I already knew, but I needed him to confirm it to make it true. I held my breath and stared at him. The words couldn’t come out. Kye saw that much.
“I am your son. Logan is my father,” Kye finally replied, still watching me with his purple eyes. He was waiting for me to react.
“You’re my…” I couldn’t say it. It was too improbable. I was looking at the face of a grown man who technically was just as old as I was. How could he be my son? I had no children, and there were no plans in the immediate future, yet here I was looking at the face of the child I had yet to conceive. It was too surreal. How was it even possible? I wanted him to say he was joking, but he wouldn’t. He wasn’t lying. I felt it. He was family. I just didn’t expect him to be my son. I hadn’t even considered having children yet. That was for a time long away from now. I was just a college student in her freshman year. This was meant to be a year of exploring, not of life-changing events such as children. This was too much. I felt my legs giving out before I could even think another thought.
Kye’s arm snaked around me as my world blackened. The warm tingles followed his touch. It was just too much to understand. My head was on overload and shutting down.
Water trickled near my head. It wasn’t the sound of the river, but it was still water. I was comfy and felt like I was lying on a pillow in the sun, just like a cat. I could smell flowers that fragranced the air around me. It was nice. It was refreshing to be comfortable, but soon reality set back in. I remembered what I was thinking before I passed out. I wasn’t just taking a nap. I needed to open my eyes and find out where I was now. Slowly I opened my eyes and decided right away to shut them again. I wasn’t in direct sunlight, but it was surely mid-day. Water continued to run nearby, and I had no clue where I was. That was motivation enough to get my eyes open. I cracked them a little at a time as I adjusted to the bright day. Even the shade I was lying in was bright. Thoughts raced through my mind, but I concentrated on the bright sun instead.
“I’ve been wanting to tell you all along, but Logan forbid me. He said it would be too much for you to handle,” Kye said from beneath me. He was the cozy pillow beneath my head. “Was it too much?”
Kye’s voice was laced with concern. I felt bad for making him worry. I was fine, just shocked.
I sat up slowly and tried to ignore the throbbing in my head. It was a bit much to grasp, but it made more sense now that I had time to think a bit. From the moment I met Kye, there was some sort of connection. I wondered how no one else saw it, either.
Now that I looked at him, he was physically a blend of Logan and me. With his deep red hair that matched my mother’s more than mine, and his purple eyes, it was easy to see him now. He looked very much identical to Logan in height and facial structure and maybe that was enough for everyone to overlook his similarities to me. I doubt that if anyone else—for even a second—had thought Kye was who he was, they would have gone along with his plans. Kye wasn’t betraying his brother, but his own father.
“This isn’t a set-up, is it?” I asked cautiously. I trusted Kye. I didn’t trust Logan.
“No. I’m not setting you up. I really want you to end up with Seti, not Logan.”
Kye leaned back into the sun comfortably now that I was off his lap. He looked relaxed, but his voice said otherwise.
“But Logan is your father, right?” I asked.
I now understood why Kye was worried. Because just being alive meant that I would end up back with Logan at some point. The part was that I didn’t understand why Kye was taking a side against Logan. Logan was his own father after all. And I didn’t know anyone that wanted to disappear. Kye wasn’t just going to die if we changed fate. He was going to have never existed at all. I was confused.
“Father? Sure, by blood, but that’s where it stops. Trust me. He’s never been anything more than a sperm donor in my opinion. That man was never a father in any capacity to me. He couldn’t win father of the year if he tried,” Kye replied bitterly.
There was much behind his venom, and I wanted to know more but was unsure of how to ask. Did Kye hate me, too?
I stood up cautiously, and Kye quickly moved to help me stand. Concern laced his face. All of the anger he had when he talked about Logan was gone. I waved off his help and took the couple steps to the ledge in front of me. I sat down across from Kye and looked into the pool at my side. I hoped he didn’t have any more shocking news, as I would end up wet this time. I dragged my hand in the water a little and felt the refreshing touch of cool in the hot air. Big, yellow fish swam lazily around.
