Sorry that this took so long ^^

FYI, this story is told in alternating chapters- Present/Past/Present/Past etc. Last chapter was present, this is the past. So you have to wait until chapter three to find out what happens to Lu Han, MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Chapter 2- The Calling

When he was two years old Kris learned that he was abnormal. His mother had been reading to him, and he’d taken the book from her and began to read it out loud by himself. Before he’d even finished one page, she ripped the book from his hands and stalked out of the room without saying goodnight.

That was before Kris knew about the Ten Canons of the Guardians. At that time all he knew was that his mother didn’t like to hear him talk about constellations and rising tides, and he had to dress himself every morning because she hated looking at the birthmark on his chest. Sometimes he’d sit in his room and try to remember a time when she’d been able to look at him at all. All he’d come up with was an itching on his chest, right over the birthmark, and he’d wonder if she’d tried to scrub it off when he was a baby.

Kris’ father, on the other hand, was delighted with his son’s amazing intelligence and did everything in his power to get him a good education. Kris started school when he was three, and by the time he was five he was learning geography and division. It was around that time that he’d first met Matron.

Of course, Matron wasn’t her real name, it was her title. In the future Kris would meet many people with this title, but she would always stand out in his mind. She came to his house one day and said that she’d been invited by the leader of his Province to give him a present.

“What do I have to give you in return?” He’d asked, wary of things that were given with no strings attached.

“Nothing yet,” She’d answered, opening a box and laying out what looked to be a cluster of random bits of junk. She arranged them in a line on the kitchen table.

“You can pick one thing.”

He’d looked them over carefully, pausing for a moment when he came to a bright red crystal. It was small enough to fit in his hand, but when he picked it up it was very heavy. He stared at it for a long time before he finally put it down and moved on to look at the next item, which turned out to be a small pair of wings carved from some kind of material he’d never seen before. Kris held them in his hands—they were even smaller than the crystal, but they were much prettier. He ran his fingers over the feathers, feeling the tiny grooves of the carvings. Though the material was hard and smooth, Kris swore he could feel the feathers grow soft and fluffy under his touch.

“Do you want that one?” Matron asked.

“Yes, please,” he said.

“Then it’s yours,” she’d told him happily, and she gave him a thin piece of leather so that he could wear them around his neck.

It wasn’t until a week later that Matron came back to tell him about the 12 Guardians who protected the Tree of Life. He’d already known about the tree of course, everyone knew about the tree! It was what had created their race, it was what allowed them to live to this day. He just didn’t know that people actually protected it.

“What does it need protecting from?” Kris had asked. Later, those words would come back to haunt him. What, not Who.

“It’s more like attending to its needs,” Matron had said. “Like a child.”

“The tree has needs?” Kris asked skeptically.

Matron nodded. “Of course.”

“So why did you pick me?” Kris asked.

Matron smiled. “’We’ didn’t pick you, the Tree picked you.”

“How do you know?”

She touched the spot on his chest where his birthmark was. “It left its mark on you.”

Kris touched the mark. She talked like it was a good thing, something he’d never thought it could be.

“Who’s guarding the tree now then?” He asked.

“The previous Guardians. Every few hundred years a new cycle of Guardians are born, and the old ones retire to lives of quiet study.”

“Hundred years?!” Kris echoed. “They don’t die?”

Matron shook her head. “Being a Guardian is a lifetime commitment. Even after they retire and the new Guardians take over, the old ones live on and make themselves available should the Tree ever need them again.” She bent down and looked him in the eye. “It’s a wonderful task,” she promised. “You’ll love it. It’s a great honor.”

Three days later he left his home to live in the Southern Sanctuary, where he would be educated and trained to care for the Tree of Life. His father cried when he left, his mother hugged him for the first time in his memory. But it was strange; she embraced him with one hand and kept the other one between their bodies, over her stomach. As they walked away from his house, Kris turned around. His father was waving, his mother was looking at the ground, still keeping her hand over her abdomen.

“She’s pregnant,” he’d muttered. Matron overheard.

“What?”

“She’s pregnant, and that’s why she doesn’t care that I’m leaving.” He’d paused. “No. She cares. She’s glad, I won’t be around to corrupt her new baby.”

