by Oxford, Rain
I blinked. “What is a Tibbit?”
He smiled. “Tibbit is my pet. He is a bird, a cray, which is similar to your world’s hawk.”
“How do you know of my world?”
“I never travel to a world without knowing what to expect. I am several thousand years old; I have had enough time to learn about your world. But mostly because I was very close to the Guardian of Earth.”
Several thousand years old. So he was alive when Mr. Luis was a kid. At least the centuries had been better to Edward. “And here I was guessing late hundreds. What about marriage? It has to be hard to stay married forever. I’m talking only about you.”
“The Guardians are encouraged have children, especially on other worlds, to mix blood. Only Guardians are immortal, but the people of my world live longer than those of Earth. Typical marriage on my world is the same as yours, except that it only lasts a certain amount of time, which is about twenty years, and there is no divorce.”
“So, you said that magic is used openly on your world?”
“Yes. It’s even respected. Many wizards here on Earth used their powers openly.”
“How come you look human?”
“Most of the worlds have a similar form. After many experiments, the gods have found this form to be very efficient. In fact, my world has used this form for longer than yours. However, my species’ bodies are more adapted to my world. We are slightly denser than humans, so we’re heavier. We have better survival instincts and we can go longer without food or water. The average lifespan of people on my world is a hundred years. Of course, a powerful wizard who uses his or her magic wisely can live for several hundreds of years. And, there are other small differences.”
“So your world is harsher?”
“No, we just have different threats. We don’t have the same technology so we must deal without its protection, and we usually deal by means of magic. At least the people who practice do. We don’t have nuclear weapons. We have machines that can destroy the sun, but we don’t use them on ourselves.”
“What about religion?”
“It exists. Everyone knows about the gods and other worlds, but not the books. They believe people can travel only with help from the gods. Religion is not so important anymore on my world, which is one of the reasons there’s much less war. However, much of our customs are based on the old religions.”
“Are there continents and countries on your world?”
“No, not like yours. There are eight great islands, each of which has a king. There is no citizenship or land tax, except for Mokii, but each island has its own means of collecting funds for things like schools. My world is slightly larger than yours and there’s much more land, but also a lot fewer people. The islands Canjii and Anoshii are both unsuitable for growing food, so Anoshii is mostly for marketing and city living. Magic is outlawed in most areas of Anoshii. Canjii is used mostly for imprisonment and biological experiments. Canjii is a good place to avoid.”
“That’s real smart: Keep the biologically harmful stuff and the bad people away from everyone else. Where do you live?”
“Shomodii. It is less populated than the other islands because the weather is very unpredictable and it has more wizards, who all need a lot more personal space.
“How do you know English? Even contractions?”
“I’ve had plenty of time to learn.”
“And germs? How come my planet’s germs don’t kill you?”
He just grinned again. “Do you think the gods would be incompetent enough to let that happen?” He sat back suddenly; I realized we had both been leaning forward.
“What about your atmosphere?”
“The atmospheres on all the worlds are much the same, except for Enep, Mulo, and Dios. Your atmosphere is dryer, has much more pollution, and is thinner than mine, but they have relatively the same ingredients. Don’t worry about it, you’d adapt. There are three worlds on which people have to live underground for one reason or another.”
“Tell me truthfully, do you want me to be your apprentice?”
He frowned. “The book has---”
“I know what the book wants. I want to know what you want,” I said.
Edward sighed. When he had an expression of extreme concentration on his face for about three minutes, I started to doubt myself. It occurred to me that he hadn’t even considered if he really wanted to be my mentor. I checked my watch and was shocked to realize I had only known him for a few hours.
And yet, I was taking in everything he said as if I believed it, when none of it made any sense. Magic doesn’t exist, aliens that look like humans sure as hell don’t exist, and Dorian was going to be pissed if I didn’t get home and feed him soon. But the thought of getting away to a new world was fun, and I always suspected that magic did exist. It often seemed that weird things happened for my benefit, or went nuts when I got angry. Maybe I just wanted to believe it all.
Before Edward could make up his mind, Jean came back in, sat down at the table, and smiled brightly. “Sorry about that.” She frowned a little at Edward’s hamburger. “Are you not hungry?”
“No, not really.” He stood again. “It was nice to meet you, but I need to be leaving.” He touched his bag as if to be sure and looked at me. “Are you coming?”
I knew he was really asking if I was going to sign the book. I grinned. “Do you want me to come?” He awarded me with an irritated stare. Maybe it wasn’t so wise to tick off my possible future mentor.
I stood up and followed him out, waving to Jean, who was eating Edward’s untouched hamburger. I probably should have given her a better farewell, seeing as how I didn’t know how long it would be before I saw her again… but she might have thought it was a trick to get her food, resulting in a violent protest. Getting between Jean and food was something a person only did once.
When we were outside, Edward turned to me. The moonlight behind him cast an eerie outline around him and blanketed his face in shadow. “My last apprentice was a few years younger than you. I looked forward to teaching him until I found he was frightfully boring and lacked the basics of creativity. Sure, he did everything I told him and practiced his heart out, but he couldn’t adapt. He couldn’t take one thing he learned and apply it to something else.”
