Magics: Escape (Book 2)

Chapter Seventeen

"KAI, GOSH DARN IT, ANSWER ME!"

Kai jolted sideways, blinking in confusion. The darkness that had been surrounding him and the menacing cackle suddenly vanished, and the bright sunlight momentarily blinded him. He closed his eyes again, realized that he was sitting up with his hands over his ears, and covered his face, leaning forward and bringing his knees up into his chest. He was still shaking, but the laughter was gone, and relief was flooding through him as he sat there in silence.

"Can you hear us now?" Linda's impatient yet concerned voice asked to his right, and Kai felt her hand touch his left shoulder gently. He nodded his head quickly, wincing at the stab of sore muscles from a day of walking. "Good," Linda breathed. "Just take some breaths, okay? We'll start asking questions as soon as you've calmed down."

Kai did as he was told, breathing deeply into his arms, trying to still his shaking shoulders. When he finally got his breathing under control, he lifted his head and glanced around him. He was sitting up atop his sleeping bag, inside the boys' tent. The door to the tent was unzipped, and Kai could see that the girls' tent was empty. He looked around him again and found all of his friends and his father sitting around him, confused and worried looks on their faces.

Falte crawled forward and positioned himself next to his son, wrapping his arms around him from the side. He rubbed Kai's back reassuringly, and Kai realized that he was still trembling. He sighed shakily and relaxed his tense shoulders.

"What happened?" Abby blurted out eagerly, then waved her hands with a tiny shake of her head. "Actually, let's let you hear our side of the story first. To give you a little more time to calm down." She gave him a small smile, but Kai couldn't smile back.

Linda took over for Abby. "I've told you that I can see everyone's dreams, correct?" She waited until Kai nodded his head once in acknowledgement. "It's confusing most of the time, because I can see all of you guys' dreams all at once, so there's a lot to see. This time, though, there was only one dream. I knew everyone else had to be asleep, but I couldn't tear myself away from this one. I'll explain what the dream was in a minute," she said, and Kai shuddered, realizing that he didn't really want her to. "I woke up near the end and came here, knowing that it was yours, Kai. But... you were already sitting up. For some reason, you screamed, which woke everyone else up. We all came here and tried to get you to ... listen to us, because your eyes were open, but you weren't looking at us. I guess it finally worked when Falte yelled at you."

That was Dad? Kai thought, glancing at his father. Falte wasn't paying much attention to anyone — he was simply staring at a spot on the tent floor, the worried lines still etched on his face as he listened.

"Let's hear your side, actually," Linda said, pulling Kai's attention back to her. "You tell us the dream."

Kai shivered and hesitated, unsure if he wanted to tell them what he had heard.

How would they take it? What would they think? Could it have just been a nightmare? Would they believe him?

He shoved that aside and told them everything. He couldn't stop himself from trembling again as he explained, but now that his father was there next to him, the shaking stopped pretty quickly.

Everyone but Linda looked extremely unsettled and confused, but Chase looked the worst. He had gone slightly pale, and his arms were wrapped around his torso nervously. Kai figured that if Shintaro were there, he would be asking and asking questions about everything. 

The thought of Shintaro bounced Kai back to reality. He realized that he would have to shove the dream - was it even a dream though? - aside until there was enough time to look into it. At the moment, Shintaro was the most important. They had to find him.