Chapter Twenty Three

I was panting while running through ahick forest. Jumping over roots, weaving through trees. Night time was the worst time to be running from a monster and that's saying something since I didn't think there were many monsters that could scare me this badly. I was over cloaking my super-speed. So much so that I wondered what could be chasing me this bad that I needed to get as far as possible as fast as possible. Something was chasing me and I had to get away as fast as I could. I still had no idea what it was or where I was or even how I got into this situation, but I knew one thing for sure. I had to run. Terror filled my body as my heart kicked into overdrive. The rush of adrenaline going through my system in order to earn the boost that could get me to safety. I reached a clearing and drew a sword I didn't even know I had. Turning to face my foe, I trembled at the sight before me. It was now clear to me that I wasn't going to be able to run away from this one.

A huge dragon that could roughly cover five football fields was chasing after me. The thick trees of the forest bent and broke as it simply glided over them. The sheer amount of magic that came off the beast was suffocating. It reached the clearing and began circling it. It was so large I couldn't see it's wing tips as they disappeared into the night stretching out it's width making it look impossibly large and leaving the estimations only to my imagination. "Finally feeling brave, boy," its voice sounded causing vibrations to rack the ground. Much as I quivered in fear at the might before me, I also couldn't deny the faint familiarity I felt towards the beast. "Come face your past. Come face the truth," the dragon spoke. I heard a clattering sound and noticed I had dropped my sword in fear. I took one look at my hands and noticed they were trembling terribly. There really was no escape from this beast. I looked back up at the beast and it had stopped circling around me. No, it was now going for the kill. It lunged straight for me. I was unable to move and completely frozen to the spot I stood and watched in terror as the dragons jaw covered my frame which was very small compared to its collossal size.

I jerked up as I awoke from the nightmare. I was breathing heavily, but luckily I was covered in a thin film of sweat rather than the usual where I was drenched in sweat. Ciara had stayed asleep even through that. She was sound asleep on my chest. Her hold on me was now weaker. I gently placed her beside me with her head on a pillow. I took a quick shower and slipped back beneath the covers. I looked at my clock which said 1:00am. It took me a few minutes to fall back into a peaceful sleep or so I thought.

…....…

"Hahahahahaha," I heard the deep sound of guttural laughter. It sounded sincere like when you laughed with your friends. The kind that was only heard from people who were truly happy. I opened my eyes to look for the source and found that I was surrounded by a great expanse of beautiful plains. My eyes finally landed on the source of the laughter. A boy and girl were having a picnic not far from me. They appeared to be in their teens, probably a year or two older than I was.

The girl had rested her head on his chest and they were deep in conversation. "Don't you think Tobias will be jealous?" the girl asked.

"Daphne, even if he were to be jealous, I don't think there's anything he can do about it. Besides he will get over it," the boy said.

"Yeah. But you know he is not the kind of person to let things go like that," she said.

"Yeah, that is true. But he would be a fool to try anything irrational. Armensia depends on all of us," he said.

"Demitri said he destroy you if you didn't ask me out any sooner," Daphne said causing the boy to chuckle. The girl and boy radiated a very powerful aura that it easily registered in my mind that this was the Siege and Homage. Wait, now I could recognise them from the tapestry in the throne room. These two were none other than Daphne and Jekyll, the first Homage and Siege.

I walked up to them, "Hi Jekyll," I said. I didn't expect much from the exchange. But rather I spoke more to myself than to him. The scene before me froze immediately startling me. Although one thing was weird, Jekyll was still moving. He looked around till he noticed me.

His face became angry almost instantly, "Why did you interrupt my date?" he growled.

I quickly raised my hands in surrender, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to."

He looked away and sighed, "Well, you're probably here because you need my help. So ask me anything. Make sure you only ask something I can answer."

"Okay. That's not very assuring, but I'll ask anyway. When I went to the throne room in the Artarak, I found seven thrones instead of six. Two of them were silver or platinum whatever. one of the two," I said and this seemed to startle Jekyll.

"Did you say silver?" he asked to which I nodded, "Go on."

"Well, everything in the Artarak is set to accommodate seven people. Seven combat suits, seven seats in the control room. What is this supposed to mean?" I asked.

"Which throne was missing?" he asked thoughtfully. It was until now that I noticed a throne must have been removed before they put the silver ones I place. The scene morphed into the throne room where we found Ciara staring at the twin silver thrones.

"Ciara," I called surprised startling her by my sudden appearance.

"Oh Kevin, its you. Guess your mind eventually wandered here too," she said.

"Yeah."

"The throne of the Homage is missing, but why?" she said more to herself than him as she returned to observing the twin thrones. Kevin turned to Jekyll who once again had an angry expression. He grabbed my arm and dragged me towards Ciara whose hand he also grabbed.

"A portal opened up in front of us, "Why don't you ask the alpha of the generation before you?" he said angrily before throwing us through it.

…....…

My eyes fluttered open and right next to me was an angry looking Ciara. "What were you doing in my dreams?" she asked with a dangerous tone.

"I don't know how I got there, honestly. One moment I'm talking to Jekyll in a dream and the next thing I know we are in the throne room and so are you," I explained sincerely.

I watched her angry expression fade, "Oh sorry. Anyway good morning," she said.

"Good morning," I said back. She vanished immediately I had greeted her leaving me stunned. Wait, what just happened? It took a moment to register in my mind that she had just teleported after saying good morning. Shouldn't have been a big deal, should it?

….......…

The events that followed after Ciara's sudden departure all went in a haze until I reached school. I even had to jog to my locker to beat the bell. This was the first time I had ever been late to school. Rubbing a thin film of sweat from my brow I placed my head in the inside of my locker to catch a breath. Something wasn't right.

"Running late I see," I heard Kendall's voice from the outside of the locker.

"Kendall, when was the last time I was late to school?" I asked him.

"Well as a master of time, that is supposed to be impossible, but you already held a record for never arriving late and except for when you missed class when we were seven, you have never missed a class," he finished his report, " what's wrong Kevin?" he asked concern slipping into his voice.

"I'm just feeling a bit drowsy, thats all," I replied lazily, grabbing my books and closing my locker, "where's everyone?" I asked.

"Oh, they got tired of waiting and left to class. I was about to leave myself when you showed up," Kendall said. He knew there must have been a reason for his friend's drowsiness but Kevin did not look like he was in the mood of answering that question at the moment.

We found everyone in my math class clustered around Ciara's seat probably discussing the dream. I began to make my way to them when the bell rang for the start of lessons. I then dismissed the thought and took my seat as they also dispersed. I placed my head in my hands and found that more beads of sweat had replaced the ones I had wiped off my forehead earlier.

'What is with me, today?' I thought to myself little did I know that it was about to get a lot worse.