Chapter 6: Seriously
Kohl
I had finally told her what I was and identified Sy’s lackeys and she laughed in my face and started walking away. This was not how I expected her to take it. Some screaming, maybe running but after everything she had just seen from my abilities to hers, she still thought I was the crazy one.
“Jayde.” I called after her. She stopped and turned around.
“Kohl, I don’t know what kind of prank you guys are pulling, but I’m out.” I took a few long strides to catch up with her as Antonio continued to try and get Arthur the Sleaze out of my hex.
“It’s not a joke everything you told me yesterday is true…Okay some of it is true. I’m one of them and so are you.” I said hoping she started putting everything together, but instead the look she gave me said she thought I was completely insane.
“Are you crazy, Kohl? Do you see my forehead? Do you see fins?” She said heatedly.
“We don’t necessarily always have telltale signs like the legends say. That’s only when we get sloppy.”
“Sloppy?” She shrilled still walking at a much faster pace now past her house.
“It is required of us to transform or seek out water occasionally to avoid signs of fishyness.” She stopped and listened to me like something was telling her it was true. “If we don’t we develop those telltale signs from legends.”
“If what you say is true, why don’t I have any tell tale signs?” She retorted still showing her anger and the fact that she didn’t believe a word I had said.
“You just turned eighteen today. The headaches you are having are only the beginning.” I said as gently as I could. I wish I could tell if she believed me or not but it was hard to read her when she was this angry. Hell, I wasn’t sure she knew what she was feeling.
“What else will happen?” She asked still every bit as guarded, but she started walking beside me at a reasonable pace.
“An unquenchable thirst, stomach cramps, chills…”
“And the cure?”
“Transformation.”
“How do you know I’m like you?” She really was sharper than I gave her credit for. She accepted everything I said and snapped back with a question that gave her the most information.
“Jayde, I’ve been looking for you since I started my reign and before that my uncle has spent the last fourteen years looking for you. I knew it was you the second I found you. Your bracelet was the final confirmation.”
“Why?”
“You’re drawn to parties like a moth to a flame, you remember that from the stories? You surround yourself with boys because everywhere you turn they are always around you.” I knew she didn’t want to believe it I could tell as she thought back trying to find something, anything to negate what I was saying. “It’s very hard for you to keep your male friends from being just friends, besides Julio, but if you haven’t noticed I think he’s very in love with you, too.”
“No, you’re wrong.” She said started to get red spots of anger blemishing her normally perfect caramel complexion.
“Jayde, it all adds up. You’re adopted, you’re wild, even when you wish you weren’t, your inner control over the opposite sex, your headache went away when you drank water, you only feel whole when you’re swimming. It all adds up.” The tears were welling in her eyes, but she was trying not to cry.
“Tell me you’re lying.” She begged, grabbing my hand in a last hope I’d say I was joking. I knew it was weak of me but I wrapped my arms around her as she started to cry.
“I’m not, but we have more pressing matters, Jayde.”
“Arthur and Antonio work for Sy. He’s the ruler of Encante-South and he wants to get his hands on you too.”
“Why am I so special?” She sobbed and I squeezed her tightly and let her go.
“Because you’re the end of the war.” I said as I started to pull her along so we could get to the river before the hex wore off. “I have to get you to Encante-North to make sure you’re safe.”
She stopped and pulled out of my grasp. “How do I know you’re not the bad guy?”
“I’ve known you two days, I’ve never lied, I will tell you everything once we get to Encante-North and if you don’t support my cause you are free to come back here or go to Sy. I have to warn you that Sy may not be as easygoing as I am, but in the end it’s your choice.”
“What about my family?” She asked, looking back at her house and still not moving when we needed to be in the water already.
“You can call them and say goodbye or tell them you ran away. You can visit when it’s safe.” Her green eyes again welled with unshed tears.
“Will they be safe?”
“They don’t know anything about this so yes.”
She nodded and continued with me to the river. Jayde was really handling this situation a lot better than I thought she would.
We reached the river in record time. I started to strip off most of what I was wearing but Jayde just stood there staring at the water.
Damn, it was her first transformation, I needed to talk her through it fast.
“Okay, Jayde, to transform you have to really focus.”
“I want to call my parents first.” She said defiantly.
I handed her my cell phone not even bothering to argue.
Jayde
Kohl handed me his phone without another word. I couldn’t even stop my head from spiraling with everything I learned. I dialed my number into the phone with minimal shaking. Kohl noticed, but didn’t say a word he seemed agitated but this was my chance to tell my parents and run. That’s what I had been planning, go to the river let him get in and run off. Only problem was he was waiting for me to get in the water, first.
I dialed the number and it went to my mother’s voicemail. “Hi mom, it’s Jayde. The party is going great afterwards I’m heading out with Kohl and a few other people. See you when I get back. Bye. I love you guys.” I said and quickly hung up the phone. Kohl stopped pacing and came towards me.
“All set?” I nodded and avoided looking at his barely clothed body, and focusing on the point that he was kidnapping me. “We are going in the water, get undressed.”
“I’ll go in like this,” I said hoping he’d drop the issue.
“It will be hard to morph with a heavy dress on.” he said again not even bothering to argue. I slid out of my dress and was left in my new underwear and bra.
“It really is you.” He said for the first time with a sincere smile.
“How do you know?” I asked confused. He lifted my arm and showed me my birthmark. Oddly, enough it looked like an outline of a dolphin, something I never put together until now. “So?”
He lifted his arm to show his side and he had the exact same mark. “It’s a sign of royalty.” He said with a typical Kohl slight smile. I didn’t even want to start wrapping my brain around my royal birthmark.
“Get in the river, Antonio and Arthur should be close now.”
“Aren’t there piranhas?” I asked not ready to lose a limb.
“They won’t bother you.” He responded matter of factly.
I looked at my dress longingly, I still was hoping to get a chance to run so I did as he said and stepped into the water but something else happened.
The world seemed to tilt and everything snapped into place. All the impracticalness of the situation seemed perfectly reasonable now. My thoughts focused on the fact that I had something in me that only made sense in the water. Kohl got into the water behind me.
“Do you remember when you stopped the fights?” I nodded. “What did you feel?”
“Angry, frustrated, confused,” I said.
“Okay, focus all your confused emotions into transforming.”
“How?”
I seemed to have gotten him with that one. He had to stop and think.
“Okay, think about swimming. Being completely at peace and free.” He said it into my ear no mor
e than a whisper. If this had happened yesterday I would have been swooning with everything I thought I felt for Kohl. Now, I wish he would step back and just get on with this lesson. I closed my eyes trying to listen to what he had said, but nothing felt different. “Think about transforming.” He said again this time from beside me.
“Wouldn’t it be easier if you showed me?” I asked. He looked at me like I’d grown another head.
“It wouldn’t help you. Ninety percent of transforming is mental, you won’t be able to see what I am thinking when I begin to transform.” I sighed and he told me to focus yet again.
“Jayde!” Antonio shouted running through the small bit of rainforest we had come in through a few minutes before. “Get away from him.”
“We need to go now!” Kohl said as he grabbed my hand and walked further into the river. I thought about all the animals that were rumored to be in this river.
“Don’t be nervous, nothing will happen just morph we need to leave, Jayde.” I turned around again seeing Antonio and his big lackey racing towards the river after us. They were stripping down as quickly as possible. “Jayde, focus.” Kohl said. I nodded and despite my confusing feelings for Kohl, something told me I was safer with him than I would be with Antonio. I closed my eyes and fell.