4.The Serpent's Caster (ManxBoy)

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Fraden

I was minding my own business, doing a crossword when I heard it. It was faint but it was there, in my mind I felt his presence.

"Fraden," I stood from my chair in confusion, I couldn't place it, but I had a sinking sensation in my gut. Before I could even think about it, I grabbed the keys to the car and went to the garage.

"Uncle Fraden?" I didn't even look up as I got in the car. "Hey, is everything okay?" I started the car and I was gone. I found myself growling at the prospect's of Linus needing help, the fact that he could he in danger scared me more than I wanted it too.

Before I know it, I arrived at a building with the words Roosevelt high on the front. I felt like I was possessed or something as I entered the building. I didn't know where I was going, where it would lead me, bit my feet carried me there and what I saw had be freezing.

"Linus?" I called to the boy in the middle of the hallways in the arms of another. A pile of ash was behind him another a little away, but what I was focused on were the large hands around Linus' shoulder.

"Breathe," the man was saying to him. "Everything is going to be fine." Somehow I swayed at the sound of his voice. It was beautiful and calming, I found myself hanging onto his every word. "Sleep." Then I blinked and hissed as Linus fell limp against him.

"What are you doing?" I asked through gritted teeth. I felt angry, I couldn't remember the last time I had ever felt so angry. The man turned and I had to force myself to focus.

"Helping." He said as he stood with Linus in his arms, apparently, sleeping. "Are you a relative?" I stepped back and scowled.

"No," I grumbled and walked over to him. "But give him here." The man studied me.

"I can't do that." I hissed at him, my orange eyes flashing and he gasped. "Oh."

"Give him. Here." I demanded of him, my hand outstretched towards them.

"I can't." He frowned and looked down at Linus with an expression so tender it was almost heart breaking. I recognized that look because once it had been given to me by Jerald and I him. I felt my arm drop as well as my face.

"You.."

"Yeah," he said fiercely, looking back at me. He lowered his face down to run his nose along Linus' cheek.

"But.." I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach. I wanted to throw up, I wanted to cry and I wanted to hurt someone. I wanted to hurt this man.

"Calm down," he told me with a scowl. "Nobody needs to get hurt here,alright?" He sighed. "We need to take care of Linus first." I felt myself calm as I looked at his peaceful face. "Let's go to the nurses office." He suggested and turned around without even waiting for me to object or agree. I scowled and followed.

I don't know why I was reacting so strongly to this, the fact that this man was holding Linus didn't sit well with me. It made me angry but also very sad. I wanted to be the one to hold Linus, I wanted to be the one to have calmed him from whatever it was that happened. It really didn't sit well with me to have this man take care or him.

Mine! I paused as I felt it. My heart ached and my head throbbed as a voice that never spoke made it seem so obvious. Unlike wolves, serpent shifter's didn't really have another conscious. The serpent part of me never spoke, ever, it only ever did once and that was to say one word and that had been over 582 years ago, when Jerald and I decided to run away together.