Original Souls (A World Apart #1) (64 page)

While staring into the boy's eyes, Sebastian began moving his lips slowly and purposefully. "There ... are ... very ... average spells one can employ to devalue a psychi
c’
s ability." He raised an eyebrow as if to exemplify his dominance over the circumstances between them. "Unless, of course, that psychic is as powerful as you..." He stopped,and yawned in Corinth's face. "As yo
u
… may be one day. But to my favorable knowledge, you have yet to accomplish that level of sophisticated mental gravity. The Nexus is your crutch, but your own psychic abilities, apart from the Nexus, are rather limited ... or so
I’
ve heard."

Corinth turned his head away from the vile man. That was about the only part of his body not hindered by straps. He wanted to see a lawyer if there were to be any further questions. But he knew that they had already deemed him guilty despite his certain innocence. Guilty of having something they wanted, which was certainly a crime to them.

<*>

Anvard and Lindle couldn't see a thing through their blindfolds. They knelt on a damp cobblestone floor, chained up to the wall. They both heard the clank of the barred cell doors opening. Footsteps dragged closer and closer. Someone removed the black cloths that covered their eyes. First Anvard, then Lindle. Lindle cringed on his knees. He kept his eyes closed. He didn't want to see what force snatched them up from the lake. Anvard, on the other hand, stared into the face of the gray-eyed fellow before him.

"Hello, Anvard!" The Imperativan man seemed over excited. Lindle's curiosity forced his eyes open.

"I don't suppose a jerk like you is here to help, are you?" Anvard knew the answer to his question, but he couldn't help but ask anyway.

"I
t’
s very nice to see you as well!" the chirper man retorted.

"Why are you Imperativans haunting me? I'm so far away from there, and yet the worst of you are here in Hyperborean."

"Oh, shut up, boy!" he shouted, and his words echoed throughout the hollowness of the structure they were confined in. "That was your worst quality back at the institution. You can't take a joke. Your own embarrassment is what got you kicked out of school. If you'd just let it go after your unnatural desires were unveiled, we would have stopped ridiculing you ... eventually
.
”

Lindle stared at the two locked in tense eye contact. The tension radiating from Anvard was ruthless. Lindle saw that glimpse into his temper when he thought that Corinth was at risk, because h
e’
d found out about his psychic abilities, but he had no idea of the history between these two though.

"What's going on?" Lindle asked with an uneasy frown.

"Nothing, really. I suppose Anvard is here because he's in love ... yet again!" He looked down at the two of them with an outright sense of superiority. "You sure do know how to pick them. You went from a troubled kid, to a kid whose mental instabilities have dragged you to death's door." He maniacally laughed with his mouth hanging wide open.

"Shut up!" Anvard shouted. "Just shut it, you animal!"

"Hum, that's an interesting assertion. Especially when considering the fact that you're the one on your knees, with a leash around your neck and wrists." He gestured to the thick metal chains attached to the clamps that held both boys at bay. He laughed again, but with a little more tact this time. Anvar
d’
s former ministrant from Imperativo straightened himself out. "Now look here, boy. I didn't come down here to be argued with."

"Could have fooled me!" Anvard said quickly.

The man straightened out his black tie. "You're making this rather difficult, but luckily for us both, I anticipated as much
.
” He then reached into his left pant pocket and pulled out a rusty looking skeleton key from a bygone era. First, he unlocked Lindl
e’
s restraints. Then he turned to Andy, twirling the key about like a gloating savior. He smirked as he undid the restraints around his neck and wrists.

They both rubbed their arms and necks, trying to get the blood flowing again. They were both wounded from the coaster ride. Lindle could barely see out of his eye that was caught by a shard of glass earlier. And Andy just ached all over.

"Why are you doing this?" an uncertain looking Anvard questioned.

"Why does anyone do anything, my boy?"

"Sen. Cade, please!" Anvard pleaded, still as polite as ever for calling Cade by his title first. "We have no idea what's going on here," he continued to beg for the man to not speak in riddles, for once.

"And here we are, once again. Your lacking sense of humor has placed you in the dark. If you'd only but wait a mere minute, I would have made my point clear. My aforementioned question still stands." His snarky attitude about this whole scenario made Anvard want to smash his head in. But that wouldn't have helped one bit. So, Andy let him have things his way, for now. "Why does anyone ... do anything?" he asked again.

Lindle answered quickly. "Because they must!"

Cade looked to him with a glint of hope in his eyes. "No, that's not the reason, but that is a logical answer. Thank you for at least attempting to participate," he told Lindle while looking to Anvard. Andy rolled his eyes in response to that quip. "Well, the pure reasoning for why one does anything is based solely on their own benefit from the toppling of the status quo. If you two are set free, I will be rewarded, greatly!" He exaggerated the point with his eyes and rubbed his hands together with the key still fixed between them.

Neither understood his reasoning, but they were glad to be free. "Is there a catch?" Anvard asked suspiciously.

