Kingdom Liaz (repost small)

[Jhessail]

Chapter One:
In which there is a curse.

“Get back here, you little rat!”

“Good sir! I take offence to the name rat!” Replied back a girl, her brown hair flying after as she ran away from the man chasing her with a huge chopping knife. The girl dodged around the crowded streets and around corners of alleyways until she finally made it into a different type of alleyway, waste covering every inch of its dirt.

The rat giggled as the man called out to her, cursing on the top of his lungs and yelling at her to get back this very instant, his voice seemed to be fading away. The rat then dodged large amounts of manure just on the grounds of the alleyways, biting into a piece of dry bread and watching her step closely before something hit her on the top of the head.

“Amelia! You naughty girl! What did you steal this time?” Amelia looked up to see a fussy looking wife and Amelia just grinned up at her, waving the loaf of bread she had bit into earlier.

“Just some food Mrs. Smith!” The girl replied back honestly, watching as the wife’s eyes rolled over and she heaved a little breath.

“Well then, come on in, you little rat,” Amelia gave a distinct frown, “my husband has got you new shoes, he has.” Amelia blinked at the news and she practically jumped up in excitement,

“Really? Truly?” Amelia questioned, moving her way to the door to open into the house, taking a peek to see that the man had indeed gave up on chasing after her and opened the door. The house was actually rather large, and the only light around the household was coming from a slow ember flame just as the base of the house and covering most of that flame was a man that looked rather determined yet aggravated at the same time.

Amelia grew a mischievous grin and tackled the man from behind, grinning at the best of her ability. The man gave a loud yell, jumping slightly as he grabbed the girl’s small body and stared at her directly.

“Ah, Amelia, you gave me quite a scare!”

“That’s your fault for putting down your guard; it could have been your apprentice to scare you then.”

“Ah…Caleb usually means well.” The husband put down the girl as she adjusted her stitched brown and green shirt with her chain gloves and pushed back her odd hair that had grown at a strange angle.

“Sure he does, now what’s this I heard about new shoes?” Jacob Smith sighed a bit and chuckled lightly, knowing very well why the girl wanted her new shoes so badly. Her previous shoes, which were a strange combination between peasant and chain mail, had vastly shrank on her as she had been going through quite a large growth spurt.

“Yeah, I managed to finally pry some metal from my apprentice’s eyes and managed to make the same pair as your father used to make.” There was a moment of silence but Jacob saw no look of remorse of sadness cross the girl’s eyes at once and pulled out the new shoes he had crafted just that night.

Amelia’s eyes brightened up immediately and she took the new shoes and struggled with her previous shoes and Jacob flinched slightly as he saw slender feet covered with red hot blisters and bruises all across the ankles. Amelia let out a relieved sigh and placed her new shoes on and grinned very brightly,

“Wow! You managed to get them just right!”

“Yes, and even left you a little toe room, hopefully you’ll stop growing so large, it’s really abnormal for a girl your age.” Amelia just shrugged and stood up, walking around in her new shoes and jumped up and down cheerfully, grinning her largest. It was then the door opened once again and Jacob laughed awkwardly as his apprentice Caleb came through.

Caleb was a lower class boy who had brown hair and golden looking eyes; perhaps those eyes were the only reason he could push other people around so easily, they were immediately intimidated by his stature and his ability to look at you and make you think he was watching your soul with a look of God’s judgment.

“Good morrow Amelia, and as nice it is to see you here…what are you doing here?” Amelia laughed slightly, brushing back her long side bangs and grinned at the boy with a lecherous grin.

“Maybe I wanted to greet my b.o.y.f.r.i.e.n.d.” The boy remained quiet for a second, looking over to Jacob, looking very confused by what Amelia just spelt, after never having any sort of education asides from his apprenticeship among Mr. Jacob Smith, a blacksmith. Jacob just shook his head and Caleb shrugged at this and stared back at Amelia,

“So your hair’s grown a bit more.”

“Yeah! Those stupid larvae demon lise have stopped pestering my hair, but it grew back weirdly, didn’t it?”

“I like it, it suits you.”

“Really?”

“Yes, very…odd.” Amelia pouted and folded her arms and frowned at the apprentice, who just raised a timid brow and turned over to his master. “Are we heading out soon?”

“Yeah, as soon as the wife wakes up the baby.”

“Huh? Where are you guys going?” Amelia asked, blinking slightly. Caleb watched as his teacher flinched again, really his master was really so ill-hearted and could not talk to any teenagers, could he? Caleb suddenly felt himself feeling sorry for the baby boy that lay just above their heads.

“Well…it’s the princess’s thirteenth birthday…and since we are of middle-class…you know it’s our job to give a birthday present to her every time we celebrate her birth…and…you know that includes you…”

“Oh heck no it don’t!” Amelia yelled, finally realizing why she was invited in earlier, and why the shoes were finally crafted. They wanted to drag her off to some stupid princess’s birthday ceremony to make sure she didn’t get into any trouble with the royalty. It was true that Amelia was middle-class, once upon a time ago.

Her father was one of the greatest blacksmiths in the whole kingdom, until he had mysteriously died and his corpse was found in a ravine far away from the kingdom. Nobody knows what the cause was because even the demons growing at the edges of the forests actually admitted that they had no idea what could have caused her father’s death.

“But Amelia, you are the age of an adult, and if you do not take any responsibility, they’ll arrest you, or worse! Kill you in cold blood!”

“What a bunch of crap! The only reason I’m considered as an adult is the age to birth babies for a buncha pigs!” Amelia bunched up, growling very visibly at the blacksmith, folding her arms as angry as she could. Jacob flinched slightly, understanding why Amelia was so angry as before her father died and the many demon larvae known as lise attacked her hair, there had been many suitors at her door, just waiting to claim her as their birthright and expect her to give birth to extremely strong and healthy boys. Amelia was angry with this of course, she was not actually one ever interested in marriage or anything of the sort the instant she turned sixteen.

“Now Amelia…” Jacob tried to calm her down, knowing her fury was indeed very frightening when needed to be, even Caleb moved around a little restlessly, staring as to make sure Amelia didn’t grab for one of the swords on the walls and throw it at his master.

“No! You hear me? I’m no longer a middle-class person! I stopped being one the instant my father died! I am not going to suck up to our monarchy just because the king said that we should give gifts to his ‘lovely daughter’ she’s a prick and I’m not to give respect to anyone like her!”
“Amelia…” The older man tried to speak to her but the girl furiously shook her head and stomped outside the house, slamming the door as hard as her slender muscles could. There was a moment of silence and Caleb looked over at his teacher and silently inputted,

“I told you she’d be against the idea, you really are pushed around by her so easily though.” The blacksmith sighed almost loudly and looked up as his wife came climbing down the stairs and a crying baby was in her arms.

“I had just managed to get him to a restful state too, what was that all about?” The orange haired woman asked, raising her eyebrow slightly.

“It was Amelia.”

“Ah, that explains a lot. Well, shall we be heading off soon then? It looks as she won’t join us.”

“Indeed, it would be wise to get to the ceremony before it’s too late, and then the princess will have your heads.” The older man stared over at his apprentice who had made the comment and couldn’t help but actually smile at him. Caleb moves his eyes slightly and stared as the blacksmith gathered the princess’s gift, “You’re giving her that?”

“Yes…I think it’d be wise to give it to this generation of leaders.”

“But…that has been in your family for over a thousand years, hasn’t it?” Caleb asked, absolutely fascinated at the prospect of just giving it away. Jacob gave a kind smile to the boy and nodded,

“It’s true, we’ve had it for over a thousand years, ever since the guardian Fhoenix came down from the heavens, we’ve been blessed with this.”

“So why just give it away?”

“I fear that times will be very upon the princess if she does not grow up into a more suitable attitude for our kingdom, and if we are ever in any trouble, Fhoenix would surely rise from its seal in this shield and help out.”

“That is surely very admirable, is there no ulterior motive?” Caleb asked, frowning slightly and staring at his teacher, expecting an answer. Jacob laughed slightly and admitted,

“Well I’m hoping that the princess will bless my son’s head, that way, surely there will be good things to come for my son’s way of life.” Caleb stared, very surprised but he gave his own smile to the man.

“You are such a simple man Jacob!” His wife called to him, huffing slightly and wrapped their son in another small sheet, “Why not ask for a donation of some guild coins? That would surely be humble enough!” Jacob gave his wife a laugh, knowing well that his wife was a money-grubber if there was ever one. But that really was just one of her beautiful qualities because he loved every bit and part of her,

“You’re right Sabrina, I’m sorry.”

“That’s all right; I wouldn’t have let you marry me if I didn’t like those simple qualities.” Sabrina nodded and gave her husband a kiss on the cheek and Caleb visibly let out a tongue to show how disgusted he was by the lovely display. Jacob just chuckled again and shoved the shield his family had kept for so long and the small group wandered outside to walk to the castle.

TBC

[Jhessail]

It was quite a long walk and along the way there were many people gossiping and showing off their presents for the princess and many others who stared at everyone with a look of hunger and jealously. Caleb knew how those people felt, after all, he basically was still one of them, and until he completed his apprenticeship with Jacob Smith, he would still be considered a poor peasant boy.

The streets were bustling with even more activity asides from the hungry looking peasants and the middle-class braggers, there were also rich people from all around the country, and faces all perched up high and mighty to be proven in front of the king of their rich lands.

There were even in the dark corners of the street demons lurking within the walls, waiting to present anyone foolish enough to cross their path to force them into the light and give their gift for the princess. They had all arrived at a certain time and the large drawbridge would only go down a certain time, the drawbridge crowded with all sorts of people around and shocking as they all got along fairly well enough.

“Well, long time no see Jacob Smith.” A voice seemed to try to taunt at him, but Jacob really was too simple to catch the tone of voice and he turned around, brimming with a grin.

“It’s nice to see you to Ms. Nicole Shinobi.” Nicole Shinobi was a girl with very dark hair and it was all put up in a bun, while she wore silk garments that were suited for one prepared for any sort of combat that could come up within a moments notice. Daggers adorned her sides with little baggages that hid secret weapons and right at the moment, she was glaring harshly at the blacksmith.

“Oh hello Shinobi.” Caleb addressed her casually, as she was around the actual same age as him. Nicole seemed to freeze up for a second as many people did under Caleb’s gaze then shook her glare free,

“Ah, hello…Caleb.” Jacob couldn’t help but grin privately while muttering over to his wife about young lovers and his wife just elbowed him in the gut, chuckling with him.

“I see that you are fully prepared for the demons to attack as usual…where’s your father?”

“Uhh…he’s getting the gift for the princess.”
“Ah, shall we be heading off then? I see that they are lowering the drawbridge.” Nicole grinned lightly and nodded, very happy at the prospect of walking near Caleb’s side.

“So Nicole, what has your father planned to give to the princess this year?” Jacob couldn’t help but ask, smiling as the girl shot him a glare, knowing the only reason she gave him such looks was because he and her father were on very good terms and that they had managed to arrange a possible marriage between her and the baby boy cuddling in Sabrina’s arms. Nicole then frowned at the question and placed her finger on her face,

“I’m not sure, but he said it would be a spectacle and amazing.”

“Hm, that does sound like your father.” Jacob nodded; moving, as it was his turn to step upon the platform that had managed to lower itself. The group had managed to make it to the other side but grimaced as a peasant had tried to come within the walls without an apprenticeship and watched as he was thrown into the moat with demon larvae known as charks.

Sabrina nearly lost her lunch as she watched the many limbs being torn apart and eaten by the gray many fanged beings. Blood drifted all around the waters and Jacob quickly got the ones he considered family into the castle, telling them to watch how wonderful the castle walls looked compared to the water.

There was a huge gathering around the castle’s guest room, everyone bustled around and turned quiet as a girl with long blonde hair, a necklace of the family’s symbol around her neck, and was dressed in the finest silk the land could see, walked to the throne with a certain amount of grace. However as soon as the princess had managed to reach the throne, many people were thrown off by the girl’s attitude towards her own father.

“Father, it is my thirteenth birthday today! I demand thirteen thousand guild pieces!” The king just laughed though, many others in the crowd grew tense as his just handed her a brown bag with the amount of money the princess requested. Jacob watched as his wife practically drooled over the guild pieces, as the princess seemed very satisfied by this. All whispers stopped as the king stood up and people stared almost nervously at the man.

