I laid awake in my bed for several hours because my thoughts were in a snarl of relived kisses and arguments.

I put a pillow across my face and blushed when Ciaran's claim that I stole his virtue came to mind. I was the innocent one, but the idea that perhaps he had something happen to him for the first time was a sweet fantasy. Trees could lie though, so I doubted I had been his first. He even said that he'd had a counterpart at some point in time. I doubted he just held hands with that person.

I finally threw back the covers and rose. Sleep meant to elude me while the past few hours with that man whipped around my head. I decided to distract myself by fixing Klack.

Klick fluttered to my shoulder as I sat at the desk that faced the moonlight and the stark mountains in the distance.

I stroked Klick's feathers as it preened strands of my hair. "Hey, little buddy, I've sure got a mess on my hands."

Persimmon meowed from the corner of my room, and I jumped in my chair, startled. He padded over to my desk and sat in front of me.

"Silly Persimmon, what are you doing in my room?"

I picked him up and set him on my lap. That was one of the interesting things about my power over ghosts — not only did I see them, but I could also touch them. They became more real from my touch, in fact. The ghost friends I had in the city recalled who they were before they died after my touch. Sometimes, they passed over to the afterlife from that.

The items my birds had collected hid in a cup contained pens. I dumped the cup and spread out the little treasures that Klick and Klack had collected.

Klack laid in a drawer, injured still. I'd put him there until I had time to see how to fix him. I pulled him out of the drawer and set him on the desk before me.

After taking off his costume as carefully as possible, I looked at the damage. One of his legs had separated at the femur and fibula, plus one of the humerus bones on his wings had snapped in half. That part would be easy to fix. A little glue should do the trick, but the other part was a joint, and I would need some way to keep them together. Klack looked up at me, and I sighed. At least he'd not "died" after the accident. He'd just been stunned.

"I'm sorry, little friend. I keep putting everyone in harm's way lately."

He clicked his beak at me as if forgiving me, and I felt my eyes sting. Before I set to work, I rubbed them—no need for tears to get into the glue and possibly disrupt any of Klack's magic. As a temporary measure, I glued the broken wing back together and held it in place with some tape until it dried. The broken leg was another matter because I needed more supplies — a bit of clay to create anchors for the hinge I needed to create, and some wire. I would ask the staff in the house in the morning. I covered him with a handkerchief and patted him gently, disappointed that there wasn't more to do for him at that moment.

Nevertheless, the work had given me some time to forget about my issues for a moment. In two days, my previous desert of a love life had experienced a sudden deluge. Three men had kissed me, and Ciaran had more than kissed me. Then there was that whole crazy thing with Noc.

My face heated as a giddy thrill coursed through my body at the thought. I covered my face with my hands as embarrassment immediately followed.

"Matt, you're a hormonal idiot," I said out loud.

I looked at the roots that branched from my heart to various parts of the mansion and the world, and I blamed them. It must be because I sensed each man's emotions that I was easily unbalanced. Or, it was the crazy sense of completeness I experienced by having each of them linked to me - even Erick.

I grimaced at that realization. It would be a snowy day in hell before I kissed Erick.

Even though it was probably not a good idea, I traced one root and closed my eyes. I wondered if the small but mind-blowing lesson Ciaran had given me might happen indirectly by focusing on a single root. Something like that had happened when I joined to the seven in the dungeon — they weren't all nearby, and I hadn't had to touch them. My conscience railed at me, letting me realize I was allowing the feelings I had through my link to overrun my moral judgment.

Despite my conscience pinching me, I leaned back in my chair and concentrated on each link. Suddenly I chose one to 'tug' on mentally while reasoning that I needed someone to talk to. I wouldn't try to do anything else. After I finished rationalizing, I concentrated on the root as if it were a straw and pulled.

I sensed a mind waking up, and I gasped at my success. The mind fumbled in sleepy confusion, then did something surprising.

He spoke to me in my thoughts.

"Matt... yo... what are you doing?"

I heard him as clearly as if he was standing in my room.

"Adrian?" I thought back.

His mind was more alert. "Yeah?"

"I can hear you in my thoughts, Adrian. Sorry about this; I was trying something out. You can go back to bed."

