“Deal.”
I wasn’t sure I heard right until he opened the door wider and nudged me outside. “We’re going to need to teleport,” I said skittishly. We landed on the road outside of Nanna’s psychiatric hospital. I shrugged off the last of the bad vibes from the teleport and scowled.
“Why this place?” I asked him.
“It’s familiar,” he said. “And it seemed like a good place to start.”
“You don’t seem to understand the concept of birthdays.”
He shrugged. “Probably not. But I understand a swindle. So get moving.”
Smart-ass.
“You’d better put the amulet on. It’s all technology from here.”
We took a train into the city. I elected to get off at Jolimont Station so we could avoid the train barriers and public transport staff. “Are you certain this is how you want to waste your birthday?” I asked.
“Definitely.”
I stood stock still and looked at him. It was then I remembered he’d helped Nanna get my records from the Department of Human Services. It meant he’d probably seen the contents of my files. “This is not going to turn into a manhunt,” I told him.
“I didn’t say anything.”
I started walking up the ramp in exasperation. Outside the platform I bought two temporary transit cards for later. The shield amulet seemed to be working because the ticket machine didn’t immediately short circuit. Kai’s presence did make the screen skip so I couldn’t press any options. “Can you step back a little?”
He eyed the two guys farther down the platform. “No.”
I took a calming breath. “I lived for seventeen years without you looming over me. You can step back two metres.”
He didn’t move until I mashed the screen of the ticket machine to prove my point. Only then did he take two measured steps backwards. The streetlight above us flickered. Oh brother.
Instead of hopping back on the train, I decided we were better off walking to kill some time. While the bad stuff still haunted me, there were some things about the human world that I missed.
One of those things was the freedom to go anywhere and do anything I wanted. That was the beauty of having no parents and not caring about school. I wasn’t saying that it was glamorous, but it wasn’t all bad either. It wasn’t until we were at the top of the steps of the Shrine of Remembrance that I realised I was eighteen. Even if I went back to living in the human world, I had aged out of school.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Wait.”
I had never been that great with timing. Today, someone was smiling down on me. It was the middle of winter, but for once, it wasn’t raining in this gloomy city. I stood there as the sun rose over the tree line of the Botanic Gardens. I couldn’t help smiling, remembering all those times I’d stood here and hoped for a good day.
“You didn’t sleep out here, did you?” Kai asked.
Classic party pooper. “No way. They have patrols here. It’s more trouble than it’s worth.”
Before that look in his eye could settle, I forced him to a fast food place for breakfast. He made a face while I happily ordered half of the things on the menu. For the first time in years, I handed over actual cash for my food.
The girl behind the register stared at Kai the entire time I was ordering. He in turn stared at the two drunk men carrying on just outside the door. He grabbed the tray of food and found a spot as far away from the doorway as possible.
I wasn’t even sure why it mattered. He could sneeze and they’d go flying. “You’re making me eat this on my birthday?” he asked.
“It tastes better than it looks.”
I wanted so bad to say I told you so when he went and ordered more. After breakfast we walked over the bridge and into the warren of the casino. “When it was super cold, I used to come here all the time,” I said. By now I knew not to give too many details or he’d get that stormy look in his eyes like he wanted to teleport me right back to Bloodline.
“Wanna see a movie?”
“You did that often?”
More often than not. At this time in the morning it had been easy to sneak into the movies without anyone noticing I didn’t have a ticket. Then I’d have a couple of hours of peace and clean before I’d have to sneak into another theatre.
I had no idea what was playing. Once upon a time, I could recite whole movie scripts. I chose what looked like a general action flick. The theatre was pretty quiet.
“So, you just sit in the dark and watch this screen?” he asked. “Cassie and Gran sometimes watch human movies, but it seems sort of pointless to me.” It completely tripped me out that he had never done this before.
“Well, yeah. And then the movie plays and you watch. It’s not much different to watching something on the MirrorNet.”
“The stuff that happens on the MirrorNet is real,” he said.
I found that pretty funny. Never in a million years would I have imagined any of what happened in the magical world could be real.
Five minutes into the movie, Kai hoisted me up and settled me in his lap. He brushed his lips over my cheek. When he kissed me, he tasted like hot cakes and syrup. Huh, so he did understand the point of going to the movies.
By the time we left the theatre, I didn’t have the slightest clue what the movie was about. But I did know that Malachi Pendragon was a faster study than anyone gave him credit for.
“Are you just going to show me the nice stuff?” Kai said when I suggested we take a walk along the Yarra.
I looked at
