FIRE AND ICE

THE HANDPRINT

The ash handprint was still warm.

I stared at it. Kael stared at it. Grandmother stared at it like she had seen it before.

"Don't touch it," Grandmother Lillian said, her voice not old anymore. Young. Strong. Like the woman in Elias's files from 1998. "Whatever you do, Ava, don't touch it."

But I was already cold. Not my power cold. Scared cold. The kind I used to get before my mother inspected my room.

Mom was holding Grandmother tight. "Mama, what is that? You said the Veil was closed. You said -"

"I said it was closed," Grandmother snapped, letting go of Mom and walking to the handprint. She put her own ice-covered hand next to it, not touching. Her hand was small, perfect, nails painted blue like mine. The ash hand was bigger. A man's hand. Long fingers. "But he never really leaves. He leaves a mark. To remember the way back."

Elias came forward with his barrel fire. The fire was low now that we were home, just orange embers. "Lillian, is it Joren's?"

Grandmother nodded. Her ice was spreading from her feet, trying to freeze the wall over the handprint. But the ash wouldn't freeze. It smoked.

Kael was still holding me. His arms were shaking. Not from cold. From seeing his parents alive for the first time in 12 years.

His real parents - not the uncle who pretended to be the Master - were on the floor of my mansion hall, holding each other, crying, covered in ash that was slowly falling off them like snow melting.

His mother looked exactly like the woman in the cage, but now her hair was black again, not white. His father had Kael's jaw, Kael's shoulders, but his eyes were brown, not amber. Normal.

"Kael?" his father said, voice raw from years of not speaking. "Kael, is it really you? Last time I saw you, you were -"

"Six," Kael whispered. He let go of me and dropped to his knees in front of them. "You died in Mushin fire. They told me -"

"We didn't die," his mother sobbed, grabbing his face, his burned hoodie, like she needed to prove he was real. "Joren - your uncle Joren - took us that night. He had just learned to eat Hollowed. He needed pure Fire to open the first door. Your father was pure Fire. I was -"

"A Water," his father finished. "Not Ice, but Water. Enough to make Steam with him. Joren took us both to make a key. He left you because you were too small. Your fire hadn't come yet."

Kael made that broken sound again. But this time it wasn't broken. It was angry. Fire, real fire, burst around his fists, and for a second I thought the rug would burn, but my ice shot out automatically and cooled it.

We were still balanced. Even at home.

Elias was watching us. "The Steam held. Even on this side. That has never happened. In 80 years, never."

Grandmother finally turned from the handprint. Her eyes, blue like mine, landed on me and Kael.

"Come here, both of you. Now."

We went. His parents tried to follow, but Elias held them back. "Let Lillian do this. She knows."

Grandmother grabbed my left hand and Kael's right hand and pressed them together over the ash handprint, not touching it, just over it.

The moment our skin touched, the handprint flared.

Not hot. Cold. A memory that wasn't mine flooded my head.

A boy, 14 years old, in 1937, falling through a Veil in a village near Jos. He was scared, alone, pure Fire, just like Kael. He ate his first Hollowed to stay alive. It tasted like ash and made him warm. So he ate another. And another. For 89 years, he ate. Until he wasn't a boy anymore. He was a door that could walk.

Joren.

I gasped and pulled back, but Grandmother held us firm.

"You felt it," she said. "That's how he remembers. Every handprint is a memory he leaves. To find his way back to any Veil he's touched. And he's touched this one now because of your Steam."

Kael's fire was flickering. "So he's coming back?"

"No," Grandmother said. "Not if we close it properly this time. Your mother and I closed it wrong in 1998 because we used only Ice. We froze it. Frozen things can crack. To truly close a Veil after True Steam has opened it, you need to -"

She looked at our joined hands.

"Stay balanced. Here. On this side. For 7 days. You have to live together, eat together, sleep near each other, keep Steam alive, even a little, for 7 days. If you fight, if you separate, if your Steam breaks, the crack opens and he comes back with every Hollowed he's ever eaten."

My mother made a small noise. "Seven days? In my house? A boy? Ava has exams -"

"Mom!" I said, ice flaring. "We just saved the world -"

"You saved one Veil," Grandmother corrected, but gently now. She touched my cheek. Her hand was cold like mine, but warm underneath. Like Kael. "There are 12 more in Lagos alone. Joren knows them all. If this one opens again, the others will too."

Elias stepped forward. "They can stay in the old guest wing. I will watch the handprint. Lillian, you and I will take shifts."

Grandmother nodded. "Ava, Kael, look at me."

We did.

"If you can do this, if you can stay balanced for 7 days without killing each other, the Veil will seal forever. And your powers - both of you - will stabilize. No more burning up. No more freezing the classroom. You will be normal. As normal as we can be."

Kael looked at me. His amber eyes were tired. He had just gotten his parents back. Now he had to move into my mansion.

"Do you have WiFi?" he asked.

I almost laughed, even with the warm ash hand on my wall. "Fiber. 200 Mbps."

"And food? Real food, not caviar tiny stuff?"

"Amaka cooks jollof on Sundays."

He squeezed my hand. His fire warmed my ice, and steam - tiny, real, soft steam - rose between our fingers.

"Seven days," he said. "We survived the Hollow. We can survive your mansion."

Grandmother smiled for the first time. A real smile that made her look 25 again.

"Day One starts now," she said.

Behind us, the ash handprint pulsed once, faintly, like a heartbeat.

Still warm.