Nadine Book 3

70. Good To Be Home

It doesn't take us long to get everything ready to moved back to Dipak's office.

Everyone is sitting in their spots at the table now. It feels good to be home.

Daddy stands up. "Did you all get in a fight with a big bird?"

Frode shakes his head. "I'll tell you later. Let's figure out everything that happened for now."

"There is one more person we need first."

Tre smiles at me. Tye says, "I'll go with you."

I make the door. Me and Tye step into the closet and crack up laughing. Then we go over to the little shop. Johen is sitting inside it.

"I heard the alarm. You were all gone. Is it over now?"

"Not over for good. Over for now. We got the castle back." I smile at him.

"Thanks to your help." Tye grabs the box that has all our original stuff in it. "But we always sit around a table and talk about everything at the end. We should have been done differently. What we can do to prevent it from happening again. Stuff like that. We want you to be there. You have a side of this story now too, and it will be different from all of ours."

"You want me to go with you to the talk?"

"I will guarantee your safety in exchange for 2 of those blow darts. I made a promise to a couple of boys. You'll get them back. They're a hard thing to explain. And someone is going to get hit with a couple of darts."

They start laughing. "They are all still here. I didn't know if you would need them again. I left them so you could find them."

"Thank you for that."

Tye shakes some feathers out of his hair.

"Where did you 2 come from?"

Both of us say, "Egypt."

Johen nods.

I smile. "The bed exploded." He puts his eyebrows up. "Will you join us?"

"Of course."

I make the door to the king's office.

Everyone at the table stares at me.

Johen comes in behind me with the blow darts.

Thora runs to him. "JOHEN." She gives him a hug. "You can sit by me. I'll make Kane move." Tre gets up and takes the dart guns. Tye comes through with our big box of stuff. He puts it on Dipaks' desk, then he shuts the door and releases the magic from it. We get sat down.

Daddy stands back up. "You 2 can keep these crowns. They are not real."

"That's Tre's best kiss trophy. I'm sure he'll never take it off." Tre takes it and puts it on his head. I smile at him.

Omar comes in with Ylle and Tanny. Omar sits to my other side and the girls sit beside him.

I stand up. "First. Johen is under my protection. No harm will come to him. 2nd. Well... That all happened."

Ylle smiles. "Yes. Yes, it did."

"I'll start at the beginning. Thora and I left the office and that man was running towards us. I blew out the window and yelled out that he was here. We jumped. Landed in the field beside the 3 of them practicing orbs. Mary showed up after a few minutes. She was not acting right. We knocked her out quickly and the 5 of us ran. We made it to a house that was off our property. Omar made a door. Thora was yelling that Mary was following us. We all got through the door and slammed it shut. At that point, we landed at Omar's house. We left flying from there. We landed in the Arena town. Johen found us really quickly and let us use a back room at his family shop. Ylle, Tanny, and a lot of magicians were called. They were able to get Mary and take her to the Yanin castle. Tests were ran. The spell was sorted. People were charmed."

Dipak gives me the stop signal. "Let's give you a break. You're skipping things. Thora you go. Start where Mary wasn't acting right please. How was she not acting right?"

2 hours later, we finally get to the blow dart part of the story.

I stand up. "The darts ended up being an extreme help in this case. Johen had some already. He was able to show Tre and Tye how to use them. Then they were able to adapt them, so we could use them for medicine and the charms later. Unfortunately, they kept shooting each other." Dipak stands up and glares at Tre and Tye like he's going to yell. "I made them a deal, so they wouldn't shoot each other anymore. They are going to demonstrate how they work for you all, because blowing on a pole sounds weird. Boys, go ahead." All 3 of them hit Dipak with a dart at the same time. "Yes, I told them they could all shoot you with a dart if they stopped shooting each other."

"That does not feel good."

"I shot him in the leg."

"You did not shoot me in the leg, you stabbed me with the damn thing."

"That's because you shot me with it first."

"BOYS. Moving on."

Johen stands up and gives a real demonstration and explains how they work. Then he explains how they were able to modify them for charms and medicine.

Dipak gets a hold of one of them and points it at Tye. Tye jumps behind Tre and falls over backwards in the chair. I give Dipak a dirty look. Then he puts a dart in it. I take it away from him. "I am not removing darts from you people all night."

