The Rising King (11 page)

His wooden eyes close and he goes into a state of sageness. When he pops out of it, he nods as if he’s satisfied by his vision. “You have a job to do and now a companion. Good luck.”

That doesn’t sound promising. And he wonders why I find it hard to trust him? Honestly, I’m finding it difficult to trust anyone. Even Kera. Her reckless nature, something Faldon warned me about, has taken root. Nothing I say will change her mind these days.

“What’s he talking about?” Leo asks when Bodog and Faldon leave.

I’m not slick, and I don’t want to lie to Leo, so I tell him straight up what I’m doing. “I have to go to my grandparents’. Do you mind coming with me?”

“Now?”

I know what he’s thinking. Too much is happening, and we don’t have time to go pay a family visit. He won’t go unless I give him a good reason.

“Listen, if I tell you something, you have to keep it to yourself. No telling anyone. Including Lucinda. Especially Lucinda.”

He blinks and then nods. “Okay. What is it?”

“I can’t tell you here.”

A grin stretches his mouth and a sharp laugh escapes. “You want me to go with you, but you won’t tell me why.”

“I will, just not here.” He shakes his head, and I dive ahead. “It’s really important. Life-and-death important. You’ve got to trust me on this.”

“Bro.” He stares at me, demanding my attention now, and says in his deep calm voice, “I’ve been trusting you this whole time.”

“Then you’ll come with me?” I’m having a hard time believing him. Everything in my life has been a struggle, but not with Leo. He trusts me. Even Kera’s having problems doing that these days.

He smiles. “Let’s go.”

We’re both battered and bruised and running on fumes. All I want to do is sleep, but I know I can’t. At least I can recharge, even though I know it’s not healthy and I’ll regret it later. I don’t know how Leo hasn’t fallen facedown in exhaustion. I suspect Lucinda is helping him stay alert, but I have no idea how.

Our journey out of the city and toward the barrier is quick and easy. We’ve traveled the path more than anyone here, and as usual, I cover our tracks just in case we’re followed. The sun edges over the horizon and lights up the east. It’s early, but I know my grandparents are awake. Living as they do, work begins before dawn. Once we pass through to the human realm, I use a bit of magic to clean up our appearance. The sight of blood-soaked clothing has a way of upsetting most people. The closer we get to my grandparents’ house, the tenser I become. The questions they’ll ask. They’ll probe and dissect my relationship with Kera, and I won’t know what to say.

Leo notices and presses me for the reason. I try to steer him off, but eventually I relent and give him just a hint of what’s worrying me about Kera.

“…so much has happened. Our lives have been turned upside down. I want to protect her, but she won’t let me. It’s like we live in
opposite world
, like I’m the chick and she’s the dude. It’s like I’m not a man. Like she doesn’t see me as a man.” I sigh, disgusted with my own insecurities. “Am I even making sense?”

“You know you just described my relationship with Lucinda. Do you find me…I don’t know, unmanly?”

“No. You’re fine. I mean, you aren’t a fighter, but you’re learning. You’ve picked up a lot of skills lately. It’s in Lucinda’s nature to be controlling, and you’ve accepted that. She says she cares about you…”

“And Kera cares about you. I accept Cin’s behavior because I know she loves me. We can’t treat them like every other girl we’ve known. They’re special. Different. And I wouldn’t change that for anything. I love that Cin will put it out there for me. Risk everything. It’s what love does to a person. Makes them risk it all. Anything less isn’t worth pursuing.”

“Yeah, but I still want to be the guy.”

“If I didn’t know you any better, I might call you a sexist pig.”

“I prefer to call myself a traditionalist. Otherwise, I just get really confused.”

Leo laughs, and I laugh along with him. I actually feel better than I have in a long time. Confiding in someone about my faults and stupid worries is new to me.

“We’re almost to the house,” Leo says and gives me an expectant look.

“Yeah.” It’s time I told him what we’re here for. I take a deep breath in and blow it out. “There’s this magic that can get rid of the Dark Souls and Grandma has it. That’s why we’re here.”

He doesn’t even try to hide his surprise. “No way!”

“It’s a big deal. Even though Grandma is nothing like me, she can use it if she knows how.”

“Are we talking LotR One Ring big?”

