He pumped Pa’s hand. “Name’s William Butler, of the Topeka Herald. Come to write a news story about your boy.” He turned his radiant grin to Jack, his lush mustache twitching.

Jack knew the man was lying. He could always tell such things. But he’d dreamed of being in the paper, and he hoped, this time, his intuition was wrong.

The red-haired woman cleared her throat, and Mr. Butler spun around. “Ah! Allow me to introduce this charming creature—my wife, Katia.”

The vivid blue of her dress stung Jack’s eyes. She strode toward him, ignoring his parents. “So you are the fourteen-year-old who’s channeling Light.” She sounded skeptical, disappointed, even bored. But her words floated on an accent so flavorful Jack didn’t care.

She leaned closer, and his skin flushed, the hairs on his arms stretching to the point of pain. “I said”—she raised her voice—“do you have Light?”

Mr. Butler barked an uncomfortable laugh. “Come now, dear. We’ve only just arrived.”

Pa put his hand on Jack’s shoulder. “Forgive our surprise. We don’t get many visitors. Come inside, where we can have tea and biscuits and a bit of shade.”

He pulled aside the dusty blanket that covered the doorway, and Mrs. Butler crouched to pass beneath it. Halfway in, she froze.

Mr. Butler nudged her through. Once inside, he gasped. “Incredible! I’ve never been in a house made of mud!”

The air inside the one-room home was stifling, still reeking of boiled cabbage from lunch. Jack and his father dragged the family’s three chairs across the dirt floor, creating a makeshift seating area. Mrs. Butler wiped her chair with a gloved hand, checking for dust before sitting down. Ma plopped into another chair, her arms folded, glowering at the younger woman with no apparent interest in serving tea or biscuits.

Mr. Butler waved away the third seat, offering it to Pa. He wandered the room like a man at the market, inspecting the family’s possessions and gliding his fingers along the bumpy sod bricks of the walls. “So tell me more about this son of yours. I hear he can do magic.” His words were crisp, quiet, yet they snuffed all other sounds from the room.

Pa shifted in his creaky chair. “Not magic. Magic comes from the Devil. Jack’s talents come from Heaven. Our pastor says it’s correct to call them miracles.” Pa’s freckled hands flew as he spoke, and Jack shuffled one bare foot atop the other, embarrassed by his father’s praise.

He turned his attention instead to Mrs. Butler, stealing quick glances at her the way one might survey the sun. She certainly looked as if she’d come from the heavens, though Jack could tell she was no angel. She reminded him more of an overheated Medusa—coiled, irked, and ready to strike. Perhaps he should have feared her. But the quicksand of those blue eyes and the siren call of her voice tugged so hard at him that he felt besotted.

With a grimace, she leaned forward, interrupting Pa. “Whatever happens here today, you will remain very calm.”

Pa’s voice trailed off. He and Ma melted into their chairs, their arms dangling as the tension in their faces shifted to sleepy grins. “We will remain very calm,” they whispered back.

Jack bolted upright from the wall. “Pa?”

“My Light, Katia!” Mr. Butler threw up his arms. “Can’t you play even the simplest role?” With every word his prairie drawl eroded, morphing into something foreign and sinister.

“It’s hot. And I grow tired of listening to men talk.”

“It’s not necessary to enchant everyone. Wait. See what’s needed. That’s what they say now.”

Jack waved his hand before Pa’s tranquil face.

“Don’t worry,” Mrs. Butler said. It was the same tone she’d used with his parents. On the surface it was no different from regular speech, but hidden in its depths a note sounded, like the ringing of glass, obscuring her words, intertwining with them, penetrating Jack’s brain like a poisoned arrow.

He shook his head, blocking it out. “You can’t hypnotize me. I have my own powers.”

Her painted lips parted in surprise. Behind her, the man smoothed his mustache. “Told you,” he said. “I had a feeling about this one.”

She looked Jack up and down, lingering over the holes in his sleeves, his too-short pants, the soles of his feet caked with dirt. She turned back to his parents. “We’re going to ask some questions. You will answer honestly.”

“We will answer honestly,” they mumbled back.

“How did you come to raise this boy?” she continued.

