Preternatural (Worlds & Secrets) (35 page)

“
What? Hey, where did they go?” I asked, looking at the box and the floor, disbelieving that I had already lost these gifts. Mum scoffed and laughed to herself. Meanwhile, Jaden had only two jewels in his case that were the same size as mine. His were a diamond and the other was an obsidian of a deep mystical purple shade. He, too, touched them, causing them to glow and disappear with the same unbearable, five-second pressure imposed on him with remarkable dental agony. We turned and looked at each other. But when we did, we jumped in alarm. Our pointed canines had grown slightly longer – just long enough for the teeniest bit of their tips to show beneath our upper lips. Jaden stared at me plainly.

“
A.J., show me your teeth,” Jaden timidly asked.

I did as he asked carefully
. But to his surprise, my upper canines now had a jewel encrusted into each them. On my left fang was the emerald deeply encrusted and below it the ruby. On the other was the diamond with the sapphire underneath it. Even though they bejewelled my teeth, the precious stones were barely visible. One could only tell that they were there when the light bounced off of them because they glinted and sparkled for that split second. Other than that they were practically invisible. Jaden had the same thing; on his left fang rested the diamond and on the other the obsidian, deeply encrusted in his enamel.

“
Whoa!” we said pointing to each other’s teeth.

“
Those are Adherings. They are immersed into you that if one of them falls out or isn’t removed properly – which is extremely rare to happen – you would be left in a permanent headache that you would never be able to shake off,” mum explained.

“
Well, the headache doesn’t sound that severe,” said Jaden with a light grin.

“
That’s funny, because the headaches tend to kill people in a day,” mum said, followed by a very sarcastic smile. Jaden’s smile vanished and his eyes widened to the size of two large coins. Jaden and I looked at each other from the corners of our eyes at a certain angle suspiciously.

“
I won’t knock yours out if you don’t knock out mine,” Jaden told me undertone.

“De
al,” I quickly replied, followed by a swift handshake.

“
And finally, Liam, could you come here please?” asked Anne. Liam walked over to the adults and knelt. They whispered things to him delicately, leaving the rest of us inquisitive as to what was so important that he had to be told privately. I saw mum’s hand stretch behind her chair as she pulled out a worn out, dented metallic case. Suddenly, she opened it and Anne extracted two objects that brought out an intense desire for me to have in my possession, whilst the adults continued to speak to Liam inaudibly and grimly. When we saw these things, we didn’t know what they were but our mouths dropped. It was like power welded into metal and we bizarrely hungered for them, progressively leaning forward and subconsciously reaching for them until Liam’s eyes darted back at us…at which point we calmed ourselves down and recoiled. They were metal wrist cuffs that seemed to have exquisite arcane symbols engraved into them.

They were etched with marks and runes that seemed close to Celtic patterns but weren’t entirely. They were a dirty shade of grey
, seeming like they were forged from strange iron and – being metallic and quite thick – had a few scratches and dents in them, as if they had already been used. But the mere fact that they looked used and dented made them look all the more antique and desirable to have. Around the top and bottom of the metallic cuffs, were a set of rounded studs in the same strange metal as the objects themselves.

I didn’t
know what these things were, but I also had no idea why the adults felt the need to give them to Liam more privately. By the time he walked back to us, he had them both clamped around his wrists, matching his somewhat muscular stature.

“
These gifts will help you all in more ways than you can imagine, so you should take extremely good care of them,” Anne said.

“
Not that Robbie has a choice to lose his,” I stated, causing everyone to go up in light laughter.

CHAPTER 12.

Flight

Robbie twisted and turned. He grasped his pillow tightly, almost in pain. With a jolt, he woke up moaning and groaning with his hands over his ears. Outside, in the dark night sky, it drizzled softly. Robbie got out of bed and slowly walked to the door. He looked at of us to see if we were all soundly sleeping – which we still were – before slowly opening the door to leave. He came back a second later to get his white woollen turtleneck jumper and slid it on due to the cold, lip-freezing, bipolar weather. He walked down the marble steps gently as his hand slid over the chrome rail.

“
Are you alright?” Jaden’s voice suddenly sounded behind him. Robbie turned and looked at him, startled, mainly due to the fact that he wasn’t expecting anybody else to have woken up at this time.

“
Yeah, don’t worry about it.” He sat himself down on a step and Jaden joined him quietly. An awkward silence was floating between the two.

“
Are you scared?” Robbie suddenly asked Jaden whilst rubbing his hands together. Jaden scoffed as they both stared towards the entrance – which was then a wall.

“
You’d expect me to be. But given all the madness that has gone on in the last couple of weeks, I’ve slowly adapted. Maybe it’s just animal instinct – adapting to survive,” Jaden lightly joked. But the seriousness drifted back into his face. “But it is frightening. That any day near Christmas we’ll be alarmed by Tarmo – and we have to venture off to close the main doors from those who are out to kill us.” Jaden gulped.

