Sovereign (Realmwalker Book 3)

by Jonathan Franks

  Hope and Gen let go and hovered, watching the dragon retreat for the surface of the water. Then Gen heard Slynn screaming. She whirled around, looking for him, and saw him convulsing on the top of one of the pillars. She rushed for him, swooped down to grab under his wings and lifted him off the surface. The lightning arced into Gen and she shuddered from the shocks. She gritted her teeth against the pain and kept flying through the bolts. She dropped Slynn onto the top of another pillar, then her wings convulsed and she couldn’t control her flight anymore. She crumpled to the glass floor next to Slynn, then curled up and moaned in pain. Her body twitched and spasmed from the shocks.

  The other fairies stood on a nearby pillar, watching Slynn and Gen convulse, not entirely sure what to do.

  “They’ll stop soon,” Shae sighed in relief. “It’ll only be another minute.”

  Gen went still before Slynn. After a long moment, Gen staggered to her feet. Her hair was sticking up and thin trails of smoke rose from her wings. Large patches of scales had been scorched away, but they regrew, regenerating as they watched. She shuddered and took a deep breath.

  Slynn’s body suddenly went limp.

  “Mom!” Gen rushed toward Slynn. His breath was shallow and he struggled to open his eyes.

  He focused on her, a strikingly pretty fairy with orange butterfly wings, and for a moment, he didn’t recognize her. He shook his head quickly and focused. “Gen?”

  Gen wrapped her arms around Slynn, crying. “Oh, thank god. I thought I’d lost you again.”

  Slynn pushed her away and got shakily to his feet.

  “Mom?” Gen asked. “Are you okay?”

  Slynn looked at her. He tapped his forehead. “She’s gone, Genevieve. Not here anymore. Please, don’t call me that anymore.”

  “What?” Gen’s eyes were wide. She shook her head. “No, no, what do you mean? Not here anymore?”

  “I’m sorry,” Slynn said. “Her presence is gone. It’s just me again.”

  Gen sank to her knees and cried. Hope touched down tentatively at Gen’s side. She kneeled and put her arms around Gen. Gen buried her face into Hope’s shoulder and sobbed.

  Slynn whispered to Hope. “Tell her. Trust me. She needs to hear it. And now, it has to come from you. Tell her.”

  Hope hugged Gen tighter. “I’ll always hold you when you cry, Gen. I love you and I’m right here.”

  Gen hugged Hope tighter and wept.

  Chapter 9

  “Why’s that man in a wheelchair?” Molly asked, far too loudly for her mother’s comfort.

  “Molly,” Sarah said quietly, “It’s not polite to stare or point or ask questions quite that loudly.”

  “But I want to know!”

  “If you really want to know that badly, you have to be courageous enough to go and ask him yourself. You know what courageous means?”

  Molly nodded in exaggerated seriousness. “Yes! It means being brave.”

  Sarah nodded at her. “That’s right.”

  “I’m brave!”

  Sarah glanced at the guy in the wheelchair and his family. They were laughing, walking – and rolling – through the shopping mall. They seemed friendly enough. There was a young man with them who looked familiar but Sarah couldn’t place him.

  “Really, mommy!” Molly insisted. “I’m super duper brave. Can I go find out?”

  “Okay, go ahead. But make sure you use all of your manners and if he doesn’t want to talk about it, you drop it and come back immediately. Okay?”

  Molly nodded and sprinted off to the man in the wheelchair. Sarah was on the lookout from back where they stood originally.

  Portia laughed. “You’re so funny. Would you have ever let me go up and talk to a stranger like that?”

  “Are you kidding?” Sarah asked. “You used to do that all the time.”

  “Really? I don’t remember that at all.”

  “Yeah,” Portia’s mom said. “You were very selective about the strangers you were willing to engage, though. You seemed to have a strong sense of who would be friendly and who wouldn’t ahead of time. You wanted to be everyone’s friend. When we would go the grocery store, the bakery ladies would give you chocolate chip cookies all the time because you were so cute.”

  “They do that to Molly.”