Pa beamed foolishly, as if he’d drunk too much wine. “We were late to marry. At first we were blessed with no—”

“Who are his natural parents?”

Pa blinked, as if not understanding. “We are.”

“He’s not the father,” Mr. Butler said. “Ask the woman.”

Mrs. Butler turned to Ma. “Who sired this child?”

Ma’s jaw tightened as she gestured to Pa. “Horace.”

Mrs. Butler leaned back. “Original born?” she whispered.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” her husband answered. “Someone left him as a baby and enchanted them. They don’t remember.”

Her eyes darted between Jack and his parents, as if searching for resemblances, which he knew she’d find. From Ma—half Osage Indian—he’d inherited dark hair, brown eyes, and a long nose, slightly crooked. Thanks to Pa, he was over-tall and lanky, his eyes tilted in a way that made him look perpetually sad. The difference was vigor: Jack’s parents were old and tired, their hair streaked with white, while he was stronger, faster, and smarter than men twice his age.

She rose, motioning to Jack. “Let’s take a walk.”

He followed her outside, into the smell of chicken feed and manure. “What’d you do to my parents?”

She hurried forward, leaning into her long shadow. “I wouldn’t have done anything if you hadn’t broken our rule.”

“What rule?”

“Demonstrating your powers at the church, in front of those humans.”

He stopped, his heart in his throat. “Humans?”

She turned to face him. “My job is to find those who break the rules and stop them.”

“But…” He struggled to catch his breath. “We’re all human.”

“I’m not. And I don’t think you are either.”

“What am I?” he stammered.

“Let’s find out.” She pinched off her glove, put one foot forward, and extended her palm. “Mirror me.”

He did as he was told.

“Now send your Light.”

“My what?”

“Like this.” A flash of gold sprang from her palm like a delicate rope, stinging him. He leapt back, his arm tingling.

At the touch of her Light, a dam of emotions broke free. First came shock—envy, shame, and embarrassment at encountering someone like himself, but so much more skilled. Second came anger and fear—the realization that she could do whatever she wanted, that he could not stop her.

But these were pulses, felt then gone, drowned by the heartbeat of something deeper, louder, shaking him like thunder. Excitement.

“Teach me,” he whispered.

The corner of her mouth twitched, hinting at a smile. “Push against my hand. But not with your body, with your mind.”

He extended his arm and closed his eyes, imagining his marble hovering between them. He tried to will it forward.

Nothing happened.

“Whoever left you here thought they were very clever.” Her voice curled around his thoughts like a vine. “But we find all the little rat pups, sooner or later. If I had my way, you’d all be castrated upon discovery—that’s the only way to stop the problem.”

A force swelled inside him, sizzling his chest, then rumbling down his arm and out of his hand. Once it was gone, he felt hollowed out, and into that void flooded a euphoric dizziness so powerful he nearly toppled over.

When he opened his eyes, Mrs. Butler was on the ground, shaking her fingers as if she’d burnt them. “Blue? What are you doing with blue Light?”

She leaped up, sprinting to the house. Jack ran after her, passing the wagon driver, who sat whistling at the sky as though nothing unusual had happened.

Mrs. Butler leaned against the doorframe, panting. “It’s blue!”

Mr. Butler turned from Ma and Pa. “What is?”

“His Light! Almost white, like ice.”

“You’re imagining things.”

“I’m not!”

“These two are completely mortal.” He flicked his wrist at Ma and Pa as if rejecting goods at the store. “Boy, what color is your Light? I bet it’s brown, if you have any at all.”

Jack didn’t know what to say. In the span of a minute, he’d learned not only that he had “Light,” but also that he had the wrong kind. He shrank into himself, hiding his hands behind his back.

Mr. Butler turned to his wife. “Let’s just follow procedure and get out of here.”

“There’s no procedure for this.”

He moved behind her, massaging her neck as he murmured in her ear. Jack heard snippets: “…witnesses…tonight at the hotel…Drömstad…”

She nodded, her mind seeming to settle. Then she looked at Jack. “Lucky boy. We’re taking you.”

At once all the fear he should have felt since their arrival rushed into him, leaving him unable to speak.

“Pack a small bag,” she continued. “A coat, if you have one. We’ll come back for you in the morning.”

