With an exasperated sigh, I nodded. “Okay. Go for it. But make it the Reader’s Digest version. If I remember correctly, Barney had a serious gift for the gab.”
“You got it.” Kai’s eyes brightened, and he started to tell Barney’s tale.
“So, when y’all were kids, a month or so before the incident in the meadow that landed his ass in prison…”
“When he tried to incinerate his own brothers and me?” I seethed, trying to control my temper.
“Yes, but there’s an explanation for that, and I’m getting there.”
“Well, make it a short trip,” I snapped. Instantly feeling horrible for being a Grade A beyotch, I made a mental note to make my man his favorite ambrosia salad as soon as we got home.
“It will go a lot quicker if you stop interrupting.”
Clamping my lips shut, I mimed zipping my lips and throwing away the key, and gave him a single sharp nod.
Of course, because Maeve is… well… Maeve… She had to mumble, “If only that were a real lock without a key…,” under her breath.
Choosing to ignore my sister, I motioned for Kai to continue.
“Okay, where was I? Oh! Yeah! So, you see, before that whole kerfuffle, Barney’s grandma had called for him in the middle of the night. She knew she was about to pass and needed to tell him something important.”
Holding up the index finger of his right hand just when I was about to ask a question, he added, “I have no idea why she told him and not his brothers. I didn’t ask, and he didn’t offer.”
Okay, so my man did know me as well as he knew himself. Ain’t love grand?
“Anyway,” Kai continued. “While Barney was there, his grandma told him that he had to protect you at all costs. That day in the meadow, he was trying to talk to you. He wanted to tell you what he knew and warn you about what was to come, but his brothers were following him.”
“And why was that a big deal?” Maeva asked as she dumped peroxide on his wound for at least the twelfth time. “They’re family.”
“His grandma said that he could only tell Martha- absolutely no one else. So, when Geoff and Wilbur showed up, they fought, and…”
“And he thought it was better to set his brothers on fire than abort his plan and come back another day?” Theresa asked, right after she appeared on the other side of Kai.
“I asked the same thing. Barney said everything just got really heated really fast, and he overreacted.”
“Yeah, I’ll say,” I huffed, abandoning my ‘zipped-up lips’ in favor of speeding things along.
Spearing me with a look, Kai arched his right eyebrow, a sure sign that he was feeling well enough to be irritated, and went on with the story. “Barney was told to protect you, my love, at all costs because you are the key to everything.”
“Then she told him about this chamber and all the tunnels. She said he had to get right down here and memorize everything. Thus, he came here every day and wrote down everything on every wall in his journal. He took great pride in telling me that he took that book to jail to continue to study.”
“When he figured everything out, he tried to tell the Warden, the Chaplain, and a bunch of other people– but no one believed him. They even punished him in some horrible ways for continuing to talk about it.”
Pausing, Kai took a deep breath. I could see what it cost him to recount Barney’s story, and it broke my heart. I was done being mad. I just wanted to take my Mate home and nurse him back to health.
Taking hold of his hand, I cooed, “It’s okay. We can talk about it…”
“No.” He was adamant. “You have to hear this.” Another deep breath, and the words just flew from his lips. “Barney said that somewhere on these walls, there is a prophecy that says if you fully awaken… If the coronation happens… You will destroy Dragoon Bootay, the entire population, and the whole Bibbidi Bobbidi Bubble.”
“Wait a minute, Bub.” Theresa jumped in. “The Wyvern Shifter who spent forty years in jail for trying to incinerate Martha and his brothers escaped from prison because his grandmother told him to?”
“That sounds hereditary,” Maeve commented, applying a pain reliever to Kai’s head wound. “Some mental illnesses are passed from generation to…”
“No.” That single word, coming from the second most powerful Witch in all the world, had us all shutting our mouths and turning to look at her. “That sounds like a Seer,” she finally added with a finality that made goosebumps start dancing up and down my arms.
A million thoughts and questions were battling for supremacy in my brain, and my Arthur was quick enough to express one of them. “Grandmas are usually right.”
“Mine ate crayons,” Chewy shrugged.