“Welcome one and all!” Sighs erupted around the circle; all still glad that the king was still indeed the kind king he was known to be. “I like to thank you all for coming to my daughter’s cherished thirteenth birthday, and with all that said, let the festivities begin!” Streamers popped from the side of the walls, guards and knights pouring them from buckets and everyone watched in fascination as the streamers gathered around the princess to proclaim she was indeed the birthday girl. The festivities had begun and Nicole jumped up as her father popped out of nowhere as usual.

“Ah, at least the guards are easy to fool.”

“Ha, you’re as sly as ever my friend.”

“Indeed…” The man with the dark hair looked confused for a second then looked to his dear friend, “Where is Amelia?”


“She decided it best not to join.” Caleb answered for his teacher, seeing the frown grimace over his master’s face. Nicole’s father then nodded and shook his head sadly,

“Poor girl, but it was a wise choice on her part.” Nicole nodded at her wise father’s words and frowned slightly again, wishing to see her friend again. Nicole knew her friend was using her training as a ninja that she had received earlier as a child against all the sellers of food so that the girl could eat. Nicole wondered often if the other girl just did it on purpose and did not know that she would be welcomed into the middle-class families as easy as one could have.

“With that said, who is this, Barium?”

“Oh! I had almost forgotten, forgive me madam. This is Pyramid, Lady Pyramid this is Jacob Smith, a dear friend of mine.” Jacob watched a haunched figure of an old woman looked up to him and her eyes surprised Jacob immediately. They were the eye color of a demon’s but still managed to hold the purity of a human,

“A Half?” Jacob asked curiously and the old woman just laughed slightly,

“With a name like Pyramid, you would think, neh?”

“Oh yes…of course, forgive me.” Jacob gave a slight bow and the old woman gave a short smile, but then looked over to Caleb, who was glaring fiercely at her.

“No need to worry little one.” The old woman patted him on the head and he still remained tense as the lady managed her way through the crowds as it was almost time to start the present giving.

“Is she the ‘gift’?” Jacob asked his friend, raising an eyebrow at his hostile apprentice.

“Slightly, she had powers beyond recognizing. Something like a witch, but not completely.” Barium replied back, smiling slightly with a secret look. Jacob blinked and shrugged as everyone gathered around the princess’s circle to give his or her gifts. The princess was given many things, glorious things that anyone else would have been grateful and glad to get.

The finest silk sheets with ancient old stories in them, of only the princess saw as ugly and burned them right in front of the gift-givers. Well-crafted jewels with ancient spells upon them, of which the princess just discarded to sell to greedy merchants later, also thinking them ugly.

There were grand potions crafted to protect the princess’s immune system, of which she just gave to the chiefs of her dinners, letting them decide what to do with it. There were many gifts to the princess but she didn’t care for any of the gifts she got.

Then came the time for when our group came up to the princess, offering the grand shield of sealing with the picture of the mighty Fhoenix upon it. However at the sight at this, the princess wrinkled her nose,

“What is this disgusting thing?” Caleb tensed up darkly, hiding his face down so he wasn’t glaring directly at the golden-haired princess.

“Princess, it is a mighty shield that was handed down through my family for many generations. It has the mighty power of the mighty guardian, Fhoenix. I offer it to you as protection for the great family and for your generation of youth.”

“Take it away, it’s ugly and it would not suit any of my wardrobe.” The blacksmith gulped slightly, tensing slightly and shaking as well, before placing the shield down and staring directly into the princess’s blue eyes.

“But princess-”

“But nothing, now if you carry anymore on this matter, I’ll have you killed.” Tension rose all around the circle, nobody could do nothing but bite their lips.

“Yes princess…but please, could you bless my child?” The princess scoffed then sneered and looked straight at the man in a very disgusted way,

“Oh yes, I can do that.” She sweetly started and her face moved into a painful looking smirk, “I can start by having the father killed!” Jacob gasped and people yelled as guards came and blocked the moving crowds and grabbed at Jacob, forcing him to the ground with his neck showing.

“JACOB! NO!” Sabrina cried out, shoving her hand above the guard’s shoulders but not able to reach the heart of the cruel princess with her tears and the baby’s bawls rose above the crowd’s jeers. But then there was a large noise, the splat of food against a soft fleshy object.

The princess gasped and looked at her perpetrator to who would dare throw a tomato at her face. Everyone’s eyes traveled to a girl, throwing another tomato up and down, her brown hair glowing brightly from the castle walls with a deep frown upon her face.

“Happy birthday Princess Elizabeth.” Amelia sneered then fingered a necklace around her neck, the jewels shining brightly with gold within the sun, “I’m sure you won’t miss these too much, see ya later.” Amelia waved them all off and ran off, jumping from the walls. The princess stood stunned then an aggravated screech erupted from her mouth,

“Guards! Go get her! That putrid little peasant! Kill her the instant you get her!” The guards stopped in their task of killing Jacob Smith and went after the girl they had just seen with a fury as the princess wiped her face with her pink silk dress. Jacob couldn’t recover from the ground but his good friend Barium Shinobi helped him up and whispered in his ear,

“Go on my good friend, only death waits you here if you dare stay. After you reach home, tell Caleb to go searching for Amelia, he’ll know where to find her.”

“But what of you my good friend?”

“Don’t worry about me, just go, before you end up killing your wife’s heart.” Jacob patted his friend on the shoulder and nodded at him,

“Thank you.”

“Just go.” The princess had finally recovered from her temper tantrum as the Smith family had managed to escape.

TBC

[Jhessail]

“What a terrible little peasant. Oh well, not that it matters anymore, shall we proceed?” The crowd seemed restless but agreed, knowing better then to argue with so many guards at their throats.

So as the gift ceremonies were about to continue, when Barium Shinobi and his guest, Pyramid, came out in front of the entire crowd, their eyes looking darker then usual. “What is the meaning of this?” Elizabeth asked as the old woman unraveled her cloak and became a young woman with long red hair and rural symbols covering her face as her mix matched red and blue eyes glowed.

“Princess Elizabeth, from the country of Halves, I was sent here to see if you are worthy of receiving the blessing of the Halves, however, I, Pyramid, have made my conclusion and you are not worthy of such a gift. But instead, you are far more worthy of a curse, a physical altering curse.”

“Nonsense, no one can perform those old spells anymore, you are quite ridiculous…Half was it? Humph, filthy half-breeds, guards!” Pyramid just took one look at them and her guard Barium took out shuriken from his pouches and threw them all at a sensitive spot that had been underneath the platemail, blood pouring over as the two moved around to dodge the mass of arrows that had came from over the walls.

“Do you truly think that princess? I see you are as foolish as you are inexperienced.” Pyramid replied back, then rose her hands and threw them on the ground, calling out, “EARTHQUAKE!” The ground moved fiercely and the tiles of the castle floor and walls fell, jumbling the guards to fall upon the ground.

All of them getting finished off by Barium’s many explosive tags and knives. Panicked screams erupted from the castle and everyone ran outside the large door, except the two, which everyone called assassins. The princess growled as Pyramid drew closer to her and she held up her necklace, the symbol of her family up to her and it glowed a fiercesome light and she called out,

“FIREBALL!” However all it did was show a bright light and the Half being grinned victoriously and grabbed at the bright necklace, grabbing unto the princess,

“The Half Country has spent judgment on you, and with this, we rule you being guilty of being a cold hearted, selfish princess that needs to learn a lesson! As judgment passes, here is your punishment! Let you appearance change and let’s see how you feel as someone lower down, see how you feel being chased as a wanted man, see how you feel when you have no hope! CURSE” Elizabeth screamed and there were even more large erupts of yells all around the castle walls, as a light just beamed everywhere. However at the end of the light, Princess Elizabeth stood there, frightened out of her mind and sweat poured from her face and the previously slain guards were alive once again.

“An illusion?” Families asked, confused as the princess heaved a dark and heavy sigh as she landed on the ground, still frightened as she had thought for certain that, that event had happened. As everyone got over their fears and just amused that it was a joke played by the castle’s wizard, they did not notice Barium and Pyramid on top of the walls, hiding within the shadows very much like the demons all around, and within Pyramid’s hand was the symbol of the castle’s family.

***

Meanwhile the Smith family had managed to get back home, breathing heavily with two teenagers.

“I wonder what the ruckus was about after we managed to leave though, I heard screaming.” Nicole inputted slightly, brushing back the hair that had fallen from the bun. Caleb gave back a shrug for his reply and Jacob just shook his head as his wife tried to calm down their baby boy. Jacob then looked at his tired looking apprentice,

“Barium told me for you to go after Amelia.”

“Why would he need to do that?” The group jumped up, shocked out of their minds as Amelia came climbing down the stairs with a timid grin upon her face, “Glad to see that I was a good enough distraction for that prissy spoiled princess.”

“Oh Amelia, thank God you’re still alive!” Sabrina said, hugging the girl as Amelia tried to avoid her arms but failed.

“Well of course I am, I was lucky I even got to hit that stupid girl, I didn’t think my aim would be that great.”

“So you’re still alive…” Caleb muttered softly, staring at her with a welcomed relief and Amelia winked,

“Of course I am. The instant I put down that necklace the guards had trouble getting it back.”

“Where did you put it?”

“You know that flag pole way above the lookout point?” Amelia questioned, winking again as the family stared at her with semi-wide eyes, “And I wouldn’t have been able to do it if you hadn’t gave me my new shoes Mr. Smith, thanks a lot!”

“Amelia, never scare us like that again!” Jacob had finally spoke, although he was very relieved that the girl was indeed still alive and very adventurous at that, it still had his heart going and pounding that the girl had dared to steal from the majesty’s treasury and dared to throw food at their princess. Amelia stared at the worried blacksmith as he grabbed her hands, and watched as his back moved up and down,

“Sorry…I just didn’t want to see you die.” Amelia spoke emotionless and Nicole found herself nodding in agreement,

“Yeah! There would be no need for you to die Mr. Smith! Even if I do dislike you a bit, that was way overboard!” Jacob couldn’t help it, he laughed, and he laughed a little long and hard, finding his seat by stumbling in the dim light. They all stared at him as he covered his face nervously and he still twitched and slightly spaced out, but then again, coming very close to death can do that to a person.

“Do you think we will be safe here?” Sabrina asked, her baby finally asleep as the time passed and everyone looked at her in silence. Nicole then nodded quietly,

“They don’t make guards do any raids anymore, at least that’s what my father says, if they really want to go after Mr. Smith, then they will hire the ninjas around the castle.”

“And if you’re hired?” Nicole gave a sly grin,

“I’ll go murder some pigs and fake it being your intestines.” Pale faces surrounded the black-haired girl as she took out her bun impatiently. “So how long do you think I should wait before I get back home?”

“Your father will probably come for you.” Caleb muttered, sitting next to his slowly calming down teacher. Amelia nodded at this and sat on the other side of the blacksmith, comforting him by patting his hand softly.

The family and friends waited quietly, watching as the window revealed that it was growing darker and darker by the minute, though it was actually long hours of exhaustion on the part of the children and two adults. There came loud knocks and Sabrina opened it quite hesitantly, only to reveal Barium.

“Daddy!” Nicole jumped on him, happy to see him alive as well, “What was up with all the screams? And where’s Lady Pyramid?”

“I had to escort her back to her place of rest, the screams…it was an illusion played on the princess, scared the entire castle.”

“Oh is that all?” Nicole pouted slightly, disappointed in this news and Barium stared over at his friend, who was still lying down against his seat, heaving large and heavy sighs in a form of depression.

“Are you alright my friend?”

“Better now.” Barium nodded slightly then stared over at Caleb and Amelia, the two blinked at him, very confused as he focused his eyes upon their own eyes, as though trying to tell them some sort of secret message.

“We shall be heading off, good night my friend, and leave your curtains drawn…Amelia, you need to stay with them tonight, as well as you Caleb.”

“But my father is wait-”

“You will stay with them.” Barium commanded and Caleb found that he couldn’t resist, so he just stared down on the ground, avoiding the words and face of the older man. Barium nodded once again and disappeared with his daughter with a puff of smoke.

TBC

[Jhessail]

In the next morning after a long rest, there was a loud proclamation throughout the whole kingdom.

“What have you done with my daughter, you fiend?” The king growled at a very longhaired boy, as the boy moved around in his daughter’s bed. The boy blinked, his blue eyes looking mildly confused.

“What are you talking about father?” The king grew red faced and glared at the young boy and noticed that he was dressed in his daughter’s dresses and grew even redder, a cross dresser! How vulgar!

