Of Sun & Moon (Midnight Guardian Series, Book 1)

by Bryna Butler

  ***

  Elsewhere, Keira was becoming increasingly impatient with her other best friend.

  “I don’t know.”

  Keira let out a long breath. She could feel her heart fall to her stomach. “Just forget it.”

  “Don’t be upset. I just…I need a minute,” Colby explained. He followed and was soon beside her again. “Why now?”

  Keira could feel her temper rise. Did he think this was just a whim, a crush, a jealous reaction? Maybe it was. She counted to ten slowly in her head and tried to give him the benefit of the doubt as she spoke. “Colby, I understand that you don’t feel the same, so forget it. Let’s just drop it.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Keira? Keira!” Nana yelled from the front porch.

  They looked up to see two strangers standing with Nana. She was standing between them with her arms around both of their waists, almost as if she were presenting them. The man to Nana’s left was tall and looked to be in his early thirties. Even under his navy sweater and khakis, he seemed to be very slim and muscular. He was ruggedly handsome with slightly tousled black hair and a bit of a five o’clock shadow. The woman to Nana's right was just as beautiful as the other stranger was handsome. Her long, shiny black hair was perfectly straight and trimmed to just below her collarbone. She looked to be roughly the same age as the man. Her long legs were clad in black dress pants and smartly topped with a red sweater set and delicate pearl necklace. The strangers’ huge, white smiles were distracting.

  “Keira, there are two people here who would like to speak with you,” Nana rang. “Goodbye Colby”.

  “Whatever they want to say to me, they can say in front of Colby.”

  “Colby, why don’t you go on home? I’m sure that Keira will call you later.”

  “Keira, maybe I should…” Colby tried to reason, but was cut off by Keira and her mounting temper.

  “No, he’s staying.”

  Now embarrassed, Nana dropped her arms from the couple and moved toward Keira. Her smile was fading. “Keira, I don’t think you understand,” she said through her teeth now gritted to sustain her grin.

  When Nana got close enough, Keira whispered, “Do you know these people? Why are you letting strangers in our home at a time like this?”

  “Let’s let them explain.” She nodded toward Colby. “Good night, I assure you that everything is fine. I’m sure that Keira will call you later to tell you all about it.”

  Colby looked to Keira. She nodded. So, he said a quick good night to Nana and continued down the path toward home. Nana wrapped her hands around Keira’s arm and dragged her to the porch. “Come on, kiddo, you’re finally going to get what you’ve always wanted.”

  Nana placed Keira directly in front of the couple for their inspection. “She’s lovely,” the woman gasped. She pulled her clasped hands to her mouth in awe. Now that she was close, Keira could see that the beautiful woman had been crying. Her eyes were still red and wet with tears.

  “She doesn’t even know who you are,” the man commented. He smirked and relaxed his stance, placing his hands in his pockets. “You’re probably creeping her out, Bianca”.

  Keira knew that name. A wave of recognition crossed her face. “Mom? Dad?”

  The woman stepped forward and embraced her so quickly that Keira did not even see her move. The man’s nonchalant expression broke and his eyes started to tear. “What you must think of us,” Bianca cried. “We have so much to talk about.”

  Nana ushered the reunited family inside. Her own eyes now tearing, she wiped them dry with a fresh tissue from her skirt pocket. The couple quickly sat down on the sofa. Nana pulled up a chair beside them. Keira was still in shock and could not move from the doorway. She would not take her eyes off them.

  “Please, sit with us. It’s been so long, too long” said the man that Keira now recognized as August Ryan or more appropriately, Dad.

  He patted the space between his position and his wife. Keira cautiously moved to them and sat slowly between them. “Why are you here?”

  Really, she wanted to ask, why are you so nice or why are you acting like you like me? She’d always dreamed of facing her parents, of telling them off for being so selfish. That was her reality, not this.

  Bianca started to sob. August reached behind Keira to stroke Bianca’s back in a soothing way. Nana interrupted, “Perhaps this discussion will be easier in the training room.”

  “Of course, the library,” Bianca lifted her head.

  The family moved down the hallway. Nana first, then Bianca and August, with Keira following. August lightened as he recognized the antique vanity in the darkened corner of Nana’s bedroom. He pushed the vanity mirror. It glowed with a brilliant white light. They paused and Bianca fidgeted with her sleeves. She took a deep breath and they entered the training room. Once all four were inside, they moved toward the first set of bookcases.