  “Yeah,” Sarah laughed, “but she never blinked up at them all cute and said, ‘Thank you so much, but… but…’ Then you’d look at your other hand and say, “But this hand is empty!’ They’d all coo over you and give you a second cookie.”

  “No way. That’s not real. That never happened.”

  “It’s real. It happened.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Portia said. She turned to Jim. “What do you have to say about that? Do you believe what this woman is telling me?”

  “This woman?” Sarah folded her arms across her chest. Then she and Portia laughed.

  “Leave me out of this!” Jim held his hands up in front of him.

  Molly made it to the other family. Sarah could barely hear Molly’s squeaky little voice over the din of the crowds at the mall.

  Her words came out in a long, but quick, burst. “Hi! My name is Molly and it’s a pleasure to meet you. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind if I asked you why you were in a wheelchair because I asked my mommy and she said that if I wanted to know I needed to be brave enough to ask you myself and you look so nice and I wondered what happened to your legs if you don’t mind telling me because you don’t have to if you don’t want to!”

  Wes blinked at the little girl in surprise. For a moment, Molly looked like she was about to run away, then Wes smiled broadly at her.

  “You are a brave girl, that’s for sure!”

  “Um, thank you.”

  Wes could feel Anne laughing behind him. Laura smiled down at the little girl. George looked like he wasn’t quite sure what to do, then he caught Jim’s eye. He whispered to Laura that he’d be right back and walked up to Jim.

  “I don’t usually tell people this because it’s a big secret,” Wes whispered. Molly’s eyes were wide. “But a dragon bit them right off when I was swimming one day!”

  Molly’s mouth dropped open in a big O. “Really?” She cried.

  Wes laughed. “No, sweetie. That was just a joke.”

  “Oh.” Molly frowned. “Yeah, I knew that, of course.”

  “A little over fifteen years ago,” Wes explained, “There was a big war and I was a soldier in that war. Have you heard of Vietnam?”

  Molly shook her head.

  “It’s a small country that’s got a lot of jungles in it. A bunch of soldiers went there to try to help some of them fight different ones. Some of the bad guys left a trap buried in the ground and my friends and I didn’t know it was there, and we set it off. It was a big bomb. It exploded and the doctors took my legs to save my life.”

  Molly’s face was full of concern. “Oh my goodness! Did it work?”

  Wes grinned at her. “I think it did. I’m still alive.”

  “Wow. You must have been so brave. Are you still a soldier?” Molly asked.

  Wes shook his head. “Not anymore. Now I’m a lawyer.”

  “Wow! Can I tell my mom?”

  “Of course. Thank you for asking. You were so polite. You can tell your mom I was very impressed with you.”

  “Thanks, mister!”

  Molly ran back to her mom. “He was a soldier and there was a bomb and it blew up and the doctors saved his life and turned him into a lawyer!”

  Sarah smiled. “Thank you for reporting back in. I’m proud of you for being so polite and being so kind to a stranger.”

  Molly beamed.

  “Anyway, good to see you, Jim,” George said. He shook Jim’s hand again and went back to join the Lachance family.

  The Ritcheys and Jim resumed their walking, heading in the other direction from the Lachances.

  “Who was that guy?” Molly asked Jim.

  “That’s my neighbor.”

  “T
hat’s Jennifer’s brother,” Portia said.

  “Genevieve.”

  “Whatever.”

  “He looks nice,” Molly said.

  “He’s a good guy,” Jim said. “And he said he’d help me get my mom’s old car running again. That’s good because I’ll need some help!”

  “I’ll help you,” Portia grinned, “I know how to change a tire, you know.”

  “Nobody cares about your stupid tires,” Molly sneered at Portia.

  “Molly Jane!” Sarah scolded her youngest daughter. “That is not polite!”

  Molly’s face fell and she looked down at her feet as she walked. She said, almost too quiet to hear, “Sorry.”

  Portia gave her sister a little friendly shove. “It’s okay.”

  “I feel bad for them,” Jim said. “But Mrs. Summers is supposed to come back home from the hospital today.”

  “She was in the psych ward,” Portia explained to her mother.

  “Yikes,” Sarah said. “But she’s okay now?”