“Where is he now?”
“He’s what you would call a lawyer.” He turned away and started walking back to the campus. “It didn’t work out. As much as I wanted to teach him, I wasn’t able to; he never trusted me, and I soon realized I would never trust him. He had a different way of looking at things, and eventually decided he didn’t like the way I was teaching him. So, you should understand that I am hesitant to take on a new apprentice. However, my other apprentices were all chosen by my decision alone; not one as a new Guardian.”
“Well, I can’t promise you I won’t be dull, and I’m about as lazy as they come. I’m also sarcastic, irritable in the mornings, and I’m pretty much an accident waiting to happen. But, I’m not gonna go all Darth Vader on you. At least I don’t think I will. Power corrupts absolutely, which is bad if you’re absolutely powerless.”
Edward stopped dead, suddenly rigid, and I realized that we were completely alone; nobody and no cars were in sight. In Houston, there was always someone around. The only noise was the wind and a distant car alarm. “We need to leave.” His voice was very low.
“They’re here, aren’t they?” I asked quietly.
He nodded. “They’re already hunting down the scent.”
“The people who’ve been around me? Like…” My blood ran cold. Vivian. “My girlfriend. They’ll kill her.”
“Yes.” He was pulling out my book and I stepped back. “There’s no more time to decide. Write your name or I’ll leave,” he warned, clearly annoyed by my lack of cooperation.
“I will accept it.” My voice was softer and shakier than I was comfortable with. He held out the book, but I didn’t take it. “When my girlfriend is safe. I accept it and it chose me,
so you can’t take it. You have to help me by helping Vivian.”
His growl made me shiver. “You would be endangering the book.”
“I would be saving Vivian!”
“It is the sacrifice of a few humans for the lives of billions.”
“It would be the sacrifice of innocent humans who didn’t deserve to be endangered in the first place! Life involves risks. Sometimes the safe way is the wrong way. Got to stick up for the little guy. Any of this getting through to you?!” I thought he was going to melt me with his glare, but when he shoved the book back into his bag, I saw a hint of humor hidden deep in his cold eyes.
“You’re going to be a stubborn pain, aren’t you? If we go to your girlfriend, and they come, they can see us leave. Maybe they wouldn’t see where we go. They would have no reason to kill your girlfriend.”
“No reason? That doesn’t mean they won’t!” I said. He sighed but didn’t deny it. “I’m not signing the book before she’s safe. There’d be nothing to stop you from dragging me off without making sure Vi’s safe.”
“You don’t trust me?”
“I have no reason to,” I said. He didn’t look angry or amused, he simply looked thoughtful. “Maybe I will someday, and I can see how that would make it difficult for me to be your apprentice, but I can’t just blindly trust you when I only met you a few hours ago.”
“Fine. Then how do you suggest we save your girlfriend?”
“We fight them. As soon as they’re done in, we take off to your planet. By the time the big bad god sends more goons to hunt the book, Vivian wouldn’t smell like me. But… If the bad guy is a god, why does he even need to send his servants to get us? Shouldn’t he know what we’re going to do already?”
“The books are protected from him by the other gods. He can’t see where the books are or who they’re with. My guess is that whatever god-evading power that allows the servants to cross the worlds, doesn’t work for someone so powerful.”
Suddenly, I realized what had been bugging my subconscious.
“Wait, if the book I sign is the one from Earth, and the book is a portal to Earth, wouldn’t that… like… do nothing?” I asked. He grinned at me, seemingly proud. “You knew that, you just wanted to see if I could figure it out.”
“You will also have to sign my book. You are quick at spotting holes in my information. That is a very good quality to have as a Guardian.”
“So, are you testing me?” I asked, sounding more shocked than I was. We were off to a great start; mistrust and deception. Oh, hell, I’m recreating the relationship I had with Mother.
“I need to know as much as I can about how you think as well as all your talents and faults. As your mentor, I will always be testing you.”
What fun. “You gave me fair warning that the book is dangerous, so I’m telling you now to think hard about this. I have terrible luck. I’m very sarcastic and I get bored easily. Mistakes happen when I get bored. If you don’t want me as your apprentice, I won’t accept the book. You can find a different Guardian, but help my girlfriend while you decide. How do we kill these things? Magic?”
“It will take more than magic to kill them. We need weapons and a plan. And I’m limited with my magic on this world. Every practitioner has a world or two that is not suitable to their magic needs. This world just doesn’t fit right for me. Its magical energy is too… thin and delicate. The beasts are very strong, but I can probably destroy one even on this world in a fair fight.”
“You don’t sound so sure.”
“Overconfidence is not a virtue.”
“So your magic is not as strong as it usually is, you think you might possibly be able to take out one, and we must fight three? Well, then, there’s nothing to worry about.” I wondered if he understood my sarcasm, but his expression was unreadable. “Do they have any weaknesses?”