“But…” He forced the words out. “I don’t want to leave.”

“Of course you do. There’s nothing for you here.” She turned to his parents. “You’ll all be here when we return.”

They repeated her words as she stepped to the door.

“Oh, and one more thing: The boy’s powers don’t come from any god. They’re shameful, and you won’t speak of them again.”

“What?” Jack yelled. “That’s not—”

She silenced him with a wave of her hand. “It’s what must be done.” She motioned to her husband, and they left.

As soon as they departed, Pa stretched as though waking from a long nap. “Odd folk.” Ma twisted her neck one way and another, following him into the yard.

Jack went to the doorway, watching them trot into the fields as the wagon rolled toward the horizon. Then he plopped down in the shade, running fingers through his matted hair. All year Pa had tried to prepare him for this, reading aloud from Revelations, certain beyond doubt that Jack was a prophet, a destined player in battles to come. Jack should have listened. Maybe then he’d have known what to do now.

Instead he’d spent his time on other books, like his father’s tattered copies of The Count of Monte Cristo and Gulliver’s Travels. The church congregation—awed by his miracles and discovering his love for reading—had dropped even more novels into his hands. His favorites were the adventures—tales of dragons and monsters, pirates and knights. Maybe he’d read the wrong kind of stories, dreamed of being the wrong kind of hero. Maybe that’s why his Light was blue, why he wasn’t strong enough to stop the Butlers, why part of him didn’t even want to.

His parents were placid and sluggish that evening. Whenever Jack mentioned the Butlers—should he go with them? stay and fight? escape in the night?—they shifted uneasily, repeating that they’d better be home when the couple returned. They went to bed early, sleeping as still as the dead.

Whatever was coming, Jack was on his own.

For hours he lay on his itchy burlap mattress, unable to sleep, imagining what he’d say to Mrs. Butler the next morning. Countless variations of refusal and acceptance rolled over his tongue, and countless imagined replies rang back in her cruel, hypnotic voice. At some point her tone softened and her responses came slower, until they stopped coming at all.

He awoke to brightness. Ma stood in the doorway, her back to him. He jumped up, heart pounding. “Are they here?”

She held the door blanket aside. The sun was well into the sky, but there was no stagecoach, no Butlers. Pa sat on an overturned bucket near the clothesline, polishing his rifle.

“He wants to talk to you.” Ma’s voice was heavy and stoic.

Maybe his parents had improved during the night. At the thought of his father’s counsel a weight lifted, and Jack launched himself outside.

In the distance, a tiny plume of dust was rising. He sprinted the rest of the way to Pa. “They’re coming! What should we do?”

Pa wiped the gun with a cloth, his expression flat. All night Jack had been uncertain whether he should go or find some way to stay. Now, in the face of Pa’s silence, he found himself waiting to hear that one magical word: Go.

“I think I should leave with them,” he blurted out. “If they’re bad or mistreat me, I’ll run away and come home. I know I’m young, but I can do it. I’m ready.”

Pa threw the rag over his shoulder, unhurried. “Remember the first time you…?” He choked.

“The first time I what?”

Pa gurgled.

“The first time I levitated something?”

Pa nodded, seeming relieved that Jack had said the words for him. “I must have known then what you were. Only I didn’t want to know. Loved you too much to see the truth.”

“What truth?”

Pa’s gaze slid to his. “You’re a demon.”

Jack startled backward.

“I always said gifts like yours come from one of two places: God or the Devil. I hoped…” Pa shook his head. “I was wrong.”

“I’m not a demon. I don’t know what I am, but it’s not that.”

“Your gifts don’t come from God.” Pa pulled a box of bullets from his overalls. “Soon as she said it, I knew it was true. Knew it like I know my own name. Like I know this bullet can change the world.”

He held it up for Jack to see before sliding it into the barrel. Then he stood and cocked the rifle, aiming it at Jack’s nose.

“No!”

“You’re my blood. My responsibility. How can I let you unleash more evil into this wretched world?”

Jack gritted his teeth. This was all Mrs. Butler’s fault. He remembered the vile taste of her Light, the sloppy way she’d changed his parents’ thoughts, as if it was nothing, as if they were nothing. How had he ever considered going with them? His face burned with shame. This had been his test, and he’d failed.

