"But that's not fair!" Corinth shouted like a brat. He couldn't believe what he just heard. Why had no one informed the compet.i.tors about all this? Neither he nor Emmy knew. He wondered if everyone else were already up to speed or just as clueless as he was."Somebody might have had a shot if you gave it to them." Corinth didn't like the thought that Lindle got to skip all the preliminary matches and start at the end.

"What...?" Lindle questioned sarcastically."Are you scared to face me?" His timid disposition of earlier had completely disappeared. He looked at Corinth from across the table with an absolutely firm composure.

"Corinth, I understand your doubts about my decision making process." Sena. Mira stepped down from the makeshift stage walking toward Corinth. He didn't see Sena. Hendrix, he figured she had left at some point while he wasn't paying attention. "I was trying to help others like you. If you had faced Lindle in the earlier stages of the tournament you would have been unfairly knocked out because of his high ranking."

Her striking gray eyes looked different to him now that he knew that she was the reason Anvard was hurt back at his old school. He didn't see her the same. He was sort of thankful about the circ.u.mstances since he wouldn't have met Andy otherwise. But she hurt his friend, and he didn't like that thought anymore than Emmy did. Though he wanted to be mad at her, he realized that she held a good point. Many kids would have been auto-ousted. Not able to show their full potential against other amateurs, because Lindle is no amateur.

"Okay, I'll go with it," he tried to sound p.i.s.sed for Emmy and Anvard's sake. They were some of the only spectators left. It was late and everyone began clearing out. Not just the sour losers anymore. Really, nearly all that were watching in the chairs setup for an audience had gone back to their dorms.

"You jealous at all?" Andy nudged his sister playfully.

"No, I'm mad!" she said quickly.

"Why?" he frowned curiously.

"Aren't you?" she retorted with cat-like reflexes. "Why is she here? Hasn't she done enough already?" the volume of her voice rising from word to word.

"Calm down." He looked around to see if any of the few stragglers left had noticed them. The coast was clear. "You can't let people get you so upset. She's just a lady. A small-minded lady, who even had the courage to admit her mistake when she noticed it. We can't hate her forever," he tried reasoning with the little blush-eyed beauty.

She sat next to him with her arms folded. The olive hue of her face getting redder and redder as she tightened her brow. She tried her best to suppress the rage that was becoming a bit of an issue since-they left Imperativo. She felt perpetually angry over the circ.u.mstances surrounding her brother's expulsion. But she didn't quite know why. She was much happier at Aurora Boreal, still the fits came whenever she'd think about what happened back in that wretched World. She turned to him with a stormy att.i.tude brewing behind her pink eyes. "You'd call someone like that courageous? You need to find out what side of these social debates you're on! And quick!"

"You jump to the end result too quick, I'd say. People don't change overnight. Even if you force their hand, their hearts are, and will be, ever still the same." He touched her hand gently and looked deep into her eyes. She calmed down just a little. "You know, when you used that Annihilate spell back at the Pavilion, I wanted to kill you?"

"What?" she barely remembered what happened that night. She tried to push all of it out of her mind. As she usually did with uncomfortable situations. It was such a scary night for such a young girl.

"I told you guys not to use lethal magik, but of course, you did it anyway. You could have used so many spells, but you let anger almost make you a killer."

That last word hit her hard. "I'm no killer!" She touched her hand to her chest like a damsel in distress.

"Yeah, you're not because I stopped you. You can't let evil people turn you into an evil person. That's what they want anyway. They want to spread their ideas. They want to be heard and in charge of people, because they most likely can't control themselves. That's why they force people to live the way they see fit. Even though most of them break all of their own rules at one point or another. You have to stop allowing other people's actions to dictate your own. Stay fresh with your ideas. If you're so certain of something that you don't even question it from time to time, then you have a closed mind. Just like Sena. Mira did." Him comparing her to that witch really opened her eyes. "Don't shut down your brain activity like that ever again, okay? 'Cause you're way too young to be a murderer." He smiled at her with that puppy dog look sweeping over his youthful face.

She couldn't manage to give one back. She just put her head up against his shoulder, and watched Corinth try to keep this from being the fastest ever recorded beat down. Still, a peculiar thought trundled into her mind, as she gazed at the two remaining compet.i.tors engaged in an enthralling monster trading card battle. She then looked up to her older brother while leaning -up against him in the empty seated audience."Is there ever an appropriate age to become a -'murderer?'" she asked, with a grin.

"Shut up and watch Corinth lose," Andy chirped in response, with a grin matching her own.