“I don’t think it controls the person, but honestly, I don’t know.”

He frowns and I already know what’s coming. “What’s it look like?”

I wince. “I don’t know.” I’ve already had this conversation with my dad and it was frustrating then, too. “Look, all I have to do is ask and she’ll give it to me. Pretty simple.”

“Okay.”

Whatever I say he believes. If this is what friendship is like, then I’m all for it.

We trot across the road that separates the woods from the house and go through the gate and into the yard. I can see Grandma’s silhouette in the greenhouse. I poke my head in. “Need some help?”

Startled, she twirls around, spilling water from the watering can onto the slate floor. She smiles when she sees me. “You scared me half to death.”

“Sorry.” I step in, but Leo stays outside since there isn’t much room for more than two in the greenhouse. As I move forward, I touch the plants and they respond like I expect, growing bigger and heavy with flowers and fruit and vegetables.

Grandma’s smile grows. “Oh, I do like it when you visit the greenhouse.”

Now that I’m here, I’m not sure how to approach the subject. “Is everything going okay?”

She puts the watering can away. “If you’re asking if we’ve had any more nasty things like the ones that attacked you, your dragon seems to have roasted them all.”

“Good.”

“How are things in Teag?”

I was hoping she’d ask. “Not so good. That’s why I’m here.”

“Oh?” She sweeps a stray lock of hair out of her eyes and stares up at me. A line of worry lodges between her eyes.

“Faldon gave you something, and I kind of need it.”

“Faldon?” She frowns, trying to place the name with the face, and then she remembers and frowns even deeper. “You mean that horrible man who tried to kill you? Why would he give me anything?”

“This is important, Grandma.” My voice gets louder, and I take a deep breath in an effort to calm down. “Really nasty things are happening in Teag and that magic is the only thing that can help us.”

“Oh.” Her lips thin, and she rubs her hands on the side of her jeans. “I’m not sure…”

I grab her shoulders in a gentle embrace and look into her blue eyes. I may not like all the aspects of being a
first
, but I’ve done my homework in the memorization department. Spell casting isn’t easy. That said, it’s the fastest way to get what you want, and I cast a spell of remembrance over her. “Please. I don’t know when he gave it to you, but it’s important you remember.”

We stare at each other for what feels like forever, and then she nods and slowly strips off her gloves. I back up as she pushes me out of the greenhouse. “You boys thirsty?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Leo says. I throw him a quick look and he shrugs. “Well, I am.”

We end up sitting at the kitchen table, milk brimming in our glasses as she sits across from us and tucks her hands in her lap.

“Do you remember?” My fingers are crossed that my spell worked.

“I think I do.”

I lean forward, and she closes her eyes. “A long time ago, a man came to the house. I thought he was a salesman, but then he brought out an old foreign-looking coin. He placed it right in my hand and asked me the oddest question. What is the one thing I’ve always wanted, but never had?”

Her eyes open and she stares at me. “It was such a silly question. I don’t want much in life, but I’ve always wanted a bird. A pretty blue songbird. Before I could blink, that coin turned into exactly what I wanted. I thought I was going crazy. And then he told me he was the father of the boy Addison had been seeing. Like us, he wasn’t pleased they were seeing each other. He told me I could make sure they never saw each other again if I would go with him into the woods and release the bird at a particular spot as I recited a poem.”

She blushes at the disbelief on my face. I have to call her on it. “You went with a strange man into the woods by yourself?” For a smart woman, she did something completely stupid.

A weak smile lifts the corners of her lips. “He’d made a bird appear out of thin air.”

Leo rapped his knuckles on the tabletop and pointed at her. “I gotcha. Something special, out-of-this-world just happened.” He turns a frown on me. “When was the last time you met a murderer who liked magic?”

“That Gacy dude. Total serial killer.”

“He was a creepy clown. Not the same.”

“Clown. Magician. Pretty close.” I return my attention to Grandma. “Why did you go?”

“I’ve heard stories all my life about magic and mischief and how our woods are special. And honestly, there was something about him I couldn’t resist. It was like I had to do what he asked.”

Faldon had to have used the same magic Kera used on Mr. Tanner and Wyatt’s dad when they were ready to come to blows earlier this summer. She used suggestion to calm them down. Faldon used his power of suggestion to convince Grandma to go into the woods. “So you went with him and did what he said.”

