Lives of Kings (22 page)

“I guess that's true,” I admitted.

At that moment, Michael groaned.

We hurried over to where he lay on the carpet, all of us peering over him as if he was some kind of feature attraction. Garrison stood with his hands protectively covering his new nose, just in case.

Michael's eyes fluttered, then opened. For an instant, he looked at all of us with nothing but sheer curiosity. Then he must have realized his situation. He sat up suddenly. When his eyes focused on me, he nearly jumped out of his own skin.

“You!” he screamed, backing away from me. He was still sitting, and when his back hit the bed and he had nowhere else to go, true panic set in. His eyes darted wildly for an escape. It was strange to have someone so big scared of me. “Get away from me! You and — and all of you!”

We certainly weren't expecting co-operation after what happened earlier, but this was something else. Before any of us could open our mouths to ask him why he was so frightened, he began yelling again.

“Get away! Leave! Go!”

I was really curious about where he expected me to go.

“Vanish, ghost!”

T
he
bed behind Michael began to shake. I could feel him drawing magic as if the air was gravitating around him. He was about to use it again, and I was too spent to defend myself.

“Wait!” Kian said, anticipating the same thing. “We're here to help you.”

Michael was still staring at me, barely listening to Kian.

“Everybody get out!” Kian yelled. There was such urgency in his voice that no one protested.

Seth, Garrison, and I sprinted out of the room, closing the door behind us and just waiting to hear something smash. I could feel the vibrations from the bed as it bounced on the floor. Only after we left did I realize how stupid it was to leave the only person without magic with Michael.

Surprisingly, though, we could hear nothing breaking, and even the vibrations slowed until they stopped altogether. It seemed everything was calm. Frankly, I was happy for the break. My vision was still hazy, and I felt weak.

It was well over an hour before Kian came out looking tired and worn, like a surgeon exiting the operating room. We all jumped upon seeing him, asking questions about Michael.

“He's adjusting,” Kian said. “I told him the story. Everything this time, along with who I am,” he added. “It seems that he's felt something was off for a while. Since last year, in fact.”

Kian turned to me and gave me a shrewd look. “He thought, probably still thinks, that you're a ghost,” he said. “As much as you've been seeing him, apparently he's been seeing vague reflections of you.”

“How does that even work?” I asked. It was unnerving to think so much in my dreams was reality.

Kian shrugged. “There must be some kind of connection. Or a memory. I just don't know what it is. But you can come in and talk to him now.”

We entered slowly, as if the large teen were a deer that could bolt at any moment. He still sat exactly where we left him, back to the bed, arms hugging his knees. His eyes were wide with shock.

“Did you do that thing to him with the memories?” I quietly asked Kian, meaning the silver screen effect of seeing your hidden life flash before your eyes. He shook his head.

“No magic, remember?”

I kept forgetting.

Seth and Garrison sat slowly in front of Michael, as if he'd run away if they moved too fast. Kian and I joined them, forming a semi-circle in front of him. I doubt this made him feel more at ease, but him bolting from the room was a real concern.

“So,” Michael said finally. “You're like me?”

We nodded. He turned to me.

“And you and I are …?”

I didn't know how to answer that, so a response full of guesses would have to do.

“I think we have some kind of past,” I told him. “I thought I was just dreaming. I had no idea you could actually see me. But when we're … similar … we feel drawn to each other, because we're meant to find one another.” At least that's how I thought it worked.

“When Kian first found me,” I told him, “and I started remembering, it may have triggered you, too. Garrison has known for a while, so has Seth. But Moira only began to experience things when we found her.”

I nearly bit my tongue. The others exchanged awkward glances as we tried to telepathically communicate a response to Michael's obvious next question.

“Who's she? Where is she?” he asked. There was nervousness in his voice that implied to be like us meant to drop like flies from the face of the earth.

“She's like us,” Seth told him. “But she went home.”

