Never Let You Fall (The Prophecy of Tyalbrook)

by Michele G Miller

  “I know I’m safe!” I shot back at him as I sat up. “Damn it! I want to remember my family, Xander! I loved him. The boy in my dreams, we were racing and then we came upon the house and he…”

  I frowned as the memories came back. There was something very familiar about the way he had abruptly stopped and listened at my house. I tried to figure out how he had seemed to know that something bad was happening. Even before we could see it.

  “Xander, did I have a brother?” I asked him clearly, knowing he would tell me.

  “No, Skye, you didn’t have a brother. You’re tired – why don’t you lay down and rest, and we can talk about this in the morning.”

  “I don’t want to rest! Why am I having these dreams all of a sudden? Ever since you came into my life, I keep dreaming of my parents’ death.”

  Why is that? I thought to myself, as I scooted back and leaned against the cushioned headboard. Why were my dreams so vivid all of a sudden? I closed my eyes in an attempt to recall every moment before it flitted away again.

  “Oh,” I breathed aloud, as a vision floated behind my eyelids.

  In my remembered dream, I saw one of the Semvon running out of the house with someone chasing him. Rioden! It was Rioden chasing him out. That would explain the metal sound I’d heard; it was his sword.

  What happened to the boy?

  I glanced over at Xander as he sat on the edge of the bed; his face a mask of worry - or something else. He looked scared - or maybe confused? He was grappling with something big, I could sense it. What had him so bothered? His blue eyes searched my face and I stared wordlessly at him.

  Blue Eyes.

  Blue eyes! The boy in my dreams! With my eyes closed, I pictured his face in the light of the flames and saw his bright blue eyes. Looking at Xander again, I reached out my hand and then lowered it, as I realized that those were the same blue eyes.

  “It was you?” I asked; an accusatory tone to my voice.

  I could see the realization when it swept over his face. The realization that he could no longer keep me in the dark. He didn’t answer me, though. Instead, he just nodded his head once, a look of pain crossing his beautiful face.

  “How? Why didn’t you tell me? I mean…” I stammered as the memory of his kisses and promises filled me again.

  “Oh my God, the kiss…please tell me we aren’t related, Xander!” I pleaded.

  “Oh God! No, Skye - we’re not. But it’s complicated…”

  “Well of course it is! Everything is complicated here, isn’t it?”

  Pissed now, I flung the covers to the floor angrily and scrambled off the bed.

  He was there? Xander was there?

  Ten years ago, he had been with me. He’d me to safety while he ran into a burning house. He had been a mere child himself, yet he had shown so much bravery. I spun around and faced him across the room.

  “You told me earlier that you had loved me forever,” I said accusingly. “I thought those were just words, Xander. But they weren’t, were they?”

  “No.” His stance was wary, but his face was dejected.

  “God, I’m so confused! If I came over with my parents when I was two, then how? When did we meet? How did you get here?”

  “I came over when you did.”

  “What?! Why didn’t you tell me that? Why did you come too?”

  “It’s…”

  “Complicated?” I finished for him sarcastically. “I get that, but it’s time we un-complicate things, Xander. NOW.”

  “I know, Skye.” His face pleaded with me as he came closer. “I’m sorry that I’ve had to keep you in the dark. There are things going on here that have never been said, and they can’t be taken back once they are. Things that will change everything.”

  “No more secrets, Xander! I want to know it all.”

  “Can we just wait for Selene? I have a feeling that she’s going to have information that even I don’t.”

  “No. If you truly love me like you say you do, then you’ll tell me about my - our - past.” I emphasized ‘our’ because it was more and more obvious that we had a shared connection.

  I really hated the way I was being so hard on him, but I genuinely felt that it was time for the lies to stop.

  “Okay,” he sighed, and ran his hand through his hair. He sat back in the chair by the fire and leaned his elbows on his knees.

  “I guess I should start with my parents. They were your parents’ Guardians, and also their best friends,” Xander started, his face becoming sad. “From what I’ve been told by Ri, Guardians marrying each other is rare, because of their duty.”

  “What is their ‘duty’? I don’t think you’ve really explained the Guardians to me.”

  “Guardians come from a specific bloodline. Well, several bloodlines, but basically they are born to guard and protect those they are assigned to. They are typically set to guard royalty, but are sometimes assigned to other important wealthy land owners, or sometimes even the families expected to marry into that family.”

  “So basically you’re a bodyguard, right?” I asked, in an effort to simplify things for him.

  “Well, yes. Except that not just anyone can be a Guardian. And we don’t just guard anyone who asks us. We have always been tied to royalty. Oh - and there are certain, I guess you could say magical, elements to us that make us perfect for the job.”

