Twenty-Five
Alex wasn’t sure how she managed to get through the next day of classes, but she did so on tenterhooks while wishing time would slow down so she could delay her first Library training session with Kaiden. While she’d seen him in Combat that afternoon, other than him looking at her intensely as if trying to read her, which was followed by an amused shake of his head and a flash of a perfect grin, they hadn’t had a chance to interact at all, not since whatever had happened between them the other night.
It was funny. Despite all the other potentially catastrophic events going on in her life, Alex still had the capacity to feel flutters of anxiety over a guy. How that was possible, she had no idea. But it didn’t lessen her nerves at the thought of seeing him again. Nor did it help her figure out exactly what she would say. All she knew was that she had to say something. So when she arrived in the Library foyer to find him leaning against the wall between two paintings and waiting for her, she gathered her courage and jumped straight in.
“About the other night…”
“Hello to you, too, Alex.”
She blinked, caught off guard by his pointed hint to her impolite greeting. “Um, sorry. Hi, Kaiden. Now, about the other night—”
“Ah, yes,” he interrupted, a smile tugging at his lips. “The night I almost kissed you.”
Alex felt heat flood her cheeks, not at all expecting him to come right out and say it. “That’s not—”
“And the night you almost kissed me.”
She swallowed. “I didn’t—”
“The night we almost kissed each other.”
“Kaiden!” Alex cried, resisting the urge to stomp her foot like a child. “Will you stop?”
Eyes laughing, he said, “I think I know the night you’re referring to. What about it?”
Annoyed that he was so amused while she felt nothing but embarrassment, she said through clenched teeth, “It was a mistake. What happened—What didn’t happen—What might have happened… It was a mistake.”
Kaiden nodded gravely. “I agree.”
Despite her declaration, Alex deflated at his response. It wasn’t like she wanted to argue about it, but it would have boosted her self-esteem a little if he’d at least attempted to disagree.
“Well,” she said lamely, “good. We’re on the same page, then.”
Suddenly amused again, Kaiden said, “I’m not sure we are.”
Wary now, Alex didn’t know how to respond.
Kaiden, however, had no such problem. Looking entirely too relaxed, he said, “You’re right that the other night was a mistake, but only because we were standing in the middle of the entrance to the dorm building. It’s good we were interrupted, because it means next time we’ll do it right.”
Alex’s heart skipped a beat. Her lungs constricted as she choked out, “Next time?”
Still completely relaxed, Kaiden offered her a dazzling smile and said, “A first kiss between two people is important, Alex. It needs to be memorable.”
Her breath now utterly gone, Alex wondered if she was going to pass out.
Kaiden’s smile softened as he read whatever was no doubt splashed across her features. Quietly, he said, “I know you have your hands full with Aven right now and you don’t need any more complications in your life—I get that. But when the time is right…” He trailed off, his silence telling her all she needed to know—that he was willing to wait for her, no matter how long it took.
All Alex could do was stare at him, unable to form any kind of reply.
“Now that we’re on the same page,” he said, his eyes sparkling as he used her own words against her, “shall we go see what kind of torture Athora has in store for us tonight?”
He didn’t wait for a reply before he pushed off from the wall and curled an arm around her shoulders, guiding her towards the staircase leading down into the depths of the Library.
As Alex stumbled along beside him, she struggled to process what had just happened. Part of her felt she should argue against everything he’d said, everything he’d implied. But another part, deep inside, was brimming with warmth, flooding with hope.
What Alex had told D.C. just two nights earlier still held true—there were so many reasons why she needed to squash her growing feelings for Kaiden. For his safety, for her peace of mind—there were a thousand arguments she could offer. But, everything he’d said… and how he’d understood without her having to explain… she couldn’t help feeling it would be wrong to fight him on this. Especially when she wasn’t sure that she would win.
… Or that she wanted to win.
It was because of her uncertainty that Alex remained silent, choosing instead to shake off her lingering embarrassment and trust that Kaiden would give her the space and time she needed. She settled in at his side, bracing for what the future might bring while listening to his calming chatter as together they sought out their teacher.
If Alex thought her strange tasks with Athora would start to seem more purposeful when she began working with Kaiden, she soon found out that she was wrong. Instead of jumping rope on her own, she jumped rope with Kaiden. Instead of juggling various objects for hours on her own, she juggled with Kaiden. Instead of learning how to caramelise the perfect soufflé, she… well, she failed that task, since she hadn’t lied about her limited baking skills, but she got to watch Kaiden complete it—as well as enjoy the delicious results afterwards.