“And you're all saving the world?” he asked. If he hadn't said it with such an ominous look on his face, I would have thought he was joking.

“We're trying to,” I said.

I didn't know how much Kian had told him. The hour he spent in here was probably used to keep repeating the same information over and over again, since it was just so hard to believe. But Michael had used magic. He had shown more control than I ever had when Kian first found me.

“Where did you learn to use your magic?” I asked, making sure to keep my voice gentle.

“I … nowhere,” Michael said. “It's just there when I need it. Somehow, things work out.”

Lucky.

“Like when you fell from the cliff?” I asked.

His eyes widened. “You were there, too?” he asked. “Yeah, that was the first time. I was stupid. Should have tied my lines better, but I got lazy. I fell, and things just worked out.”

He was obviously gifted and strong. Now, how to tell him that without freaking him out? We could certainly use his help.

Michael took a deep breath. “What happens now?”

We all exchanged glances.

“Now, if you'd like to join us, you'll go home and make something up,” Seth said. “Tell your family you'll be back, that you'll be okay, and I can come with you to make it more convincing.”

“How will you make it more convincing?” Michael asked. When Seth only smiled, his brows furrowed. “Oh, right.”

After fielding several more questions about the logistics of our travels, Michael slowly got up and we followed him. We had agreed to take him to his small house outside the city centre, where he and Seth would talk his parents into letting him leave.

It wasn't easy. With every step Michael made, I could sense he wasn't sure whether to move forward or turn around. But as with all of us, learning the truth about himself pushed him to join us.

When we drove to his neighbourhood and parked in front of a blue bungalow, Michael didn't even reach for the door handle. He just sat, hunched over, packed into a car full of strangers. I didn't blame him for being unsure. It didn't even sound like a good deal to me anymore, especially after what happened with Moira.

Eventually, at Seth's prompt, he opened the door and walked to the house. I thought I would calm down when they entered, but instead losing sight of them just made me worry even more.

“Calm down,” Kian told me, placing a hand on my shoulder. I felt the tension ease under his touch.

“Can you believe you were haunting this guy?” Garrison chuckled.

The tension came back in an instant.

“I obviously didn't mean to,” I retorted.

“But you're sure you've never seen him before in the past?”

I thought about it. “I have seen him. I remember him from our memories of invading the Godelan, from being in front of the king, and things like that. Where we all were,” I said. As a man, he had been as hulking and imposing a figure as he was now. “He was always near, and I guess I remember seeing his face more often than others I didn't recognize.” It could have been only perspective, though. I didn't remember anything specific about him.

The amount I still didn't know about the past bothered me and made me think that I would never know the whole story. Perhaps it was for the best. Maybe I wasn't meant to live with two full lives in my head. Or maybe I'd never be as powerful since I chose to keep this life. Unlike Moira. Was she more powerful than us now?

Kian took my hand as I thought. I often wondered if he heard my thoughts, since he seemed to anticipate my need for moral support. His timing was impeccable.

“You know what I'm thinking?” I asked quietly.

He smiled at me. “I know your worried face.”

We sat for another half hour in silence. Finally, Seth and Michael came out of the house. Michael wore a huge, stuffed backpack that loomed over his head. I'd never seen a pack so big, and yet he carried it on his shoulders as if it weighed nothing. He struggled to get it into the trunk and then climbed in, folding over so that he'd fit in the tiny car.

“If I'm going to be travelling with you guys,” he said as he finally managed to shut the door, “can I request more size-appropriate transportation in the future?”

“You got it,” Garrison replied immediately. He was glued to the door on the other size and didn't look very comfortable himself.

“How did it go?” I asked.

Michael tried to shrug in the small space. “I was going to move out anyway this fall to go to school,” he said. “This is a little different. But if the problem's as bad as the guy up front said it was, I'd rather use my … ability … for some good.”

He had forgotten Kian's name. I wondered how much had stuck, given the amount of information and shock he had absorbed in the last few hours.