“
You have all of us and your mum. We’ll prevent anything from happening to any
of you.” My brother half smiled but Robbie could read the terror in his eyes.

“
Robbie,” his tone changed to that of a curious one, “– are you an
orphan
?” Robbie chuckled delicately.

“
Technically
, that would be the term,” he said simply. A few seconds of awkwardness floated between the pair again.

“What happened to your parents, if you don’t mind me asking?” Jaden had pushed in the
question very carefully.

“To be honest with you…I don’t remember them. In fact, I’m not even sure if I
had
parents. We weren’t adopted by the Wittles or your mum or anything like that – but we were known at the time.”

“
What do you mean
‘at the time’
?” Robbie scrunched his face as he pondered; trying to remember.

“
About…two thousand, six hundred and twenty-eight years ago, I would say? It’s been too long,” Robbie answered unsurely. Jaden fell awestruck and stumped.

“
You’ve been alive for…
how is that
–?
What
?
I mean, I know we live longer once we get to our twenties but you’re just fourteen –”

“
It’s quite complicated – don’t trouble yourself. It’s a
long
story anyhow. Someday I’ll tell you when I remember most of it. Would you like to go outside?” Robbie mumbled through the half-darkened downstairs area.

“
Sure,” Jaden replied, absent-minded. The pair went outside to see the dark and beautiful sky, complete with only a very few stars embedded in the mass of indigo velvet up above. Their bright lights were luminescent and their shimmering reflections dazzled on the faces of the two. The drizzle began to recede and upon their arrival outside, the grass became dry.

The jade-green grass was crisp and dry beneath the canopy of trees planted circularly. The moonlight of both of our moons descended gracefully through the gaps of the broad intertwined leaves like chalky mist and fog.
They went underneath the canopy and sat themselves down.

“
You know, I’ve been thinking: maybe we should tell the adults about the reincarnation doors,” Jaden’s voice spelled out through the darkness. Robbie took a sharp inhalation.

“
You’re really scared, aren’t you? Is it that hard? I understand your position, but we shouldn’t tell the adults just yet.”

The sudden opening of the door
s made the pair jump. But to their surprise, it was only the girls creeping silently in their pyjamas and hoodies towards them. Liam and I came trudging out after, whispering to one another and muffling our laughter and chattering.

“
Hey, guys,” Jade sat herself down. Tammy came out holding a book and immediately rested herself next to Jaden. She opened it and propped it on his lap. I wasn’t sure what he saw but his eyes widened and his mouth dropped.

“
You found it,” he whispered.

“
Found what?” Jojo asked, clueless. Jaden looked towards Tammy and smiled at her – canines showing, Adherings glowing – as she stared back at him with her brightly lit pink eyes fixed on his face in a self-satisfied smile.

“
Quick, light a campfire!” Jaden then urged. I could tell he was excited for this, but I didn’t know what the fuss was about.

I
raised my hands and looked upwards at one of the tallest trees whose thick branches spread out like twisted, crooked vines. My hair became mahogany brown and my eyes turned a leafy green as five logs of wood came tumbling down to the middle of the circular ground. They fell onto each other with no more than soft thuds. I lifted my hands above my head and shook my fingers. Leaves gently glided down onto the pile of logs just as I had commanded – I adored the fact that I was getting better at this stuff. I wasn’t
superb
– but I was getting better.

I pressed my hands against the logs. F
rom the centre of my palm, my hands started to glow a fiery red. They glowed, then dimmed, then glowed again, coming back hotter with redder luminescence. The flames that I could see in my glowing orange veins increased each time they appeared. Finally, a spark twitched on the logs and all-too-quickly, they burst into a blazing and crackling fire, causing embers to glide overhead as the charred wood continued to burn underneath dancing amber flames through the darkness.

“
What is it you found?” Jade asked again. Jaden shook his head, tussling his black and white hair away from his face. Jaden gripped the worn out book and gave Tammy one more bright look with his charmingly warm smile before starting. We looked at him eagerly and with deep interest.

“Hey, zebu, wildebeest…
African wild ass
….anytime would be good,” I crankily said with creased eyes, still not fully open from me recently awakening. Jaden’s eyes brightened to gold. His skin turned rough as ginger fur surfaced halfway whilst his canines lengthened to sabre teeth. He growled at me and his face quickly returned to normal halfway of his transformation. He looked back at the book.

“
It says,” he began, “
some have tried calling it the gates of hell – others, a place of no return. But the actual name given to this place of broodiness where evil and darkness spawn, is the Cavern of Worlds. According to Vernaescian folklore, what was once a historical place of Vernaesce, now bound with darker forms of kinesis, belongs to the Monarchs of Corlévati. It was said that when all was dark and cold in the latter half of the year after the Samhain celebration, they would tear themselves free from their void prison and appear there. But the stone doors of this place were made differently. If to be touched, from the exterior, by a person of mixed blood rather than one whose is set in stone, strength wouldn’t be needed to close the doors and the Barons of Corlévati would be trapped with no possible means of escape. This place was supposed to be in the Shadow realm, in the Lesantil whereabouts, underneath its treacherous waters.
”

It all ended with a sharp gasp.