Chapter 19:.

Lessons In Session

May 22, 1002 ~ Daylight Corinth once again found himself dreaming of a dark green sky and a coaster up high. He jumped again from the high-speed cart, and again it came plummeting down with him. He twisted and turned as he fell through an endless sky. The dragon in the distance seemed to be closing in on him and the two shadowed figures that surrounded him. They descended toward the water as individuals, and then magikally shot back up into the sky as a trio. A trio set one in the same.

He could barely see through the dense fog clouds. They almost looked like smoke and smog, they were just so thick. He thought he made out an image of someone he knew. It looked like Walker. Walker was in the clouds holding something in his hand. It appeared to be the green dog whistle he'd given Corinth weeks ago. The winds carried the cloudy shape of Walker closer and closer, until the dragon breathed a single breath of white fire on him, knocking him out of the sky. Corinth screamed out, and then covered his eyes as the shadow figures tightened their circle around him. They pulled in close, but he fought them off as best he could. One grabbed at the back his neck, his arms, and his legs. It tried to carry him away through the clouds over the waters below.

Then the oddly shaped metallic dragon unexpectedly opened up its large mouth in front of him. It was drastically closer than it had been only moments ago. It shot a white stream of fire into Corinth's face. The shadows around him started to fade, as his face began melting away. He pleaded with the beast to no avail.

Then like a shooting star, another figure in white rushed down from the heavens above and below all at once. He couldn't tell what direction was what. He lost that mysterious sense of awareness to all things that he usually possessed. The mysterious figure came between him and the dragon, without recognition of fear. The blinding figure possessed eyes of fire encased in crystal spheres, standing beside the small boy with the turquoise-colored eye of the sky, which held all things in sight. Then the crystal and fire-eyed figure shined its light so bright that everything went white.

Next Corinth knew... he explosively woke up in his bed covered in another drenching sweat.

His breaths, hard. Harder than he ever remembered. Like Emma kept reminding him, he isn't very athletic. So he never worked up much of sweat doing anything too active. But these dreams were becoming more and more vivid, turning into marathons of their own sort. The voice not to mention. He could hear the Nexus plotting inside his head, just as well as it heard him thinking his thoughts and everyone around him thinking their thoughts. The Nexus was taking a ma.s.sive toll on his body, heart, and certainly his mind.

I gently whispered inside his mind. "Don't be afraid, Corinth. I can protect you from the storms of tomorrow." But it was no use.

He rolled out of bed onto the floor screaming and gasping for air. "Leave me alone!" He smacked his own head with both hands, pounding away until he hit himself in the eye. He saw dazzling lights and had double vision when he tried to open them up again.

He looked tired and felt alone. He slouched over, lying there balled up on the cold floor of his single dorm for several minutes. He thought about all the things that went wrong. Why they had to happen to him of all people? He kept his eyes closed for a long period after he resealed them, so as not to get dizzy from the double vision he encountered from the smacking. When he tried opening them again, he saw a much-welcomed sight. He reached out with his hand and smiled, turning his head upright from the chilled floor.

"Good morning, buddy." He rubbed Oliveto's fresh looking green fur through his fingers. The dog licked his face in return. Corinth didn't like being licked like that, but he needed a kiss and hug from somebody right about now. He sat up quickly and pulled the pup in tight. He rocked on the floor of his small dormitory with Oliveto for a while. Until he heard the waking bells ringing from the Watchtower.

He stood up like he was ready to take on a new day. He brushed off his insane outburst as if it had never occurred, even though he really wanted to crawl back into bed and let the madness overtake him. Then it'd be done. But no, he wasn't that boy, so he pressed forward nevertheless.

He stretched his arms and yawned, looking down at his little friend. "I've got to get you to the PuP Pound quick." The dog whimpered in response, putting his head down. "Hey, don't give me that face. You got to spend all weekend with me." He bent over and tossed around Oliveto's long fur. "I'm going to miss you too, but it's Monday. Start of a new week and the same old cla.s.ses. But I have to go to cla.s.s, don't I? Hum?" He didn't expect an answer, considering he was talking out loud to a growing puppy, like he understood English. Though he didn't know English, per se, Oliveto still understood where he was headed. It became a matter of routine. The pup knew that once those bells rang Corinth would be up and taking him to the PuP Pound farther away from Olympia. They housed all the student and ministrant animals there. And that's why Oliveto hated it. He was more of a people animal, rather than an animal ... animal.