The mindless and downright bizarre tasks Athora set them gave Alex not only the chance to get to know Kaiden much better, but also to experience the Library on a deeper level than ever before. From swimming through underwater rooms, to floating in spaces with zero gravity like the ChemTech facility she’d once broken into, Alex was reminded over and over that there were no limits to what the Library might offer. Other times the rooms themselves were normal but contained mysterious additions—such as hot coals for them to walk across, but they were only hot when they thought they were hot, with the point being that what their minds conceived, they created. The only way Alex managed to make it across unburned was by keeping her eyes closed and acting like she was walking on normal-temperatured rocks. Athora, however, made her go back and do it again until she could cross with her eyes open and not get burned.
Throughout it all, Kaiden remained at her side. He never questioned Athora, which made Alex wonder how he’d trained with the mysterious man for years without losing his mind. When she asked him on their walk back to the dorms on Tuesday night, he simply said the alternative wasn’t worth the risk just to assuage his curiosity. When put like that, Alex understood completely.
On Wednesday night there was a change to their routine, since after they finished, Athora told Alex that her parents had been asking for her.
Who, exactly, they’d been asking, she didn’t know, but she wasn’t willing to question her intimidating instructor in case he considered that as her breaking the rules, and instead she merely thanked him for passing along the message.
Now that Alex and Kaiden were training together, he usually hitched a ride with her down to the cavern and back up again. But after hearing about her parents, Alex thought it best if Athora returned Kaiden to the foyer that night so she could go and check in on her family and make sure they hadn’t accidentally raised a mummified priest to life.
The problem was, just as she was about to make her request, Athora disappeared.
“So, your parents, huh?” Kaiden asked, his curiosity evident. “You brought them over from Freya with you?”
Alex gave a helpless shrug and said, “They kind of panicked after realising I’d been missing for eight months my first year here, back when I didn’t know I could open doorways between worlds.” That felt like a lifetime ago to her now. “I wasn’t able to come up with a reasonable excuse, so I told them the truth about Akarnae and Medora. To avoid being locked up in a psych ward, I brought them here and Darrius explained everything. They’re archaeologists—people who study ancient relics and artefacts—but they’re also intrepid explorers, so naturally, they decided they wanted to spend time in a whole new world. It’s the greatest adventure they’ve ever been on.”
Kaiden cocked his head to the side. “Is that safe for them? Considering everything between you and Aven?”
Alex sent him a small smile, touched by his concern. “I was worried about that too, but the Library has been very accommodating with providing a safe place for them. They’re having the time of their lives and they’ve never even left the building.”
Kaiden seemed both amused and disbelieving. “This I have to see.”
Alex looked at him, not following. Or perhaps, not wanting to follow. “Sorry?”
“Athora said they’ve been asking about you,” Kaiden reminded her unnecessarily. “I presume you’re about to go visit them. I’d like to come.”
Alex was shaking her head firmly before he even finished speaking. “No way.”
Now he just looked fully amused, all signs of disbelief gone. “Why not, Alex? You’re not nervous about introducing me to your parents, are you?”
Everything within her shifted into panic mode at the very idea. “My friends haven’t even met them yet. Only Darrius.”
“Then I’m sure they’ll enjoy some fresh company. Unless…” He sent her a challenging look. “Is there a reason you don’t want them to meet me? A reason, like, say, worrying they’ll get the wrong idea about us?”
Refusing to let him see how much his words were affecting her, Alex lifted her chin and blatantly lied, “Of course I’m not worried.”
To prove her false words true, Alex summoned a doorway right in the middle of the cavern that opened to the Ancient Egyptian environment.
“After you,” she told Kaiden, motioning with her hand for him to step through first and desperately hoping her parents would be deep within the bowels of the pyramid where they couldn’t be located.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case, since after she and Kaiden battled the dry, sand-stinging winds to enter the ancient site, they happened upon her parents only a few chambers down from the entrance, right where Alex had last seen them. It looked like they were finishing up for the night, since they were packing away their tools and chatting about something unrelated to their work—a surprise in and of itself.
“… and then I said to him, ‘I don’t know about you, sir, but my wife thinks my beard makes me look—”
Alex cleared her throat loudly, not at all wanting to hear what her mother thought about her father’s facial hair.
Both Rachel and Jack looked up at her interruption, their faces brightening. Then their eyes flicked past her as Kaiden stepped into view, and if anything, their expressions became even more radiant.