"How the heck can I go back to sleep now? How are we doing this?"

"You remember the training Ciaran did with me tonight?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, he taught me how to do this pulling and pushing of energy through touch." I blushed as the imagery of that moment surfaced at my mere mentioning of it, and I waved it away. Then I continued speaking to his mind.

"That got me speculating about the first time I connected with all of you in the dungeons. Not only did I receive your emotions as I can now with touch, but I heard your thoughts and dreams, and... many other things. It was just for a moment."

"That's crazy, Matt. I don't know if I like that idea. Are you doing that now?"

"No. I'm just hearing what you're sending towards me, but not what you're thinking about."

"Phew, okay, that's good. I don't want you able to read my mind all the time."

"I don't expect I can do it unless I concentrate on our root."

"Cool, but... Matt, I'm getting some crazy emotions from you. What happened tonight?"

I blushed again. "You can feel them?"

"Yeah, it reminds me of when... uh... never mind. I'm here for you, Matt. I won't judge, honestly."

Sincerity flowed through the link, and it filled me with hope. It would be nice if at least one person in my court could be a friend to me.

Taking the risk, I told him about what had happened in the music room. I told him how confused I felt, and how unprepared I was for a relationship of any kind.

"Adrian, I can't understand what happened between Ciaran and me. I'm bewildered about the whole thing, especially when I learned it was the way the Edentrees used to make babies before they were cursed!"

"Yeah, I don't appreciate Ciaran. He seems like he enjoys tricking you. Seems like he has something up in that head."

"Well, I was the one that went too far. I assume he was going to do something minor, but I got all caught up like I did at the party."

"Matt. you aren't going around blaming yourself for things again, are you?"

"... Maybe." I fiddled with Klack's pompoms. There'd been some dark days when all I did was blame myself.

"Well, stop it. He's the one that let it go as far as it did. He could have stopped sooner. I think, from now on, you should have someone with you if you need to be with Ciaran. The boy seems like he has some plans we don't know about."

"I wondered about that too. Although I hope it's not true, I think he wanted to be the Royal Consort all along so he could gain power in Duir's court. I don't want to get embroiled in their politics, Adrian."

"I agree... so... do you have a choice yet?"

"What? God no... that would be like... my official husband. But if I had to decide tomorrow, I guess Luke, but only as a political marriage. He's already been doing the job." I looked out at the stark white mountains and wished that I could be a hermit on one of them.

"That's going to thrill Luis if he comes back." A wave of disappointment flowed through the link, followed by resignation. Had he wanted me to pick him? 

I scoffed at myself. Of course not. Then I touched the treasures that Klick and Klack found me. There were a couple of keys, a pen, three strange gold coins, and a ring as I thought about how '"thrilled" Luis would be. "Yeah, I know. I'm going to use the link to find him tomorrow and hope that he'll talk to me. I don't know anymore."

"I got your back, Matt. No matter what. Me and you, we'll figure out how to get back to earth, and then you'll join that boy band with me."

I laughed aloud. "I'm not a boy."

"Hey, you're magic. We'll improvise!"

"I should let you go back to sleep, Adrian."

"Wait, this is the first time I've been able to speak to you alone. I wanted to talk about the night with Joseph. There're some things I think you believe about that night that I wanted to make sure you know."

After so much time burying Joseph, everyone seemed so determined to unearth him. I pushed back from the table and paced. "Fine, what is it?"

"I didn't have time to talk to you about it, and Luis didn't know, but Joseph didn't get to do anything to you. You sent him running before he could get down to business."

"That's not how I remember it." I frowned as I tried to unearth those hazy memories. I remembered how sour his breath was and Adrian's screams. The feel of the knife in my ribs — that I could remember, definitely, but... between the bite and the knife... things were hazy.

"No, Matt, the minute he bit you, you did that thing with your roots. That's why he cut you."

A sense of elation overcame me as I collapsed on my bed. "Seriously?"

"Yeah... I was going to tell you the next day, but I was riding a high. I thought you and me were together because of what happened the night before."

"You mean when I stole your life force?" I cringed.

"You gave most of it back, and some of yours. But no, it was what happened right after."