“Guards!”

“What? Father why are you calling the guards?” It was then the boy blinked and noticed something strange to himself. The boy grabbed at his throat and grew wide-eyed, “Father! Look! I can prove I’m me! See, my neck…” His throat was bare…it was bare! That…that half-breed had managed to alter his original appearance! But how, that was impossible! Those spells were long gone and dead; it should have been impossible!

Yet, Elizabeth mused in her mind, she was definitely no longer a girl and her father was looking very murderous at her. Elizabeth tried hard to think of when her necklace disappeared and remembered that, that strange Half must have took it when she grabbed at her. Elizabeth watched as guards ran into her room and watched the sharp ends very closely, fear tensing up in her spine as she realized that she was probably going to be gutted very soon. Elizabeth fumed in her mind, what in the world had she done to deserve this? She was just doing her job as a member of royalty.

“Now this is your last chance, where’s my daughter?” Elizabeth looked desperately for a way out, this was hopeless, and this was just great. She was going to die a man and under her father’s orders. Elizabeth then spotted her hairbrush, now this wasn’t a normal hairbrush; it was an heirloom from her mother that could control the hair inside the brush to tangle her enemies when needed.

So without any more need to encourage herself, she made a grab at the hairbrush and forced her inner thoughts to capture the people in front of her, even her own father. Hair flew out from the brush and wrapped around all of her ‘enemies’ so to speak and she ran out, still dressed as a girl.

“What in the world is going on? I can’t look that boyish, can I?” Elizabeth asked, ripping furiously at her long skirt to turn it into a weird looking mini-skirt and she stared helplessly at her legs, no longer were they slender…but at least they still weren’t hairy, that’s a good point, right? Elizabeth ran faster, dodging the people she met, trying to her best to avoid their gazes, trying to make them believe she was still just the princess, waking up early for some strange reason.

Elizabeth breathed unrestlessly as she had managed to get out of the castle walls but stared very hesitantly at the moat full of the demons. There was no way she would be able to get the bridge down, especially now when she was a male… commoner! This was hopeless, she would go back to explain to her father, but she knew he was hardheaded right now.

“There he is!” Oh no, they discovered her! Elizabeth growled and went for her ribbon that had held her long hair in a long ponytail and held it fast against the water, praying that it would work like it was supposed to have originally been planned.

Elizabeth flinged it into the water and watched as stars erupted across the whole water and the guards watched fascinated as the stranger boy jumped into the water, water splashing everywhere but he was not eaten by the charks.

They watched even more shocked as the boy climbed against the solid wall of the other side, grunting and sickly wet and was surprised when the boy had made it to his quest and ran out from the moat and into the village. All they would have to go off from the boy’s appearance was that he was wearing the princess’s clothing, and even then those looked like he was going to tear off sooner or later.

***

Amelia woke up early that morning, along with Caleb and the two of them were just raveling tiredly along the streets to reach Caleb’s father’s house.

“He’s going to be angry when he sees you, neh?”

“I’ll just tell him I did another all nighter.” Amelia nodded at this and jumped slightly as a boy with long blonde hair pushed her. Amelia growled and grabbed the boy’s hair angrily, demanding an apology. Only then though, Amelia spotted it wasn’t a boy, it was a girl! And the girl was the princess!

“YOU!” They both called out, hissing at each other angrily as the recognized each other. Caleb raised an eyebrow, seeing Amelia very angry with a blonde boy that looked slightly familiar, but not really, what could have this boy have done to Amelia? Caleb watched as Amelia raised a fist angrily and the other boy started to pull her hair as Amelia punched the boy in the gut. Caleb was getting confused, and he often did not like being confused, but in this case he thought it best to just watch.

The two indeed got into a worse fight, tumbling onto the ground and getting mud caked all over the two. Amelia turned to straddle the boy and punch him the face as he screamed like a girl. This boy had no pride as a man, did he? Caleb felt himself feel very disgusted but then yelled as they rolled over and tripped him over.

They had got him involved in the fight and were going to regret it. Caleb pushed roughly at the new boy and kicked his face deep into the dirt, quickly getting up and twisting Amelia’s arm to make her stop struggling while his foot was still pushing the blonde boy into the dirt.

“Look, whatever you two are arguing about, you should stop it now or I’ll have to seriously punish the both of you, and I’m a blacksmith, I know how to hurt you both.” The boy grunted from the dirt and Amelia cursed back at him then frowned at Caleb, nodding to him and letting the boy know that she wasn’t going to start anymore of the fight. Caleb let the both of them go and the boy stood up, glaring daggers at Amelia,

“How dare you, you little rat!”

“Why the hell does everyone keep calling me that!” Amelia shrieked and folded her arms, “And why are you out of your palace, oh charming princess?” Amelia sneered and Caleb raised his eyebrow. It was true this boy was wearing princess clothing…but he was in no way a princess. Even if he had long blonde hair.

“You…you can see me?” Elizabeth asked, shocked to a point and Amelia blinked rather innocently at the princess.

“Well of course I can, it’s not like Caleb can’t see you either, I mean look! Dirt’s all over your face! Though you deserve it, you brat!”

“Amelia, what are you talking about?” Caleb finally decided to intrude, confused to his breaking point.

“What do you mean?”

“There is no princess here.” Amelia blinked again and looked back at Caleb then at the princess then back again and pointed at the princess in disguise unknown to Amelia. “That is a male boy, judging from his height, he is hardly thirteen.”

“I turned thirteen yesterday, thank you!” Caleb stared hard at the girl turned boy and the boy blushed, embarrassed at his childish tone.

“Either way, there is no way that this person is a princess…even if he is…feminine.” The boy took offense to this and folded his arms angrily though Caleb could really care less and stared over at Amelia, expecting an answer for her odd behavior.

“But…I see the stupid princess when I look at…‘him’” she put her fingers up and moved them up and down to show how she thought Caleb was momentarily insane for this comment. Caleb looked back at the boy who Amelia had said was actually the princess. Caleb guessed there was a resemblance but he couldn’t really see anything that would make them one in the same.

“Whatever, let’s just get to my father’s house before he goes crazy with worry.”

“Ah right, I almost forgot your father is worse then your own mom.” Amelia nodded, rubbing the arm that Caleb had earlier twisted and the two just walked off, leaving the boy to his own business. Elizabeth blinked in shock and ran after the two,

“Wait! You can see who I really am!”

“So what if I can? Apparently, I’m a crazy peasant girl, now begone pest.”

“But you can tell my father that this is all a mistake.” Amelia stopped and froze angrily as Elizabeth grabbed her sore arm harshly, begging the girl to do as she requested.

“Why should I go to a stupid king if he can’t even see his own stupid selfish daughter is in front of him? Why should I point out the truth to someone who doesn’t even usually see all the suffering his lower peasant goes through? WHY SHOULD I HELP THE ONE WHO TRIED TO KILL ONE OF MY BEST FRIENDS!?” Amelia yelled on the top of her lungs, slapping the boy harshly across the face and ran after Caleb.

Elizabeth felt her face stung and she did something no sane boy would and started to cry loudly. Amelia stopped at that and started shaking harshly; Caleb stopped with her this time and looked back at the miserable crying boy.

“Eesh, has he no dignity?”

“He is a she, and she is a royal member. Sonofa…” Amelia took a deep breath and glared over at the girl turned boy as he started to rub his eyes in a sad motion. The boy had lost everything in one day; the only thing he had left was girl clothes that called him a cross dresser and thirteen thousand guild pieces. Wait! That was it!

“Wait! I’ll give you one hundred guild pieces if you’ll help me!” Amelia stared long and hard at the boy though female in her eyes and growled furiously, folding her arms.

“Why should I bother helping a stupid princess?” Caleb stared over at Amelia, as she brushed back her brunette hair nervously. Caleb then watched as the boy get up and stared away as he tripped a few more times in the mud and dirt, he was positively filthy now.

“Please, I want to just go home and not have my daddy kill me.”

“HAH! Now you know how it feels to be wanted!”

“Please!” Amelia watched as the boy continued to cry and Amelia shook her head and walked away, watching as Caleb followed after her and the princess continued to pursue them, tears still pouring down her eyes. Amelia was no way ever going to help her, she was a selfish princess and nothing could ever change that.

[Jhessail]

Chapter Two:
In which there is a forest.


“Ah, just the two I was looking for.” Caleb and Amelia blinked as they could find themselves staring at Barium, and Caleb’s father, Ion.

“You were looking for us?” Caleb found that hard to believe, because he knew from experience that if Barium was really looking for the both of them, he would have found them in ten seconds flat. Caleb then saw Barium’s daughter sitting haughty on a small table, frowning darkly at her father as though he had asked her to do something that was really too much for her to do.

“Yes, I wanted to-ah, there she is, the mighty princess herself. So Pyramid really was right.” Elizabeth bristled up, and Amelia rolled her eyes, as Caleb grew even more confused than earlier. Caleb did not like the fact that it seemed that he was the only one sane around here to see that this boy was really still a boy and not the princess.

“You! You did this to me! Change me back you…you hag!” Barium threw back his head and laughed as Nicole jumped from the table she was sitting from and pointed angrily at the princess,

“Don’t call my father a hag, you b*tch!”

“Don’t call me that!”

“I shall call you whatever I want, you fag!” Nicole called out and Caleb was glad that it seemed that someone else seemed to have been just as confused as he was, especially with switching the cruel names or so. Elizabeth growled and got into another fight the second time for a day, but yelled as she was easily defeated with a sharp foot up her spine, and a taunting female voice above her head, “You shouldn’t mess with a ninja.”

“Now Nicole, that’s no way to treat royalty.” Nicole looked up fiercely at her father and removed her foot from the spine of the princess and did nothing to help her up. The princess looked more miserable than ever and Caleb was soon to his other confused breaking point. “Hand over your guild pieces.”

“Why should I?” Elizabeth yelled, brushing back part of the dirt that had managed to cake up on her face.

“Are you not hiring us to get rid of the curse?”

“I shouldn’t have to hire anyone! You remove this curse from me immediately!” Barium was amused from this and chuckled at the princess, folding his arms as his daughter mingled with in the back with Caleb and Amelia.

“I cannot. I am just a ninja after all; the only one who could get rid of such a curse is the Half that cast it.”

“Then go get her! I demand it as the royal princess!”

“What would you say if I told you that it was not really Pyramid who had cast the spell? But she had been just holding it upon the judgment of the grand council of the Half Country?” Elizabeth gasped at this then growled,

“I’ll tell daddy that the Half Country have ill being towards our country! Surely this was a plot to go against our country!”

“Oh far from it princess.” Barium sneered and poked at Caleb’s father who looked like a very sore man, glaring over at the new boy, “It is actually something to help strengthen our country. Now, I suggest you use up three hundred guild pieces to hire the people you need to cross over to the Half country.”

“You…why you…I DEMAND YOU TO TAKE THIS CURSE OFF OF ME NOW!” Elizabeth screamed, stomping her feet and Amelia couldn’t help but glare as the blonde thumped on Barium’s chest, demanding him to as such she asked. Barium just grabbed both her hands and she started bawling again, but he ignored it easily,

“Now are you going to pay up? I promise you that the three I choose will get you to the country.” Elizabeth struggled, trying to get out of the older man’s grip, crying more tears in anger. Nicole heaved a puff when Caleb faced her, asking calmly on what in the world what everyone talking about.

“Well…remember Pyramid, that Half we met the other day? Well she was judging on if the princess was a worthy princess to receive blessings or not, and she had been holding that curse to change the princess’s appearance if she was not worthy.” Caleb then stared at the boy with a different light, and seeing that Nicole and Amelia were both not fooled by the illusion, obviously this really was the princess. How very strange.

Elizabeth finally then decided and moved to grab the pouch that was attached to her side and pulled out three hundred guild pieces, still crying pathetically for a male. Barium counted the pieces very happily then looked over at Nicole and nodded. Nicole gave a long sigh,

“Come on then princess, we’ve got a long journey.”

“What! Just you! I refuse!”

“Who said it was just me? Come on Caleb, Amelia.” The two jumped up and Caleb then knew why his father looked rather angry and why Barium seemed to be giving him fifty guild pieces to satisfy his son’s soon to be absence.

“Wha?” Amelia asked, off guard and Elizabeth paled.

“You can’t honestly be serious! There is no way these two could help save me from any curse, not even guide me to the country!” Amelia growled at the boy and moved her sleeves up, preparing for another battle as the other had just rubbed her the wrong way.

