Chapter 6

On our way back to the strange fountain, Colin rudely explained that I was the weakest Zodiac to ever darken the Colonies doorstep. With a fear of drowning, and heights, I was basically useless as a leader. We reached where the water fell from the ceiling. The magic was evident in the way the water moved.

The water didn’t crash hard against the ground. It just passed right through the ground and probably re-filtered somewhere else. The water fell in a perfect circle without drips of water splashing onto us.

The closer I got, the more I noticed that the water wasn’t moving in any specific direction. If I imagined it going up, it appeared to go up. Magic defied even gravity laws. A law I particularly enjoyed when it came down to it. I could tell Alalai was just as nervous as I was. He claimed never going this way before.

“What other way is there?” Annie curiously asked Alalai. We stood at the base of the waterfall that appeared to be going upwards. Or maybe it was going downwards, if I angled my eyes right. I wanted to touch it. I wondered if the water would splash against my hand, or if it would just continue flowing in whatever direction it chose. Colin squeezed my other hand to tell me to knock it off.

“My brothers always took the stairs. I’ve never gone up, personally.” Alalai smiled at the memory of family. If his family was around, why weren’t they with him? The fact that there were stairs was a huge relief. Drowning wasn’t on my to-do list today.

“Stairs? We should definitely try those out.”

“I don’t think so. You’re a Zodiac. It is time you face your stupid fears.” Colin yanked my back to my spot beside him. I threw my head back and groaned dramatically.

“I really want to take the stairs,” I whined. If I was hoping for sympathy, the only attention I got was from Alalai.

“You don’t want to take stairs, trust me. It took my brothers two days to climb to the surface level.” Alalai laughed like it was a good memory. His laughter revealed sharp incisors in his top row of teeth. I stared mystified at just how sharp those teeth looked.

I looked up the water, and found that the water had stilled. It wasn’t moving up or down now. This water confused me more than anything else in the magical world. Colin pulled away from my hand and hopped into the flowing water. I panicked.

Was he leaving me behind?

On impulse, I jumped in after him. Crap.

I didn’t feel the sinking motion that pulled me down before. This time, it was pulling me up forcefully. The water stopped me from breathing in and my chest was already starting to hurt. It was very hard to make out anything in the dark water. Instead of flailing around like last time, I simply let the tide take me.

I felt something tap me on the shoulder, and frantically turned to see Annie beside me. She pulled my hands away from my face. I shook my head violently. Annie might have some strange ability to breathe water, but I definitely couldn’t. I ripped my hands from her grasp and put them back over my mouth. She didn’t give in though. She gestured taking her own hands away from her face and made an up and down movement slowly in front of her lungs.

Was she suggesting that I could breathe water?

My un-oxygenated brain must have made the decision for me because before I knew it, I was cautiously lowering my hands and opening my mouth. I was stunned when I took a breath in. It didn’t feel like water in my mouth. It felt like air.

I breathed out air and the bubbles rushed upwards in the water. We were underwater, floating upward in a waterfall, and breathing air at the same time. This was breaking all of the human laws of nature. At this point, why were those laws even written.

After realizing that I wasn’t drowning, I stopped panicking. The current pulling us upwards was strong, and there was no way I could sink. I hated that sinking feeling. It reminded me too much of drowning.

The artificial light from the colony filtered through the dark waters. I could finally see the top.

My head broke the surface and I gasped. This air felt less stale than when under the water. All I wanted to do was breathe in this air. Colin was already climbing out of the pool. His clothes didn’t even appear to be wet. My eyes caught sight of how his jeans clung tightly to his well muscled ass.

“Are you coming or are you going to stare at my butt for the rest of the night?” Colin hoisted himself up onto the side of the fountain and stood up. My cheeks turned a dark shade of pink. He couldn’t have possibly noticed that I was staring.

“Like I would,” I quipped back with clenched fists. Ethan, Annie, and then Alalai all came to the surface shortly after us. I thanked my lucky stars they didn’t have to witness what just happened. Annie and Ethan exited the round fountain first. Then Alalai lifted himself up onto the fountain’s uneven stones.

“Colin, you have to explain things Sam! He was going to drown himself thinking he couldn’t breathe in there.” Annie was livid. For someone as non-threatening as Annie, it took a lot for her to get angry. It still sounded nicer than anything I would have said at the moment.

“I didn’t feel like giving Sam training wheels.” Colin defended as he crossed his arms over his slim chest.

“Training wheels? As if! You wouldn’t even last a day in the human world!” Annie shredded his last piece of dignity and turned back to Ethan. Ethan was waiting for the embrace and buried her face in his chest.

Colin shrugged his shoulders. I looked up to realize I had no idea what window was ours. All of the windows looked exactly the same. There were a few posters hanging from windows with names on them and I assume that must be for younger kids trying to get back up to their house. Dragons were slowly making their way up to their own windows, and I watched in fascination.

“So where will Alalai be staying?” Ethan’s tone implied that it wouldn’t be his house. I tried to find an appropriate answer for that. I still didn’t have one. I was supposed to be some big shot Zodiac but I didn’t know this world. I was a human looking in from a fogged over window.

“He’ll stay with us for tonight. In the morning, we’ll ask Ms. Agnes if he can stay with her since the colony is full at the moment.” Colin saved me from having to take responsibility for my actions.

“Alright.” Ethan began to swing his arms back and forth and breathing deeply. He exhaled a big breath and a green smoke engulfed him.