My heart started beating as dread crawled up my spine. "What happened, Adrian?"

"Like I said, when Joseph attacked you, his bite turned you into a girl. You still had brown hair like you were Matt, so I guess not all the disguise went away, but you definitely were a girl.  I was freaking out that you'd changed, but when you asked me to kiss you, well, I did. Then you passed out again, and I spent all night listening to your heartbeat, afraid you'd die. You woke up hugging me, thanking me. I thought you meant about what we did..."

Oh, sweet cheeses... I blew out a breath in relief because I thought he was going to say we did something else. "I'd meant about you saving me because I thought you had magic."

"You didn't remember?"

"No..."

"I think Luis did something, Matt. You know, I argued with him before you saw him tonight. He was going to take you away. He helped get back all of your disguise and threatened me not to say anything.  Anyway, I was happy to see you when you got back."

"God, I'm sorry, Adrian. It makes so much sense why you were hanging all over me the next day. I was clueless."

"I'm just glad we got that straight. Makes things easier for me to handle now. At least I know who to be mad at."

"Yeah. But, now I'm a girl, that must be hard."

"The girl thing isn't a problem. I kissed you as a girl, not a guy. It's having to share you. I don't think I can do it. I just found you again. I thought maybe I could lure you to Korea, then... start over without Luis breathing down our necks."

"Hah.... we definitely have things to work through."

"We will, Matt. Hey, I found you again, didn't I? We had this talk too. Progress!"

Progress, sure.

I let Adrian go back to sleep and let go of the connection. I realized that I really wanted to speak to Luis this evening. As I thought of him just ditching me, my fury built as I tried to do the same thing with my connection with him. I found an awareness at the other end of the link, but it was animal-like. It became alert to my intrusion and then hostile.

"Luis?"

There was no response, save for a wave of growing anger that surged towards me in a painful crash. I flinched at the backlash.

"Talk to me!"

The anger billowed into a rage that whirled within my mind like a hurricane. Buffeted, I severed the link with a cry.

I clenched the ring into my hand and gritted my teeth, my anger joining with the echoes that Luis had left me with. For three years, he'd lied to me and kept me isolated. Also, for three years, I was just his 'baby brother' and nothing more, even though he knew I wasn't a boy. He wouldn't let me find anyone, but he wouldn't take me for himself.

Well, screw him! He could stay out there, wherever he was, for all I cared. I would not look for him after all! I would tell everyone that Luis could suck it!

I stomped around the room and went to the mini-fridge, where I angrily guzzled down three cherry cokes. I looked at the last can of coke and crushed it, tears forming in my eyes as Mike, Luis, Aisa tortured my thoughts. Screw them all!

There was a soft rap on the door. I opened it and found Adrian standing there, looking worried.

"Matt, it's so weird. I felt you being upset."

"Sorry..." I leaned my head against the doorpost. "I don't think Luis is coming back."

"Want me to stay with you?" His mouth lifted in a crooked smile, but his eyes looked pitying.

I'm sure I looked surprised because his smile turned into a grin. Grinning myself, I opened the door wider. "Sure, come in."

He walked in and gave a low whistle. "Nice digs — way better than mine."

I shrugged as I looked around at them. "I miss my treehouse, to be honest."

I flopped down on my bed and buried my head in my pillow. Adrian sat down on the other side of it and put his hand on my shoulder. "Are we going to go looking for him in the morning?"

I shook my head in my pillow, and it muffled my response. "No, screw him."

He patted my shoulder, then laid down next to me. "Wanna hear what I've been up to for the past three years? Maybe it will take your mind off your troubles for a little?"

I lifted my face from my pillow and nodded; then, I turned my body to face him. "Yes, very much so."

So, he told me. I learned that a nice family took him in, and they'd discussed adopting him recently. He spoke to me about his bandmates, who he'd known throughout high school. He told me about friends and what they were like. Then he nattered on about the opportunity in Korea.

Somewhere during his nattering, I wound up with my head on his chest. I'm not sure if he pulled me there, or I put myself there. With his soft, deep voice still rambling,  I fell asleep to the sound of his steady heartbeat.