“From now on I’ll be normal,” he promised. “No more miracles. I’ll stop.”

“You can’t stop. The magic is part of you. It’s who you are.”

“I can stop. I don’t need it. I don’t even want it!” His skin blazed hotter with the shame of his lies.

Behind him the coach rumbled to a halt. Sweat beaded Pa’s brow, the rifle shaking and rattling. It dropped a notch. “What am I doing?” he whispered.

Jack exhaled in relief. “The lady’s here. Maybe she can undo this.”

Pa lowered the rifle as if surprised to see it in his hands. He looked up at Jack. “I’m not strong enough,” he said. Then he flipped the gun beneath his chin and fired.

Blood sprayed into the sky. Pa’s eyes rolled back, his knees buckled, and he crumpled to the ground. Around his head spread a dark halo, glimmering in the sun like melted rubies.

Gunpowder burned Jack’s nostrils, and the sounds of the yard rushed at him like daggers: chickens squawking, hooves clomping, Ma screaming. She landed on Pa’s body, beating his ribs as though she could pound the life back into him. Jack only stood there, numb.

Finally he spun around. The Butlers were there. Had they seen everything? “Fix him!”

Mrs. Butler shook her head. “Fixing that is beyond my ability.”

“Do it, and I’ll go with you. I’ll do whatever you want.”

“Take heart,” she said. “He was human. He didn’t have much time left.”

Jack slapped his chest. “I’m human, too!”

Her smile was sad. “Choosing such a thing is beyond your ability.”

Behind him, the rifle cocked again. Ma aimed it at Mrs. Butler, holding the weapon far steadier than Pa had.

Mrs. Butler flinched, jerking her hand to her collarbone as if stung by an insect.

Ma fired a second time. A third. Each bullet bounced off.

“Go to sleep,” Mrs. Butler said.

Ma collapsed, and Jack fell to his knees beside her.

Mr. Butler tsked. “Quite a mess.”

“It’ll be fine,” Mrs. Butler snapped. “We only need to adjust her memory, visit those townspeople again—”

“That’s too much! Let’s just leave a barrel of money and get out.” He turned to Jack. “You’ve learned your lesson, haven’t you, boy? You won’t cause any more trouble.”

“William, he has blue Light!”

“That was a trick of the sun in your eyes.”

“It was not!”

Ma was peaceful in her repose, her chest barely rising and falling. Jack took her wrinkled hand and squeezed, absorbing its warmth. He would not think of Pa, lying dead on the ground behind him. He would focus, instead, on the one parent he had left.

“I won’t leave my mother.”

The Butlers glanced at Jack as if they’d forgotten he was there. “Now don’t worry about her,” Mr. Butler said, his voice affecting a sudden kindness. “Even if we do take you—”

“—which we will,” Mrs. Butler said.

“—which we most likely will,” he continued, “we’ll leave her richer, happier, maybe even a bit younger. She’d like that, don’t you think? A new beginning.”

“She doesn’t need a new beginning.”

Mrs. Butler folded her arms. “All humans want a new beginning.”

“She’d be alone!”

Mrs. Butler stepped forward. “You’re young. When you’re older you’ll understand.” She glanced at her husband, her words slow and deliberate. “Solitude can be a blessing.”

Mr. Butler stiffened. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means—”

Jack grabbed a handful of dirt and flung it, making Mrs. Butler cough. When the dust settled, she was covered. There was a moment of silence. Then Mr. Butler laughed—a hearty guffaw that roared across the prairie, slicing under Jack’s skin like a razor.

Jack dug for more dirt. Instead his fingers found something smooth and round. His marble. At the sight of it, his heart fluttered with hope. Make it stop, he thought.

The sphere sped away, and the laughing ceased.

Mr. Butler stood frozen, staring at nothing. In his forehead was a hole the size of a penny. His jaw fell open, exposing a pink, wet tongue. He was dead before he hit the ground.

“William?” Mrs. Butler dropped to his side. “William!” She slapped his face, scanning him for signs of life. Then she whipped her gaze to Jack, eyes wide and disbelieving. “What did you do?”