  Jim shrugged. “I guess. I don’t know too much about what’s happening over there anymore. But I know that was Laura, George’s fiancée. That must have been her family. I haven’t met any of them.”

  “How lovely for them.”

  “Oh,” Jim said, noticing Babbage’s, a store where they sold computer software and video games. “I want to go in there, if you don’t mind.”

  “I’ll go with him,” Portia said. “Why don’t we meet at the Auntie Anne’s in, like, half an hour?”

  Sarah shrugged. “Sure.” She looked at her watch. “Pretzels at, let’s just say two thirty.”

  Portia nodded curtly and she and Jim went into the game store.

  “They’re in love,” Molly told her mom.

  Sarah watched as they walked away together, hand in hand. Portia was talking animatedly to Jim, who laughed at something she said. “Yeah,” Sarah sighed. “It sure looks like it, doesn’t it?”

  -

  George and Laura said goodbye to Wes, Anne, and Michelle, and brought their bags out to the Jeep.

  “Why did we wait so long?” Laura asked. “I thought we made a solemn vow to finish all of our Christmas shopping by Halloween this year.”

  “Yeah, we did,” George laughed. “Someone may have tried to drag you to the store a few times, I think.”

  Laura elbowed him in the ribs. “Irrelevant!”

  George laughed and shut the tailgate. He pushed Laura against the back of the SUV and kissed her.

  “Mmm,” Laura purred after he stepped away. She opened her eyes. “But you totally got the back of my jacket all salty!”

  He spun her around and brushed it off for her.

  “Here,” she said, handing him the keys. “I’m not in the mood to drive.”

  “Your brand new car?” George asked. “Handing it over already?”

  “I trust you. Besides, I know where you live. And,” Laura pointed at the giant heap of snow the plows had left in the parking lot, “I’m secretly hoping you’ll try to drive up one of those and I’d rather you roll it over than me!”

  George laughed. He opened the passenger door for her and closed it after her, then got in on the driver side. He made sure the Jeep was in two-wheel-drive, then backed out of the parking spot. He drove off to an emptier part of the lot, cranked the wheel to the left and dumped the clutch, spinning the Cherokee around in a tight series of donuts. He looked out the window and saw a nearly perfect corkscrew of tire tracks following them through the snow. He pulled the lever to shift in four-wheel-drive and headed for the snow mound. He had just gotten both right wheels on up on it when a white Chevy Cavalier with a big orange gumball light on top approached.

  “It’s the fuzz!” George cried. “We better get out of here!”

  “Yeah, I’d hate for that mall security guy to arrest us. Hit it!”

  George steered off the snow mound and then drove calmly and sedately to the end of the parking lot and turned onto the mall drive and down the street. He and Laura laughed the whole way.

  “That was awesome!” She giggled.

  They went through a McDonald’s drive-thru to get fries and Cokes and they still arrived at the hospital half an hour early. They talked and finished their fries and their drinks.

  “Are you excited to have your mom back at home?” Laura asked.

  George nodded. “Yeah, I really am. We’re still here for another three weeks, though. Can you do another three weeks at my folks’ house with my mom home?”

  “Yeah, sure! She might be happy to have another girl around to take care of stuff while your dad’s at work.”

  “Okay. Just making sure,” George said.

  “I’m sure. I just want to be where you are.” Laura squeezed his hand. “I’m worried about her, too. I know that doesn’t help much, but I am.”

  “I know. And thanks.”

  Laura kissed George’s cheek, then adjusted herself in the seat to snuggle against him. They sat like that and listened to the radio until they saw Geoff’s black Saab pull into the parking lot. George turned the volume down on the radio then turned the car off.

  “Why do you do that?” Laura asked.

  “What?”

  “You always turn the radio all the way down before you shut the car off.”

  “Oh. Yeah, it’s because I hate it when I turn the car on and the music starts blaring right at me.”

  “That explains it.” Laura shrugged. “You’re weird.”

  George laughed. “Ha! Well next time, I’ll turn it all the way up and we’ll make your eardrums bleed.”

  “No, no. You just keep on doing what you’re doing. Maintain the status quo.”

  They walked up to Geoff as he was getting out of the car.