Once he dropped Oliveto off at the pound, he didn't waste any time. He darted through the semi-outdoor corridors. The stone masonry of masters were used as stepping stones to propel the young boy forward. He jumped over a mini-wall, cutting through a gra.s.s field that could get him faster to the back gateway into Olympia. His former skateboarding skills were in full effect as he finally reached the Diamond Atrium.

He came up upon Sena. Hendrix'sma.s.sive house at the center of it. He stopped and wondered why they put the PuP Pound so far away from Olympia, as he peered in past her open curtains. He didn't see anything particularly interesting inside. Just old looking furniture and no TV. That b.u.mmed him out. He hadn't gotten the chance to watch TV in so long. The commons around school were riddled with kids day and night, and they weren't keen on sharing. He stepped down from a barrel he climbed on to get a better view. He dusted the dirt off his hands and navy-blue uniform pants. He kept running along the path after he hopped another wall out of Hendrix's backyard garden. He figured they needed the s.p.a.ce to accommodate all the animals, so the pound couldn't be inside Olympia. But it being closer to the student dorms didn't help him at all. He had to leave Olympia and walk all the way to the far side of Delphi dorm. He pa.s.sed Concordia Nova and Elysium dormitories on either side during the walk that he felt took forever.

The atrium he traversed was formed by way of the four featured buildings of the school. They were set up at four different points to make a diamond in the center. He remembered seeing the outline on that map Emma had stolen from Sen. Bernard. He saw from the map that the walkways above his head were what really gave it its diamond shape. They reminded Corinth of miniature versions of the Puente del Cielo. These mini-versions were also high, but not nearly as high as the sky bridge that connected the Worlds. They connected at the tallest point of each building. The twelfth floors. Though Olympia was still wider and simply more ma.s.sive than its counterparts setup about the school grounds behind it and toward the Central Lake.

He got back with no time to spare. Coming into Olympia from the back entrance presented a challenge. His first period cla.s.s was much closer to the main gate side of the building. And it's on the second floor. He rode the elevator up with no one but himself. Normal people had already reached their destination several minutes ago. Those people would be late as well. But no one would be more late than little Sen. Gambit.

When the doors opened, he sprinted down the wide hallway. The room doors all looked the same to him. They had no cla.s.s numbers marking them for guidance. It was strange to him that the dorms had numbers, but none of the cla.s.srooms did. He always counted the torches on the wall to remind him which cla.s.s was his.

"Three, four, five, six, seven!" He made it to his cla.s.sroom just as Sena. Lilith was opening the door. She nearly hit him with it in the process.

"Oh! I'm sorry Corinth!" She reminded him of his mother, so in his eyes she could do no wrong.

"That's all right, I'm fine." He scratched the top of his scalp, covered in thick jet-black hair.

"You're late, as usual, but I'm going to let it slide, as usual. But this seems like it is becoming a bit of a bad habit. You might want to look into breaking it sooner rather than later," she said while giggling. She was very good with kids. She was the perfect ministrant to instruct rotations cla.s.s. "Go in and find a seat then." She waved him pa.s.s.

But before he could enter, a hyperactive gentleman walked out abruptly. The man roughly b.u.mped Corinth in the doorway, sending his flimsily held stance wobbling to the floor. "I'm sorry, man, but you should watch where you're headed!" the rude guy blurted out.

"Uncle Evan?" Corinth looked up from the ground where his uncle had knocked him down. He was beyond surprised to see him jetting out of Sena. Lilith's fully filled cla.s.sroom. "Where ya going?" Evan's blue eyes seemed wild and confused when Corinth first spoke. His hair and clothes were so disheveled that Corinth barely recognized him as the spiffy and dapper fellow he loved so much. It looked as if the man had not long ago been crying too.

"I'm on my way. No where special, just getting away from here." He suspiciously looked to Lilith when he stated his case to the boy on the floor. He didn't bother to help him up or anything.

"Here, honey, let's go into cla.s.s." She extended her hand and Corinth took it.

She continued waving him in through the door, even pushed slightly on his red and blue backpack. But he couldn't help but look back, wondering what was up with his uncle. He hadn't seen him since last Friday. He took him out for an awkward lunch after he heard about him losing to Lindle at the tournament. He seemed distant and cold then. But not nearly as bad as right now.

