Chapter 45: Pearl

Storm

I’ve decided the last few chapters of this book should be Mikal’s summary.

Of all of us, he has probably had the most interesting year. While a lot has happened to me too, I think the others have summed up my major achievements in their way. I know that I’m a very content man. Being surrounded by the huge loving family that I have managed to gather just makes me an even happier one.

I find plenty to keep me occupied and having my kids has also been a major distraction, towards which I’ve been delighted to divert my attention. Helping run Daniel’s Wizards’ School has also been a labour of love. It was a brilliant idea and a great way for us to keep tabs on each other and bring us all closer.

Mikal is a brilliant teacher, and we had to build a dedicated server just to store his knowledge. Bron has also contributed immensely to our collection and even the development of our teaching methods. Being of similar ages, he and I have become very close friends.

Lee, Sean and other people from Harmony have managed to come and visit us and given lectures that are always packed. They have even joined some of Mikal and Bron’s classes, and the boys have gone to lecture in her school. Lee said her school is packed to the rafters when they visit.

Mikal did one of Bron’s theatre productions the first time, and they and Crystal have done some since. Lee said there were some very starry-eyed wizards after the performances and it wasn’t just the younger element. They have done them here too, and get standing ovations, each time.

The three of them told me they had a ball putting them together and I just knew they had. I’m still learning how they achieved half what they did. As far as a display of how to do wizardly things, it just boggled the mind.

I do wonder what the next few years will bring. As far as the prophecy is concerned, I believe it has been achieved as well as it can be. The people are slowly becoming one, as well as you could expect. At least we all have the same laws and the rulers agree.

You will always get malcontents, but despite the Keltrian way, I don’t think even they could totally subvert the nature of sentient beings. After all, people that they had cast out were responsible for destroying their system of planets.

I’m just glad that so far, we have avoided the same cataclysm happening here.

Mikal

Since my last contribution to this story, a lot has happened.

After Crystal and I had our little altercation with Dolton, I sent my ship to Earth. Crystal had said she had used a portal on an island, so I went there first. Xia has shields that can turn our ship invisible, so we found a convenient place to land before going to visit the cavern.

Xia was conducting a search on Mike and Mikael for us. Crystal informed me that theoretically, it had been nearly eleven years since she was last here. She pointed out things that had changed, commenting that there were more shops and houses in the sub-division.

She had seriously thought of buying a property and moving here with Daniel. She’d made an appointment with the real-estate lady but had missed it since she jumped to Amity. She pointed out a ten-acre property and said she had liked it as it was close to the cavern.

“They haven’t done much with it,” I replied.

“No, it seems they like to keep it private and natural, although there are more trees than I remember. I don’t remember it having solar panels like those. They must have upgraded when Sean’s went on the market,” she said.

“Aren’t they still expensive?” I asked her.

Crystal chuckled, “Not from what I heard. Sean told Bron about how he was selling them to third world countries for peanuts,” she replied.

“Is that a form of currency I don’t know about?” I asked trying to think if I’d heard that expression.

“It’s what you buy monkeys with,” Crystal said trying to keep a straight face.

“Ah,” I replied smiling at her. Apparently, I had gaps in my education. Xia was linked into the local satellites, busy gaining me updates on the political and social changes since David had left and what I had heard from Crystal until she left here. Most of my understanding of Earth society was out of date.

“Hey, they have kids,” Crystal said. She had zoomed in on the house, and the young couple had come outside with two kids. I guessed the kids were about eight and five. “Bloody hell!” she exclaimed.

“What?” I asked.

“Mike, that’s Mike, I’d know that walk and that smile anywhere,” she said staring avidly into the screen.

I was a little worried by the exuberance she was displaying. I understood from Daniel that this Mike had been very special to Crystal. I looked closely at the screen. “Isn’t he supposed to be like forty-six or something?” I asked.

Crystal frowned and looked more closely too, “He barely looks older than when I left, and she looks no older than me. Hum, something fishy is going on here. I think we need to go visiting,” she said.

“Are you sure, you wish to go that far?” I asked her.

“Yeah!! Something is very odd about those two. Oh shit! I think I know who she is,” Crystal exclaimed in excitement.

“Care to enlighten me?” I asked.