Matron patted his head soothingly. He ducked away.

~~~~~~~~~~

There was already another boy at the Southern Sanctuary; a baby, practically.

“This is Tao,” Matron told him. “He’s two. Tao, this is Kris. He’s five, so you have to listen to him. He’s your older brother now.”

Kris bit his lip. He would rather have been alone than in charge of babysitting this child. He didn’t understand children, he’d practically never been one himself. He didn’t want to be anyone’s older brother.

But he underestimated Tao. Much like him, the child was very bright; Kris discovered that in their first lesson together; Tao’s knowledge amazed him. As the weeks went by they sometimes had contests to see who could solve equations first, or who could make Teacher more surprised with what they already knew. Sometimes Kris would have to remind himself that he wasn’t actually related to Tao; the boy really felt like his blood relative. They did everything together, from lessons to playing. It was a wonderful feeling, to be needed by someone. To be adored, really—because anyone could see that Tao simply adored his older brother.

Unlike Kris, however, Tao’s gift was apparent.

“Each of the twelve Guardians has a power, given by the Tree of Life, in return for their service to it,” Teacher told them. “The gift is expressed in your birthmarks. Tao’s is time—he can freeze everything in time, but he will remain aware and mobile. Kris’ is flight.”

Kris dropped his pen in shock. “I can’t fly,” he protested.

“You will one day,” Teacher assured him. Everyone did, but even though Tao’s affinity became more and more advanced, Kris’ was barely there.

After their lesson’s Kris would take Tao behind the Sanctuary to a small garden, where Kris would throw things in different directions and Tao would freeze time and run to catch them. There was a swing set near the garden, and sometimes the two of them would play on it. The closest Kris came to flying was when he would jump of the swing at its highest arch and land gracefully on his feet. Had anyone else done it, they would have twisted their ankles, but he never got hurt.

Following their playtime, Tao would be forced to take a nap (Guardian or not he was still a child) and Kris would go to his room and stare at his reflection in his mirror. He was supposed to have wings—he’d seen pictures of the other Guardians, and those with his power had wings. Matron told him that they were trapped under his skin, growing with his bones and muscle. And no matter how hard he tried, how much he focused, they would not come out.

Kris’ struggle with his gift was still running rampant when the other boys joined the Sanctuary. By that time, Kris was seven and Tao was four. The other two, Yixing and Lu Han, were six and seven respectively.

It came as quite a shock when Tao and Kris walked into the dining hall and found two young boys already seated at the small table. Matron stood behind them, Lu Han’s hair. He’d looked like he very much wanted to cry, and the only thing restraining him was the belief that seven-year-olds did not weep.

Matron introduced the two newcomers and promptly left so that they’d have time to “get to know each other.” The second she’d gone, Tao—bless his heart—walked over to Lu Han and patted his cheek gently.

“You can cry if you want to,” he’d said. “We understand how it feels to be scared.”

They’d all wound up crying that afternoon, although later Kris would say that it hadn’t been so much for how much he missed his home as for how much he didn’t miss it, but they found comfort in each other and in knowing that they weren’t alone in their grief, whatever their reasons for it were. After that there was no room for awkwardness between them. Even more than brothers, they became each other’s lifelines.

They became best friends. They were playful and caused all kinds of mischief and mayhem. They threw dirt and mud like paint at the outer walls of the sanctuary and pretended to be artists. They played tag and hide-and-seek in the libraries. They were serious, too. They pushed each other to be better in lessons and to learn on their own. The Masters lead them in Meditation and they took it to heart, even doing it without being asked. They concentrated on bettering themselves and each other.

They were there when Lu Han became overwhelmed with nostalgia for his home. They comforted Tao when his nightmares made him scream himself awake. Two months into his stay, Yixing received a letter from the Guardians saying that his name would be changed to Lay to honor a dead scholar. He’d had a panic attack because he didn’t know who he was anymore, and Kris, Tao and Lu Han reminded him that his name did not dictate his personality. And when Kris became frustrated because he was still the only one without an obvious sign of his gift, his brothers assured him that he belonged at the Sanctuary as much as they did. Even so, sometimes it felt like a knife was being into his chest when he watched Lu Han throw rocks at Tao for him to freeze and catch, or when Lay ran around healing torn butterfly wings and sick birds.

It wasn’t until Kris was nine that his wings finally made their appearance, in the most painful way possible. The four of them were playing in the garden, or rather Tao and Kris were playing. Lay was openly wondering if he could help regrow a lizard’s lost tail, and Lu Han was covering his ears and trying very hard not to throw up. Kris was just about to warn Lay for the third time to shut up or he’d be the one who got to clean up vomit, when he felt the skin on his back shift. He dropped the rock he’d been about to throw.

