Fledgling

by Tabatha Palomo

  Chapter Nine

  “Hey,” Kai had to grab Austin’s arm to get her attention, and she winced, “Glad to see that you made it.”

  Austin grabbed her uninjured shoulder and glared at him. He smiled back, although his face and tone were icy, the complete opposite of her fiery temper.

  “Fire dragons don’t die as easily as your kind,” Aiden said, staring at Kai with a thin smile, “But Kai, I have to work something out with my brother, so I’ll just have to trust that you can watch Austin for me.”

  Kai gritted his teeth and started forwards, but then restrained himself. He sighed, “Yes, sir.”

  Without another word or gesture, Aiden left. He didn’t disappear into the crowd as the others were able to do. The people gave him a wide berth as he walked, much as they had done a few minutes before. They watched him leave.

  “For just a second in the human world, he was bearable to be around,” Kai sighed, staring at Aiden’s back.

  Austin looked at Kai, her eyebrows creased. She didn’t want to agree, but…she did. Aiden hadn’t been the same since they had set foot in Affelil. The Aiden she knew wouldn’t have trapped her against a wall or threatened to kill her (regardless of the fact that they were empty threats), and he definitely wouldn’t have insulted Kai.

  “What did you want to tell us?” Austin asked, changing the subject. She wanted to give her best friend the benefit of doubt.

  Kai straightened his shirt, concealing his anger, “Ah, right. It’s about Chelsea. Her funeral is next Wednesday, and I thought you should be invited.”

  His voice faltered on the word funeral, and Austin instinctively put a hand on his arm. She barely knew Kai, but he had helped her and he was hurting right now.

  “Right,” Austin sucked in a breath and looked away. For some reason, she had expected Chelsea to stay in the human world. She hadn’t thought that the tragedy would cross dimensions with them.

  Kai stepped backwards, effectively shaking her hand off him. It shouldn’t have surprised her that he wasn’t the touchy feely type, “I know that you two weren’t close. You don’t have to go.”

  “No,” she said immediately, swallowing, “I’ll go.”

  Kai nodded quickly, “That was all the business I had with you, but I guess I’m your babysitter now, right?”

  She nodded and Kai looked at the dancing crowd.

  He said, “Can I ask you for a favor?”

  She quickly pulled her hand away from Kai’s arm. She had completely forgotten that she’d left it there.

  “If you ever have some off time, I have a shop in the center of the city. I get a lot of customers, but the work has been stacking up without me there,” he sighed, “I would have asked Chelsea for help, but that’s obviously not going to work.”

  “Sure, but aren’t you a storyteller? Aiden made it sound like that job wasn’t…well, popular,” she stammered, not wanting to end up insulting him. He didn’t give any signs that he took offense to anything she said, so she relaxed.

  “What he doesn’t understand is that the people here need fiction in their lives,” Kai said. Austin found herself swaying to the beat of the loud music, influenced by the crowd. Kai, on the other hand, stood still, not moving to the music at all. It was making him stand out, and he was receiving odd looks because of it.

  “I understand,” Austin nodded. She really did. Stories give readers a new reality, a better one. In stories, everything has the possibility to be better.

  She said. “I’ll just ask Aiden when I can go.”

  She guessed that the Affelil military had some sort of schedule for training. Everything usually did. She would just have to work her life around that. Austin had never guessed that she would have to change her schedule for anything but school. But wasn’t it a kind of school, in a way?

  She would be learning things that she hadn’t known before. That seemed like school in a way.

  “Wednesdays,” Kai said, breaking her out of her thoughts, “Almost everyone has off Wednesdays, including our military.”

  “Including you?” Austin raised her eyebrows. Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of her helping?

  “The shop is always open when I’m in town,” Kai shrugged. Just then, a little girl bumped into him and scurried away. He stared at the child in distaste, “Could we talk somewhere else? Somewhere with less people?”

  “How forward of you,” Austin teased, but still agreed, “Sure.”

  For the first time in awhile, being around so many people hadn’t made her uncomfortable. Still, she understood if Kai didn’t feel the same way. They made their way through the crowd, and Austin stumbled a few times. The crowd was unforgiving now, without Aiden’s presence.

  They settled inside a small coffee shop. It was nearly empty, a stark contrast to the festival outside. Everyone must be too busy for a cup of coffee.

  “All the businesses here are family owned. You’re not going to find any Starbucks or Walmarts here,” Kai informed her, striding up to the cashier, “An apple cider and a pumpkin spice latte, thanks.”

  “How’d you know that I like that?” Austin asked once Kai had sat the steaming cup of cider in front of her. She took a small sip of the fall beverage and couldn’t help but smile at the taste.

