Keeper's Knowledge (Balancer's Soul cycle) (47 page)

It was getting late when Veronica said
“That is enough for today. I must attend to my egg and bathe myself before we attend our evening meal.”
She looked at Connor
. “Thank you
, little one, for showing me how to throw a ball properly. I will not let you down for the game tomorrow.”

She started to leave when Connor grabbed her tail. She instantly stopped to look at him with amusement
still
dancing in her golden eyes. “There is something I must ask everyone before we separate.” He released her tail and walked over to stand by
Sarah
. “Xaon’s pitch; how many of you could follow the ball after he threw it?”

Sarah
raised
her
hand, but no one else could even lie that they saw it. Connor looked up and
she
knew he was processing this and
searched
for a
solution. Everyone looked at the two of them
and remained silent until Connor looked down at
everyone
again. “This i
s
the only solution that will save you from getting struck out
every time
.” Everyone moved closer to listen. “His pitch is too quick for
you to see
or slow with your external abilities
, but he has a tell
tail
sign. You will know he is pitching once you see his tail twitch suddenly. He only had two throws in his
repertoire
. The fastball and the Gyroball.
H
e
had prided himself on relying on speed alone. His tail usually sways like yours does Veronica
, until he pitches to keep his balance
.” She couldn’t help but look
at her tail to see it swaying.

Connor’s voice took on a cheering chant. “The moment you see his tail twitch, swing! Don’t try bunting, swing! Don’t listen to the crowd or your thoughts, swing! Don’t make any comments or taunts, swing! Forget the passage of time, swing! Whatever you do just…,”

“
SWING
!” Everyone
shouted,
getting caught up in his excited chant.

Soon after Connor finished explaining what a Gyroball
i
s
,
Veronica retrieved her egg from Clarein
,
who was grateful to hold the egg again.
Connor asked the referee if he could borrow the Keepers bat. The referee said it was allowed for tomorrow’s
unorthodox
game.
Jillian, Jack
, Mark and Kara had already left
them
to go down stairs.

Sarah
might not have Connor’s acute hearing, but a buzz
filled
the air about the special game
tomorrow
.
She
became more
excited and in a small way scared about
what would happen then
. Connor threw his left arm around
her, sensing the conflicting emotions
.

She
couldn’t have been any prouder about who
she
was with. He is strong, smart, caring, compassionate, calm, collected, empathetic, reassu
ring, humble and completely in love with her
.
Nothing more could be asked.
She
looked up at his face as his huge arm lightly
slung over her
shoulder. His
strong and square
jaw could cut steel. His
straight
nose and cheekbones were all
perfectly symmetrical
. His sandy blonde hair needed another trim, but still looked
incredibly
handsome. His
sharp
hazel eyes remained forward as
they
made
their
way through the crowd
and down the stairs.

Liz eyed the
enormous
bat as Connor managed to get it through the front door. Once he did
,
she smiled and said that
the
rooms were all
repaired and all effects remained as is and she personally disposed of his bloody wastebasket
.

Connor took their
room key from his pocket and unlocked
their
fixed door. It swung open
silently on oiled hinges
.
Sarah
entered the room first
. It took some finessing, but they
finally managed to get the bat in
to the
room
,
without destroying anything. The bat was slightly larger than half the length of the room.

He shut the door
for privacy
.

She
looked at him as he scratched the back of his head while studying the bat. “Well what is this miracle fix for the bat so we
little
people can play?”

He chuckled. “My first idea was to shrinking the diameter of the handle for our grip
, but
t
he
effect
would be the same
as
when I made the
human sized
bat into a boomerang. What I need to do is reinforce it from the outside.” He smiled like he had already figured it out. “
What I intend to do it pull some of the metal from the inside middle of the bat and pull it out from the bottom. After that
,
I’ll bend the metal around and weld it where we will hit the ball so that it won’t buckle under extreme force.”