“Actually, Amelia and Caleb are far more suited to travel to the Half country then others.” Amelia and Caleb stopped momentarily to stare at Nicole’s father with mild confusion and both tilted their head simultaneously.

“What do you mean?”

“Amelia has eyes that can not be fooled by any illusion and Caleb possesses the power to craft practically anything. He is also a fabulous cook!” Nicole rolled her eyes at her father’s words, as they had sounded a little surreal, despite it being the truth.

“My eyes can see through any illusion?” Amelia asked, pointing at her brown eyes in curiosity then blinked as Barium nodded, giving her a certain remainder of a conversation she had with her father a long time ago. Amelia stood still for a second then nodded at this and blinked even more as she was handed fifty guild pieces, as well as Nicole and Caleb. “This is for you three, use it well, unlike the princess here, I know you can handle all of your money well.” Elizabeth growled then Amelia realized again what her situation was,

“I am not guiding through some country to help some stupid selfish princess!”

“I am not going to let myself be guided by some rat!”

“FOR GOD’S SAKES! QUIT CALLING ME THAT!” Amelia yelled at her and jumped on the boy for the second time that day, aiming for his face once again only to be pulled off with Barium’s strong arms and Amelia hissed up a cursing fest just for the princess and the princess tried to curse and argue back but failed miserably as she did not know half the words that spewed from the other girl’s mouth.

“Both of you calm down now!” Barium commanded forcefully and the two shut their mouths immediately and stared fearfully at the strong older man. Barium gave a slight sigh, “That’s better. Now all of you sit down, you need to plan this trip out.” Amelia growled again and folded her arms,

“I told you, I’m not going to guide some stupid princess just because she was too selfish not to be worthy of the Half’s blessings!”

“What’s so great about having a Half’s blessings!? They’re filthy half-breeds!” A silence crawled around the small household and Amelia was the first to move. This time, Barium did not stop her when she punched harshly at the princess’s face, blood spurting from her nose and the princess shrieked, “What was that for!?”

“Halves are not filthy; they belong here as much as we do. If I hear you curse Halves again, I will have no choice but to beat you senseless.”

“What’s so great about Halves!” Elizabeth then sneered, “Oh, was your father a Half? Or perhaps your mother? That would make you a filthy Fourth, wouldn’t it?” Amelia glared harshly and Elizabeth found herself screaming as Amelia tackled her once again, as it was all she could do and she was very close to beating the princess into a pulp when her two friend’s grabbed at her arms and she was dragged up, kicking and screaming.

“I’ll get you, you evil, selfish, bratty, b*tch!” Amelia yelled on the top of her lungs, “Nobody gets away with mocking my mother! My mom was a saint, unlike your cheating mom!” Elizabeth’s heart held still and she growled, getting up and also ready to start a fight but Barium had managed to stop fists from being raised against each other.

“I see that you two are going to have some problems on this trip.”

“Understatement of the history father.” Nicole inputted, holding her friend’s fist harshly as she struggled and only focused on one goal and that was to hit the princess. So soon, the two arguing forces were settled besides each other, glaring evilly at each other while being tied up fairly well. “God, this is going to be a long journey.” Nicole muttered slightly angrily with a mild frown.

Caleb just nodded, seeing as he had no real choice as he saw his father actually agreeing that he needed to guide the princess now turned prince to the Half country. Besides there was a more serious matter behind that fact that Caleb noticed but he did not speak of it.

If the princess was not recovered back to the throne, the country would eventually go to war accusing neighboring countries and warriors of stealing away the princess. All the countries would engage in a war when the king would probably die from the war he started, then blood would spill from the innocents all over, and fear would be everywhere. There would be even little children killing each other, Caleb shuddered at the mere thought of it and lingered his gaze to Amelia to shake his mind from such terrifying thoughts.

TBC

[Jhessail]

“Give me one really good reason why I should help her out? Why have you sold yourself out just for guild pieces?” Amelia asked, finally realizing in her head that there obviously had to be a good reason besides being the palace’s ninjas. Especially since nobody would actually be able to tell if the princess really was the princess…well except her that is, but that was because of her mother’s blood really.

“Well…it’s a lot of guild pieces.”

“Don’t just say it like that! I know you have some sort of ulterior motive!” Amelia yelled at the man had who just rubbed the back of his head lightly, looking over at his daughter, who just shrugged a bit. Amelia glared at Nicole, who just gave the same response as she gave her father and heaved a quiet sigh; “I don’t want to do this. I’m not good at much else then fleeing and seeing through stuff.”

“Now that’s not true, you’re also very good at kicking for someone who has such terrible feet.” Elizabeth blinked and looked at Amelia’s feet, seeing her strange shoes and tilted her head slightly to see what the big deal was and was slightly shocked to see bruises up to the other girl’s ankles, and lord knows how deep they were in her actually feet.

“Well…these shoes are made of part metal.”

“A strong metal at that. Jacob told me those were made from the adamantine that your father had originally left you.”

“What! But he told me that he took if from Caleb’s apprenticing metals!” Caleb snorted and folded his arms, looking for once like a very cocky teenager,

“As if I would ever let him do that, who do you think managed to get your measurements?” Amelia stared, shocked for a moment then stared at her shoes with a new light. Elizabeth went through her knowledge that she had been taught over gruesome hours in the academy and frowned,

“Adamantine is supposed to be the rarest metal of them all.” Amelia scowled,

“So the little prince does know a thing or two.”

“Shut up, Fourth!”

“Brat!”

“Girls, girls, calm down.” Elizabeth shot Barium an ugly glare but could do nothing otherwise, only struggling slightly in the binds she had found herself in and whined slightly as she started to feel completely dirty.

“…Why would Jacob waste the adamantine on my shoes though? You guys could have used that to build some sort of sword or something to get a lot more guild pieces for the shop.” Caleb looked away uncomfortably then muttered lowly,

“It was my idea.” Amelia blinked, shocked momentarily then asked,

“Your idea?” Nicole shot a jealous glare but the glare that it was targeted to didn’t quite make it as Caleb nodded and Amelia grew even more confused. “But why? You could have used it to become a definite blacksmith.”

“I’ll become a blacksmith on my own time, but I could see that if you continued to run around those previous shoes you had, you would have seriously injured your feet to the point of becoming a cripple.” Amelia huffed, pouting up at the boy and threw her body against the chair she had been sitting in.

“What a waste…”

“Wow, one thing we agree on.” The two threw glares at each other once again and there was an immediate sigh across the small household. Amelia then looked down to the ground and around the household, trying to avoid talking, especially since she did not like what would appear in her mind set. Amelia really did not want to help such a selfish girl, even if that girl was a boy at the moment.

“Amelia, please help us out on this. We need you.”

“Why would you need me?”

“Are you kidding? The forest is FILLED with illusions made by the ancient demons of Yore country and then there are the immoral witches that like to play tricks on people! You’re the only one who wouldn’t be able to be fooled by them ‘Lia!” Nicole called to her friend in the girl’s nickname and Amelia just nodded at this, acknowledging it as a fact but not a major factor into making her come along with the journey.

“Oh this is getting tiring.” Caleb’s father gruffed out, speaking for the first time everyone entered in his household, and stood up from his small seating arrangement on the floor and stared straight in the teenager’s eye. “Girl, what was your father’s duty as a blacksmith?”

“To craft his finest weapons when asked of the king, and if needed perform in any duty possible when asked.”

“And you?” Amelia tensed up and looked away, refusing to answer, especially since she had considered herself as a true commoner now that her parents were long gone. “I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you!” Caleb’s father demanded, heaving his broad chest in her direction and Amelia gave an irritated sigh and glared back into the man’s brown eyes,

“As daughter of a blacksmith, I must do all that I can to help my father out in his best wishes.”

“And what would your father’s wishes be, child?” Amelia gritted her teeth,

“To save the kingdom.”

“And how would that be possible?” Amelia was shaking very visibly now, her eyes expressing her anger as her face was contorted in a vision of forced pride.

“If I escort the princess to the Half country and get the curse off of her.”

“So?” Amelia then hung her head down low, grunting miscellaneously at the ground and Caleb just signaled to his father that this was a symbol of Amelia’s surrender to the path that had been laid in front of her. Elizabeth huffed though, rolling her, or rather, his eyes and glared at Amelia, not seeing what was at all special about the girl.

“Well, now that we got that all settled, you promise to play nice ‘Lia?” Nicole winked and Amelia grunted again as Nicole unwrapped the ropes that had tightly binded the two and stared over at her father, expecting probably more of a mission request from his mouth.

Barium looked at the defeated Amelia, the dirty Elizabeth, the stoic, yet very confused, Caleb, and the lovely soldier known as his daughter. Barium looked up to the roof, praying to the heavens he was doing the right thing, as it was the truth and there was nobody else who would be able to do the mission up ahead.

His daughter would supply the stealth and tracking techniques, along with being a very helpful bodyguard the entire way, Caleb would manage to keep track of the guild pieces, cook and be able to make anything they would need as long as he had the right materials.

Amelia…Amelia would guide them on the right path and hopefully have enough patience and wit to deal with all they came by, and even though he didn’t expect much from the princess, he suspected that the princess would have a fair knowledge of magic and legends concerning the land all around them, enough to get them going even more. Nicole then coughed slightly,

“Father, is there something that you are forgetting?” Forgetting? What could he be forgetting? Barium took a quick look at the group then laughed slightly,

“Oh yes, you will need Jacob’s shield of course, then you will need a change of clothes I expect. Rations probably would be helpful as well, correct?”

“Very good dad.” Nicole seemed slightly annoyed at her father’s lack of enthusiasm, but inwardly Nicole was very grateful and happy at this chance. This was just a journey on her own, without any of her annoying ninja bodyguards, and she would be able to prove her worth to her father! That and as an added bonus, her best friend and the guy she had a mild crush on was going to come with her! This would surely be a grand quest!

TBC

[Jhessail]

“Can I take a bath? I feel so dirty.”

“Better get used to it prince, the roads we plan on taking are even worse then that mud in your hair, but I suppose we could lend you our bathroom for now.” Elizabeth grinned brightly,

“Where is it?” Caleb couldn’t help it; he gave a naughty grin and pointed outside to a window revealed a barrel with steaming water in it. Elizabeth blushed darkly and yelled, “You can’t expect me to bathe in front of so many others!”

“Oh I expect it, I also expect you to get ogled by many perverts out there.” Caleb couldn’t help it again; he hadn’t had someone to tease about the outside bathroom in ages! His older brother was a part of the militia after all, so his older brother lived in a small quarters that the kingdom had given him. Elizabeth screamed, moving around and about, trying to get as clean as she could without getting out of her clothes and going outside.

“You know…we can’t go around calling you prince…or Elizabeth for that matter.” Nicole noted, pointing it out to everyone else, and they all nodded at her obvious statement of fact.

“Hmm…Edward.”

“No, no, Elijah.”

“Ew! What kind of name is that? Eric, Eric!” Elizabeth watched as her new three guardians argued over his new name and frowned. Well, he ought to have a choice in the matter, shouldn’t he? Elizabeth tried to think about it, thinking of a good name that he had heard throughout the ages then grinned as they continued to input a lot of E names.

“How about Elliot!” Elizabeth’s guardians stared at him silently then shook their heads immediately, all disagreeing with the name. “What? Why?”

“That name is a name of our current priest. I don’t think it would be wise to go around calling you that.” Caleb and Nicole nodded together and the foursome quieted down as Barium had managed to gather all the supplies that were needed.

“What about Eamon?”

“Huh? What kind of name is that?” Amelia rubbed the back of her head nervously as she usually did from habit,

“It’s a name I heard from my father when he was talking about a really old tale…it’s supposed to mean wealthy or something or another.”

“That would definitely sound like our new friend here.” Elizabeth scoffed at the mention of being called that with the protectors.

“Well why an E name?” Barium asked the children who just gave a glare at him, as though asking him why he even bothered to question their methods. Perhaps it would be easier to extinguish the fact that the boy that they had officially renamed as Eamon was really princess Elizabeth in a cursed disguise. “Well never mind that then, here are all of your supplies. I even managed to get a horse for Amelia.”

“Huh?”

“I just happened to mention your name to a certain boy that lives with the horse keepers and he just happened to give me a horse.” Barium simply said, whistling in a noncommittal noise as Amelia glared at him fiercely.

