Wizards and Thieves - Chapter Four
Chapter Four: What is this strange place?
"Maybe we should take him to the hospital?" the woman suggested.
"Yeah, let me grab my jacket," Lord Petros said. He moved past them into the living room and then a bell sounded from him. Niall stared as Lord Petros reached in a pocket and pulled out a small box that was causing the ringing. He poked something on the box and held it up to his ear. "Peter Burke." Lord Petros seemed to be listening to the small box and Niall wondered if he wanted it to ring again. Lord Petros turned and stared at Niall with his eyebrows raised. "Don't worry; I have eyes on him right now. He seems to be hurt, so hold off on that team, won't you, Jones? I'll get to the bottom of this."
"Honey, what is going on?" the woman asked as Lord Petros put the ringing box back in his pocket.
Niall took half a step back as Lord Petros came straight over to him. "That was Jones; they say that Niall's anklet has been cut."
"What?" Mossy exclaimed. He turned towards Niall. "Why didn't you tell me?"
Niall stared at them all. "I have no idea what you are talking about."
"Well, maybe it just went dead," Lord Petros said. He reached out and tugged at Niall's pants. They lifted up to reveal nothing around Niall's ankle. Lord Petros straightened up and looked at Niall. "Did you take the anklet off?"
"I still have no idea what you are talking about," Niall said. He shook his head. "I admit, they told me that I was the chosen one and they were going to send me after you, but I ran away. I have no idea where the stuff is, but I must have been hit hard with the magical backlash. This might even all just be a dream."
Lord Petros frowned at him. "I think that we are definitely taking you to the hospital."
"Wait, something doesn't seem right," the woman said. She came around and stared at Niall. "Do you know who you are?"
"Niall Caffrei," Niall replied. He frowned at her. "I can remember who I am just fine."
"And do you know who this man is?" the woman asked as she motioned to Lord Petros.
"Lord Petros," Niall said. He rolled his eyes. "Anyone should be able to tell you that; it's been said that you shouldn't mess with him if you don't want to end up dead and serving him."
"What?" Lord Petros exclaimed, staring at Niall with wide eyes.
"And do you know who I am?" the woman asked.
Niall looked at her, inspecting her for really the first time. He frowned as something floated to the top of his mind. Something that he hadn't really paid attention to, since he was focusing more on the plans for the castle rather than the people inside of the castle when the high priest was rambling on. "Lady Elisabet?”
“Honey, you’re going to think that I am crazy, but I don't think that is Niall,” Lady Elisabet said. She turned towards Lord Petros, who was staring at Niall. “The names he is calling us are so close, but wrong.”
“Which means that he has hit his head,” Lord Petros said.
“But the way that he is saying his name,” Lady Elisabet said. She turned to Niall. “Say it again.”
“Niall?” Niall repeated, raising his eyebrow at Lady Elisabet. He had noticed that their pronunciation of his name was slightly off, but he hadn't thought it was such a bad thing.
“That isn’t his normal way of saying it,” Lady Elisabet said. She turned towards Mossy. “Haven't you noticed it as well?”
“I just thought it was because he hit his head,” Mossy said. “So, they are cloning people, huh?”
“Clones don't exist, beyond sheep,” Lord Petros replied.
“And what do you think people are?” Mossy asked.
“You really think that this isn’t Neal?” Lord Petros asked his wife.
“I do,” Lady Elisabet said. “Listen, you know Neal Caffrey better than anyone, you tell me. Is this your Neal?”
“My Neal?” Lord Petros scoffed and Niall made a face in return. Lord Petros seemed to be skeptical of the whole thing, but he did focus in on Niall. He frowned in utter confusion. “I don’t think he is Neal. He doesn't have the anklet for one, and that scar from Keller.”
“What is this fascination with my ankle?” Niall asked.
“Our Neal, I can't believe I called him that,” Lord Petros shook his head, “Our Neal is a convicted thief who is only out of jail because he is monitored. You don’t have the tracking anklet, and you really don't seem to know what it is, so I have to believe that you are different than the Neal Caffrey I know.”
“He got caught, huh,” Niall said, mostly to himself. He ignored the look that Lord Petros sent him; it wasn't as though he was planning on stealing anything from them. He didn’t have a market for that sort of stuff anyway.
“So, now that we’ve established that you are not the Neal Caffrey that we know and we know that this event happened about ten minutes ago and that whatever happened caused some kind of computer glitch with the tracking system,” Lord Petros listed out. “What do we do now?”
“Find Neal, of course,” Mossy said, giving Lord Petros a look as though Lord Petros was insane.
“But how do we go about that?” Lord Petros said. He frowned and then turned towards Niall. “Tell me everything that happened before you woke up at Mossy’s.”
“Before you start badgering the poor boy, why don’t I make some tea and get some snacks?” Lady Elisabet asked. “He looks like he could use something and you won't get anywhere if your lead collapses on you.”
“All right,” Lord Petros said. “Why don't we sit down in the living room and we’ll figure this out?”
“Yeah, sitting would be good,” Niall said. He held a hand up to his head, which was starting to pound again. It was just starting to sink in that this was not his world at all and these were not the people that he had known.
He wanted to figure out how to get back to his world, because he had wanted to escape being the chosen one, not the whole world. He was sure that the wizard’s staff was what caused this whole thing, which meant that he had to figure out a way to reverse the backlash. He wondered whether this version of Lord Petros was as good a Wizard as in his world.
Chapter Five