I had a son. That was still hard to grasp. And he was pretty cool. I mean, I was friends with my son. That was even stranger. Logan and I created a guy as nice as Kye. It sounded improbable, but it wasn’t. He was sitting only feet away from me.
“Are you feeling okay?” Kye asked still completely worried about me.
“Yeah, just a little dizzy, and this sun is a bit much,” I added, shading my eyes. “Not used to this sun. I’m pretty sure it was winter when we left home the last time.”
Kye smiled, but it was still strained.
“I’m sorry,” he began, but I cut him off.
“Did you like me or hate me like you do Logan?” I wanted to think he liked me, but I wasn’t sure about much now. He wasn’t who I thought he was, and I couldn’t help but question everything he had told me thus far.
“Do you think I’d be here if I hated you?” Kye replied, now his smile was genuine. “I’ve always loved you. You were the only reason I kept going all these years. You didn’t deserve what Logan did to you. I had to save you.”
That helped a bit. I don’t know why, but I didn’t want to be hated by Kye, especially after finding out he was my son. We lapsed into silence. I had many questions but didn’t know where to start. How long did we have before Logan ended up getting me? Was I happy with Logan, or just a prisoner? Would Logan find a way to use the stones in my arms? What was Kye like as a child? Was he a good baby or a colicky one like one of my friends’ little sister? Did he have a best friend? What did he like to play with? Where did he go to school? What was our life like? Here I was his mother and yet I knew nothing about him. To be fair, he hadn’t been conceived yet, but it was strange. Kye had tons of memories, but I had none.
Kye looked around us as I thought through everything. He was letting me have my time. I took a moment to really look at him. Physically Kye was my age, somewhere in his late teens or early twenties. He was larger than Logan by a little bit and certainly more muscular from his years serving in the military. When we were dating, Logan used to joke that I’d have to marry him some day, as we would make really beautiful babies. Guess it wasn’t a joke. Maybe he knew already that we would. Kye was quite handsome, and the added muscle didn’t hurt his appearance either. Why did Logan send his own son to live with the military while he lived as a prince? It was very confusing. I never really understood Logan as it was, but as a father he was even stranger.
“Why are you going against Logan?” I asked finally.
“Have you met him?” Kye asked rhetorically. I didn’t answer. Kye sighed and toned down his anger. “I’ve spent my whole life wishing you got to choose your parents. I would have never chosen Logan, even as a baby.”
“Would you still have chosen me?” I asked.
I didn’t know why, but I needed the reassurance. I had spent the last few months getting to know Kye. I actually liked him. He was a wonderful man and had easily filled the spot of best friend when my world changed, and Logan kept my friends away.
“I’ll always choose you as my mother, but Logan is never on my list as a father. I’d rather not have been born at all than to have him as a father,” Kye replied. His plan made a bit more sense now.
“And when you disappear, how do you expect that will make me feel?” I asked. Had he considered that if his plan worked, I would have been left in Egypt alone with family I had never met.
“It’s nice to hear I’ll be missed.” Kye stood up
and walked over to sit next to me. “I can live with the fact of never being born if I can save you from the fate Logan has planned for you. Since I was a small child, all I ever wanted to do was protect you. Logan wasn’t just a terrible father; he was just as terrible at being a husband. You were never happy with him for even one moment. You aren’t meant to end up with him. I’ve seen how it’s really meant to be. I need to make that future for you. I need you to be with Seti and be happy. I can’t stand to see you suffer more at the hands of Logan. Even if it means I will disappear, I can live with that if I know you’ll get the ending you were meant to have. No one should ever have to live the life you will live if we don’t fix this.”
