Kingdom Keepers: Once Upon a Dream

Chapter 15

A/N: Promised I would add all the current published chapters today! Moving on! Hope you enjoy!!!

***

Earlier that day, Casey was on the phone with Finn. He'd just told her what their plans were at Magic Kingdom the next day, and she was on Cloud Nine. Her Dad had given her a few guest passes to use for her friends to get into the parks, and she had arranged to go to Finn's house to give him some of them for Terry, Amanda and Jess.

"That's great news!" she exclaimed. "Okay! I'll see you later about the tickets!"

She hung up and fell back on her bed with a squeal, clutching her phone tightly to her chest. She couldn't believe it had actually worked. She'd done it; she'd gotten all of them together and on the hunt for Overtakers. She was about to text Erin when she heard a voice from her bedroom doorway.

"What's great news?"

She sat up quickly and saw her mother smiling at her, drying her hands with a dishtowel.

"Oh!" Casey stuttered. "Nothing! I just um...Dad and I are going to a movie after school tomorrow and he got tickets for the one I really wanted to see."

Casey's mother said nothing, but raised a suspicious eyebrow.

"And free popcorn!" Casey added, throwing her hands up in a light cheer.

A few more moments of silence passed, and Casey was beginning to panic that her cover was close to blown.

"What?" she asked, after her mother continued to do nothing but stare at her.

"Nothing," her mother said. "You've just been seeming to spend a lot of time with your father lately."

"So?" Casey snapped. "You've been on my case to spend more time with him, so I did."

Now chalking up her mother's actions to petty anger, Casey ignored her concern and turned to her phone, hoping it would signal her mother to leave.

"No," her mother said. "I'm just...you look so much happier lately Case,"

"Well yeah," she said. "I guess you were right,"

She got up and closed the door, feigning anger in order to get her mother out of her hair. As she sat back down on her bed and prepared to text Erin, her mother's words stuck in her mind. She was happier, now that she thought about it. Now, with this news from Finn, she could only see things going up.

Just then, her phone buzzed, and she looked down to see a text from Jess.

Need to talk. Meet me outside your place at 1:30

Casey held her breath and looked to the door that held her mother on the other side. Sneaking out of her house in the middle of the night would not be easy; her mother watched her like a hawk. But then she looked to the Kingdom Keepers books, displayed carefully and neatly on her shelf, and she remembered the risk the Keepers took to do what they knew was right. She knew, even though she'd never directly been told, what Jess could do, and she knew that if Jess needed to talk to her, it was probably serious. Not hesitating another second, she typed a reply.

I'll be there

Nerves paralyzed her, and her stomach overflowed with butterflies, but then she took a deep breath, and a smile found its way onto her face. She was finally becoming a part of a real adventure, in the best way imaginable. All of her dreams were coming true.

***

At exactly 1:28 in the morning, Casey snuck quietly down the hallway rom her bedroom towards the front door, shuffling across the floor in socked feet, so as to make as little noise as humanly possible. She looked to the living room; as she'd expected, her mother had fallen asleep on the couch with the TV on, an event that had been fairly common since the divorce. She sighed; her mother was a light sleeper as it was; she'd have to be extra careful.