  “Magical elements? You mean, like the whole thing where I can feel you when you’re near?”

  Xander smiled at me when I brought that up, and continued on. “Actually that’s a rather special, um talent. I was talking about our heightened senses. We are born with sharper sight and elevated hearing, in addition to the tracking reflexes we have.”

  “Tracking reflexes? Like a bloodhound?” I teased, just to see him smile again. He leaned back in his chair and flung a pillow at me lightly as he laughed at my joke.

  “No, Skye. The fact that we can feel demons, and sense them when they’re near. I don’t really know how it works, or even where we got it from.”

  “Okay, so that’s Guardian 101, right?”

  “Yep, that’s it in a nutshell. There’s so much that even I don’t know, since I wasn’t really schooled or trained properly. But Ri did as good a job as he could at getting me up to speed.”

  I couldn’t disagree with him there. Xander’s reflexes and senses had saved me countless times in the last three days alone, and apparently even when I was eight.

  “So your parents were both Guardians?”

  “Yes. They grew up in the same village as your mother, and had known her all her life. The three of them were inseparable. It was that friendship that brought your mother into the path of the new King, your dad.”

  Ready to hear this story, I crossed the room and sat down cross-legged on the end of the bed. The fire crackled across from me, but it was just embers and small occasional flames now.

  “Go on.”

  “Well, from what I was told, my parents had been assigned to the castle as extra Guards after their training. For some reason, your mother went to the castle to see them and while there, your dad happened upon them. He apparently fell for your mom on sight.”

  “You told me that my mom had been betrothed to someone else before she married my father.”

  “Yes. But I have no idea who it was, or when. I don’t know what happened; I just know the happy story. Your mother, while visiting mine at Castle Montibello, met your father and they fell in love. Your dad had just been crowned King a few weeks earlier, because his own father fell ill and could no longer rule. He was young; they all were.”

  Xander continued, “I think my parents and your mom were twenty three or so at the time, and your dad was just a few years older. My parents had only been at the castle for a year. I was told that when your parents married, your father let your mother choose my parents as her personal Guardians, because she said she felt safest with her childhood friends.”

  “So when did your parents marry?”


  “Not long after yours. Your mother was able to convince your father that it should be allowed. He agreed, because he had become so fond of them as well.”

  “Why would that not be allowed?” I asked naively. “I mean, two Guardians marrying?” I asked, trying to understand how everything worked in Tyalbrook.

  “Well, many Guardians don’t marry because their job just keeps them so busy. It’s hard to have a family when you’re always away, protecting someone else’s. My parents were even more rare, because they guarded the same person. The worry was that if a crisis arose, they would be more concerned with saving each other instead of your mother.”

  “However, their long relationship with your mom proved to be an asset. No one could argue the depth of their love for her, or the importance she held in their lives. When I was born, your parents were named my godparents; solidifying their relationship even more.”

  “I still can’t believe that my parents were royalty…and that I’m supposed to be a princess!” I laughed lightly. A vision suddenly popped into my head of me sitting on top of some flowery float, waving and smiling.

  “You are a princess, Skye,” Xander reminded me gently.

  I shook my head and stretched my legs on the floor. I didn’t feel like discussing my supposed bloodline right then, so I told Xander to continue the story.

  “Well, I told you before that I really don’t know a lot of this stuff. You have to remember that I was only four when we came here. I don’t recall much.” He shifted in his chair and hesitated.

  “Xander, can you at least tell me about how you came to be here with me and my parents? I know that you know that much, at least. When did your parents die?”

  “Fine. I came here with you and we lived in the same house. We were raised as brother and sister to the outside world, but I knew that we weren’t. It kept us safer to pretend.”

  “What? So your parents died in Tyalbrook, and my parents brought you with us when they fled?”

  “No, Skye – my parents died ten years ago.” He sighed heavily and cradled his head with his hands.

  “Oh, Xander! I’m so sorry.” I crawled over to him and pulled myself into a crouching position; shifting myself in between his knees, and placing my hands on his arms.

  “It’s not that I don’t have sympathy for you or your parents. It’s just - I’m trying hard to understand it all.”

  I knew that I must have sounded cold-hearted. Here I was drilling him about my past, without a shred of thought about how he must have felt.

  “I know,” he whispered, and lifted his face from his hands. His fingers were balled into fists. The very dim glow of the fireplace was the only light in the room, and it threw his face into shadows.

  “I haven’t told you everything, Skye. I don’t want you to hate me when I’m done.”

  I slid his hands into mine, squeezed his fingers tightly and narrowed my eyes on his.

  “I won’t hate you, Xander. I couldn’t,” I whispered, my voice barely audible.