"Rotate, Rotate, Rotate," that's all Lilith said as she walked the aisles in-between the silver desk. Corinth was standing amidst a bunch of students he didn't know very well yet. He had cla.s.ses with Emma, Emmy, and Claudia, but none of them were in his first period. She stopped at Corinth's desk. "Good job," she said, looking down at him willing the key to spin at his chest. "The idea behind rotating your llave; is that special drive from within. That force inside you that you derive your strength from!" she continued on speaking out to the entire cla.s.s as Corinth tried to focus on doing exactly what she just said. From the will within. From the will within; he kept on telling -himself to hold true to Sena. Lilith's words.

Corinth had to borrow a spare key of sorts. He didn't have a personal llave like most everyone else. This made him stand out in rotations cla.s.s. Everyone would compare their llaves, whether the treasured tools possessed protective or specialized spells and whatnot. But Corinth not having one of his own put him on the outer perimeter when that type of socializing went on. No one really wanted to talk to him anyway because of his strange eyes. He scared some people. Everyone had a preconceived notion about whom they were around, dependent solely on the person's eye color. But Cory's eyes were so different. Something none of them had seen before, unless they had somehow met Corinth before. He was that supremely unique. Draconians almost never married outside their race. Simply a known fact, not as much a judgment coming from the other students.

He lost his focus while he was looking at the kids around him with faster and steadier rotations. Normally, these keys would just drop out of position if someone could no longer stabilize them. But something always made Corinth's experience with them a lot more disastrous. In a flash of golden light, the llave burst into the pixie dust from which it came.

"NOT again!" Corinth felt as embarra.s.sed as ever. Everyone at their desk around him instantly recoiled. The dust filled the room as they all stepped away, coughing up a storm. A storm stirred by the odd boy that could not wield magik.

Sena. Lilith was the only one brave enough to come closer. She put her hands on his shoulders from the front of his desk. "You'll get the hang of it. I'm sure of that." She used a finger -with pink nail polish on it to lift his chin. "Don't be embarra.s.sed." She turned and looked to all the cowering students in the cla.s.s, covering their mouths and whispering laughable explanations to Corinth's weird lack of dexterity with magik. "Who here can say that they've mastered rotations?" No one said a word. "That's right! None of you have. Otherwise, you'd be instructors, not students. This is a place of learning, not judgment. If you see someone like Corinth having a rough go of it. Extend what you've learned from the ministrants if you're truly so much smarter than they are. Don't just stand against the walls like defenseless little children." She smiled at the end to let her pupils know that she wasn't angry, but instead concerned.

A few came up to Corinth with a spare llave from the golden box up front on Lilith's desk. One kid even joked about the golden pixie dust llaves Corinth kept breaking at every cla.s.s. "You've broken so many of the gold pixie llaves-that I'm surprised the school hasn't started charging you yet." Corinth forced a grin as all the kids now surrounding his desk laughed out loud. Even with that relatively kind gesture, he was still uncomfortable. But couldn't figure out quite why.

Math and history cla.s.s with Emma didn't help him to feel any better. She wrapped herself up in the pink jacket she wore overtop her school uniform, while sitting behind him in the row of desks.

Military-gray jackets, with navy-blue and red stripes going round the collars and cuffs. The creased pants and ruffle skirts were navy-blue, excepting the red and gray stripes at the cuff ends. White-collar shirts underneath and white socks covered by black loafers, which made every student feel restricted and confined inside their own bodies when donning the overly structured apparel.

"Have you ever noticed it's so much colder on the sixth floor than any other floor? That's why I always bring an extra jacket out with me." She was lying through her teeth. She really just hated the uniforms, so she chose to style them to her liking.

"It's late May," Corinth said while rubbing his head and pushing his growing dark hair away from his face. He needed to get it cut, but couldn't be bothered to enter that creepy barbershop at the Refectory.

"So!" she shouted like a mad princess. "That doesn't mean it won't get cold some more before summer settles in," she twisted her lips up like she was right, never mind the logistics.

He laughed, which made her turn to him dramatically, inching forward in her desk to see what the turquoise-eyed boy was up to. "Actually, that's exactly what it means. Because it's late May, it's not going to get any cooler. Not at least until September!" With his back twisted toward her, he flung his hands around trying to describe in great detail just how wrong she was.

This pulled the attention of their subst.i.tute history ministrant. "Excuse me... back there... but this sure isn't study group time. We're answering the questions at the end of the chapter, if we've wrapped up reading it already, of course." He put his head back inside the newspaper he held after that whole spiel. Why he had a paper-newspaper, none of the students knew. He wasn't even that old, so they figured he'd be a likely adult to embrace newer technologies. But apparently not.