“In the time that I hunted them, they fought nothing, so I don’t know. If there was a storm, I could draw lightning. Most beasts of magic are weak to lightning.”
I gazed up at the clear night sky. “Any minute now,” I said. When standing next to an alien, anything is possible.
Edward looked up. “Whatever we do, we must do it now.”
Chapter 2
Vivian lived with her father, three sisters, and two brothers in a big house near the university. Her father wasn’t “emotionally stable” enough to continue working after his third wife, the mother of Vivian’s twin sisters, died. Unfortunately, his disability check didn’t take care of the bills, so as the oldest, Vivian had to work and help him take care of her siblings.
Vivian’s house was two stories and made of brick, but it still managed to look like it was coming down any day. In her driveway there was an old, blotched pink Thunderbird that was once rose red.
“Why are we hiding here?” Edward asked me. He was very good at whispering so his voice didn’t carry. We were hiding in the bushes next to her house. I wasn’t worried about getting caught, because anyone who saw us would just assume us to be perverts.
“I don’t want to come in contact with her or draw them closer to her, but I need to see that she’s safe.”
“There is no scent of blood,” Edward assured me.
Stupid vampire alien; all knowing alien with your books and magic. “Just hold your horses.” The porch light came on and Cooper, the oldest brother at thirteen, pulled a black plastic trash bag out to the dumpster on the street corner. Clearly, they hadn’t met any evil monsters from another world. When Cooper went back into the house, I stood.
“Would it be dangerous to see her again, with the monsters so close?”
“Yes.”
“What about after they’re dead?”
“Any contact would reinforce your scent on her, so yes. If you want her to be safe, you mustn’t come in contact with her again, just in case more of these beasts are sent to find the book. I also suggest that we leave this place now. Wherever we go, we’re drawing them to us; they can smell both your book and mine,” he said.
I nodded and started back down the street. “How long before they find us?”
“That depends on how much we confuse our tracks. If we walk aimlessly around, it’ll be more difficult for them.”
“And if we just stay in one place? Say, if we stop right here?”
“Then it’ll be an hour at the most.”
“Okay. There’s a skateboard park down this street. If we draw them there, people won’t get in the way. We can think of a plan and hope to the gods it rains. Wait, can we ask the gods to make it storm?”
A sour look appeared on Edward’s face. “We must never ask for favors, only receive them gratefully when provided,” he said. I rolled my eyes. Typical god. “If the god of this world wants it to storm, it will. I could make it storm myself on my world, but the weather is more stable here and I am not so…”
“I get it.” We walked for a moment in silence while we both wondered what we would do.
“I would like you to reconsider signing your book now.”
I grimaced. “We’ve already talked about this. Vivian first.”
“Yes, I understand that you want your girlfriend to be safe before you leave, but you’ve already realized that if you sign your book, you still can’t leave. On the other hand, you will become the Guardian and your power will become much stronger. Would you, for the sake of having the power to fight them, sign your book now, and my book afterwards?”
I thought quickly. “I don’t know any magic, so it wouldn’t do any good.”
“Not correct. You may not know how to control magic, but it responds to your emotions and strong will,” he said.
We arrived at the park, where a ten-foot-tall fence blocked our path. The huge park was broken into four sections; the walking trails, the public pool, sports activities, and the junior center. The city was in the process of building ramps and half pipes for the daring, idiotic boys who wanted to show their friends how much they could do before they busted their sk
ulls in. The fenced in sports section had been locked down for several months due to construction on the tennis court and the skateboard ramp, so I didn’t bother to go to the gate. While it was only mildly bothersome, I hoped it would give us the space and privacy we needed.
I started to climb and didn’t pay Edward any attention until I dropped to the other side. He hadn’t started climbing. “This is the park. You have to go over this fence. You know, to get over here.”
He crouched slightly and then jumped. He only touched the gate once going up and landed on his feet beside me.
I gaped at him and he grinned. “You’re just showing off.”
“If I were, you would not have seen me jump. Consider signing your book.”
“When I do, you won’t have any more time to decide if you really want me as your apprentice. Are you so adamant about me signing that book because you think it’ll help me fight, or because you don’t trust me? If I sign my name, I’m committed to it and I can’t back out of it when Vivian is safe.”
His expression was hard. “That has crossed my mind, but if you were to stay, Vretial would send more beasts or servants and, chances are, you will still smell a little like the book. That means you would still be in danger. If anything, it would help to draw them away from the books. No, the reason I want you to sign the book is because you are unconsciously holding back a lot of power and with the powers of a Guardian, even an untrained one, you could be a great asset in fighting.”
“Would I be immortal?”
“Yes,” he said.
I nodded to myself. Immortality. Eternal life. So far, I’d lived through three things: my mother, school, and the fast-food industry. Mother took my soul, school took my childhood, and french-fries took my hope for a better future. That’s what life is. Do I want eternal life? I peered up at the clear sky. The full moon lit up the concrete and there were several stars visible despite the town lights. “What about Vivian? Will I ever be able to see her again?”