He sat down and crossed his legs. He scooped the bat up and held
it
in both of his hands. She
then felt Connor summoning his energy. Suddenly the metallic bat began to rise
an inch above
his hand and began to glow
cherry red
.
The
room became
like
a sauna. Then a thick stream of metal escaped out of the handle and bent around the shaft. The end of the stream melted with the top of the bat and
welded itself
along the bat
’s surface
until
the shaft
began to shrink in diameter for the handle
. The metal began to
eventually
cool and
it
slowly landed in Connor’s hand. The room was still stifling, but the worst was
now over. Sarah
had
no choice except
to open the front door to ventilate the heat out.
She
turned around to see Connor
holding the now thinner handle with ease. It now looked like the handle now has a guard like some swords do.

He stood and held the bat out
for her inspection
.
She
stepped forward and felt that the metal
remained
warm
, but bearable to hold
.
She
wrapped each of
her delicate
fingers around the handle with childlike ease. The weight of the bat was as expected, but easy enough for even
Jillian
to manage.

They
bathed
, ate dinner with everyone and Sarah
finished the night
off with a bang,
finally showing Connor how much happiness he gave to
her
this day.
It felt like nothing
bad
even happened last night
as all stress was blissfully released
.

Early the following
morning
,
when Connor
woke up, Sarah was
already wide
awake and looking at
him passionately. He
was still laying on
his
b
ack and she cuddled up against his
side
. Her breasts
,
soft yet firm
, pushed desirably
against
his
ribcage and her
silky
left leg was tossed over
his
. The bed sheet obstructed
a clear
view
of her beautiful body. Thick hair
wrapped over her right shoulder and spread out across the bed.
His
hand was resting around her back and across
the top of
her hip.
He
moved the palm of
his
hand and softly rubbed her lower back. She closed her eyes and a soft moan escaped her lips. When she reopened her eyes she spoke in
a
silken
voice. “That was a wonderful night
you gave me.”

“I can say the same from my perspective.” Her hand started tracing the tattoo on
his
chest and her eyes
contently
watched her
own
fingertips moving up and down each line in a slow trace. “I love you, Sarah.”

Her fingers stopped and she looked back up. “And I love you, Connor.”

He
reached down and cradled her bare bottom and brought her up higher to
him
. She didn’t seem to mind and she moved so
their
lips could finally meet. She broug
ht the covers up with her and he
didn’t mind that little bit of compromise.
He
r lips were soft and warm a
s
they
shared breath
, hers sweet and his masculine
.
When
the
kiss ended she sat up and kept the covers over her breasts. “We need to get ready
for the game. Get a change of clothes to bring
with you.” She looked down at him
and smiled with her kiss swollen lips. “We both need a bath first. We both sweat like pigs last night.”

“Ok
,
I get the point
, but you can’t say it wasn’t worth the
multiple
grunt
s
.”
She giggled, but didn’t disagree
. “We’ll get a bath first
before we wake up the others.” He
brushed
his wild
hair back with
his
fingers.

“Oh, wait just a minute…” He
turned to see
her jump out of bed, to put on his
old
shirt
that barely remained on in the room when they got back from dinner
.
Connor’s
shirt came almost all the way down to her kneecaps. She went to the dresser and pulled out one of her daggers from their sheath. And she walked to the edge of the bed
. She also had
his large
cloak in her hand for some reason. “Can you please come sit over here for me? I’ll give you a haircut.”

She opened the cloak an
d he
hopped out of bed to slide i
n a pair of boxers
he
wore yesterday;
he
still need
ed
to change them after the bath
so why waste
. He
walked back and sat down on the edge of t
he sheet and cloak. She held a bare
Fang in her right hand and stood in front of
him
.
S
he had to roll
up
the sleeves because the arms
of his
shirt
were too long for her. She lifted a handful of
his sandy
hair up and sliced through it with the razor sharp blade. She sat the handful of hair by
his
side and continued cutting for the next ten minutes.
When she finally made the last cut
she shook her fingers in his
hair to knock off any stragglers. “All done. You look much more handsome now.”

“May I see?” S
he smiled as she walked away to
return the
dagger
in its sheathe
. She opened her drawer and brou
ght out her small hand mirror. Connor
lifted it to look at her
handi
work
. She gave
yet another
great cut. She took off a lot of hair, but left just enough to
still allow him
brush it to the side or
to the
back if
he
so chose. “Wow, you are an artist.”