“Well there is no doubt that I will be taking the horse!” Eamon declared easily, showing how easily he was indeed a girl as he strutted outside in his shambled dress and very much like a royal girl.

“We probably should get him a change of clothes before we head off.” The group nodded and prepared for the long trip that they knew the journey was going to be. However as everyone got ready from his or her own separate paths, Barium pulled Amelia aside and gave her a necklace.

“This is the royal family symbol!” Amelia whispered, sensing the quiet tension from her best friend’s father. Barium simply nodded and looked away before quietly whispering to the girl,

“This is under a disguise right now, only you can see through it, but Amelia, whatever you do, never give the prince the necklace back, and never cast a spell from the point of the necklace, other then that, I need for you to wear it.” Amelia rose an eyebrow and hissed quietly back,

“Why should it matter if I tried to use a spell on it? I’m not of royal blood!”

“True, but you did not witness the necklace malfunction yesterday when the princess tried to cast a spell from it. It seems that it may recognize someone else as its master if they even have a hint of royal blood in them or as long as they’re worthy.”

“And what’s that got to do with me?”

“Well…your Fourth blood may confuse the charm on it.”

“Ah, I see.” Amelia finally understood and nodded at the older man, grabbing it from him and placing it upon her neck. To any normal mortal, the necklace was a choker with a golden cross in the center of its black leather. Barium nodded and looked over at the ready group,

“Prepare for anything Amelia. Even if your eyes can see through illusions, doesn’t mean it will see through the sweet lies of the witches out there.” Amelia nodded and joined the group, who was helping Nicole up on the holster of the horse. It seemed that while Amelia and Barium were talking, Caleb had managed to convince Eamon that it would look very suspicious if they left with a dirty man on top of the horse, and a man that looked very much like the princess that was also wanted by the entire kingdom. Nicole was a far more suitable choice for a horse, seeing as she was the only one who was definitely classified middle-class just by the look of her fine armor shirts.

“So are we all ready to head off?” Amelia asked, enjoying privately as Eamon whined about his aching feet just at the start. This was going to be a long journey; Amelia couldn’t wait until she dumped Eamon back at the palace walls and hopefully as a more humble prince. Though, Amelia speculated throughout her mind, that was highly unlikely.

“We should be.” Caleb pronounced, heaving bags against the horse to carry the heavy rations while he would carry even more. Caleb even gave some for Eamon to carry but the boy refused. “Look, if you’re male right now, you need to act like a male. And men carry their own bags.” Caleb shoved the backpack to the boy and Eamon huffed angrily. Amelia smiled; glad to see that Caleb wasn’t as easy to forgive as Nicole seemed to be. Then again, Nicole could be extremely greedy and as a ninja, she had quite a few skills at the pocket.

“Well, shall we be heading off?” Amelia asked, the shield on her back, protecting it thoroughly as everyone nodded except Eamon who, even though wanted to get the curse off, did not want to be carrying around the junk that they needed for the mission.

They all finally agreed on the task ahead of them and started to move off, a good-bye was welcomed from Barium and Caleb’s father as they started to make their way through the village.

TBC

[Jhessail]

“So this forest, is it really that big of a deal like that ninja was saying earlier?” Eamon asked, adjusting his shoulders as they grew extremely tired from the weight on his back.

“Dunno, never really been there myself. How about you ‘Lia?”

“Dad would occasionally take me there to gather orders from some secret man deep in the forest, but I don’t know much about it otherwise.” And before Nicole could ask her crush the same question he just shook his head,

“Don’t ask me, I’m just an apprentice peasant.”

“Well this should be interesting then, shouldn’t it?”

“You are truly enjoying this, aren’t you? I swear, you’re sick.” Amelia shook her head at her dark-haired friend and just smiled at how excited the girl really was. Eamon scoffed, thinking it ridiculous and barbaric all at the same time. The four had finally arrived outside of the village’s limits and stared down the long twisting road that would eventually turn into many dirt roads.

“Tell me we have a map.” Eamon actually scoffed out, watching as Nicole searched the little pouch she had on her belt and pulling out a small scroll.

“Of course we have a map. My father is very resourceful, unlike you.” Nicole stuck her tongue out, tensing up slightly as a professional ninja in training and looked down at the map. There was a moment of silence that encompassed the group.

“Do you know how to read it?”

“Of course I do!” Nicole yelled back at him, blushing slightly as she stared even more intently at the scroll.

“But you’re holding it the wrong way.” Eamon pointed out, frowning in extreme distaste and dislike as Nicole blushed again and turned the scroll over, looking fairly confused. “Hand it to me.”

“As if a spoiled brat would know any better.” Amelia scoffed, folding her arms and highly doubting the prince’s intelligence. Though really, if looked at, there really was no good reason to believe in the prince’s ability to perceive maps as needed. Eamon growled visibly at the brunette and swiped the scroll away furiously and Nicole scorned the spoiled boy.

“Okay, right now we’re here.” Eamon pointed at a part of the map and everyone nodded, gathering semi-around the boy, all slightly surprised that Eamon had delivered as he promised, that he could indeed read maps. “And we need to head through this forest to get to the Half country…however it isn’t that easy-” Eamon was then cut off from Caleb who grunted.

“Don’t talk like that, you sound to…girly.”

“I am a girl.”

“Not right now you are, Caleb, you’re going to have to teach him how to speak right.” Caleb just grunted again and Eamon frowned, continuing from where he left off,

“Anyway, after we get through the forest, it seems that there will be a large river that would be in our way, and then followed by two villages which seem to have some form of high populace.”

“What villages?”

“It says here,” Eamon squinted his eyes for a second, taking a closer peer at the map then shrugged proclaiming what he could read, “Ivalisea and Blun.”

“Weren’t you born in Blun, Amelia?” Caleb questioned looking over as the girl walked to the horse, petting it calmly on its mouth, feeding it a carrot she had earlier got out from her pack.

“I think so…if I remember correctly; dad always said that was a fishing magic village.”

“Ew…fish.” Eamon shuddered at the mere thought of it and his less picky comrades glared at him momentarily for it.

“Well okay, whatever. So you can read a map, good for you…can we just get going?” Nicole impatiently put, climbing down from the horse and pulling Amelia to rest upon it. Amelia disagreed at first but then Caleb pointed at blood was seeping through the leather part of her new shoes and Amelia climbed on the horse. Caleb took her shoes from her feet and Eamon sneered at the sight, shuddering from the sheer ugly sight of it.

“Dear God ‘Lia, why do you keep these sort of shoes? I mean…I know they can be helpful at times, but they seem even more a burden then a help.” Amelia shrugged, not looking very much like she cared and held softly at the horse’s mane, tsking slightly to make the horse go foreword. Nicole huffed impatiently and looked over at Caleb with hopeful eyes and the boy just rolled his eyes.

“You should really know that more then I do, Shinobi.”

“Caleb, please call me by my first name! And what do you mean by that?”

“Who made the original version?”

“Her father of course!” Eamon raised an eyebrow as the girl clapped a hand over her mouth abruptly then nodded sadly, finally noticing what her friend held such great love for the shoes that killed her feet just being in them.

“What was her father?” Eamon asked, curiosity getting the best of him as the horse trotted a little down further the road, leaving the three alone together while Amelia had her alone time with the horse itself.

“A blacksmith.”

“One of the finest in all the lands, I would tell you his full name if I knew you could appreciate it or not.” Caleb smirked over at Eamon who growled slightly then pushed his hair back slightly, glad that it had at least kept its weight and length so proudly.

“You all act as though I’m the most uncivilized being there ever was.”

“Trying to kill our friend does that; we have no trust in you whatsoever.” Nicole bluntly replied, adjusting her own backpack and stared at the blonde boy with a different look then ahead to look at Amelia, who was still far ahead. “But you’ve really got to watch out with getting fights with ‘Lia, she can be a force to reckon with when needed.”

“Very true.” Caleb agreed and Eamon snorted, trying to keep the laughter that had tried to start up from this statement.

“That peasant? Oh next thing you’re going to tell me is that she actually has magic powers!”

“She may, we don’t know. Amelia is a Fourth after all.” Eamon burst out in giggles, which Caleb seemed to flinch at, proclaiming it was too girly to be…giggling.

“There are no known Fourths in the world that have any magic powers, they may have inherited some physical attribute from their Half parent, but there is no way they have any control over magic.” Nicole gave her own version of a half-heartened sigh,

“If you say so ‘Mon, but how many Fourths have you known throughout your life?” Eamon was consumed with silence for awhile, as they soon caught up with the horse who had been slightly been wandering from the path and Amelia seemed to be stuck in her own little world.

Eamon tried to think about it, but the more he thought about it, the more frustrated he would get. How many Fourths had he heard about in all his time in the castle? It didn’t make any sense that the bloodline of the Fourths would disappear from using the magic their parent had used so easily.

Eamon tossed and turned the idea until it was sore in his head; he was best with science after all. There was something missing in the equation that made up the biological being that was known as a Fourth. Oh but whatever, Eamon simply thought, rolling his eyes once again, sick and tired already, hoping that they would get done with this journey quickly…and he, once he was a she again, could have them all killed the instant they stepped back in the castle.

TBC

[Jhessail]

When they had finally reached to the forest, it was very dark out. Caleb suggested they made camp for the night and Eamon grew very disheartened at this news but agreed as he stared uneagerly at the chirping crickets in the woods. They all ate and did small work to keep their camp from any harm during the night; however there was a problem when it came to the sleeping arrangements.

“No way are you sleeping with us.”

“But I’m a girl!”

“Only in spirit! Right now you are a male in physical form! Who knows what your mind could be thinking of doing to us at night!” Caleb groaned and sat down on a stump, watching the three ‘girls’ argue out the sleeping arrangements. It ended with, as it should have been in the first place without argument, boys and girls, separate tents. They all slept rather peacefully until Amelia got up to go to the bathroom and found that she couldn’t fall back asleep.

“What are you doing awake?” Caleb asked, moving his tent’s flap a bit to hide the light that Amelia had started to calm herself down from the darkness.

“I couldn’t sleep I guess…I really shouldn’t be here. I should be back on the streets, stealing Mr. Tahmato’s tomatoes.” Caleb laughed slightly and went to sit next to the girl, both watching the fire quietly. Amelia tensed up slightly as Caleb’s hands wandered to her open feet, tracing over the scabs and bruises aching all over the toes and ankles.

“These kind of remind me of my hands, you know?” Amelia just nodded quietly, listening as Caleb continued without her help of acknowledgement, “Sometimes…I’ll just work so hard on something, I’ll never stop at it, and then Jacob would take my hands and would give me such a disappointed look.” Caleb brushed back his dark hair and looked at Amelia with a small smile, “We’re both very similar, aren’t we?”

“I guess.” Amelia shrugged, giving her own little smile of sincerity and looked back to the light. “Why are we out here? Helping him? Why are we even attempting to get along with him?” Amelia questioned to nobody specifically, as though she wanted an answer from the flame, however Caleb could relay his thoughts on the matter.

“In a way, we’re here because of our fathers. Your father’s pride and loyalty to the country, my father’s agreement and Nicole’s father is a trained ninja mercenary after all.” Amelia gave a loud sigh at Caleb’s true thoughts and fell back to the ground, staring up at the stars that hung high within the skies. Amelia held her hand out to the stars and muttered,

“I had once heard that when a person dies, their soul is able to travel to certain places before going to where they belong.” Caleb gave her a confused face but did nothing as Amelia covered her face slightly, “I wonder if I could visit the stars when I die?”

“Why are you saying something like that?” Amelia shook her head, the dirt building up from behind her strange short hair.

“Who knows? I just felt like it, I guess.” The only other one awake gave her a stern stare and laid right next to her, staring up to the stars with her, trying to see what exactly she saw. This was the closest they had been, as odd as that sounded in his mind. But really…Caleb didn’t mind so much and he grabbed Amelia’s hand, continuing to stare up at the stars. Amelia did nothing to respond to the warm over worn hand and they both slowly fell asleep under the penetrating glare in the night’s sky.

***
The two were rudely awaken by Nicole’s screeching at the prince to get the heck up because they needed to head out earlier or the creatures of the forest would be able to trick them much easier.

All of them except Nicole groaned in pain and annoyance of the dimming sun starting to rise over the hills to reveal them all to a healthy morning. Nicole stared as they all prepared for their morning walk through the forest, all with lovely closed eyes and only grunting to the responses that needed more then just a yes or no shake of the head.