  Nana pulled out a step ladder and balanced on her tiptoes. From the top shelf, she pulled a book bound with a heavy red cover. The pages were edged in gold. As she pulled it from the shelf, she opened it to a bookmarked page and glided to the desk.

  “Keira, this is why we had to protect you,” Bianca said.

  Keira lost it. This was just the last straw. “Protect me. How dare you. I’ve never met you, now you show up out of the blue and say you’ve been protecting me…because of a book.”

  “Keira!” Nana warned.

  “No, she has every right to be upset with us.” Bianca looked desperately to August for help.

  “Keira, you are very special, we’ve always known that you are more than a guardian and now we believe that Bov knows it too.”

  “We never wanted to leave you. It was agony…” Bianca choked on her tears. “But we had to, to save you. He would have known that you existed and he would have…” her sobs completely took over.

  Keira’s throat tightened and she struggled to gulp a new breath. Her knees buckled, but August caught her before she hit the floor. Why did they send Colby away? She knew that she needed her solid friend now. This was more than she could bear.

  “This is what started it all, Keira,” August said pointing to a page in the book. “It’s a prophecy that has been handed down through many, many generations of guardians. It was written by a charge blessed with prophetic sight.”

  Keira stared at the words on the page. She struggled to see them clearly through her tear-drenched eyes. It read:

  A child born of sun and moon will

  impart a human gift to bring forth

  the fall of the house of Gammen.

  “Of sun and moon,” Keira read aloud. August’s eyes darted to Bianca, who again dropped her head sobbing.

  “We believe this prophecy is about you, Keira,” August said. “I am the moon, your mother is the sun.”

  “Right.” Keira clamped her hands over her head. “This is ridiculous.”

  August’s eyes darted back to Bianca. She wiped away her tears and lifted her head. She looked lovingly into August’s eyes then turned to Keira and brushed her hair from her face. “Your father is like the moon. He is a protector, just as the moon watches over the earth.” She sniffed and continued, “I’m like the sun, not a protector, not a guardian”.

  “But of great benefit to the world,” August resumed and took Bianca’s hand.

  It clicked. “A charge…His charge,” Keira suddenly understood. She grabbed her mother’s wrist and turned it to see a smashed copper coin dangling from a tiny bracelet. It had rough edges and was engraved with swirls and strange symbols circling the universal figure eight symbol for eternity.

  “I knew it,” Keira burst. “No humans in the training room, but you have an Atlantis token.”

  “Yes,” the two confirmed. Bianca pulled her sleeve back down nervously to cover up the trinket. August moved on to clarify. “You know that on this side of the barrier, time moves much, much slower. That’s where I lived, but I was young and curious. I wonder
ed what became of my first charge. So, I crossed the barrier to seek her, to see the future that she made possible. When I returned, instead of a child, I found a beautiful, smart, young woman…my other half. She had grown to become my perfect Bianca and it was love at first sight. We were married in secret.”

  Bianca picked up the story, “We were happy, making a life for ourselves among humans. We even started a family. Your father knew the prophecy. He knew that Gammen took it seriously. So, we took every precaution to make sure that no one would know that God and our love created a child. At least, that’s what we believed. But he came,” she stared into August’s eyes trying to find the strength to finish. “He was one of Gammen’s minions. An untalented fortuneteller, whose visions were more often wrong than right. He decided to check out his vision first hand before alerting the emperor.”

  “To Bov, incompetence is punishable by death,” August explained.

  “That is what saved you. August was able to destroy the mogdoc quickly. Still, we couldn’t be sure that there wouldn’t be others to follow, so we had to….sever…our connection.”

  Bianca dropped her head again in uncontrollable sobs. Like partners in a tag team match, August tagged back into the story, “We made it safe for you here; then we distanced ourselves by crossing the barrier and living on the other side. No one but Nana and your protectors would know that we ever had a child that could threaten Gammen’s reign.”

  Keira’s body relaxed. Finally! Something she could wrap her head around. There was so much that she couldn’t. “You sent me away because you thought Gammen would try to kill me to stop the prophecy?”

  “Yes, we sent you to hide and train with a wise, and powerful, old friend.” Keira turned to see August staring directly at Nana.