"What does he mean, 'if we've wrapped up reading.' He's neck deep in a news article. He's not reading what we're reading. He probably just gets the answers from the back of the teacher's book." Corinth seemed unusually agitated.

"What's wrong with you today? Back in math you were so annoying." She was one to talk. "But I liked it. You should be like this more often. It's way cooler than your whole, little distressed boy act." She reached into her pocketbook and pulled out a compact and lip-gloss. As she reapplied, she kept on talking, "...by the way, no one's buying that c.r.a.p."

Corinth agreed with her about one thing. He had been acting weird. His distressed boy 'act' is really-him. Not that he was unhappy, but many stressing matters had come about in his life. He was surprised by how well he dealt with it all. He was glad that she didn't like him that way. It meant to him that he's generally a reasonable person, because Emma seemed to despise using good reason at all cost. But something else much larger than that was weighing on him. To the point that he thought he'd explode if he didn't work it out soon.

From the last vertical row of desk, he looked out the windows to the left of him. He felt an unsettling twinge of fear in his heart. From the seat behind him, Emma followed his eyes to see what he was glaring down at on the OlympusGrounds. Walker was pa.s.sing underneath the branches of a sycamore tree. He abruptly stopped during his stroll and looked up toward the sixth floor cla.s.sroom windows. Corinth knew he couldn't see him because of the broad windowsill, but he stared at Walker all the more since the man's warming eyes were now facing up. Walker turned his gaze away to the gra.s.s beneath his feet, but gave a modest nod while looking down. He went on pa.s.sing through with his book firmly gripped in one hand. He spat out apple seeds just after he took another bite from the luscious fruit he held in the other hand. Corinth didn't want to, but he knew that he needed to speak with him immediately.

Emma pulled in closer, snapping her fingers in front of his face. But he crept closer to the window, pressing his fingers, and nearly his entire -faceup against the gla.s.s. He watched Walker's every move, like a hawk stalking prey. "What are you doing?" she sounded sincerely concerned for her friend. All her -respectful snapping at him yielded no response. Figure that! Still, the glazed over look in his eyes scared her while she watched from behind, as Cory seemed to break with reality.

He came back to the real world a second later than she would have hoped. He shot her an agile glance, and then turned around quickly, plopping his bottom back down at his desk seat. "Worry about yourself. I'm fine."

It wasn't often that she did it, but Emma took the high road. "I just want you to know-that I'm here if you want to talk about it."

He unfolded his arms and looked back at her behind his desk. "Like I said, I'm fine!" He seemed certain that Emma wasn't the right person to bring his feelings up with. He had to get to Walker.

Corinth decided to skip lunch for two reasons. First, he didn't want to see Anvard. He knew he'd have a ton of questions that he couldn't answer just yet. Second, he figured it was the perfect time to catch up with Walker. After science cla.s.s with Emmy and Emma, he told them he'd meet them at lunch after he came from the bathroom. That was an obvious lie, but not to them at the time. By now, they'd most likely figured it out. But he was already halfway to Walker's villa off the West Lake.

The Olympus Grounds were a galactic stretch for someone to walk on an empty stomach. So Corinth decided to cut out the middle man and travel back upstairs, to the twelfth floor of Olympia. From his dorm he retrieved the green whistle his friend had given him. From there he took Oeste skywalk, cutting across the twelfth floor of Olympia to the twelfth of Concordia Nova. The skywalk glided across and through the sky much faster than Cory's tired legs could carry him by foot. He looked down to the Diamond Atrium as kids sat outside eating lunch and chatting about. The atrium's structure made it so that the Concordia Nova dormitory set out much farther across the grounds to the left, or west, of Olympia. Walking out of that building from a side exit would put him much closer to Walker's place along West Lake.

His stroll across the treeless grounds was uneventful. The most interesting thing he witnessed was the beauty of West Lake. The second to smallest, but definitely the most graphically detailed. The way the sun hit the sandy wood docks, and most certainly the water itself, made everything light up in the area. He could see that the silver pixie dust was being put to good use on Walker's villa. The house reflected more light than the lake. It shimmered as Corinth tiredly dragged himself up the many looping ramps Walker had installed outside his front door. It reminded him of standing in line at an amus.e.m.e.nt park. Minus the dreadful wait, that is.