"Yes, but of course. There always is. Isn't there?" Cade turned and began walking out of the small cell, onto the gray and silver cobblestones. The silver pixie dust shined brighter than ever. The hallway he stood in had very reflective shards of glass covering the walls as high as the eye could see. Anvard, with Lindle following, stepped out after him. He looked up at the high and narrow divide between the wall and the roof of the cell. The cell was an outcrop that hung over their heads, but just outside of it there was no ceiling to be seen. Just the ever-extending glass covered wall growing tall up into the immense darkness that posed as a ceiling without definition.

"Where are we?" Lindle was mystified by his surroundings.

"One question at a time, please!" Cade threw up a lone finger to silence him. "Now, about the catch. I need you to do something that I've never witnessed a teenager do before," he paused for their reaction.

Anvard sighed and looked around. But still asked, "and what is that, Sen. Cade.?" Andy couldn't believe the man was dragging this out like this.

"There you go! Now you're getting involved, Andy. Okay, so, what I need you to do is very difficult for ones of your age group to do," he built up his tone with each word. "I need yo
u—
to listen!" That was his grand spectrum. He wanted their undivided attention, so they would fully understand what he was going to reveal to them. Cade expected they'd be offended, but neither of them flinched.

Even Lindle was fed up and just wanted to move on. He couldn't believe how much grownups changed over time. He could tell that Cade wasn't very old. No more than thirty-five-years old, and yet he seemed to have completely lost touch with what i
t’
s like to be a kid.

"All right then," Cade embarrassingly turned to the side, "I want you to grasp a very simple idea. Very simple. It is that;
hope is not real
. It is not based in reality, it has no finite point. I bid you not to believe in what you hope, like so many do. I would prefer that you
act on what you know
. It will carry you farther in all of this, because fate cannot be broken or reformed, unlike your friend Corinth is destined to believe."

"Well, if Corinth believes in it then so do I! His hop
e—
will be my belief system!" said Anvard firmly.

"Ha!" Cade huffed with a laugh. "Didn't you say something similar about that boy from my home World?" Cade could barely contain the rupture of giggles spilling out from him. "Yes, I believe you did. You said that; 'his trust, is your confidence.' Pretty words from the pretty boy of Lirio." He looked at Anvard disdainfully. Cade didn't care that Andy liked boys, he just didn't like Andy. A sensitive athlete with the looks of an Adonis. Cade didn't live out a childhood of grandeur, as does Anvard. He reveled in knocking the boy down a few pegs. "May I ask you, Anvard, did you say that phrase before or after he betrayed you? Ha-ha-ha!" He laughed, but Anvard was over the whole thing. He didn't have time to care about his former Levantarse coach's jokes. The coach they secretly called; Señor Fancy-pants, because he wasn't nearly as rugged as the athletes he trained. He was over it all, he just wanted to find Corinth.

"If that's all, we'll be going." Anvard turned and walked in the opposite direction down the narrow hall tightly pressed up against the rocky walls.

"Please, do go," Cade said evenly. "Help your boyfriend, if you still can."

"Wait, we need to know where we are," Lindle insisted.

Anvard turned back. "Don't bother, Curly. He's not really trying to help us."

"Marry, marry, oh how contrary!" he rhymed like a jester. "My primary goal for this evening is to ensure your success. That's why
I’
ve salvaged this from that soaking wet knapsack of yours, Lindelle."

"Yeah it's, LINDLE."

"I honestly don't care very much, boy," Cade admitted coldly. "I heard your ministrant mention your scornful title upstairs."

"Our teachers are here?" Anvard asked quickly.

"One question at a time. Tha
t’
s the rule." Cade's mischievous smiling face sent chills down both their spines. He looked dangerous in a playfully sadistic way.

"You can answer the other question, if you like," Lindle said, because he was sure that the map Cade held up in his hand would tell them exactly where they were.

"All right then, on your request ... Lindsey." He'd probably never get it right. "Your school ministrant, Sen. Lilith, I think that's what she goes by while at your school. Well, anyway, she's very far upstairs on the top level. Ready to perform the transfer between Andy's boyfriend and the Chancellor of Draconia."

Anvard ran up to Cade, scarring the delicate man slightly. Instead of any funny business, he just grabbed the map from out of his hand. Then took off down the corridor in the opposite direction. Lindle followed behind closely, and then decided to turn back to a smirking Cade.

"Thank you!" he hollered back. Cade waved them on encouragingly, and Anvard punched Lindle in the shoulder.

"You don't thank your enemies!" Anvard yelled in a muffled tone.

"But he helped us!" Lindle seemed upset by Anvard's punch. He rubbed his arm while they jogged away.

"If you trust me even one bit, you'll believe me when I say that he's an enemy. No matter how much he pretends to help. He even admitted it himself. This isn't to help us, it's for his own benefit in the long run."

"Okay." Lindle placed his trust in Anvard as best he could.

<*>

"Open it!!!" Sebastian had finally lost his cool. His patience for Corinth's defiant ways had been tested too long already.

"Sebastian," Lilith called, "you mustn't wake the beast, as it were. The boy has built courage from the little obstacle course we designed for his way over here, but he's still a meager child."

He turned his attention to Sen. Lilith, as Corinth knew her to be called. She was leaning inward to his ear and covering her mouth. She whispered, so that Corinth wouldn't be able to hear.

"How good are you at blocking psychics?" he growled at her.

"Well, I'm not nearly as trained as you bu
t—
"