  “Yeah,” Keira nodded. “She’s trained me well. My first vox went smoothly. But…”

  “Your first vox!” August exclaimed. His formal attitude disintegrated and all that was left was pure giddiness. He was like a father, seeing his baby walk for the first time. He jumped up and clinched Keira’s shoulders. “I can’t believe it! My little girl, all grown up.”

  “Okay, Dad.”

  It was odd to use that word…Dad. She couldn’t help but notice how clumsily it dropped from her mouth. She hoped that the awkwardness was not apparent to him. Well, that’s not entirely true. She hoped that it caused him a little bit of guilt. Perhaps if she tried it again, “Dad, I just don’t think I’m ready to face Gammen. I don’t know anything about this human gift and I think Gammen took these two kids from school.”

  “It’s okay,” he assured her. “The traveler was watching over the party. He was able to get that girl off the street just after the party. Her family took her out of the country to a safe place. They’ll sort it out with the authorities when this is all over.”

  “What about Bobby?”

  “Unfortunately, we didn’t know about the boy until after he’d been taken. As for the prophecy, your human gift, it will become clear in time.”

  “I’m so tired of waiting.”

  Nana cleared her throat. “If I may interrupt, I sent you the message because I think the time is now.”

  Bianca asked, “What do you mean?”

  “The Sect is after your daughter and there’s this…” Nana closed the book. For the first time, Keira could see the cover. It was a luxurious, brilliant red with the title printed in golden script, The Hayes Prophecies.

  Bianca and August stared at Nana for the answer that Keira could see right before them.

  “I thought it was a coincidence. You and Colby are just friends. It’s not an uncommon last name,” Nana rushed to explain. Keira looked to her parents and momentarily relished the fact that she was not the one in the dark this time. Nana continued, “Now that we know your charge shares the same name, the same family, I have to think that it’s more than that.”

  This was enough information for August to grasp a conclusion. “You believe that your charge is a descendent of Cohen Hayes, the author of the prophecies,” he stated for everyone’s benefit. “Amazing.”

  “So what do I need to do?” asked Keira.

  August considered her question carefully. “Lay low. We’re not sure what this means. Go about your normal business. We can protect you in the meantime. The baby should be protected since mogdocs can’t sense charges, except at the exact hour when the vox is bestowed. That’s the only vulnerable time. It will be a few years before you’re called again. The second vox will be given when he loses his first tooth.”

  Nana asked, “What about Colby?”

  “Is that the cute boy you were with this afternoon?” Bianca chimed.

  “Yes, the Hayes boy,” Nana emphasized.

  “Wait, I’m confused again,” Bianca said. “He’s too old for the first vox.”

  “Two of them! Amazing,” August exclaimed. His eyes were opened wide and nearly all of his pearly white teeth were showing in his giddy smile. “I can’t help but think that our little darling is a bit of an over-achiever, Bianca. The prophecy asks her for one human and she’s already got two lined up.”

  “Stop that,” Bianca said as she playfully pushed August. “You’re embarrassing her.”

  “Okay, you’re being weird.”

  They silenced and settled into preparation mode. Keira retreated to a comfortable reading chair in the far corner of the training room as Nana and her parents began making defensive plans. Even from across the room, she couldn’t take her eyes off them. She reflected on the affectionate playfulness of her parents and could see why August chose the words, “my other half”. They seemed to truly be two halves of one, from their tag team storytelling to their constant, loving gaze on each other.

  Bianca strolled over to Keira and stood behind her. She leaned over and took Keira’s hair in her hands, stroking it gently, and pulling it back from her face. It felt good. “Mom?” Keira noted the peculiarity of saying the word aloud.

  “Yes, sweetheart?” Her voice was shaking. She was teetering at the brink of yet another round of sobs.

  “I have to know. You’re a charge, a great one, so…” The words were harder than she thought they would be, but Keira continued. “Were you able to change the world before you met Dad? Or did you two alter the master plan by falling in love?”

  Of course, what she really wanted to ask was if her birth destroyed her mother’s destiny.

  Bianca laughed gently. “Can’t you see how I’ve made this world better? Yes, Keira, I was able to make my contribution to change the world,” she said. “You are the contribution that I’m honored to have brought to the world. You are meant for great things, Keira. You will save the world.”

  Keira smiled and felt peace. She quickly drifted to sleep in her mother’s safe arms.