He traversed the ramps, finally meeting the staircase that would take him to Walker's front door. He grabbed the black railing as he almost fell down. His stomach was in knots. He figured he shouldn't have skipped lunch, but it was already too late. He fell down, rolling over on his side after his head hit the edges of a few steps. Could this all possibly be just a stomachache, he thought, while billowing in agony? For having hit his head, he now had a thumping headache to contend with too. So he couldn't tell the stomach pain and it apart any longer. They merged into one solid stinging torment.

He didn't bother opening his eyes as he heard footsteps coming down the long wood paneled ramps he just walked. He made a guess on who it could be. And if he was wrong, he didn't want to know who it was.

"Subsidio Ex Nodus," in a reserved tone the man spoke with compa.s.sion. Corinth opened his eyes and saw Walker's not so bright face. His curly blonde hair blew with the wind. He squinted his eyes, which made him look much more serious to Corinth than usual."Come on youngling, up-and-addy!" Walker leaned over to give Corinth a hand.

"What was that spell?" he asked. "I feel so much better." He grabbed his stomach as they took one stair at a time. Walker held onto him from behind. Making sure he didn't fall.

"Don't you know any spells like that?" Walker questioned the young boy of things he already knew well enough.

"Not really," Corinth said.

"Oh, no!" Walker sarcastically cheered. "Your marvelous father didn't teach you anything?" Corinth shot him a look. Walker paused in a grimace, and then cracked a wide smile across his overall gloomy face. He looked tired and used up. Even more so than he did when Corinth noticed him on the Olympus Grounds that first night. Still, Corinth laughed with him.

"He tried to teach me. Lots of people have. My mom was the only one who could really get through to me. But still I never mastered any spells with her either."

Walker's face turned down. What little smile he had before was wholly erased. "You can't use magik... at all?" his voice cracked when he said it. Not even his wildest imagination ever envisioned a life without magik. He couldn't process the possibility of not possessing all the powers he acquired over the years from reading book after book in the wake of his self-imposed solitude.

"No, not really," was Corinth's dilapidated response.

Walker's upper lip trembled as he helped the boy into his villa on the lake. He rushed Corinth in through the doorway, because he needed to get a tissue out of his pocket before the waterworks really started pouring down his drudged face. He sat the trite boy down on a long beige sofa in front of a gla.s.s coffee table. To the left was an open gla.s.s door that covered a half wall. The sheer white curtains fluttered with the breeze coming off the lake. Walker turned his attention to the deck just outside the gla.s.s door that overlooked the lake. He then dramatically blew his nose with the tissues he produced from his pea-green pant pocket. He turned back quickly to his guest to see a giggling child stretched out across his plush couch.

He attempted to console Walker with his next statement. "I always thought magik was cool, and still hope to get better at wielding it. But I'm not torn up inside about not being able to wield it." Walker looked down at his used tissues, feeling a little silly now. "That's why I always worked harder on my school work. Making the honor roll every semester is just as cool as blowing something up. And levitating, walking on walls, or whatever people do with their llaves! I'm not sad is what I'm really trying to say. I still haven't given up hope yet?"

That last statement sounded -more like a question to Walker. He figured that was a huge part of why Corinth dragged himself over. "So-" he encouraged Corinth to just spit it out.

"So...?" Corinth knew what he wanted to say, but was reluctant.

"Please, Corinth, I've had a real sloppy day. I would love to forget all about my problems and give you a hand." He took the seat opposite the young boy filling the sofa. The love chair was comfortable enough for Walker, considering he often chose gra.s.sy knolls as seats over cushions anyhow.

Corinth's eyes looked around the pretty room. The decor was very peaceful. Mostly serene light shades, with a drop of drama in every few glances. The artwork that covered much of the walls garnered most of the attention. But once again, Corinth realized that adults in Hyperborean, or at least at Aurora Boreal school, didn't like TV much. There was no television in sight inside of Walker's den. "Why don't you have a TV?" Corinth asked instead of what was really on his mind.

"Corinth, just tell me!" his tone was just subtle and excited enough to relax the boy. He decided to let it all out for Walker's ears to hear.

Over tea and a rather fruity fruit salad, Corinth told Walker about his dreams. They were mostly the same, but came in different forms. Walker didn't seem the least bit surprised to Corinth. In fact, he almost wrote it off. "I know there's something more you want to say. I can feel it," Walker told him with pa.s.sion resounding in his voice. "I'll have you know, this question is more important than your dreams."

That honestly shocked Corinth. "But did you hear the part about you. It looked like you'd die just falling through the sky like that. I think it killed you even before then."

"Corinth, if anything, I'm more concerned about the part where you were attacked. But no matter, because it's just a dream."