“Do you realise what this means? They could have torn free and escaped
any
time they wanted during the years that have passed. But why then, haven’t they? Why now?” Jojo asked. We were all befuddled, but she made sense. It was quite unsettling, knowing that they had the power to break whenever they pleased, but instead they chose the year where we had found out about our true heritage.

“
What did it mean
by
‘mixed blood’
and
‘rather than one whose is set in stone’
?” I asked.

“
It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Liam quickly straightened up. We looked at him, ill-informed. He sighed and rolled his eyes impatiently.

“
Don’t you get it?
Mixed blood
– you need to be hybrid. Being set in stone are the abilities you are meant
to be born with; like any of the elements, Shifftocasting or time-morphing.”

“
And what about when it spoke about ‘strength not being needed’?” Jojo added. Liam suddenly slouched again, stumped.

“
Maybe it meant that being a hybrid is all the strength you’d need to close the doors,” Jade responded.

“
But we have no idea where this ‘
Lesantil
’ place is,” Jaden said glumly. At that point, Liam’s eyes perked up as they looked through the flames wildly.

“Spell that,” he instructed Tammy. She did as her brother
commanded and he began writing the letters against the grass, wilting as he passed his static-ridden fingers over it. Liam straightened himself up to get a better view of what he had written.

“Of all the years of research, this is when my geography and history is most useful,” he mumbled to himself.
We looked at each other strangely, lost as to what was snaking through Liam’s mind. His eyes were transfixed on the letters as he looked at them savagely. He began to knock on his temples and slap himself rapidly, as if doing so would enable him to recall what he had forgotten. Jade quickly stood up and moved next to him.

“Come on, come on;
where do I know this?” he pressured himself, electricity writhing all over him and the grass.

“Chill a little bit, buddy; you’re killing all the ants,” Jaden said sorrowfully. At that exact instance, Liam’s eyes shot open with all their electric blue splendour.

“THAT’S IT!” he exclaimed, his loud yell contained within this force-field and preventing the sound from escaping. Jaden seemed to have jumped back from Liam’s outburst.

“
Antilles
! The Sea of the Antilles, Jaden, that’s it! You beastly, backward, brilliant
genius
– I could
kiss you but I’d kill you
!” Liam flared as he stood up in an electric rage of excitement.

“What, what is it?” Tammy then quickly asked.

“The Sea of the Antilles is a group of islands bordered by the Caribbean Sea!” Liam hissed quietly as he sat himself back down to avoid waking the adults.

“But what does that have to do with this place?” Robbie asked.

“Lesantil is an anagram of Antilles. So we know this place is in the whereabouts of the Caribbean Sea in the Shadow realm,” Liam concluded.

“
And we’ve already established that only hybrids can get this door closed, which we are,” I concurred. At that point I knew Jaden and I were thinking the same thing.

“
Why don’t we do it soon then? Get it over and done with,” I spoke out. Tammy looked unsure.

“
It could be risky – maybe we should wait for some time,” Robbie advised.

“
You
do
realise you’re asking for us to wait for them to be free before we close it,” I quietly retaliated. But why shouldn’t I retaliate? Our –
my
– life was on the line. If there was a shot at making sure it wasn’t anymore, why delay?

“
He
does
have a point, Robs,” Tammy said, almost in a whisper.

“
All the same, I agree with Robbie, in a way; let’s at least just wait a few days – maybe not Christmas as the book instructs, but at least just for some time,” said Jade.

“
Just in case more demons are on the road to us,” Liam began “I think it would simply be better to wait.” I didn’t
love
the idea, but it did seem rational to at least just wait for a short while. I knew I would want to take this matter into my own hands.

I hugged my knees and stayed close to the crackling fire. My hair slowly turned red in accordance with my eyes.
Being in my Pyrokinetic state, I didn’t long for such warmth like everybody else.

“
Why don’t we get marshmallows?”               Jojo suggested, breaking the silence that befell us.

“
Yes
,
brilliant idea
!” Jaden and I agreed in unison – we never failed the opportunity to have something to eat at any given time.

“
Be back in a minute,” she disappeared leaving her green sparks trailing behind her. She arrived not a moment later with three, long, sharp metal rods and four very large packs of marshmallows, then sitting down and opening one bag. We toasted them and ate whilst talking about something other than our imminent death, with traces of melted sugar running messily on the sides of some of our mouths; of course one could easily guess who those were, those who had no dignity left when placed before food – it could only be us boys!