“Jack, honey, look!” Rachel cried, as if her husband wasn’t standing right beside her. “Alex brought a boy with her!”
She made it sound like it was the most wonderful news in the world, like discovering that Christmas, Easter and her birthday would all be repeated back to back for the rest of her life.
“I didn’t really bring him,” Alex said even though she knew there was little point in attempting to explain that she’d allowed him to come under duress. “He just… decided to… tag along.”
Silence descended as her parents and Kaiden all looked at Alex with raised eyebrows.
“Well, whatever the case,” Rachel said brightly, “it’s wonderful to meet another alien like Darrius.”
Alex’s eyes bugged out. “Mum! Don’t call Kaiden an alien! Or Darrius! What’s the matter with you?”
“They’re from another world,” Rachel said, as if explaining something basic to a child. “That means they’re aliens.”
“Technically, we’re from another world,” Alex corrected, wondering how, after all their worldly—and other worldly—travels, they could be so culturally insensitive. It was a wonder they’d survived as long as they had and not been stoned to death by the natives at some ancient dig site or another. Then again, most of the people they dealt with were already buried, and the dead weren’t so quick to take offence.
Rachel tapped a finger against her lips. “You know what? You’re absolutely right.”
“I’ve always wanted to be an alien,” Jack said, sounding thrilled. “I can now officially put that on my résumé. I bet it’ll give me a slew of job opportunities. Can you imagine?”
Alex didn’t want to imagine. In fact, she didn’t want to imagine just about as much as she didn’t want to be there right now. And that was a lot.
“Are you going to introduce us properly to this young man you so staunchly defended?” Rachel asked, her eyes shining with parental glee.
Seeing her mother’s expression, Alex began backing away. “On second thought, I think I’ll come back later. Alone.”
She spun on her heel only to run straight into Kaiden.
Shaking with repressed laughter, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pivoted her back to face her parents, his strong grip compelling her to walk forward with him.
“Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Jennings,” he said, reaching out to shake their hands. “I’m Kaiden James, a friend of Alex’s.”
Alex could have sworn her mother swooned a little at his polite introduction.
“Kaiden, son, a pleasure,” her father said. “But please, call us Jack and Rachel.”
With a smile that prompted Rachel to give an audible happy sigh—thus causing Alex no small amount of mortification—Kaiden nodded his agreement.
“Are you one of Alex’s classmates?” Rachel asked, looking between him and Alex—specifically where his arm was still wrapped snugly around her.
Alex tried to edge away from him, or at least untangle herself from his grip, but he only curled his arm tighter.
Ignoring the glare she sent him—though, his lips did give a hint of a twitch—he answered, “I’m a year above Alex but we do share a couple of classes.”
“Ah, yes,” Jack said, scratching his bristled chin. “I find it fascinating that half your curriculum is based strictly on your potential for a subject rather than your age or aptitude. It’s quite ingenious, really.”
“That’s how Alex and I met,” Kaiden said, sharing openly. “Her test results came back with a high potential for Combat so she ended up in the same class as me. And just between us”—he leaned in close to them as if divulging a secret—“she’s come a long way since the first day I saw her. For a while there, we thought she’d managed to cheat the potential test. But now she’s left us all in the dust.”
“That’s my little girl,” Jack said. “Beating up kids twice her size.”
“That should be your next Twitter handle,” Rachel said with a chuckle. But then she frowned. “Do they even have social media here?”
Alex pulled out her ComTCD and waved it for her parents. “No Internet, but they more than make up for it with other technology.”
Rachel and Jack both stared at the Device.
“Is that a cell phone?” Jack asked.
“Something like that,” Alex said, returning it to her pocket. “I’ll show you another time. But for now, why don’t you tell me why you asked to see me? It’s getting late and we need to get back to our dorm before curfew.”
What Alex said was true. While time stopped when they were in their Library lessons with Athora, the Ancient Egypt ‘room’ wasn’t one that remained frozen. The underground cavern, too, followed the normal physics of time, which is why they only used it as a come-and-go destination, rather than for the entirety of their lessons. Ever since Athora had left them, the clock had been ticking for Kaiden and Alex—something they both needed to keep an eye on.
“Mostly we just wanted to check in on you, sweetheart,” Rachel said. “Darrius stopped by the other day and filled us in on a few things, so we wanted to see for ourselves that you’re doing okay.”
Alex’s body stilled and Kaiden’s arm tightened further at her reaction.