No, it wasn’t his skin shifting…it was something under his skin. And it wanted out. Now.

Kris fell to the ground, eyes shut against the pain of his muscles tearing apart. He was vaguely aware that he was screaming, but he could no more stop it than he could stop the pain. He heard Lay screaming for a Matron, he heard Lu Han telling Tao to cover his eyes, and the next thing he knew he was in the Healers room with Matron holding him up by his forearms.

“Don’t fight them,” she ordered. “If you do you’ll only prolong the agony.”

Kris dug his nails into her arms and bit his lip until he tasted blood. It hurt so much, and he could feel the pain growing stronger. If it didn’t stop, he was going to black out…

“Kris,” Matron shouted, shaking him a little. “Do you want your wings or not?”

Kris shut his eyes and screamed as his skin ripped open. He heard blood splatter the walls and felt a weight on his shoulders, but before he could see his wings he fainted.

When he woke up he was lying on his stomach, cocooned in the softest sheets he’d ever felt. He’d buried his face into his pillow, wincing as the movement sent a tendril of pain down his back. It took a moment for him to remember why he was in so much pain, but when he did remember he shot straight up in his bed, heart pounding in the back of his throat. He looked around wildly and saw a mirror on the wall near the door, and he scrambled to get out of the bed. The sheets tangled around his legs coupled with the weight on his back meant that it took him awhile to even stand upright, but the second he had his balance back he rushed to the wall, nearly running headfirst into the mirror.

The first glance at his reflection made him clap his hands over his mouth to stifle his scream of shock. He stared into the mirror, taking in his pale face, wide eyes and by the Tree he had wings.

His chest heaved as he tried to inhale properly; tears of joy sprang to his eyes. He hoped he wasn’t dreaming, he’d die if he was dreaming. He shut his eyes and with a shaking hand he reached behind his back. He touched feathers and screamed again, this time in excitement.

Kris opened his eyes and looked over his shoulder, nearly whacking his face on the upper arch of one of his wings. He turned around in a circle, trying to twist his neck further and further around to see more of them before finally contenting himself with the mirror. They were absolutely huge, he probably had a seven-foot wingspan already, and covered in black feathers. As he studied them he noticed that they appeared to have an iridescence about them, as depending on how he angled his body they were either black, green or purple. He couldn’t stop touching them, and he couldn’t stop grinning. They were gorgeous.

He heard a gasp and saw Matron standing in the door. “Well, look who finally woke up.”

Kris was so giddy he couldn’t even get a complete sentence out. Matron laughed and lead him back to bed.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions, but right now there are three boys in the hallway who are very anxious to see you. Can I send them in?”

Kris nodded as he remembered the episode in the garden. He had no doubt that his brother would be frantic, heaven knew he would have been had he been in their situation. Matron opened the door and beckoned with her finger. Less than five seconds later Kris would up with 3 tearful boys at the foot of his bed.

“Don’t you ever scare us like that again,” Lu Han shouted at the same time Lay and Tao burst into simultaneous tears. Kris floundered for a second, he’d never had to deal with three crying boys at once before.

“I’m okay, I promise,” he assured.

“You were clawing at the ground screaming your head off,” Tao hiccupped. Kris hadn’t remembered that part.

Unsure of what else to do, Kris asked if they wanted to see his wings. They all stopped crying at once and nodded eagerly. Kris turned around and heard gasps. Deciding to play it up, he fluttered them.

“Can I touch them?” Tao squealed. Kris grinned and nodded before giving his wings over to be petted. It felt kind of nice actually. Lay hung back, staring at Kris' back in awe.

“They won’t burn you, you can touch them,” Kris insisted. Lay crawled over and gently his right wing, as though he was afraid it would break. Kris fluttered it again and Lay leapt back with a shriek, which had them all in a laughing fit.

They calmed down after a while; Kris settled back against the pillows cradling Tao in his lap, Lay and Lu Han made themselves comfortable at his sides.

“Can we stay with you tonight?” Lu Han asked.

Kris tightened his grip on Tao, put his right arm over Lu Han’s shoulders and rested his head atop Lay’s.

“I don’t think anyone could tear you away from me.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Following Kris’ acquirement of his wings, the Teachers at the Sanctuary decided it was time to start seriously training them to use their Gifts.

“Why won’t the Guardians teach us?” Tao asked. The Teachers looked scandalized.

“They cannot leave the Tree,” they said. “Not even for you.”