Nicole gladly fed the horse, which she blessed as Star, as her friends had finally woken up and were having the time of their lives trying to force the prince in full alert before they would get into the forest itself. Nicole surveyed the area outside of the forest last night, it looked fairly beautiful and not at all suspicious, but she would remain on her guard for the sake of her friends.

Leading in the front was Nicole, guiding Star calmly through the roads, Eamon was finally on the horse like he had wished in the beginning and he was reading from the map, trying to make out some of the squiggly lines that had been placed on there as road markers for any traveler to see easily, following the two was Caleb and Amelia, both silent and peering around the many greens all over the enchanting trees. They all walked in silence, not able to start a conversation really. It was when Eamon whined that they all started to talk again.

“What’s wrong?” Amelia asked, a very distrustful tone in her voice.

“I need to…I need to…” Eamon blushed and the girls got it right away, excusing the boy to do his business in the trees, though he complained up a large fit about that too. A sigh came all three, waiting impatiently for the other boy to finish going to the bathroom when there was a sudden rustle. At first Nicole smiled, and started to talk when she froze. Right in front of the rustling bushes came out a hunched figure covered in a dark cloak, immediately alerting the teenagers that there was no way that this was Eamon.

“Why hello there, dearies.” A grandma voice echoed from underneath the hood but Nicole frowned, tensing up. Amelia was right behind her in the tense department, frowning at the old lady’s cloak and Caleb looked at the two, semi-confused but greeted the old woman.

Amelia shot a glance over to her best friend and Nicole nodded, peering down around the old woman’s feet. Blood, the cloak was caked in blood, and Nicole betted if she were to look at the bush, and at the woman’s hands, there would be blood lingering on them as well.

“Hail, may I ask what you are doing wandering around these woods without a guide?” Caleb asked quietly, offering the woman his hand to fully step away from the bushes. The old lady took it and stepped out and Nicole confirmed her fears of there being lingering blood drenching the bush lightly.

“Ah, such a nice kind young man. You see, I lost my guide earlier.” More like murdered, Nicole thought darkly, placing her hand over her pouch and watched Amelia look like she was ready to raise her legs in order to give a good kick out to the more then likely enemy ahead of them.

Caleb nodded at her, treating her kindly which rose the girls’ suspicions even more. Caleb was usually not so warm to anybody, even when they had first met each other, Caleb would just give a cold gold glare at them. Something was wrong and something was very strange.

“Ah, I feel better.” Eamon stumbled back, brushing his blonde hair slightly back with a dark blush upon his face as though still embarrassed by the bodily functions of his new body.

Eamon then blinked at the new person who decided to join them and he frowned, tensing up as much as Nicole and Amelia, slightly confused as he felt a compelling urge to comfort and console the lady who had blood over her feet. Eamon was torn between certain conflicts that were rising up in his mind but he ignored them and reverted to his usual normal self. “Who’s this hag?”

“She is no hag Eamon, shut up.” Eamon stood still as he was in the line of sight of Caleb’s full power of penetrating glares. Eamon grew immediately confused and peeked over to the other girls of the party and they just shook their head, furiously trying to tell Eamon to shut up as Caleb requested.

“I don’t know why I should, a stranger coming out of nowhere? Humph.” Eamon folded his arms and shuddered as the old woman gave him a lingering stare, as though trying to convince him that he needed to follow the lady, give her everything she wanted and more. However, a more logical, and a, sadly, more selfish side of Eamon refused to succumb to this strange lady.

“Well now, aren’t you a rude young man?” Amelia stared down at the feet once again, trying to make completely sure that it was from someone else’s blood, because she really never knew, but so much blood…it had to be from someone else. But there was one question that kept popping up in her mind, why was Caleb acting so homely around her? Heck, even Eamon didn’t seem as bad around this strange woman, something was wrong and something was very different.

TBC

[Jhessail]

“But Eamon is right about one thing, who are you?” Nicole questioned, posing herself into a much more comfortable interrogative position. Nicole almost growled as the lady ignored her completely and marched up to Eamon with Caleb’s guiding helping hand and shoved her face within Eamon’s. Eamon grew increasingly nervous as green eyes pooled over his own blue eyes, searching for something. But whatever for?

Eamon asked himself, the urge to follow every word this woman said echoed within his mind but he refused. He was royalty, even as a man, no royal man would DARE give up to just anyone!

“I think it best if you would answer my friend’s question.” Eamon finally mouthed, finding his mouth grew very dry somehow and the hag gave up staring at him, though she even looked mildly confused as she answered as requested,

“My name is Aurora.”

“Lovely name.” Caleb inputted, still holding unto her hand and Nicole felt a twinge of anger deep in her heartstrings, and twitched mildly and quite visibly. However she controlled her anger as Amelia took a few steps closer to the older, giving Aurora her own penetrating stare. “Is there something wrong?”

“Oh no…of course not.” Amelia gave Caleb a smile but he just grimaced at her, ignoring her entirely to turn back to the kind compliments of the woman. Amelia slowly came back to her friend then suggested something that Nicole was slightly shocked at, “Shall we try to help you find your guide then? I’m sure it isn’t safe for someone as…” Amelia tried to choose the right words for nothing came to her mind but luckily Nicole was there to finish the sentence off.

“As wise as you to be alone in the forest. You’re here to get to Blun, I bet, right?” Aurora gave a hesitate look, but then she nodded, agreeing with the ninja. “Great, then we should head off, shouldn’t we? Caleb, help her on the horse, after all, someone so revered shouldn’t be walking around. In fact, I bet you’ve been wandering around for weeks, haven’t you?” Nicole blabbed off, helping Caleb help Aurora unto Star and when they started to move again on their trail, she backtracked to Amelia, who was forcing Eamon to keep right next to her, as much as she disliked it.

“Well that is an interesting way to keep her near us.”

“Yeah, I had to think fast. I know she can’t be wandering off by herself, she has the suspicious kind of face.”

“And that blood…” Eamon watched the two silently whisper to each other, both contemplating on their new teammate and couldn’t help but forcibly voice in,

“Blood? What blood?” The girls shot him a surprised glance then looked at each other, nodding casually. Eamon huffed slightly, folding his arms, walking as his feet felt very exhausted but something in him refused to admit it, “Tell me right now!”

“There is a lot of blood on her feet and hands.” Nicole hissed back, groaning almost loudly as she was forced to watch Caleb enjoy the time he had talking to the old hag.

“There is? But I don’t see it.”

“Obviously she has a charm spell on her, that would explain Caleb…though I wonder why you’re not fully succumbed to it.” Amelia voiced in silently, looking back and forth between the laughing hag and the blonde boy. Eamon thought about it for a second then shrugged,

“Ever think it could be because…oh I don’t know, I JUST turned into a boy yesterday?”

“That would make sense.” Nicole agreed and Amelia just rolled her eyes, sighing in a disgusted state.

“Whatever, as long as he doesn’t turn on us like I think Caleb’s about to.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Obviously the hag is a witch that is going to finish us all off for food or spell components or something like that or another, and she’ll use Caleb otherwise she would look even more suspicious as she enters in Blun.” Eamon grew furious at the simple idea of it and almost shouted on the top of his lungs at the old woman but Nicole and Amelia immediately covered his mouth, both pretending to laugh at what a riot Eamon could be. Caleb just shot them a curious glance and went back to visiting with Aurora as though she was the greatest thing in the universe.

“Okay, now that we know that, we need to plan a way to get away with killing her.”

“What? KILL?” Eamon almost shouted, but Nicole and Amelia had once again pretending to laugh while covering his mouth, both shooting daggers into his blue eyes to give the little message to shut up or he would die very soon, and not from the witch’s hand.

“Yes kill, witches have always had a high bounty upon them, and besides, it’s either her or us.”

“And I rather it be her.” Amelia grunted and Eamon just shot them a perspective glance, which made the two look away uncomfortably.

“You two already know of killing other people? How barbaric! You’re what’s wrong with this country!”

“Oh shut up, as though you’re any better, killing people just because they give you one of their family heirlooms! Look, we’ve both been trained as ninjas, though I’m no where as near to the skill Nicole has here, we know that we need to make kills sometimes in order to survive in this world.” Amelia growled at him, getting up in his face, very visibly angry at their choice of going around this situation to handle it. Eamon pouted slightly as the girl had beaten him at a verbal argument, especially since she was the only way to continue through this creepy forest.

“Okay, so how are we going to do this?”

“You, you’re not going to anything. You’ll just get in the way and more then likely become enchanted just like our dear friend over there.” Amelia pointed her head towards the dark-haired boy ahead of her, whom was till laughing like he was having the time of his life. Nicole nodded in agreement to this and gave her friend a strange signal, and disappeared into the trees, leaving the two alone.

[Jhessail]

“Okay, so how are we going to do this?”

“You, you’re not going to anything. You’ll just get in the way and more then likely become enchanted just like our dear friend over there.” Amelia pointed her head towards the dark-haired boy ahead of her, whom was till laughing like he was having the time of his life. Nicole nodded in agreement to this and gave her friend a strange signal, and disappeared into the trees, leaving the two alone.

Eamon grew angry, annoyed and somehow very scared. Why was he feeling this way? What was different about killing this old lady and killing any other peasant criminal that was evil through his eyes? It had to be that charm, Eamon thought deeply in his mind, watching as Amelia walked foreword to the chatting two, joining very casually into their conversation. Eamon wondered how they were going to get her and felt ugly as the images drifted into his mind.

Amelia was busy with her own things, trying very hard to distract the witch on the horse and begged for forgiveness up to the heavens above as she was going to partake in the sin up ahead. Aurora didn’t seem to suspect anything as Caleb kept strictly by her side and gave very dirty looks to the girl he had just slept by last night. Amelia just started off with quiet questions, acting curious of the hag’s background when they reached a form of a clearing. A fork road with an extreme lack of trees around both the roads. Amelia looked up back to the trees then over at Eamon,

“Hey, which way should we go?” Aurora raised an eyebrow at the girl’s behavior, also curious on why she would have to ask the boy that had been trailing behind them. Eamon blinked then moved to struggle out the scroll that kept the map upon it, staring at it. “Well?” Amelia asked impatiently and Eamon stuck out his tongue at her.

“Well it looks like if we go left that will lead us to the large river that we have to use to get across to Blun, but if we go the other way it will eventually lead to Ivalisea and we could take a day’s journey to walk to Blun that way, it’d probably be safer considering the tracks around.” Eamon replied back, pointing to the right in his own decision that would make him think it wise. Amelia just nodded then waved her hand off and Nicole came crashing out of the trees, landing in a very graceful and balanced way on the horse, pulling out a knife to go straight for the hag’s throat.

However before she could finish her assassination though, Caleb knocked her off with a clear swift push of his hands, Nicole landed on the ground grunting in obvious pain but she recovered quickly and pulled out another knife as Caleb came charging at her his bare hands.

Eamon watched blankly as Nicole tried to dodge the warning hands of her friend and watched how she tried to use her weapons without hurting her crush. Eamon also watched as Amelia had managed to tackle Aurora off of Star and was wrestling the hag, grunting loudly as her skin started to turn a deadly green color.

“That’s a poison spell!” Eamon tried to warn Amelia, but she continued to roll around the dirt, giving all physical injuries that she could to the witch. The witch grunted and managed to push Amelia off into a tree stump and Amelia grew ill, falling to the ground and her arms turned deadly green, slowly spreading to her face.

Eamon growled, searching around for anything that could help him cast a spell. Eamon wasn’t particularly good at spells because he always needed some form of a catalyst with it before, but right now there no choice to attempt an easy spell. Judging from this witch’s choice of spells…she obviously can’t handle herself physically, Eamon thought, looking around for a long-range weapon as he realized it would be hopeless to cast a spell without a catalyst.

Lying on the ground was a large stick and Eamon grunted, heaving it up and swinging it about to hit the witch. The stick wilted slightly at the end that hit Aurora but it obviously did its job of distracting the woman before she could finish Amelia off.

“You little boy! How dare you!”

“Indeed.” Eamon grunted again, falling down as he tried to swing another blow to the witch, however the new balance of the stick made him fall but manage to lift itself high enough to give a cut to Aurora’s face. Blood dripped down her new fresh wound but she shrieked, the long branch had still been infected with the poison that had been killing it earlier.