“Darrius came here? What did he say?”
“He told us that your Aven-elf-fellow has been quiet lately so you’ve been busy trying to build an army,” Jack said, causing her stomach to dip—until she saw the wide grin on his face. “Alex, honey, that’s an admirable goal, but you’re only seventeen.”
“Yes, you should wait until you’re considered a legal adult in at least the European Union before drafting a contingent of militia to your cause,” Rachel said, somehow with a straight face. “You still have half a year left before you’re eighteen. Don’t you think you should wait until then?”
Alex loosed a sigh of relief as she took in her parents’ expressions and realised they hadn’t taken anything Darrius had told them seriously.
“I don’t know, Mum,” Alex said, playing along. “Six months is a long time, and you know I’m not so great when it comes to patience.”
Her parents chuckled good-naturedly, but then they sobered and Rachel said, “Darrius seems worried. And we figure if he’s worried, we should be worried.”
Alex stepped away from Kaiden and moved to hold her mother’s hands. “Darrius is worried for a lot of reasons right now. Aven has been quiet lately, and we’re all a bit on edge—Darrius in particular, since he feels the burden of responsibility to protect us all.” She lowered her voice. “And, to be perfectly honest, that might not be possible.”
“I want you to tell us the truth,” Jack said, stepping closer. “Just how much danger are you in?”
As much as she wanted to fib, Alex couldn’t bring herself to lie to her father’s face. So she quietly answered, “A lot. But that’s true for all of us.”
He held her eyes as he said, “I take it there’s nothing we can do to convince you to stay here with us? Or return to Earth?”
Alex shook her head. “Remember, if Aven wants, he can just come through the Library and find me there, anyway. I need to be here doing what I can to stop him. And I need you to trust me enough to let me do that.”
“You’re our daughter,” Rachel said quietly. “We might get caught up in our work, but we still love you. We’d do anything to protect you. This situation with Aven, it doesn’t make me comfortable letting you go face it on your own.”
“I promise I’m being as careful as I can be,” Alex said. She looked back at Kaiden and softly added, “And I’m not on my own.”
The contemplative look Jack and Rachel cast between her and Kaiden was frustratingly presumptuous, but she knew it was in her best interests to use whatever means necessary to ease their concerns. If Kaiden’s, well, Kaiden-ness managed to help, then so be it.
“No, it appears you aren’t,” Jack said in a knowing voice.
With a squeeze of her fingers, Rachel released Alex’s hands but pulled her in for a hug. While doing so, she sneakily whispered in her ear, “Goodness, he’s attractive—it’s like he’s stepped right off the cover of GQ! And the way he looks at you—”
“Mum!” Alex yanked backwards before her mother could say more.
Rachel was unrepentant and grinned impishly. “Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. You have eyes.”
Cheeks burning, Alex couldn’t bring herself to look at the quietly chuckling Kaiden, since from that comment alone, he didn’t need to be a genius to guess what Rachel had whispered in Alex’s ear.
“Was there anything else you both needed from me?” Alex curtly asked, while mentally adding, Other than embarrassing me further, of course?
“As long as you promise to continue being careful out there, I think we’re good,” Jack said. He motioned to her wrist and said, “Has that tattoo of yours come in handy yet?”
Alex froze at his question, and then immediately felt like hitting herself.
The tattoo.
She could have used it at any time over the weekend, especially when she was about to become dinner for the Jarnocks’ river beast. But using Drock’s Beacon had never crossed her mind.
In hindsight, Hunter had managed to save them in time, but still—if she’d remembered the option to call for help, there would have been a lot less anxiety on her part. And while Bear was now completely healed, if she’d used the Beacon, he never would have broken his leg in the first place.
“Not yet,” Alex answered her dad after a short pause. “But that’s good news, right? It means I haven’t been in a position to need it.”
That wasn’t entirely true—or at all true—but they didn’t need to know that.
“Do your best to make sure it stays that way,” Jack said, tweaking her nose like she was five years old.
Alex didn’t respond verbally, but she did nod, feeling more at ease with the deceit when it wasn’t spoken aloud.
“You two had better get going,” Rachel said.
Alex nodded again, but she paused mid-motion when her dad looked squarely at Kaiden and said, “Can we trust you to protect our little girl, son?”
An embarrassed sound escaped Alex’s lips before she could stop it. Where was a bolt of lightning when she needed one?
Kaiden’s response was as quick as it was serious. “With my life, sir.”