“He was very persuasive. Before he left, he had only one request. He said after I did exactly as he instructed, the bird would change back into the coin, and when it did, I should hide it.”

“You hid it?” Leo looks at me with a big goofy grin on his face. “She hid it. See, bro? Everything is peachy keen.”

A sinking feeling hits my gut. “What happened when you let the bird go?”

“I think it sealed the gates so no one could slip between the two worlds again. It’s what he implied.”

Faldon had exiled both my mom and my dad to a life without their one true love, while trapping the coin in the human realm, out of reach of my power-hungry dad. I don’t know how Lani figured out how to unseal the gate between the worlds, but when the gate was found open and guards were posted, she used her
incordium
dagger on the barrier, compromising it when she entered the human realm.

I steady the heavy thud of my heart and ask, “Where did you hide the coin after you used it?”

“I couldn’t keep it in the house. It made all sorts of trouble. It didn’t like being hidden away, so I did something I regret.”

Leo leans close. “You threw it in a lake?”

She blinks. “No.”

“Tossed it on a passing train?”

“No.”

“Buried it?”

She cocks her head to the side. “Like a buried treasure? That’s a great idea.”

“Leo.” We don’t have time to play twenty questions. “Will you let her tell us?”

“I don’t know how to explain it, but the coin demanded human company. I…it sounds odd…I would talk to it every so often, but not often enough. I guess it thought I was ignoring it, and it attracted someone else.” She looks my way. “Your mother.”

On hearing that, I slump dejectedly in my chair, throw my head back, and close my eyes. I cuss a blue streak. Not out loud. Grandma’s not a woman you swear around and live to tell about it. “This can’t be happening.” Mom has the coin? Talk about a disaster on an epic scale.

The stress in Grandma’s voice is heartbreaking. “When Addison found it, I didn’t want her to have it, but for some reason, I gave it to her. One moment the coin was there, lying quietly in her palm, and the next moment it was gone.”

I squeeze my eyes shut tighter. Mom has the magic and just like Grandma, she probably doesn’t know she has it.

Leo is totally engrossed in her story. “So you don’t know what it turned into?”

“No, and by that evening, she was gone. A runaway. I didn’t even remember about the coin until you asked. It’s like the whole incident was washed clean from my mind.”

Magical amnesia. Yep, Mom has no clue.

“Trippy,” Leo breathes on a note of awe.

I groan. Why can’t I catch a break? Mom has the magic, has had it this whole time, and I have no idea what it could be. I lived with her for seventeen years. I should at least suspect what it is.

Leo’s big foot slams into my shin. I only groan louder and ignore him, too busy with my own horrified thoughts. He clears his throat and asks Grandma, “Do you know where your daughter is?”

“We’ve tried to find her. She’s terrified of her father, especially now.”

I open my eyes to see her looking distressed. I straighten in my chair. “Why now?”

“I didn’t want to tell you, but she stole several thousand dollars from her father’s petty cash when she left you here with us. He was supposed to pay a bill, otherwise there would never have been that much in there.”

Mom. The lying, sneaking thief. I’m surprised Grandpa trusts me as much as he does. I wouldn’t. My teeth ache from gritting them so hard.

Leo rubs his thumb along his chin. “She had to have told someone where she is.”

Grandma shrugs her shoulders, and Leo turns his dark gaze on me, a questioning arch to his eyebrow.

“Well, she didn’t tell me.” My family isn’t anything like his. Mom never intended to come back. She stole a huge amount of money and probably changed her name. “Why would she? I’m the last person she wants to see.”

“That’s not true,” Grandma says automatically. She’s too kind to assign such mean behavior, even to her selfish daughter. “Your grandfather is the last person she wants to see. You’re her son. She loves you.”

“Grandma, that last bit is the biggest story you’ve ever told.”

“And the truest.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Leo says and stands up. He’s ready to leave. “We’ve got to find her.”

“How? It’s been a couple of months since she left. Where are we even going to look?”

Grandma pops to her feet and pulls out a road map from the junk drawer near the den. “Your grandfather tracked her as far as Willow Creek, California.” She thumbs her way to the map of California and points to Willow Creek. Leo takes the map and smiles. “That’s not all that far.”