A large green scaled dragon appeared from the smoke. Ethan was much bigger than Grandfather Wei was. Annie jumped onto Ethan’s back excitedly and pulled Colin and Alalai on. I was set on taking the stairs. Annie held her hand out to me. She wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

I reluctantly got on.

When Ethan’s wings started flapping up and down, I clung to Colin’s back. I dug my head into his back with my eyes closed. I didn’t want to see how far I could fall. Colin held onto my hands that were braced around his wrist. He wasn’t even holding on! Was he crazy?

His thumb rubbed small, calming circles into my hand. Although it offered comfort, I didn’t want him not holding on to Ethan. If he fell off, I would be going down with him. Plummeting to my death by dragon mishap was not how I wanted people to remember me.

And now that I think about it, Alalai wasn’t holding on either. My head left Colin’s back to slowly check behind me. Alalai was sitting there, acting completely unafraid of what was happening right now. Alalai was leaning back in an easy pose with no fear of falling off. Did anyone notice how high we were?

Soon, Ethan had stopped moving forward. Colin slid the window open, and then hurled himself through the open side. He landed gracefully onto the floor of the apartment. Annie looked back at me. Apparently, it was my turn. She was crazy, there was no way I was jumping from Ethan’s back to a half open window.

“Sam, I won’t let you fall. Just jump.” Colin held out his hand from the window. He sounded a little too sincere for it to be believable. My hands were clammy and gross from how nervous I was. A cold sweat ran down my back. I couldn’t jump. What if I slipped? What if I missed the window, smacked into a wall, and plummeted to my death? That was a lot of What if’s.

I counted down from three and jumped. I hit my head on the top of the window seal, and felt myself starting to fall backwards when Colin pulled me in. Without Colin catching me, I would have fallen down the other way.

“Jesus, can’t you be more careful?” There was the Colin I know and love. Wait. love? I didn’t just think that. It was just the adrenaline beating through my muddled brain.

“I tried! Isn’t that better than nothing?” I rubbed at the newly formed bruise on my forehead. Alalai was last to jump in through the window and he landed successfully on both feet. Annie waved goodbye with a cheerful smile.

Ethan didn’t say anything as they flew to their own window. I watched as Annie jumped in first, and then Ethan changing back into a human as he launched himself head first through the window.

“You have a very nice home.” Alalai commented as he looked around at the living room. Colin shook his head.

“It’s my grandfather’s. We haven’t moved out yet.” Colin felt the need to correct him. Move out? I haven’t even lived here for a day yet! I still needed to collect my things and find out what was really going on here. Alalai shrugged in Colin’s direction and continued to wander around.

An old, rusty yell came from the kitchen and Colin’s grandfather came out flailing around a metal pan. He swung at Alalai’s head. He flinched away and tripped over the coffee table. His face was full of panic at the sudden attack.

“Just knock him out, he’ll be fine in the morning.” Colin, like always, looked bored with the situation at hand.

“I can’t do that!” Alalai looked exasperated.

“Okay.” Colin shrugged off his shoes by the window, and I followed suit. I kept a close eye on the old man. Colin’s grandfather must have been old, and confused. This morning he seemed completely aware. This was such a sudden change in demeanor.

Grandfather Wei had Alalai cornered with his pan raised. Before I knew what I was doing, I managed to step in between the old man and Alalai. There was no time to block the blow so I took the full blow of the pan to my head. I was going to have a serious headache when I woke up from this.

I crumbled to the ground without any elegance left.

I heard shouting, and a crash of things falling. I felt arms shaking me back into wakefulness. Everything was blurring when my eyes reopened. I could feel the goose egg already forming above my left eye.

“I’m very sorry. Please forgive me, I was confused,” Grandfather Wei was pleading. He knelt down next to me. My head pounded in rhythm with my heart beat. I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign but at least my vision was clearing.

“Don’t worry about it,” My voice was hoarse and I wasn’t sure I could trust it not to crack. I tried to get up but Colin held me down. That’s when I noticed my head was actually in his lap. My head was inches away from… No, stop that line of thought right there, Sam.

I thanked the God above the lighting was too dim in here to see the color of my cheeks.

“I’m fine, really. Let’s get to bed.” I attempted to get up again. This time, Colin reluctantly released me. Alalai was stared at me while I brushed my hair away from the swelling bruise.

“You… you protected me again…” He made it sound like no one had ever protected him before. That made me nervous and I wasn’t sure what to say.

“Well, of course.” I let out a shaky laughter. I dizzily hoisted myself to my feet and held my hands out for balance. Colin wrapped my arm around his shoulders to give me support. I silently thanked him for the help.

“Goodnight,” I murmured as Colin took me down the hallway. He was bringing me back to the bed I woke up on this morning. I had no problem with that. As soon as the door to the room opened, I fell onto the bed. I refused to move again.

“Why was he staring at me like that?” I asked as Colin stood awkwardly in front of the bed. There was a slight pause from Colin before he climbed into bed with me. I scooted as far away as the bed would allow, but that didn’t change the fact that he was still in same bed as me.

“You are a Zodiac. Saving a measly troll like him is basically unheard of.” Colin mumbled from his side of the bed. His voice was gruff and unsettled.

“What’s with the prejudice against trolls?” I raised my voice above a whisper. I instantly regretted it as my head ached from the noise change.

“Just the way it is,” Colin sounded so close to sleep that I didn’t want to keep him awake with more questions. It was a painfully long day and I needed the rest too.

I promised myself I’d ask him more questions in the morning.