Eyeing him as only a father could, Jack smiled and clapped a hand on his shoulder. “You know, I believe you mean that.” Glancing at Alex, Jack declared, “This one’s a keeper, sweetheart.”
Overcome with mortification, Alex now wished for not just a bolt of lightning, but an entire electrical storm to smite her where she stood.
Kaiden looked down at his boots while once again shaking with mirth, so Alex was able to spear a what-the-hell? glare at her parents, but the conniving matchmakers showed no signs of remorse.
A strangled noise came from the back of Alex’s throat as she turned from them, grabbed Kaiden’s arm and stomped to the exit of the chamber. Only when she reached the limestone corridor did she halt and, with a sigh of frustration, turn to look back at her parents.
With all the danger circling around her, she wasn’t willing to risk storming out on a bad note—just in case—so she called, “I don’t like you both much right now, but I still love you. I’ll come back when I can. Until then, make sure everything that’s dead down here stays dead. Okay?”
Laughing like she was being funny—when she was not—her parents agreed and called out their farewells.
Kaiden returned their ‘nice to meet you’s and, to Alex’s horror, promised to visit again soon. Before he could commit to anything else—like, say, a wedding—Alex dragged him away and opened a doorway straight back to the underground cavern. Only then did she have the courage to glance at him, and he promptly burst out laughing at what he read on her face.
“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled. “That was hilarious.”
Still laughing, he pulled her forward and, before she could react, pressed his lips to her temple in an impossibly soft kiss.
Her breath arrested at his seemingly natural show of affection.
“I think your parents like me, Alex.”
The air rushed out of her in a whoosh and she came to her senses enough to glare at him. “Next time, I’m leaving you down here.”
He grinned knowingly. “Liar.”
He was probably right, so she didn’t respond, but she did continue glaring at him.
“We should go—it’s nearly curfew,” he said.
And just like that, it was as if nothing had happened. Nothing awkward, nothing embarrassing, nothing abnormal. In an instant, he’d somehow made her feel comfortable around him once again. Alex had no idea how he’d done it. But she was grateful. Because like he’d guessed a few days earlier, she couldn’t handle more complications in her life right now. So the fact that he was giving her exactly what she needed by not pressing her for… more… meant the world to her.
Because of that, she smiled at him, the only indication of gratitude she was capable of offering. But something in his face changed as he looked at her in the dark of the cavern, and when she summoned a doorway for them to return to the foyer, he reached out to keep her from stepping through.
“Wait,” he said. “Ignore what I just said. There’s somewhere I want to take you first.”
Brow crinkling, Alex said, “But… curfew…”
One side of his mouth hitched up. “What’s life without a little risk, Alex?”
Snorting at the overused quote—in any world—Alex asked, “What do you have in mind?”
“I’ve met your parents. It only feels right that I introduce you to mine.”
Caught off guard, Alex squeaked out, “Now?” The single word was shrill enough to echo around the cavern, causing her to wince.
“Now seems like the perfect time,” Kaiden replied, a strange emotion flashing across his features.
It was that emotion—the uncertainty he so rarely exhibited—that brought Alex up short. But she still said, “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” For a multitude of reasons, she thought to herself. Her parents had been bad enough—but meeting his, too? She was certain it would lead to embarrassment the likes from which she’d never recover.
As if reading her mind, his lips twitched and he said, “I can guarantee they won’t say anything that makes you feel uncomfortable.”
Alex knew there was no way he could promise such a thing. But despite her misgivings, she was curious to meet the people who had raised Kaiden and Jeera.
Seeing her wavering, Kaiden looked both triumphant—and nervous. It was the latter that sealed Alex’s decision, her curiosity winning out over her trepidation. Kaiden had always come across as confident from the very first moment she’d laid eyes on him. Not arrogant, never that. But self-assured, knowing exactly who he was along with what strength and skills were at his disposal. The nervousness, however, was something new. And it was enough to intrigue Alex into banishing the doorway she’d summoned, tentatively nodding her agreement.
“Not that it would work in here, but I don’t have an authorised Bubbler vial with me, so…” Kaiden raised his voice and said, “Library, just this once, would you mind—”
Before he could finish his request, another door appeared in front of them.
“Never be afraid to ask, Kaiden James,” came the Library’s rumbling voice.
Unable to help herself, Alex smirked and said, “Now who’s the Chosen One?”
Kaiden laughed, his nervousness dissolving. “Don’t worry—you’ll have your title back by the time we return.”
And with that, he reached for her hand and led her through the doorway.