The Glistening Key (A Key Keepers novel) [Completed]

Episode 32

Kai and the boys fell to their knees when Lulu undid her ice. She joined them on the ground when she was done.

Kai crawled over to his wife who was still unconscious. "Violet! Violet! Wake up! Wake up please!"

When he went to reach for her, a cocoon of vines encircled her body.

Lulu gawked. "Vi..."

"Benny!" Alden shouted. "That guy is gone!"

Benny hopped off the back of the wagon. "Let's get out of here as soon as we can then."

Allie gasped. "Violet..."

Benny went to pick up Sky.

"Help Kai and your friends." Allie smiled at her trembling baby brother. "I'll take care of Sky and Lulu."

Kai took Vi into his arms. He cried as he crawled into the back of the wagon.

"Is that Violet? What happened to her?" Allie asked.

"Not sure," Alden said.

"She devolved," Edgar said, popping out of thin air with Thyst.

"Devolved?" Sky asked.

"The key helps a K.K. reach higher levels of power than their bodies can otherwise handle. However, once they lose the key, they lose that increase in power," Thyst said.

"Given her brother and nephew's own devolutions, it should be similar to the evolution of her powers."

Thyst smiled. "Plants thankfully aren't as harmful for their KK as fire or lightning are."

"I fought the cult." Alice clenched her teeth. "I should fought with you."

"The important thing is that you weren't taken," Thyst said.

"We should get out of here while we still can," Benny said.

Thyst rubbed Kai's head before hugging Sky. "I need to get home. Chi is with Willie."

"Take good care of your wife," Edgar said. "I need to get back to the temple."

Kai was still crying.

"Kai, don't cry." Lulu wiped away his tears. "Vi wouldn't want you to. If she could talk, she would say 'I'm not dead, you oaf'."

"T-that was a great Vi impression," Kai said.

Lulu laughed.

Alice bit her lip. "I'm sorry, Kai."

"You shouldn't apologize!" Alden's expression hardened. "Lady Violet chose to protect you. She knew the risks, we all did."

"Thanks for protecting me too, Sir Alden."

His face flushed. "S-sir? I'm still a squire." He sighed. "Probably unworthy of such a lofty title given my performance in your kidnapping and now."

"You are still a kid, right? It's alright to mistakes. Even adults do that every single day."

Kai rocked his unconscious wife in his arms.

Alice looked at her brother, shushing him and covering him and his wife with a blanket. "Focus on your wife. Let us worry about everything else."

That was when Cody spoke up. "If it's alright with you, I'd like to cook."

"You don't have to," Alice said. "I usually take care of that."

"That doesn't mean you don't deserve a break," Cody replied.

Alden folded his arms. "Some of us are banned from the kitchen. The only way Cody would be banned from the kitchen is if he had the plague or something."

Kai furrowed his eyebrows. "Banned?"

"It would be bad to let a sick person cook..." Alice said.

Her brother rolled his eyes. "I meant the others, Miss Obvious."

Her cheeks flushed. She coughed and turned back to Cody as he stirred the pot. His eyes were focus on the task as if he were caring for treasure. "Do you like cooking?"

"Yeah. My parents owned a tavern. My dad would serve the drinks, while my mother would make the food. My siblings and I would often help her when there were a lot of people, even though she wasn't fond of us hanging out at the tavern. Guess you could say that cooking reminds me of home." He smiled. "Bet that Mom and Carly are whipping up something right now. After my dad passed, I took over making the drinks."

"A kid working at a tavern?" Allie asked, furrowing her brow.

Kai laughed. "I was just as surprised when I first met Cody. Kid can fight."

Cody flushed. "It was all to stop the drunken brawls."

Kai lowered his head to his vine-covered wife. "Violet doesn't talk about her parents very much... As her husband, I should probably have some idea of what they were like..."

Alden rubbed the back of his neck. "Right, Jack said she was like us."

"Family isn't just blood, though. Vi's siblings are all orphans or abandoned children. You probably wouldn't know that if you watched them interact."

Allie smiled. One could say the same about the four of them. After all, she was adopted by his and Sky's parents.

She had to ask her parents about that the next time she saw them. She didn't mind being adopted, but she would've liked to have known why they'd kept it a secret for so long.

Alden scoffed. "I didn't say that family had to be blood. So, when do you think she's going to wake up?"

"Not for a few days at least, a week or maybe more. Mom told me that it might depend on when the next Key Keeper awakens. Vi's favorite brother didn't wake up until his twin came in to replace him."

Allie crawled over to the front of the vehicle and peeked out. Lucy was talking to Sky about how Vi would be fine.

Vi and Kai hadn't told her, but she knew that they were aware of who Violet's successor would be. Poor Lucy, she was in for a bigger task than merely gathering the stones.