Dipak laughs. "I really do want to try it and I think our craftsmen can remake it. They do seem quite handy. Can we keep them for a few days, Johen?"

"Yes that's fine."

"I'll try it out later then."

Ylle stands up and tells how they got Mary and what happened to the magicians after that.

Tye tells everyone how we went to his dad's for the medicine and a place for Mary.

Tre tells everyone what the magicians found in the man's house. Then he tells everyone how we lost Thora and gained Ana.

"Thank you for the rose set of bath products. I'll send you a new one."

Omar tells everyone how he made the door work and how Johen was able to hit everyone with charms.

"After that, it was a waiting game. It was still 40 hours before you would wake up. So we had to wait."

Dracul asks, "How was it 40 hours?"

Omar and Tre explain how all that worked.

"The alarm sounded in Johen's village one night. We moved fast. I have no idea why it sounded, or who set it off though. Does anyone?"

Tanny nods. "There was a man fitting his description in the village. The alarm was sounded and everyone left. We don't know if it was really him. Our main priority was evacuation. It was successful."

Ylle smiles. "A little too successful. The queen went to Egypt. It was like they were all gone from my radar. I kept having to expand the search. It was near morning before I finally found them and was able to signal people to her."

Omar nods. "Same here. I had no idea where we were. That was one hell of a hiding spot, Nadine."

Dipak looks at me. "Did you have that planned out?"

"No sir. I was in a hurry at the door. I was scared and couldn't think of anywhere except Tre's apartment. I knew that was stupid." I pause so everyone can laugh. "I picked the first place that popped in my head. Egypt. I love it there."

Dipak stands up. "So for the next 40 hours you were in Egypt with Tre, Tye, Ana, and Omar. And you had to wait for us to wake up. So nothing happened, you were only waiting?"

"Yes sir."

"We're going to stop here for tonight. It's already dinner time. We will start back up in the morning with what happened after we woke up. Johen, I'm assuming you want to hear the ending of this?"

"Yes."

"Do you want to go home or stay the night here?"

Johen looks at me.

"It's your choice. We have an apartment you can use here. Or we can use the magic doors to get you home and back. It's whichever you prefer. You're still under my protection either way."

"I'll stay."

"Ok then. Everyone, let's change chairs. A different table awaits us. Servants get an apartment ready for our guest."

Omar stands up. "Do you want me to make a door to the dining room?"

I give him a dirty look. "Omar, we've been sitting for 7 hours. Let us walk."

Mary stands up. "If you are covered in feathers, you need to brush them off before you bathe. They will get stuck in the pipes, and it will be a mess... I'm saying this now, before I forget. I'm really looking forward to the gigantic bird fight in this story though."

We all laugh.

Thora stretches. "We need to go do something. We've been sitting forever."

"I found dance lessons you need to take with me."

"That will work. After dinner, though. I am hungry."

"Me too."

Tre puts his arm around me. "I'm coming this time."

"Me too. And don't forget your sunglasses." Tye pulls his out of his pocket.

Kane comes over. "So, who is going tonight?"

"Elkie, Dorseti, Mary, Me, Thora, Tye, Tre, Johen, Mary is pointing at you Kane." Dipak puts his hand where I can see it. "Dipak." I glance around. "Anyone else? I know it's been a stressful week. If you want to go and walk around Egypt, I understand that. You don't have to stick with us the whole time. Actually, we will not be together the whole time anyway. The girls will take a dance lesson and the boys usually sit around creepily with sunglasses on. I don't really know what else they do."

Bud shakes his head. "I would like to see it sometime. But not at night. You all go burn off some energy." Everyone else seems to agree.

"Everyone, after dinner if you are going. Meet in my office in the medical area. I will take us from there."

"Use my office, it's the closest."

"Fine, meet in Tye's office after dinner. I will summon Elkie and Dorseti there."

Thora jumps up. "OK LET'S GO EAT, BEFORE I EAT JOHEN."

Johen looks scared. "She won't eat you. We don't eat people."

Dipak smiles at him. "No, we suck all their blood out."

Tre nods. "Or just break their necks."

"You 2 forgot slicing them apart with swords." Tye pulls his sword halfway out.

"Boys, knock it off." I wink at Johen. "They won't hurt you."