I shivered a little. I was even more curious now about what Kye’s childhood was like, but his determination to change it made me not want to ask for details. It sounded like it would be too painful to talk about, and maybe too painful for me to know what my fate would be if we didn’t stop Logan. Maybe I would another time, but I had heard enough. My future with Logan was one that I wanted to avoid at all costs. I was a bit happy the goddess had given me more stones. Hopefully, that would be enough to keep me out of trouble.
Kye threw an arm up and over my shoulder. He let out a loud sigh.
“It’s nice to finally tell you.” He gave me a squeeze. The familiar warmth of family ran from him to me. “Even if I disappear at the end of all this, it was still the best few months of my life.”
What had his life been like?
Looping my arm underneath and behind him, I squeezed him back. He was the only reason I was still going on and fighting back. Without him, I would have been stuck with Logan. I was just as happy to have him as he was to have me.
“I don’t know if I can grasp the son thing, you’re a bit too old for me to do that, but I will say you’ve been the best friend I’ve had since Logan found me to fake save me. I wish I had your memories of being a family. I wish I could remember you more as a child and everything that went on in our lives.”
Kye pulled me tighter, squishing my head to his shoulder. I couldn’t see his face, and I wondered if that was the reason he was still hugging me.
“When I was a child I lived with you until I was five. After Logan found out that your happiness was me, he took me away, trying to make you dependent on him. After that, I got to see you twice a year for a couple days. That was it. I grew up missing you and knowing that it was my father that kept me from you. We never were a family.” I was held too tight to look at his face, but I felt the lone tear drop on my head. “You taught me everything you knew about time travel. You knew that if I didn’t save you one day, no one could. I wish I could have saved you sooner and gotten rid of Logan. If he wasn’t around you would have never had to go through any of this.”
Kye sounded defeated. I was surprised. He had saved me.
“Could you have really done anything different?” I asked as he released me, and I could look up at him to read his face as he talked. “You were just a kid.”
Kye shrugged. “I should have been able to. Kid or not, I was the only one that could help you, and I never did. I was too afraid he’d find out.”
“He thought you’d change the past?” I asked. If that was true, why did Logan ever leave Kye alone with me?
“Because I took a vow to obey our bloodline,” Kye replied. “In order to not bounce around time periods and never age, I promised Logan that if he left me in one time period until I wanted to leave, then I would do everything that was needed for my family.”
“As in, he planned for you to help him?” I asked. Kye had seemed conflicted since the first day I met him.
Kye shrugged. “I couldn’t go against him until you asked me to. See, you are my bloodline also. Logan did his best to always forget that. He always saw you as just a trophy and never a person. I wish I could have acted sooner, but it was the best I could come up with.”
“You were just a child,” I replied. He’d been thirteen when he came to the past to live. That wasn’t old enough to be rescuing people.
“I may have been young, but every year that passed that I didn’t help, it was my fault you had to live through the pain of being with Logan. I wish I could have gone back and stopped it all at the beginning. All the times he’s messed with your life should have never happened.”
“Wait.” I looked up at Kye. He had told me that Logan had rearranged my past eight times. I was curious what my life was like in those times.
“You know how you only remember things after you can time travel?” Kye asked.
I nodded. I understood that part.
“You don’t remember those other lives at all.” Kye was saying what I already knew.
No, I didn’t.
“But they were all the same ending. You ended up with Seti. You had a family and were happy. I wasn’t part of it. That’s how it’s supposed to end. That’s how we have to make it end. I promise you that I will spend my life making this right. You have a destiny that Logan can’t change and shouldn’t change. When he takes away your future, he doesn’t just mess with you and your life. He messed up history. You don’t want to see the future he made, and we will need to figure out how to change it back to the real future you are destined to live.”
Kye was so serious that all I could do was stare into his violet eyes. I wanted more than anything to know about the past he had and remembered, but I could see how much pain was behind it. Kye didn’t have a happy childhood. Logan wasn’t a good father. There was so much bad he remembered, but there was one good thing. He loved me. I couldn’t have been that bad of a mother if he was determined that he was trying to change the past and erase his future. Or maybe my future with Logan was worse than I could image. Either way, we had a lot to worry about. Kye was back to staring at the sky like Logan might just pop right into view.