“HOW DARE YOU! I CURSE YOU! I CURSE YOU!” The witch cried out, raising her hands high and above to bring down a spell to the cursed prince, probably to kill him. However Nicole had luckily came by from her fight and moved one of her knives around to stab the witch straight into the back. With enough force to penetrate the spine, making the very dead witch stand up straight in pain before she died of it penetrating her system. Nicole jumped back as the witch fell backward in agonizing pain and stared blankly as the body started melting into the ground, decomposing as an ancient discarded skeleton.

“Necromancer magic?” Eamon stood up, discarding the branch completely and looked over to Caleb who was holding himself up by a tree, holding his head with his other hand, looking very confused and frustrated at the same time. Lucky me, Eamon thought in his mind but then turned over to Nicole who surveyed the skeleton with a frown.

“Necromancer? What’s that?”

“Someone who uses negative energy that’s in the air to do evil deeds, like reviving the dead for their selfish wants. We were lucky; this was obviously a low cast spell.”

“Are they usually powerful? And why hasn’t the kingdom heard of them?” Nicole stared over at Eamon to reply but finally spotted Amelia and panicked outwardly, jumping at the girl’s body who was almost completely green.

“What happened!?”

“She touched the witch; the witch obviously has a poison shield around her.” Amelia stared up at Nicole who was holding her, and she nervously grabbed at Nicole’s knife at the girl’s side then nervously slashed her arm open.

“You idiot! Don’t be doing that!” Nicole yelled but Amelia didn’t listen, trying to let the poison drain out but fell faint out of weakness and pain. Caleb finally regained his senses and rushed to Amelia’s side and gasped in terror, trying to patch up the wound.

“This isn’t good…Eamon quick! Which would be the quickest route?” Eamon jumped up a bit then nervously pointed right and a frown came deep to his face.

“But that would be a large detour to our mission!”

“I don’t care! Amelia is dying and if we don’t get her to a healer quick, I promise you, you won’t see the next morning sun!” Caleb threatened, grabbing the green girl’s body and rushing to the right from the fork on the road.

Nicole quickly followed; grabbing Star who had weirdly stood still throughout the whole period, as though knowing better then to leave and Eamon rushed after them, growling underneath his breath of how stupid and troublesome this really was. They all continued to run but there was one thing that Nicole noticed,

“You actually helped though.” Nicole looked back with a curious stare. Eamon blinked at the matter then noticed the very same thing himself; he looked away and growled.

“Of course I did, I need body guards after all.” Nicole stared quietly before continuing to rush foreword, a smile popping on her face. Perhaps her father was right, perhaps this journey would be very benefiting for the whole kingdom.

TBC

[Jhessail]

Chapter Three:
In which there is a detour.

“What do you mean 50 guild pieces!?” Nicole shrieked at the older healer man, who just rubbed his ear in an annoyed way and glared at the young ninja.

“50 guild pieces to get rid of the deadly poison your friend has upon her.”

“But that’s way too much for just a quick cure!”

“I can tell that this spell was cast by a powerful old witch, it takes a lot out of me to attempt the white magic arts when I don’t think it worth it.” The healer simply replied back, giving a slight shrug,
“But if you don’t think your friend’s life is that important...”

“Damn you healers and your expensive tastes!” Nicole cursed at the man, scouring through hers and Caleb’s share, cursing even more as she bunched all the pieces together and gave it to the grinning man.

“Thank you for doing business with me today.”

“Never again.” Nicole hissed with a low voice, turning away as the healer go to work on curing Amelia’s disease. Nicole then stumped outside into the waiting room to see the boys of the group sitting down almost nervously on metal chairs. Nicole then gave a slight sigh and Caleb looked up with bright hopeful eyes, afraid for Amelia’s life.

“I had to spend our share but she should be fine in the morning, you know how healers work.” Caleb nodded and gave his own version of a short-relieved sigh. Eamon just snorted slightly, folding his arms impatiently,

“We don’t have until the morning!” Eamon complained, brushing back his blonde hair angrily. Nicole gave an ugly glare to the blonde and just folded her own arms back in reply as well as opening her mouth in a very large intimidating way,

“Well fine, if you don’t think my friend’s life is that important, and you think you’re all that great, then go ahead. Without me!” Nicole huffed sitting next to Caleb, folding her legs up in a stance that told Eamon that she would stay right there forever and a day for her friend.

Eamon gave a loud aggravated scoff, tempted to just grab the girl by the hand and go marching foreword. Though that was an odd aggressive thought, no matter how well it sounded in his mind. Eamon then waved his hands about and gave Nicole an ugly look before sinking into his chair, pouting very much like a baby. Nicole gave a mischievous grin.

“Well, now with the argument done with, let’s go get some more supplies.” Caleb muttered, starting down at the pair with a low voice, his eyes hidden away from the two. Nicole then frowned, recognizing the certain voice pattern and shy stance that meant that Caleb was blaming himself for this whole incident. Nicole groaned inwardly, it would take days to get Caleb back to his normal self.

“Supplies? The last time I checked we had enough rations to last us a week.”

“I meant weapons.” Caleb bluntly put, pointing at Nicole’s legs, which were still littered with little pouches that held her little weapons all stuffed in them protectively.

“Oh.” Eamon just blankly said, watching carefully as Nicole stood up, brushing her hair back a bit as she prepared to shop for more weapons. “But I thought you could make weapons.”

“I can, but I would need to find a strong heat and some metal to be able to make a suitable weapon for all of us.” Eamon just nodded then, not understanding completely as he had originally thought that blacksmiths had the ability to make certain metals from just thin air.

Which wasn’t normally off, but that was only for the blacksmiths that had an extensive history with the properties of alchemy in their family, which was normally very common upon blacksmiths, but Caleb hadn’t been raised by an alchemic blacksmith, so he didn’t know of those abilities.

Eamon then blanked out completely as Caleb swiped at his thousand guild pieces and watched just as blankly as Caleb took out thirty guild pieces.

“Hey! What are you doing with my money?”

“Nicole just spent part of our share, so we need to use your money.”

“That’s for important stuff!”

“Like what? A new wardrobe? No.” Nicole grimaced; preferring her battle suited clothes then to any other. Eamon opened his mouth to start to complain when Caleb just harshly and rather quickly inputted,

“Look, for this mission we need to go incognito, you won’t be needing all these guild pieces because we’re just basically telling ourselves and the world to mug us and leave our body in some alley somewhere. Now do you want us to put a weapon in your hand or are you’re going to prove your incompetence by opening that big mouth of yours?” Eamon closed his mouth immediately, growling inwardly as Caleb’s full sentence slowly comprehended within his mind.

“So now that, that is done with, shall we head off to the market place they have here? Kind of wish Amelia was up…”

“Why, it’s not like she would help us around here.” Eamon grumbled, feeling sore in the back of his mind because of Caleb’s scorning.

“Shows what you know, Ivalisea is covered with puzzle illusion spells, there are a lot of mages that have way too much spare time. There’s also a lot of apprentices all around that have to practice their magic with other mages.”

“I…see…” Eamon replied slowly, ignoring Nicole’s words for some odd reason. There was something about ignoring the girl that felt right, probably because she was a commoner, thought Eamon silently, though he dare not tell her that. Caleb rolled his eyes, still looking fairly gloomy when the three headed out from the healer’s clinic and out into the complete city. Eamon watched as Nicole tensed up, looking around everywhere as though expecting someone to just jump out and yell ‘BOO!’.

Eamon soon found that Nicole was indeed correct when they started wandering about the town and finding themselves in the many puzzles all around but it made Eamon comforted slightly that there were also tourists around the city that seemed as confused as they all did. It wasn’t as if the puzzles really were there, but they looked so real so it was hard to tell if you were going the right way or not.

“E-e-excuse me,” Spoke a shy voice and Eamon turned around in a disgusted manner to see a young looking girl who was slumping ever so slightly with dark red hair and dressed in fine silk materials that made it very apparent that she was an apprentice for a spell caster or so. “Do you know the way to the general store? My master wanted me to make apple pie to-night.” She seemed to add in an after thought and stared hopefully at Eamon, who just turned away from the girl with a look that told the girl that he didn’t care.

“No, we don’t, I’m afraid. But we were trying to head that way, let’s travel together then, hm?” Nicole asked then looked over to the men of the group and glared at them, making sure they didn’t say anything against her inspired idea, which they didn’t. “By the way, my name is Nicole Shinobi, and you?”

“Remel, I don’t have a last name yet.”

“It’s good to meet you Remel.”

“Isn’t Remel a boy’s name though?” Eamon whispered over to Caleb who just shrugged as Eamon got a sharp hit to the back of his head, being made a demand to take what he said back.

“What about you two?” Remel asked curiously, throwing a shy glance over mostly at Eamon, but still with a very sincere stare.

“Caleb, I also do not have a last name.”

“Eamon Ro-” Eamon started speaking but his mouth was immediately covered by Caleb, who hissed in his ear,

“We can’t have you going around saying your real last name idiot! Just say you don’t have one!” Eamon grunted and pushed Caleb off of him, looking clearly angry and upset at the same time.

“Ro?”

“Yes. Ro.” Caleb rolled his eyes, huffing ever so slightly as Nicole had managed to calm him down,

“Yeah, Row, like in a boating family.”

“Oh! That explains it!” Remel said quite cheerfully, getting the name and stared at Eamon with a new kind of respect and admiration. Eamon found himself extremely uncomfortable due to this gaze, because of the fact that he once was a girl and he knew what that stare meant, but there was also the puzzling emotion of pride coming from inside himself. Ugh, how disgusting. The four then started to walk together due to Nicole’s demands and tried to bypass all the illusions cast.

TBC

[Jhessail]

“So Remel, have you lived here long? We’ve only just arrived here.”

“Oh not very long. Only two years really, but I’ve mostly kept to my master’s house and haven’t really wandered out around here, because it’s always so difficult to find my way.”

“I hear what you’re saying.” Nicole replied, nodding in full agreement and the boys just kept to themselves, seeing that the girls were getting along fairly well without the need to interfere with any method of talking.

“People should really make a map for this place.” Eamon grunted though finally, as they had spent over an hour wandering around the whole area.

“You only say that because that’s all your good at, reading maps.” Remel blinked at this harsh worded criticism from the girl that had just been talking to her very friendly like, and tilted her head ever so slightly.

“You’re only good at reading maps and sea charts? But…wouldn’t he also have to be good at capturing fish and stuff like that?”

“He was directly born into the Row family!” Nicole quickly covered up her mistake and Caleb found it fairly musing that the dark-haired girl was so bad at covering up her tracks really. Normally she could be quite clever when the situation called for it, but this town seemed peaceful so Nicole probably didn’t really have her guard up. Caleb rolled his eyes again as he fell through a wall that was put up as a direct illusion. The small-formed group followed after him.

“Ah! We found it!” Remel happily cheered, running towards the store. Caleb looked back at Nicole to make it was entirely safe, but the girl went right after chasing Remel with a look of silly happiness upon her face.

“Women.” Caleb found himself saying, not quite sure what else to say that would put his annoyance into words.

“Uh-huh…” Eamon replied back, shaking his head slightly, but understood why the two girls were cheerful, unlike his other male companion. The boys found the girls inside the store, Remel looking at ingredients for a nice tasting pie for her master and Nicole was searching the place for weapons.

Eamon found himself being dragged off by Remel, who wanted a ‘professional-looking’ someone to help her pick the ingredients to her pie. Caleb went off to help Nicole find the weapons.

“So are you very good on the boat?” Remel asked, her heart practically flying out of her mouth with the terms of endearment for the blonde boy. Eamon stared dully at the fruits lying for display with displeasure, definitely not as good as within his walls back at home.

“Hm? Oh yes, I’m fairly decent at navigating and reading our way through the sea.” Leave it to a prince to be able to lie easily without even giving a flutter of the eyebrows. Remel seemed impressed by this by the look of awe upon her face.

“Wow, I would love to be at sea…it’s always been my dream.” Ah, that would explain the immediate ‘crush’, Eamon thought to himself, frowning ever so slightly. Perhaps if he tried to avoid the subject,

“What about you, what are you an apprentice for?” Remel seemed ecstatic because of this change of subject, and Eamon knew why. Women LOVED to talk about themselves, no matter how low their self-esteem may be, they loved to prove that yes indeed, I am here and awesome, here me cry out!

“I’m training to be a healer!” Eamon twitched ever so slightly, and couldn’t help but question,

“Your master isn’t the head of the Temple of Rikshaeta, is he?” Remel blinked in slight shock and she nodded to this extremely. Eamon felt himself grow somewhat very irritable, the next time he saw that old man…

“Why, what do you know of master?”

