The Crystal 2 by Jones M (reading cloud ebooks .txt) 📕

"She exposed the dream to everyone in Crystalia?" I stated in disbelief, and Selena nodded.

"Erick is currently facing questions from witches about the dream and why he avoided telling them. In fact, his advisors wondered why he kept such a secret from them."

"He has advisors?" Ethan asked.

"He's a king. Of course he has advisors. Anyway, his mother also heard about the dream. Let's just say Erick is working on a way of apologizing to everyone in Crystalia."

I winced. Poor guy.

"Emery had told us to check if the dream was really a vision of the future. We did, but then it turned out to be a fake one."

"What?" Zane asked with raised eyebrows.

"We are certain that the erwiches sent the dream to Erick."

"Why did they do that?" I asked.

"I don't know," Selena replied. "I'm just as confused as you guys."

Emery's P.O.V

Idiots.

I had chanted a spell to listen in on what the guys were talking about. It just seemed to piss me off more. It was very obvious why the erwiches sent the dream to Erick.

They wanted me to look evil in front of everyone, and everyone had bought it.

The realization had earlier dawned on me, and to say that I was pissed would be an understatement. I was wishing that I could just teleport to Eva's castle and kill all the erwiches by myself.

But then, I had to be calm. My plan needed all the erwiches present for it to work.

My mind wandered to the awful events that had happened to me. 

Could it be that every bad thing that happened to me, every time I said I was innocent and the guys didn't believe me... was the dream...

No.

Hell no!

It couldn't be!

However, the more I thought about it, I realized that it could be true. 

I had no idea of how long Erick had kept the dream from me. There was a possibility that everyone decided to look at me differently after they had found out about it. 

Everyone had known about it, and so they could have made their assumptions about me because they thought I would turn evil.

I shook my head in disbelief.

Could it be that the dream made them turn their views of me?

I just kept getting more pissed off. Everyone knew about the dream, so it had to be true.

I couldn't believe those guys. They all let a dream, a dream that stupid Erick did not analyze, change their views about me. 

It all made so much sense. If Erick had not had the dream, they wouldn't have been mean towards me...

Would they?

I wasn't sure. Even without the dream, Bianca was still around. I wasn't certain that anything could have changed.

Moreover, I realized there was something that everyone had not yet figured out.

If I was arrested for something I didn't do, was forced to become a lone witch, had been blamed for posting insults on Twitter that I never did, and accused of trying to kill Liam when I didn't... did they not realize that they were not dousing the fire but adding more fuel to it?

I was a crystal for goodness' sake! If they wanted to avoid another incident of a crystal becoming evil, they should have been careful. They shouldn't have hurt me the way they did because that was just ruining it for them.

I banged my fists on the table, still shocked by what I had realized. I wanted to yell at everyone for thinking that a stupid dream gave them the right to change how they acted around me.

It all made sense.

But then, I stopped myself.

There was no point trying to get through to them. The guys definitely did not know me if they chose to let a stupid dream divide us. I had already given up on trying to make them see that I was innocent, and I was planning to stick to it. 

In fact, I had a feeling I wouldn't have to stay for long, especially after the false message I sent the erwich minutes ago.

The erwiches wanted an evil crystal and forced everyone I loved to believe I would become that. Well, they would get just that.

I was done being played. It was my time to form my own game, and this time, there will be no rematches. 

There will be no losers because they will all be dead.

Ethan's P.O.V

"So, what you are trying to say is that the dream Erick had was nothing but a mislead sent by the erwiches?" I asked to confirm what I was hearing.

Selena nodded for the second time. I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion.

"Doesn't this change everything we thought about Emery?" I asked.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked with a confused expression.

"Well, ever since Erick had told us about his dream, we have been acting differently around Emery. It had led us to believe that Emery wasn't innocent in, um, you know..."

"Hitting Liam with a car?" Selena added.

"Posting awful things about us on Twitter?" Logan spoke with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes. All that. Does it mean that she was actually innocent?"

"Look, Ethan. The hacker thing--" Liam went to speak, but he was interrupted by the sound of the TV. Emery had increased the volume.

All of us went to speak to her, but we came to a stop at what we saw on the TV. A reporter was saying something about the hacker, Tom Acker.

"... have received a list of names of accounts Tom Acker had hacked into. Most of them are wealthy business people..."

"They are speaking again about the hacker. How can we know for sure that he really--" Zane was interrupted by the news reporter.

"Among those who were hacked are celebrities, specifically the members of the boyband the Ordinary Brothers and the new upcoming star, Selena Gomez."

There was pin-drop silence in the room as we watched the news.

"The mentioned celebrities are the most affected, with specific amounts worth more than ten thousand dollars being drained from their accounts."