“And I suppose you aren’t going to tell me what that future is,” I teased, trying to lighten the mood. Kye turned and looked at me. He grinned and understood that things were getting too serious for the moment.
“Nah, why would I do that? Where would the fun be if you knew how it was supposed to end?” Kye was teasing me right back. He understood. I needed that. We both did.
My father returned only briefly before leaving us to wait again. He was a busy man and didn’t exactly have time for me to ask the hundreds of questions I had. It was hard to just sit around without knowing what to do. What was Logan planning? How come Kye was still here? Something had to be in the works. Something had to change. Everything we had planned was working, but Kye was still proof that Logan would get his way. Seth had already made it to the edge of the city, and we had less than an hour until I would see him again, yet somehow Logan was still going to win. I hated the feeling of defeat but hated it worse when it felt like we were so close to the end.
With each passing minute, Kye grew more worried. His memories were slowly changing, and Logan must have done something again. Logan had erased everything Kye remembered back to the first time Logan took him officially time traveling. Kye, luckily, had been time traveling since he was a little kid and at a much younger age than Logan ever knew, so he kept memories that Logan thought he was erasing. Nonetheless, it made Kye worry more. Logan didn’t want Kye to know anything or be able to help me. We would be completely unprepared for anything Logan might do without Kye’s knowledge.
When my father returned, I could already tell that Seth was nearby. I could feel the tingles I felt around him, along with the warm fuzzies that meant my mother was with him. My family and friends had returned.
“If you stay in the shadows, no one will question you,” my father was explaining to Kye.
I had a feeling, by how my father looked at Kye, that he knew exactly who Kye was, but he was discreet in not saying anything.
Kye nodded to my father. I looked at the man I had only met the day before. He was wearing a small white shendyt like Seth wore in the past, but something made it seem less military and more ceremonia
l-like. There were gold bands around my father’s upper arms and wrists. I already knew by his home that he was wealthy, but I had to wonder if it was from the military. Were military leaders wealthy? And, for that matter, why wasn’t he with Seth’s father. Weren’t they co-leaders of the military? I had many questions and no time to ask.
“I have to say a prayer to the gods for Paramessu to return and the bounty he brings back. After that, we can find a place for us all to meet alone. Don’t let her out of your sight,” my father warned Kye. “I may be able to stop Logan from time traveling into my country, but that doesn’t stop him from physically sneaking across the borders.”
Kye nodded. I really wanted to know more. How did my father stop time travelers in his country? What did that even mean? Was my father actually a god like the Goddess? I didn’t know what he was or what his job was. I had way more questions than answers. He didn’t seem like he was still in the military, and since he was about to say prayers made it seem more like he was a priest of some sort now. Would he be in the position to marry my mother? I sure hoped they knew what they were doing by bringing my mother to Egypt. The last thing I wanted was to deal with her having to marry the pharaoh instead of my father.
My father stopped by the doorway. He gave me one last look before nodding to Kye. We were to follow him. Kye motioned for me to join him at the doorway. My father was further down the hallway and surrounded by guards. Two men marched in front of him, and two were behind him. It did strike me as odd for a military leader to need guards, but then again, if my father held the power to help keep his country safe from people like Logan, I would want him to be protected at all times also. I never imagined I was the child of a priest, but I never imagined meeting a goddess and being given the power to travel through time, either. Life just kept throwing me surprises.
Once Kye was sure my father was far enough ahead of us, he took my arm and guided me with him through the shadows. We weren’t exactly behind my father as we followed him, but even with all our jumping between shadows, we kept up with him. As my father rounded the bend in front of us, I could feel the pull of Seth even more. I paused mid-step at the tingles.
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