Kris took offense to that—if they were Guardians too, shouldn’t they be taken seriously by the older generations? But he couldn’t exactly say that, so he kept his mouth shut.

The bad part about having the ability to fly meant that his body needed to change before he could actually achieve lift off. The Teachers told him that his bones needed to hollow out, a process which could take up to 10 years. He could fly in the meantime, but not too high or too far, because he was just physically unable.

And more than learning to fly, Kris had to learn to take care of his wings, and boy were wings high maintenance! He had to keep his feathers clean and orderly, he had to be careful about what he leaned against, and since they were wide he had to watch where he stretched them. In three months he’d already knocked over several vases and portraits.

The other three didn’t really have this problem. For one thing they’d been using their gifts for ages, and they had at least an elementary grasp on their abilities. They were moving on to discovering their full potential; Lay was starting to bring dead plants back to life, and Lu Han was learning to take control of objects that were already in motion. Tao’s ability was so advanced that the Teachers really hadn’t been able to figure out what to do with him, not to mention that the gift of Time had always been a mystery, known only by those who possessed it, and they were notoriously unwilling to share its secrets. Finally it was decided that he would learn a different skill—an art of attack and defense known as Wushu.

For three years they trained to control their gifts, then one day the Master of the Sanctuary called them in to his room.

“It’s been decided that you will be sent to the Northern Sanctuary,” He informed them, “To continue your training with the rest of the Guardians.”

The four of them gaped at him.

“But we only have four,” Kris protested, picking the most practical reason why this move was not good, instead of whining that none of them wanted to leave home. “Aren’t their supposed to be six from each half of the planet?” The other three boys nodded feverishly, though Kris knew that each of them were also thinking only about how they just didn’t want to leave home.

The Master looked disgruntled for a second. “Yes, but occasionally it happens where one side will have a greater number than the other. This cycle has eight Guardians from the North.”

Kris wasn’t sure how he felt about the idea of them being outnumbered.

“The point is,” the Master went on, “We need to appoint a Southern Leader before we send you.”

He eyed them seriously and Kris shivered.

“So, who is it going to be?”

On cue Lay, Lu Han and Tao looked at Kris.

“You’re kinda already our leader,” Tao whispered tentatively.

“Well then it’s settled,” The Master said. “We’ll hold the ceremony in two weeks and after that you’ll be on your way.”

Kris felt like a knife had been stuck into his gut. He knew he’d have to go to the North eventually, they had the bigger Sanctuary (not to mention it was more equipped to help them develop their gifts), and after that they’d be off to the Tree, but the thought of leaving the South had never really hit him before.

Kris didn’t have time to dwell on that though, because then a Trainer had to be called to help him prepare for the ceremony. It was tedious work, full of rules and precise steps that had to be followed.

“The hallway of the Room of Ceremonies is fifty feet long,” Trainer told him. “You will need to stop every five feet and bow.”

So he needed to learn how to bow.

“What is your posture?!” She screamed at him. “Are you a farmer or a Guardian?”

Kris bit his lip against retorts and practiced until he perfected every step, until he could keep his face blank as was required, until his back and neck ached and he could feel his hollowing bones creak with his every step. But Trainer was satisfied and left.

A week before the ceremony a Matron saw him practicing walking and bowing in the hall.

“What are you doing?” She asked incredulously.

“It’s for the ceremony…” he said, unsurely.

She sighed and rolled her eyes. “That is the old way of doing it,” she said. “The Masters don’t expect ten bows from you. One at the beginning of the hallway and one at the end is fine, and on the way out don’t turn your back on them. Face them at all times. Do that and you’ll be fine.”

Kris hit his head against the wall when she left. He’d wasted a whole lot of time and effort on nothing, then.

The day of the ceremony everything went according to plan—he walked down the hall, sat in a large chair and drank some kind of potion the Masters brewed up. Tao, Lay and Lu Han were in the room too, faces schooled into perfectly blank masks. Kris did everything he was supposed to, but he felt unsettled. Something wasn’t right—it’s too rushed, too careless. The Masters barely looked at him, but when they did it sent chills down his spine. When he walked out of the ceremony, he didn’t feel any more like a leader than he did walking into it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anyway, the reason it took so long is because chapter 4 (the continuation of this chapter) is freaking huge and I kept having to change the cut-off point for this one otherwise chapter four would be like 12 pages long. But I am satisfied with where this cuts off now ^^

Next chapter- back to the present!