“To be honest,” Michael continued, chattier now as the situation washed over him, “ever since that fall I took while climbing, I was expecting aliens or something to come get me. You guys are a relief. Sorry about your nose, mate,” he said to Garrison. “I felt something around the corner that just made my guts want to fly away.”

“It's okay,” Garrison said, feeling his nose.

After the original panic subsided, Michael seemed determined. It was both good and bad. Good, because he needed that determination. A lot had happened since I myself was panicked upon seeing Kian in the rain. It was also bad because the rest of us were all exhausted. We only made it back to the hotel as the sun was setting, and Michael wouldn't stop talking.

Questions would often punctuate his stories of his childhood and tales of all of his extracurricular activities. After missing a second question in a row directed at me, I finally had to interrupt him and tell him I was too tired after healing Garrison. Which led to a series of other questions. Michael eventually caught on that our attention was waning when we sat in the hotel room he'd share with Kian and kept eyeing the doors.

“I'm talking too much, aren't I?”

We all rushed to say no. Even though the answer was yes.

“I've just always felt a bit different,” Michael confessed. “It's nice to have people that are in the same situation. Feeling the same way.”

“Of course,” Seth said. “We'll feel even more the same way, though, after we've had a little sleep.”

That night, I didn't even bother finding pajamas as I got under the covers of my bed. Sleep wouldn't last long, however. I woke up only an hour later to snores that seemed like they were shaking the hotel.

I couldn't believe how loud Michael was. I was left staring at the hotel room ceiling, vowing to buy earplugs the next day, though I knew they could not stand up to his volume.

After a half hour or so, I heard a small knock on the door connecting my room to Kian and Michael's. I opened it to find Kian, dishevelled and clutching a pillow.

“Can I sleep here tonight?” he said.

Training with Michael was far more exhausting than with Kian. Every day, we drove out in the cramped car to a section of a large park that turned into a forest. Michael led us on an hour-long hike to a place where he had never seen another soul, and we practised our magic. Archery. Grappling. Sword-fighting. It was all a blur.

Of course, none of these defences could ever be used against the Godelan, but it kept us on our toes, and Kian was right — the repetition that linked us so strongly to the activities of our past lives did bring up random memories, and thus increased our magic.

At least it was cooler in the forest than in the scorching sun everywhere else. We had been in Australia for over two weeks and I had barely seen a cloud. While that would usually be a good thing, signs of drought were everywhere.

As I immersed myself in the exhausting activities of my past, I received for the first time glimpses into my younger years. My parents. Horses. I even began to see Garrison, Seth, Moira, and the others as teenagers, much like we were now. Michael was ever-present in my earlier memories, and my theory of us being related somehow was reinforced by the fact that it appeared I had known him a long time.

Michael was very strong, and his magic leaned in the direction of Garrison's and mine, versus the more mind-oriented like Seth and Moira's. Even Garrison had to take timeouts from the training, struggling and out of breath. Michael relished the idea of moving trees and boulders, as if he had craved this power his whole life and simply hadn't known.

During our exercises, between dodging Garrison and Michael's physical magic, Seth also took time to teach me how to protect myself against a mental attack like Moira's. He emphasized over and over that he had no idea what he was doing — but he would explain to me how he got into my mind and ways that I could force him out.

The forest was full of distractions. Upon Seth's first attempts to get into my head, he was so delicate and careful that I could barely feel anything. He increased the magic he was forcing on me incrementally, until I began to feel like I had with Moira. He commented on how much power he needed just to replicate what she had done on a daily basis for weeks.

“That must really be a strong suit of hers,” he commented.

“Great.”

I had so far been wholly unable to push him out.

Nearby, an old trunk crashed to the ground as Michael turned to us, his eyes lit up as if he couldn't believe what he had done. His expression was quite goofy and childlike, especially on such a large man. I smiled in return. At least he was having fun with it.