  “When we - you and I, that is - came through the portal, we didn’t come with your parents,” he confessed, as his blue eyes burned into mine. “We came here with mine.”

  Xander must have clearly seen the complete look of confusion on my face, because he actually leaned forward onto his knees in front of me. The chair he had been sitting in made a scraping noise as he pushed it back.

  “Skye, it was my parents who raised you. My parents that died in that house ten years ago.”

  It wasn’t my parents who had died? Were they still out there looking for me? Hope swelled in my chest at this thought.

  But then a low moan escaped my throat, as the enormity of what he’d said hit me. His parents were dead…because of me. Me! How could he still care for me?

  “No!” I gasped, and tried to pull away.

  “Skye, stop – it wasn’t your fault!” Xander insisted, as he pulled me closer to him. He was so intuitive when it came to me. He knew what I was thinking, sometimes even before I did.

  “They died protecting us. It was their job.”

  “So that makes it better?! Hell, Xander! How can you even stand me?” I spat; yanking away as I scrambled to my feet.

  “I’m the cause of a war in your home country, the cause of you, your parents, even your uncle being forced to leave that country to live in a foreign world, and then the cause…” I stumbled, not wanting to put into words the actions I was indirectly responsible for. “…the cause of their deaths.”

  How was I supposed to deal with this? I turned my back so that I was no longer facing him, and tried to come to terms with what I had learned. Xander started to step forward, and I heard the floor board creak as he moved. I quickly held my hand up to stop him.

  “Don’t! Please just don’t come any closer at the moment. I need to deal with this.”

  His parents were killed because of me. He was here because of me. How did I…how did I get here with his family? What had happened to mine?

  “Why did my parents send me with your family?” I finally asked, still not able to face him.

  “They wanted to protect you. They knew that my parents would give their lives for you, so they sent you away with them. I believe they thought that by the time the enemies figured out you were missing, and without knowing who you might have left with, they wouldn't know how to find you.”

  I wanted more. What little explanation I’d heard made a kind of murky sense in my heart, but I needed more. I could tell that it was still dark outside, judging by the lack of light in the room. In a few hours Selene would be able to fill us in. I just prayed that she would know what Xander didn’t.

  I didn’t have the energy or desire to get mad at him or continue to drill him. He’d already lost his parents over me, and I couldn’t act like it didn’t matter and that only my questions were important. I felt tears start to roll down my face as I turned back towards Xander.

  He was so…amazing…as he stood there in front of the fire and waited for me to address him. He was gorgeous, brave, and a steadfast protector. He was my Guardian and my brother of sorts.

  Brother? He’d said that he knew growing up that we weren't related, but I speculated about just how brotherly his feelings were towards me. I couldn't help but wonder if he’d been confusing his sense of duty and brotherly affection towards me for something more.

  “Skye?” He held out a hand as he stepped towards me. He always tried to make sure that I knew he was there for me.

  “I’m so tired, Xander. I’m scared, and confused, and… Just. So. Tired.”

  “I know. I promise - I have no other secrets to keep. You need to understand that I’ve been living with that information all my life. It was important to your safety that you never find out that they weren’t your real parents.” His eyes pleaded with mine. He was asking for my forgiveness, when it was me who should be begging for it from him.

  “I wanted to let you know ages ago, and especially when you started to ask about them. I wanted you to know who had really raised you, but I just couldn’t tell you.”

  “It’s alright. I understand. Can we just go to bed?”

  He nodded his head yes, but the sad look on his face lingered as he moved to place another log on the fire.

  “Yeah, get back in bed. I’ll get this built back up.”

  Nodding numbly, I crawled back onto the large bed and placed my head on the pillow; closing my eyes. I tried to think of any memories I had of his parents. About the people I had known as my own parents. Nothing.

  I listened as the sparks flared when the heavy log hit the burnt embers of the earlier fire, and then I heard the scrape of the chair again. I opened my eyes and leaned up on my elbows, spotting Xander across the room. He had settled back onto the stuffed chair again.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’ll just stay here by the fire. You know, keep watch.”

  I slumped back down and tried to block out the questions that were running around in my
head. My mom and dad had sent me to another dimension to hide out with their best friends. Why hadn’t they just come with me? Realizing that Xander didn’t have the answers, I attempted to give up the endless circle of thoughts as far as they were concerned.

  I decided to place my hopes in Selene. Hopefully she would be able to provide more details around my parents and why I came here in the first place.

  However, there were a few things that Selene wouldn’t be able to answer for me. Those were the ones I found myself obsessing about, once I’d put my parents out of my mind.

  Keeping my eyes closed and my head turned to the shadows, I found the courage to ask Xander what was on my mind.