“Not until I’m sure, but we might have passengers when we go home,” she told me and then hurried off to get dressed. She fussed and made sure she looked presentable, and then she checked me over to make sure I was too.

She took a big breath and blinked me to their driveway. Holding my hand tightly she walked me up to the door and pushed a button beside it.

“Yes,” a voice said.

“Hi, I think an old friend of mine lives here,” Crystal said to the air.

“Who are you looking for?” the voice came back.

Then a male voice gasped, “Bugger me!” and the door was pulled back. Crystal and the man looked at each other in shock, and then they were hugging each other tightly, saying unintelligent worlds and then dancing around as the hugged.

I smiled at the bemused young woman and put out my hand in greeting, “G’day, I’m Mikal James and the lady hugging your husband is my wife, Crystal.”

He eyes went wide, and she looked at the pair who were still in a bear hug with tears in their eyes. “The Crystal?” she asked me.

“Going by the way they are hugging each other, I believe so,” I replied and took her hand. I looked at her as I held it and said, “Hum, I think we had better take this reunion inside. You are not what you seem, are you my dear?”

“Neither are you, and I bet our condition explains a lot about her too,” she replied. “So how did you find us?” she asked me as I followed her inside. We assumed Crystal and Mike would follow eventually.

She took me to the kitchen and got busy making tea for us. I answered her question as I sat the dining room table and replied, “Chance, if you believe in fate,” I replied.

I then had two gorgeous kids checking me out. I thought the boy would have been eight going on nine and the girl not much more five. She looked at me and said, “You glow like mummy and daddy. Is you magicians too?”

“Yes,” I replied solemnly. “So are you,” I then told her.

“See,” she said to her brother, “I’s told you we was, too.” She gave me a brilliant smile and then skipped off with a raggedy looking doll under her arm.

Her brother looked at me, and I saw a resemblance to Daniel. This kid looked enough like him that you’d know instantly that they were related. I said to him, “Did you know you had an Uncle Daniel?” I asked him.

He looked at his mother and then back at me, “Daddy said I looked like my granddad. Does Daniel look like him too?”

“Well, Daniel looks like you, but he is older of course,” I replied.

“Does he have girls making google eyes at him and trying to kiss him?” he asked me seriously.

I chuckled and replied, “Yes, and it gets him into all sorts of trouble.”

“Well, if he gets into trouble there isn’t much hope for me,” he said with resignation.

“As long as you are a gentleman and don’t take advantage of them, you will be fine,” I told him.

“That’s what dad says,” he told me. “Oh, I’m Mitch, My sister is called Gemma. It’s been nice to meet you, sir.”

He put out his, and I shook it. He looked up at me and grinned, and then walked away shaking his hand. I watched him with a smile. ‘He will be one to keep an eye on,’ I thought.

The other adults all looked at me. Mike put out his hand, and I stood and shook it. “Sorry about the greeting, I was a bit overwhelmed,” he replied. “Woh! What are you?” he asked me as he looked up into my face.

“A little higher up the ladder from you,” I replied with a grin. I then sat as I felt the ceiling in this house was a little low. I’d had fun trying to duck through the doorways as it was.

Crystal laughed at my double innuendo, and the grin on Mike’s face said he got it too. Pearl shook her head and finished putting tea and a big plate of cakes and biscuits on the table with other things. The others then joined me, and once we had our cuppas, I looked at Pearl, “So how did you get here, Pearl?” I asked her.

“How do you know my name?” she asked me with a little trepidation.

“I’m not sure if you will feel sorrow or not, but Doug is dead,” I told her.

She went pale, and then relief washed over her face, and I felt some of the tension go out of her body. “Thank you, you have no idea how much better that makes me feel. I was always worried that he would come here. It was why I couldn’t leave here,” she said.

Mike took her hand, and it was obvious to me that they loved each other deeply. I felt myself relax and as the tension left me, I knew Mike wasn’t a threat. Crystal took my hand and gave me that smile that makes my heart rate speed up and gets other things stirred up, as well.

Pearl looked at us, and I think she also knew that while Mike and Crystal have a history that wasn’t where their hearts lay anymore. She smiled at me and said, “I came here about eleven years ago. It seems Crystal and I also have a history.”