  “Hey, dad,” George said.

  “Hi, guys. You guys ready?”

  George and Laura both nodded.

  The three of them went inside, but when they went to Gabby’s room, it was empty. Geoff started to panic and he chased down a nurse.

  “Dr. Perry is with her right now,” the nurse said. “She’s in recovery but she’s not coming out of the anesthesia like normal. I’m sure it’ll be okay, Mr. Summers. Doctor will come and talk to you in a few minutes. You can stay in the room.” The nurse grabbed a pair of clipboards out of a stand on the desk and bustled off to another room.

  George looked expectantly at his dad when Geoff came back into the room.

  “Having trouble waking her after the anesthesia. The nurse said it was no big deal.”

  For another twenty minutes, Geoff paced back and forth in the empty room. Eventually, Dr. Perry came in.

  “Mr. Summers,” she greeted him warmly. “Good afternoon.”

  “What happened?”

  Dr. Perry raised her eyebrows in surprise at Geoff’s tone. “Happened? Nothing. I’m sorry about the delay. Gabrielle took a bit longer than usual to come to after the anesthesia this afternoon. She’s awake and lucid now, and I know she’s eager to see you. We’ll bring her in in a few minutes. We’d just like to keep an eye on her for a few more minutes now that she’s come to. Sound good?”

  Geoff shrugged.

  “She’s okay, Mr. Summers. Really.”

  “Okay, thanks Doctor.”

  Dr. Perry left the room.

  “You believe her?” George asked.

  Geoff nodded. “Yeah, actually, I do. I’m sure everything’s fine.”

  In another fifteen minutes or so, a nurse wheeled Gabby’s bed back into her room. Gabby’s face lit up into a broad smile when she saw her family waiting for her.

  “Hi, you guys! Oh, George, it’s so good to see you. Laura, you look lovely.” Gabby took Geoff’s hand.

  “You get to come home today, mom,” George said.

  “I know! I’m very excited. But I need a little bit, okay? I’m always dizzy after the general and I need like half an hour before I can really walk around without feeling completely sick.”

  Dr. Perry came back into
the room with a stack of papers to review with Geoff and Gabby. Finally, after all of the discharge papers, all of the after-care instructions, Dr. Perry put a hand on Geoff’s shoulder and one on Gabby’s.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Summers? I just wanted to tell you that I’m very happy to have been able to work with the two of you. You two are really great. Your family is solid and you two have such a strong connection. Without being there for each other, this would’ve been a much longer process. But you two made it through as well as anyone could hope to. I’m proud of both of you, and I’m very happy to have been able to help in whatever way I could.”

  “Thanks, Dr. Perry,” Geoff said. “We’ll see you at her follow-up next week, and then on the twenty-eighth, right?”

  “That’s right. Try to take it easy, but also try to enjoy your holiday. I’ll see you two soon. Merry Christmas.” Dr. Perry waved as she left the room.

  “You need anything, mom?” George asked.

  “No, honey, if I eat or drink anything now I’ll throw up for sure. We just need to sit for a while. Tell me everything that happened while I was away!”

  -

  Two hours later, they got back home. Geoff and George helped Gabby up the snowy driveway and into the house. Gabby got settled on the chaise section of the sofa with her ideal ratio of pillows and blankets. Geoff tucked her feet under the blanket and kissed her forehead. She smiled up at him.

  “Honey?”

  “Yeah?” George answered.

  “Can you bring me a couple of photo albums, please?”

  George nodded. “Of course.” He fetched two of their family photo albums, put one on Gabby’s lap, and the other on the sofa next to her. “Need anything else?”

  Gabby smiled and shook her head.

  “Okay, good, because I really have to go to the bathroom!”

  “Go, silly,” Gabby laughed.

  George rushed out of the living room and Gabby started to flip through the pictures. There were lots of pictures of her and Geoff and George and Greg. There were lots of pictures of a girl, too. Clearly, the family knew her, spent quite a lot of time with her, but Gabby couldn’t quite place who she would have been. There certainly were lots and lots of pictures of her. Eventually Gabby pushed the stranger from her mind and dozed off on the sofa.