I hoped it wasn't another ploy by Emery to make it look like—

"From what the police have gathered, it was spotted that the undocumented withdrawals began last year on July whereas for Selena Gomez began a few weeks ago. The money had been transferred to several private accounts in which we believe belong to the hacker's accomplices. The police are investigating the accounts with the best IT professionals available. It will be a while before the owners of the accounts are revealed. 

More importantly, since the Ordinary Brothers were most affected, the police believe that it is possible someone the band knows must have been helping Tom steal from them. What is the relationship between the hacker and the Ordinary Brothers? Why would he choose to hack into the boy band's accounts instead of other wealthier people? "

Logan had changed the channel.

"What the hell?" Selena screeched in shock. The rest of us were standing still, staring at the TV with the same expression.

"We were hacked?" I asked. "Could Emery--"

"No, she couldn't," Harry replied. "This started a year ago. Emery wasn't around then."

"It could be possible. Besides, where could she have gotten the money to buy her laptops? Do you also remember that she paid for her own hotel suite when she first joined us on tour?"

Emery turned to face Harry with a glare.

"It is good that you have asked, Harry," she said as she rose from her seat to face us. "I'm glad I get to clear this up. Tell me. How else could I have gotten money?"

"You stole from us?" Zane asked in anger. Emery just smirked.

"No, you idiot," she said. "My mother had passed away, remember? So she had to have left some money behind."

That had most of us silent. I had not known that.

"What?" Selena asked in shock. "But I didn't receive--"

"And thank goodness you didn't. Remember that time I stayed at home for three months? I sorted out and inherited her insurance and retirement money," she said, shocking the hell out of us.

"If you want, I can prove it right here. There are some legal documents in here that you can see for yourself."

Just as she spoke, a brown folder with the logo of a bank appeared on her palm. I took it as the others huddled around me, inspecting it. We took out some papers, noticing that some of the amounts written were more than a million. They even had names of lawyers and their contact information.

I had no option but to believe Emery.

"But it says that you can divide the money with me," Selena said, reading the will of Emery's mother.

Emery showed a smile that did not reach her eyes.

"It also says that I'm in charge of my mother's account. So, you won't be getting any cash you stupid self-centered bitch!"

We gasped.

"Besides, you're a musician now. You will get more in a year than the amount I currently have."

"But she left it for us!" Selena persisted. Emery looked enraged.

"Are you this selfish?" Emery yelled. "Thanks to you guys and that bitchy girlfriend of Zane's, I have nothing. I can't even go to college because of my incriminating actions! If I can't go to college, I can't get a decent job! I also can't get a decent job because everyone around me hates me! Do you really want to take the only thing I have left to sustain me?"

Selena remained quiet.

"B-but--"

"You hurt me a lot, Selena. You sold the only things that were left in my mother's house, and stupid Erick does not want me in Crystalia. I can't even visit my mother's grave without getting judgemental looks from witches! You can try, but I'll be damned if any one of you, including Bianca, takes this away from me."

With that, Emery stormed away from us and went into the bunk-bed area. The rest of us remained silent for a while, embarrassed over what had occurred.

I looked at Selena, seeing a hurtful expression had taken over her face. In fact, she looked close to tearing up.

"I need some space," she suddenly said before rushing away from us and heading towards the kitchen. For a moment, I wondered if the kitchen could provide the space she needed.

"If it wasn't Emery, who else could have been taking the money?" I asked.

"No one, Ethan. The hacker obviously did it," Logan stated with a look of disbelief. 

"So, what? Are you saying that my girlfriend is a liar?" Zane questioned in anger. 

"No, but it's a possibility. Think about it, Zane. If it wasn't Emery, it was the hacker. And why would Bianca lie to us and say that Tom was innocent?"

I couldn't believe it, but I had to agree with Logan.

"No! It can't be true!" Zane did not want to even think about Logan's words.

"Zane--"

Zane moved quickly. It took us all by surprise when Logan received a punch on the nose. It had been strong enough to almost make him lose his balance. Liam was shocked as he quickly went to steady Logan.

"Don't say another word, Logan, or else I will make you regret it," Zane warned before storming away from us. 

"Logan, are you okay?" Harry asked as we all went to tend to the injured bandmate. He just groaned, and I watched in shock as blood started dripping from his nose.

What the hell?

Liam quickly placed his hands on Logan's nose, healing him. The bleeding had stopped, but Logan remained passed out.

Oh crap.

"What the fuck is his problem?" Harry said with a glare as he went to run towards Zane.

"Let it go, Harry," I advised as I stepped in his path. "We have a tour to do, and it will be bad if we all cannot get along. Do you want us to be on the tabloids because of a stupid fight?"

Harry glared at me for a few seconds before sighing.

We all relaxed, but we made sure to sit away from Zane.

Third Person's P.O.V

It was past 12 at night. The tour bus had taken the boys, Emery and Selena to a nearby hotel immediately after their concert in Phoenix ended. 

There had been some tension between Zane and the rest of his bandmates. Hours later, Zane decided to go to Logan and apologize. The two made