Crystal frowned, “How so?”

Well, it seems that I actived the portal. From what the book and I have worked out, when I was eight, I fell through the wall in to the cave. I hit my head hard. I was dazed and lost my memory. I stumbled into the portal room and onto the dais. Book said that I disappeared, and you and a baby took my place.”

“When I was escaping Doug, I told my portal on Pearl Island to take me home. Apparently, you were sitting on the dais here and it activated. You went back to Amity and the portal you were locked onto, and I took your place here. Some of the crystals here then failed, so the portal became locked while it was repairing itself.”

“We think the portal here stayed locked onto mine. Book said Tristan was able to activate it twice after I left, but then for some reason, it would lock back onto the portal I went to. If you tried to come back during the first ten years I was here, you probably wouldn’t have been able to. It took Tristan and me that long to get the silly thing to work properly again.”

“Isn’t that about when Storm said that the three systems came back into sync?” I asked Crystal.

“Yes, I guess having two Lord Wizards working on the problem must have had something to do with it,” she replied. “So how did you two meet?” she asked them.

“She seduced me,” Mike said with a big grin.

“Yeah, like that was hard to do,” Pearl retorted.

“What can I say, I’m a sucker for a tall blonde, with nice tits and a cute arse,” Mike said making us all grin. He then looked more serious. “After the big blow up with dad, I kinda lost it for a bit. Then you breaking up with me had me really mad and I tossed in my job and went bush.”

“I wandered around Oz for a few years doing odd jobs and then went back to Bundaberg. I’d had this idea in my head and dad financed it. So when I became filthy rich, I decided to look for a nice place to get some peace and quiet.”

“I remembered Daniel saying that you loved coming here. So I came to find out what appealed to you so much about this island. I was having dinner by myself in one of the open restaurants; just chilling out, when she wandered in.”

“Pearl just walked up to me and said, ‘are you married?’ When I said no, she smiled and took my hand. That was about ten years ago. I’ve been living here ever since,” Mike said.

“How’s Michael?” Crystal asked with trepidation.

“Good, very good, I’m not sure what you did to him, but he never looked his age even when I was a kid. Then Pearl did some spell on him and mum and gave them some bling and about a year ago they moved to a place called Harmony.”

“Dad’s teaching at some fancy school they have while learning to be a magician. I know he asked if you were there but I don’t think it was to bother you. When Pearl removed the spell from us, we came to realise why you panicked and dad was really upset for a bit.”

“He told me what happened between you, too. I don’t think your spell removed all of his guilt, but I did understand. He knows Daniel’s his by the way. I think he knew when I first brought him home to visit and it was why he was pestering me about meeting you.”

“He did love you, you know. He and mum had a few heart to hearts, and I think he came to realise that he was as much in love with what could have been if things hadn’t happened as they did. You were the first person he fell in love with and losing you so soon after he had let you into his heart was hard for him.”

“Personally, I think you two would have had a rough time. Dad’s a bit possessive, and I think knowing what your step did would have eaten at him. The shock of what he did was a real wake-up call, and he had to do a bit of reassessing.”

“Mum stuck with him, and I think he has finally come to realise what a gem she is and has let go of his past and got on with living a new life with her. After Pearl had given them the bling, they decided it was time to redo their lives. They had a smash-up renewal of their vows and then shipped out.”

“Mum said she is expecting a baby and dad is happy as a clam. He has really changed in the last five years and loves being at the school. He is teaching engineering and is thick as thieves with a bloke he calls Pete, and his other mates.”

“I think Pete’s the Queen’s dad but the fact he and a few of the others are from Oz and in his age group, they have all become bosom buddies. So yeah, it was rough for a bit, but he has come out on top. Pearl says with the bling he has, he should still have a long life ahead of him and dad is embracing it with a passion.”

I had been watching Crystal while Mike brought her up-to-date. I was relieved to see that she was happy that Michael had got over her. I wasn’t that surprised it had taken him so long. I’m not sure I’d get over losing her in a hurry.

I’ve had her haunting my life for about as long as he has, and now that she was mine, I’d probably be no different to Michael in wanting to keep her. It surprised me that I too felt possessive of Crystal. I’d never felt this way for another woman and it kinda shocked me.