The marble flew back to him, red and sticky. He pocketed it as he rose to face her.

And that’s when everything stopped, as if all of time had been a countdown to this second, and a multitude of futures sat bridled and ready, awaiting what would unfold.

A crow cawed, and the moment was over. Mrs. Butler sprang up, yellow lightning crackling from her hand. As if by instinct, Jack threw his arm forward, and blue Light exploded from him. The two streams collided in midair with a reverberating boom.

Wind blew between them, unfastening Mrs. Butler’s curls and sending them flying outward like fire. She screeched and writhed, struggling to push Jack’s Light away. But the collision point—where blue ate yellow—inched nearer to her by the second. Soon she’d die. Jack didn’t care. He’d kill her and a thousand like her if he had to. But he would never go with them. He would never be one of them.

She had only seconds left. “I’ll be back!” she yelled. “With others. You’ll pay for what you’ve done!” With a wave of her arm, she disappeared.

He gasped, stopping his stream, and the prairie grew quiet.

The wagon driver groaned in his seat, clasping his head with both hands as though forced awake with a terrible headache. He looked at the three forms on the ground, and then his eyes landed on Jack. “What’d you do?”

Jack marched over. If Mrs. Butler could command people with her voice, he could too. “You see nothing strange here.”

“I see enough.” The driver jumped down, yanked out a pistol, and aimed it at Jack.

Would bullets bounce off him as they’d bounced off the Butlers? He noted the scrapes and bug bites along his arms, then raised his hands in surrender. Bullets were a risk he would not take.

The driver spat. “You’ll hang for this.”

Jack took a steadying breath. One thing he’d learned in the past year was that the answers often lay inside him, if he was quiet enough to listen. He looked into the man’s hazel eyes, searching, until he hit upon a pool of anger, resentment, and jealousy, tinged with fear and exhilaration.

As soon as Jack connected with the man, feeling his emotions as if they were his own, his heartbeat slowed. He knew what to do. “Put the gun down.”

“I’ll put the gun down.” The driver’s eyes widened in horror even as he lowered the weapon. “What’s happening?”

Jack dropped his hands, stepping closer. “You like me. You’ve always liked me.”

A struggle contorted the man’s face, as if something inside was tearing apart, being deconstructed and built anew. His grin grew wider. “I like you.”

“The carriage and horses are mine now. You’ll help me pack. Once Ma and I leave, this homestead can be yours, as long as you never tell anyone what you saw here today.”

The driver repeated the words.

Jack strode toward the house, fondling the marble in his pocket, forcing all thoughts of Pa from his mind. Soon Mrs. Butler would return with reinforcements, her sour Light aching for vengeance. This was not the moment for grief or regret—there’d be time enough for that later. Now he had a mother to protect, a wagon to load, and two bodies to bury.

And the day was already wasting.

VITA ETERNA explores themes of power and responsibility, relationships and change, connection and reinvention. When a bored, immortal queen falls for an idealistic rebel, she must quickly modernize or risk losing her comforts, her realm, and her last chance at a new beginning.

Vita is the leader of a clandestine group of immortals who are able to channel Light, a mysterious substance with both healing and destructive capabilities. Once a warrior queen, Vita now—in the twenty-first century—cloisters herself in a hidden palace, bored with her long life. This complacency shatters when she discovers an outsider, Jack Driver, with power equal to her own. News of Jack is invigorating a growing resistance to Vita’s rule among her kind, threatening the fragile cohabitation of humans and immortals that she has fought to achieve.

Jack, a civil-rights activist in New York, knows nothing about Vita or her secret world. His childhood encounter with members of her army—which resulted in his father’s death—led him to believe that his Light was evil. In his final words to his father, he swore to forgo “magic” and live a normal life, a promise he struggles to uphold.

When at last Vita and Jack meet, they experience an intense attraction, drawn together by their unique powers. Needing him by her side to quell the revolution, Vita urges him to embrace his Light, becoming the god he’s meant to be. But Jack refuses to join the army that has hounded him. In fact, the more rebels he meets, the more sympathetic he becomes to their cause. Maybe it’s not the Light that’s corrupt; maybe the corruption lies inside the woman he loves.