The Brotherhood: Tristan

[k_a_webb]

Written for Surprise Story Week: 13 (again).

Yawning, Tristan finished the last of his observations on the new arrival. He put his pen down on the desk and looked around the study. Almost everything in the room had once been his grandfather’s because he’d found himself unable to replace anything or get rid of anything, even though he’d been the leader of the shapeshifter’s Brotherhood house for over a decade. The picture on the desk was the only picture of his grandparents that he knew existed so it felt as though his grandfather was still there. His only addition to the room was the pictures on the wall next to the door. When he looked at those pictures he was reminded of why he’d taken over in the first place and why he couldn’t just walk away, no matter how much he wanted to.

Opening the top drawer of the desk he took out the book of observations his grandfather had written in. It wasn’t full but he’d never been able to write in it. Instead he’d put it in a drawer in the mistaken belief that he’d never look at it again. Three weeks into his tenure as leader he’d found himself pulling it out and reading what had been written about Kara, just to get a better idea of what she’d been like before. When he’d put it back in the drawer he’d promised himself he’d never look at it again. A few weeks later he found himself pulling it out again to read about the other lost members of the Brotherhood for no real reason at all. After that he found himself reading it regularly, reminding himself of the people in the pictures.

‘Conrad,’ his grandfather had written, ‘is twelve. He’s a gregarious and outgoing boy, with an interest in everything and everyone in the house. Kara still has no interest in the new arrivals but he isn’t going to let that stop him from making friends with her. So far he’s spent most of his first day here following her around and asking her questions. I think she’s not quite sure what to make of him because people normally leave her alone when she ignores them. The only power I know of is his ability to shapeshift into a domestic cat.’

Tristan turned to the third of May. ‘Kara and Conrad are inseparable. I never believed that anyone would have the patience to push past her walls, but he did. I’m glad that she has a friend and he’s beginning to get her to talk to the other three people here. They’re happy enough to let her in because of him. He’s told them, he was talking to me about this the other day, that Kara is a good person who couldn’t deal with the fact that her parents threw her out and just needed someone to understand her. I was surprised at how empathetic he is and I wonder if that’s one of his powers. There’s so much still to learn about what may or may not be a power.’

The next important entry was on the fifth of May. ‘We’ve had another new arrival. Miriam. She’s very shy and I was surprised when Kara was the first person to talk to her. I think Kara sees something in Miriam that reminds her of herself. It’s wonderful to see how much Kara is growing with Conrad here. He’s been such a breath of fresh air and we all love him.’

Using a finger to keep his place, Tristan looked up at the pictures of Miriam and Conrad. Kara thought that Miriam was jealous of their powers, because Miriam’s powers were useless until she gained a mind power, but sometimes he wondered whether the girl was actually jealous of Conrad. It was easy to see why she would be so jealous. Every time his grandfather wrote in the book about Conrad it was positive and it seemed like he was friends with everyone, while Miriam’s entries weren’t always so bright. He kept his finger where it was so he could go back and turned to the twenty-third of July.

‘Miriam is a difficult child to deal with. I want her to talk to me about what she’s thinking and what she’s feeling, but she doesn’t want to. Instead she talks to Kara, who in turn refuses to tell me about the problems Miriam is having settling in. I’m sure it’s that. The girl will only talk to Kara, and occasionally Conrad, she doesn’t seem interested in learning how to use her powers at all, and sometimes I think it might have been better if she’d never found this place at all.’

Thoughtfully he turned to the first of August. ‘Miriam has made progress. One of her new powers has bloomed and she has the ability to control people using her mind. It’s amazing. For the first time she wants to learn how to use a power and she asked for my help. I have said that I’m at her disposal twenty four hours a day if she wants me. Conrad and Kara are working by themselves on other things, so I don’t need to worry about them, the others are also doing well because of the help they’ve been getting from Conrad (he can explain things in a much easier way for his peers to understand than I can) and everything seems to be going better than I ever thought it would.’

Tristan shook his head. His grandfather had always played favourites. If you were on his good side then all was wonderful, but if you happened to do something he didn’t like then it was easy to fall from his graces. Some days he wondered why someone like his grandfather had been one of the first people to find out about the Millenium powers. There were other people out there who would have been better suited to the job than Leonard. He wished he could know what was going through Miriam’s mind so he could get a better understanding of why she had decided to do what she did.

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

Originally posted at dreamwidth.org (and crossposted to livejournal.com) as kajones_writing.

Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.