Page 33 of Jade Lion and the Witch Boy
Kai stops when the portal disappears, and he gazes at the archway. When he looks back at me, he seems shaken. “Sebastian, will you…come with me?”
I gulp. The vulnerability in his dark eyes is undeniable.I’d go to the ends of the Earth for you, Kai.“Yes, if that’s what you want. I can take an impromptu trip to Hong Kong.”
“Well, let me just…” Luther is completely ignored as Kai reaches the left base of the arch. His palm shines with emerald arcana, and, in seconds, the portal is back open. “Oh, okay, you’re just, um…turning it on yourself…alright.”
I exchange a surprised look with Luther before Kai tugs my hand forward. In a few short steps, the Union building is gone, and I’m outside in a thicket of trees.
The archway appears to be housed in an abandoned temple of sorts. Green hills surround us on all sides, and this forestclearing is so quiet. The sun is rising in the distance, confirming that yes, we’re back in Hong Kong. “This is so much easier than going through customs. International travel, no security checks, I love it!” I remark.
“Um, do you want me to accompany you?” Luther asks. The portal powers down behind us, and I wait for Kai to reply. Instead, he gazes upward at the azure sky.
“If I pull up a map, I can take you to where I found your statue,” I say.
“Statue?” Luther murmurs.
Kai turns back to Luther and says, “Give us privacy, please.” Then, he begins marching forward, taking my hand. “This way.”
I give Luther one last apologetic look before being tugged away. I might not like wizards, but Luther must be as confused as I am. What is going on with Kai? I’m concerned for the man, though admittedly, I enjoy having his hand in mine.
The two of us walk ten minutes through the forested hills on dirt trails. Even if it were midday, I doubt many people would come here. The urban center of Hong Kong is nowhere near us, so none of this landscape is familiar. But judging by Kai’s look of fear and hope, he’s latching onto familiarity. I only pray the memories he unlocks won’t break his heart.
He pauses when we get to a cliff and looks upward. It must be at least twenty feet high. “I think I saw a stone staircase back there,” I mention.
Kai shakes his head and raises his hands out. When they glow, I know what he’s about to do. Arcana gently flows out of his wrists and down to the ground.
“Woah!” I say as my clothes start to move upward. Green wisps surround me, and the gravity below feels weaker. My whole body is being gently propelled upward. Kai’s magic is moving me up, and he isn’t even looking down at me. While Iknew the Jade Lion could do a levitation spell, I didn’t expect him to take me along for the ride.
After a few seconds of feeling like a helium balloon, I gently land on the ledge above. My feet touch the ground, and I’m grateful to be back to my regular weight.
“Warn a guy next time,” I say with a grin. Kai doesn’t respond; he’s frozen a few feet in front of me. I move next to him and gaze out at the thicket of trees, casting shadows all around us.
“This…is where it happened,” Kai says in almost a whisper.
“What?”
Kai takes in a sharp breath and closes his eyes. “This…is where I was bound.”
My eyebrows jump. I look around; nothing about this area screams magical torture chamber. The ground appears to have once had stone tiling, but many old forests have remnants of former structures. There could have been a building here.
Kai waves his hand, and green arcana floats about. “This area once looked like this.” With his words, Kai makes a circle with his hands. In moments, the emerald energy shapes into an illusion of columns and pillars towering above us. The ground resembles a round platform with runes etched into a magical circle. My pulse races when I realize the gravity of it all.
“This is where…?”
“Yes.” Kai turns to me with moisture in his eyes. “This is where my coven of wizards cast the spell that forced me into my lion form. At the same time, I was bound into that statue, my imprisonment.”
My breath stops at his confession. He was tortured and trapped by his own coven?
I don’t have time to process any of it before Kai drops to his knees. He heaves, like he’s holding back a century’s worthof heartbreak. “I remember everything now,” he says in a voice laced with pain. “They…betrayed me.”
“Kai…”
“Everyone I cared about…” His shoulders slump, and his sob rings out amongst the trees. “They tore my life from me.”
“Hey, hey.” I quickly get on my knees in front of him. It’s an instinct, as always, to protect Kai, even from himself. There’s nothing to think about. Like a magnet left too far from its pairing, I grasp him as he cries. I rub his back, needing him to feel my presence, my heart, and how much I care for him. “Hey, you’re safe, Kai. I swear, you’re safe.”
When he sobs again, he leans his head on my shoulder, and I rub his scalp. In that moment, all of the arcana dissipates, and we’re back to the darkness of the forest
“Please…please don’t let that happen to me again, Sebastian,” he says through sobs.