  “Aiden hired only the best to be your guardians. It’d be a shame if I couldn’t even remember your favorite drink,” he took a sip of his own coffee, “I’ll introduce to tea soon, if I can. Not sure if Aiden will let us keep up contact.”

  “What kind of dragon are you, Kai?” she asked as she sat down in one of the hard chairs near the window. He sat across from her and looked out, staring at the flags and clothes, all blue.

  “Water,” he replied absentmindedly, “And I’m probably the only one here that doesn’t like the festivals.”

  “Isn’t today your ancestor’s birthday?” Austin chose instead to stare at Kai. He continually changed in front of her, and she couldn’t pin down who this guy was really supposed to be.

  She had been under the impression that he was the average popular guy (not that she really knew many popular guys), but that had just been his cover in the human world. He was supposed to have been Chelsea’s boyfriend, but he wasn’t acting like he had just lost a lover. When she had first seen him today, he had been cold and angry, but his face had softened since then.

  Who was he?

  “Oceana sounds gullible. I’ve never been fond of her, so I don’t celebrate her birthday like my race does,” he leaned back in his chair, “New Year's is always fun, though. We took that holiday from the humans.”

  “It looks like you’ve all taken a lot of things from the human,” she brandished the cup for him to see, along with the cardboard strip around it to prevent her from burning her hands. She doubted that Affelil would have come up with all this stuff on its own. They were such a…human invention.

  “We took coffee from humans, but the coffee holders are our invention,” Kai smiled at her disbelieving expression, “The best inventions always come from us. Our air dragons figured out how to reverse the effects of pollution long before we started to damage our world. That’s why everything here is so clean.”

  “Then why does everything look the same?” Austin wasn’t convinced. If they were so far ahead and intelligent, then the buildings should look like something out of the Jet stones, not Italy. The coffee shop should be covered in chrome, not looking like the average Daily Grind.

  “We all like how it looks. Tell me, how would you improve this little café?” Kai asked expectantly. He smiled when Austin was unable to come up with an answer, “The machines never break down, the chairs are comfortable, and it’s warm. What else could you want?”

  “You’ve made your point,” she drained the last of her cup, already feeling awake from the caffeine.

  “Now it’s my turn to ask the questions,” Kai leaned forwards, locking his hands together, “What do yo
u remember about your childhood?”

  “Everything,” she answered immediately. Aiden had accepted that answer, so she expected that Kai would, too.

  “No, I mean, what specifically? You are the closest person to Dustin that’s still alive,” Kai said, “This could help Aiden’s team find him.”

  “What’s in it for you?” she raised an eyebrow. She had already decided to tell him; she wanted Dustin caught no matter what. Still, she wanted to understand his motives.

  “Well,” he chuckled, not upset at being found out, “It wouldn’t make a bad story.”

  In a low voice so that the other customers wouldn’t hear her, she told him almost everything, excluding only the parts that would get her killed. With every word, she watched his expression change from interest to amazement to worry and then back to interest again.

  If not for Dustin…well, her story would be normal. It would be safe.

  For the next two hours, Austin talked. She talked until her throat and mouth went dry, at which point Kai would buy her another apple cider, and then she would talk again.

  As she told him everything, skipping from topic to topic in no particular order, she watched his face light up and darken, then light up again. When she told him about Dustin’s role as her big brother and how she had trusted him, Kai’s expression was confused, like he could never understand how she had made that mistake. When she told him about the lake she loved to swim in near Dustin’s cabin, Kai smiled. It was only when he stiffened, when Austin told him about all the times that her mind had been erased and controlled, that she stopped.

  “What?” Austin asked, setting her third cup of cider down. It had gone cold sometime in the past couple minutes.

  “Your mind can’t have been messed with that many times,” Kai raised a hand as if to touch her forehead, but he quickly thought better of that, “Not without ill consequences.”

  “Ill consequences?” Austin raised her eyebrows at the phrase, but the strange wording didn’t stop her blood from running cold. Kai sounded serious, and even a little scared.

  “When a,” he paused and started over, “When a Fledgling’s mind breaks, it isn’t pretty.”

  Austin ran a hand through her hair and let it stay there, cradling her head. Dustin had broken her, or he almost had.

  Kai continued, “You just need a necklace. A special magic-y necklace full of magic stuff that you won’t –and shouldn’t- understand. I’ll talk to Aiden about getting one for you.”

  “Thank you,” she coughed, her face heating up. She wasn’t used to being noticed, much less people going out of their way to help her.

  When she looked up to meet his eyes, she saw him smile.