“Nothing, nothing.” Eamon just waved her off, picking up some strawberries to hand to her, rather glad at the moment for his training in speaking from the castle. Remel accepted the strawberries and Eamon continued on, “Are you decent?” Remel gave a gleaming grin,

“I would like to say I am.”

“Really, are you performing the white arts?” Remel then frowned; a sore face emerged completely.

“Only a few minor spells, nothing to completely accept me as a healer yet.” Eamon simply nodded, not really paying attention but held his face as though he was. Eamon then jumped a little when Nicole threw a knife in his direction.

“Let me see how you’d handle it.” Eamon rose one eyebrow but kept wisely shut (though inwardly trying very hard to beat Nicole up with his lack of mind powers) and held it up for the girl to see. Nicole shook her head in a disappointed motion and took it away, walking back to Caleb telling the boy that the other had no fighting instinct whatsoever, even with a magic dagger. Remel blinked slightly, though stopped paying attention and looked for flour and more ingredients for her pie. Eamon, glad that the girl didn’t want to talk to him anymore, walked over to the group he had hired.

“So you think this necromancer thing is serious?”

“All necromancers are serious, because they’re really rare and…well…evil.” Caleb stared abruptly at Nicole’s light wording and shook his head, rolling his eyes at her eloquence.

“But it shouldn’t be too serious if we don’t do anything to show ourselves against any bad magic.”

“Right,” Nicole nodded wisely at Caleb, who just rolled his eyes because of the girl’s odd agreement.

“But didn’t we show ourselves when we killed that hag?” Caleb gave Eamon a glare, telling the boy that he was talking like a girl again, but the boy easily ignored it.

“Well yeah, but we didn’t leave anything that would signify it was us.” Nicole replied back, handling Eamon a rod, only to take it back seeing as Eamon didn’t handle it very well.

“But what about that one girl…Amelia, won’t her poison condition show that she’s been infected with the necromancer’s magic?”

“Well you tell me, was that the witch’s own protective barrier, or the bad magic of a necromancer, after all, you seem knowledgeable in magic.” Caleb gave Nicole a strange look and the girl hit him on the shoulder, giving a skeptic ‘what’ look back.

“Hm…I believe it was the witch’s herself, but I’m not sure, I’ve never even heard of necromancers until apparently we were attacked by one of the lackeys.” Nicole gave a stubborn sigh and looked back at the weapons.

“Then it could be a problem now.”

“Wonderful, you guys are beautiful bodyguards.” Eamon yelped as Nicole banged a quarterstaff on top of his head, giving a mean face,

“Your sarcasm will not help in this situation; now let’s see how you handle this.” Eamon gave a groan and took it from her hands, and was satisfied as Nicole decided not to steal it back.

“A staff guy, huh?”

“Well, he does look he handles a staff very well.” Eamon glared at the both of them, seeing as they enjoyed their private joke.

“Well the jokes on you, I am a girl you know.”

“You certainly are.” Nicole said with a straight face, looking behind Eamon. Eamon blanked out for a second then looked behind his back and twitched ever so slightly.

The poor, innocent Remel stared widely at Eamon, looking up and down as though trying to comprehend how someone who was supposed to be a girl was supposed to look so boyish…Though Caleb would argue that Eamon was definitely girly looking for a boy. There were only a couple moments of silence before Remel decided to take a few steps back,

“Oye, Remel, it’s okay, we were joking. Row’s been on boats way to often he’s got land sickness. Makes him say crazy stuff sometimes.” Caleb simply said, marching up to the confused girl and placing his hand on her shoulder, making a crazy motion over to Eamon. “Okay?”

“Oh…Okay…” Remel blinked simply, as though it actually made sense. Eamon was shocked that Caleb’s obvious lie worked, apparently peasants were very trusting.

[Jhessail]

“Have you got all you need?” Nicole jumped in, immediately changing the subject, leaving the boys alone to talk to the now very hesitant Remel.

“Women.”

“Tell me about it.” Eamon replied by instinct, as Caleb looked across the weapons and Eamon found himself hitting his forehead, surprised by his new boyish instinct. Ugh, this really was WAY too strange.

Eamon, in a very bored motion, watched as Caleb surveyed carefully a bunch of weapons that Eamon saw no point to it. Nicole had a lot of knives and daggers on her body, why couldn’t they just use those? Then again, they were not the best, and the prince never settled for anything that was less then best.

“Hm…’Lia, will like this.” Caleb said rather randomly and Eamon scoffed, but curiosity overcame him and he looked over to what Caleb was examining. It was a long sword with a strange kind of balance around it; a jewel was at the end of its hilt.

“And why would she like that cruddy thing?” Caleb gave a short glare, that once again Eamon was apparently talking like a girl again,

“She doesn’t show it, but she likes to duel.” Caleb gave just a short nod to himself, confusing the blonde companion as he pocketed the sword around his waist to buy it off later. Nicole came to them eventually with a frustrated looking Remel and they paid for their new purchases and Eamon found himself with a new staff.

It was basically like a big tree branch, in his mind, how useless. Eamon desperately wished he could cast spells again, but it was very odd how they could not work unless he had the catalyst. Eamon would have to think about it some other time though, as Remel was pushed into him, making the two of them run into the ground.

“HEY! WHADDYA THINK YOU’RE DOING, EH!?” Nicole shrieked angrily at some big, obviously drunk, barbarian of a man. The man groaned at Nicole’s loud voice and gave her an ugly look, right before smacking her away into another wall. Nicole grunted as she landed on the ground, snapping her neck to make a loud cracking sound and she stood back up as Caleb took out the long sword they had purchased not too long ago.

Eamon helped Remel back up and stared as the huge overlooming man roared and started to charge towards Nicole, looking enraged. Nicole naturally flipped but yelped loudly as the man grabbed around her waist and threw her against the wall again.

“Old man, let go of my friend or I will have to kill you.” Eamon felt his breath suddenly caught up in his throat as Caleb held the sharp blade against the man’s neck. Even drunk, the man could tell that his life was in danger.

So said drunk growled, threw Nicole away to the ground and walked off, thumping the ground incredibly loud for everyone to hear that the group of four were not ones to mess with. Caleb sheathed the sword and helped the injured Nicole who held her ribs.

“Thanks Caleb.”

“You need to work on your guard, I suppose.”

“Shut up.” Nicole chuckled, hitting the boy on the shoulder but groaned as that seemed to make her ribs to rub together.

“Are you okay, Ms. Shinobi?”

“Ah, well I’ve had better days.” Remel frowned slightly and Nicole didn’t stop her as she lifted up her silk shirt and Eamon found himself drooling as Remel checked the slowly bruising area.

“Ow, wow, he held you really hard, just a second; I think I can mend that.”

“Really? That’s awesome!” Nicole replied quite happily, ignoring the drooling Eamon (who did not note the evil protective fist that was coming from behind his back). Remel just nodded, a slight blush coming to her face as she clapped her hands in prayer, ignoring completely as Eamon yowled in pain as Caleb forced him in a headlock and muttered quietly,

“Grant me my power my lord, cure these wounds that are apparent.” Remel placed her hands upon Nicole’s wounds and Nicole sighed as the pain slowly ebbed away from Remel’s power. Nicole gave the redhead a grin,

“Good job.” Remel blushed again happily at this then Nicole turned to the two boys, “Stop messing around, we got to get to the temple, and who knows how long THAT will take us.” Caleb nodded at this and stopped giving a noogie to the blonde prince, who gave him a nasty glare in reply.

TBC

[Jhessail]

So the group wondered around, boys remained silent as Nicole told Remel great fake tales of the life on sea and how adventurous it could be at times. Eamon had to admit the girl had a skill to weave tales even better then the royal court jester.

“We’re here.”

“Oh thank God.” Eamon whispered underneath his breath only to get hit in the ribs by Nicole for being rude. Eamon found that he was getting used to these constant jabs to his side, somehow it really didn’t seem bad when Nicole was the one doing it. UGH, ewwww. Eamon hit himself once, earning a strange look from Caleb, but he ignored it, as they all walked into the temple together. While Remel disappeared from their sight, Caleb went into the room where Amelia was resting while Nicole dragged Eamon back outside.

“Okay, since we’ve got a day to waste, you and I are going to practice your skills with the staff, because sometimes we’ll be too busy to protect ourselves to worry about your sorry hide.”

“Of which was already demonstrated.”

“Shut up, smart ass.” Nicole hissed, taking his staff quite easily from his grasp and hitting him harshly on the head with it. “Now do you handle this with one or two hands?”

“One of course.” BAM, Nicole hit him on the top of his head, looking disgusted to a point,

“They don’t teach you much in the palace, do they?”

“Quit hitting me and I’ll show you what they’ve shown me.” Nicole wagged her finger at the temperamental prince, frowning deeply.

“Now, now, you should treat your weapon elder with more respect, now you use TWO, count them, TWO” she waggled her hands around the staff, moving the staff around to emphasize, “hands to balance the power of this kind of staff. It’s a blunt instrument most of the time so it’s really good for knocking people out, but it isn’t good for much else. Maybe a concussion or so, wow, sounds like you.” Nicole carelessly commented, giving a smirk to the bored looking boy.

“Great, fine, whatever. So what are you going to teach me about the staff, oh great weapon elder.” Eamon knew better then try to cross the girl’s temper, after all, there was a quote somewhere about the scorn of a women being worse then hell’s fire. Nicole simply nodded, her dark hair bowing down with her head, being caught in the light.

“Alright, I’ll teach you the vital areas to do an easy knock-out. I mean there isn’t much you need to learn about it, it’s basically an overgrown stick.” Just like the branch, how annoying.
Eamon really wanted his magic back. So after a, oh so, pleasant match and a forced memorization of one’s personal vital spots (also some sort of skill called shiatsu, not that Eamon could make heads or tails of it), the two went back into the temple and flinched as a pie flew over their heads to hit the ground over them.

“AH! NO!” Shrieked Remel, tears coming from her eyes as she was covered with flours and she ran in between the two, looking at the dead pie. “I worked so hard on it too,” Remel moaned over the new found death of the pie. Eamonsnickered underneath his breath, luckily Nicole didn’t catch it and she started to comfort the poor apprentice. Eamon just simply scoffed and walked off, ignoring the mourning Remel and comforting Nicole.

“This is strange.” Eamon suddenly spoke to himself as he wandered around the temple; the halls had just suddenly gone dark on him. There was only the taunting small life of light in the lanterns that hung above, the sickly green light made Eamon unsure of his footing as he crawled against the wall as it was his only reassurance. It really was creepy, only silence lingered in the air and a pungent smell of…well Eamon didn’t know what it was, it was just something very suspicious and ugly to the nose.

Then he heard other voices, he was sure that he recognized one of the voices, in fact, he was sure that it was the voice of the head priest that was supposed to be busy curing one of his bodyguards. Eamon tried to silence his breathing (which was no problem as he was taught growing up to not be heard breathing, as it was just a common thing) and continued against the walls, trying to blend into the shadows of the area.

“Is that so?” Eamon stopped completely, letting himself slide into the ground to prevent any anonymous peeking in his direction and listened carefully. This place was creepy, but even Eamon knew that there was something afoot here.

“Yes sahr, it seems that someone has defeated the Witch of Foot Hills that the young necromancer had resurrected not but a moon ago.” A foreign accent? That was very odd, Eamon noted to himself, but leaned in the direction of the voices, waiting for more of the conversation. Perhaps it was good that this place was so dark.

“That is very strange; I heard only other magic users should have been able to defeat her.”

“I do not know how sahr, oh may I recommend the necromancer’s charm? He says that he cast a spell of command upon it.”

“Did he now?” The priest spoke and Eamon could swear he could hear some shuffling carpet, which was very strange in itself because the floor was completely stone, “But that is very odd, are you sure you don’t know anything more about it?” The priest tried to get more information about the killing of the witch.

“I may.” The foreign man replied back with the hint that he wanted to be paid for his services, of which the priest tsked and simply gave the man a few coins. “I believe that it was actually a couple of travelers.” There was a moment of silence to contemplate the new news.

“Really now?”

“I believe so sahr.”

“How much is the necromancer offering to get these travelers?”

“Oh, do you believe you have some information, sahr?”

“Even better, I think I do have all of them. One of them’s down right now because of a deadly poison spell.” There was a mild point of a shuffling but Eamon scuttled to tell the news of the priest and a seemingly deadly deal with a foreign man and the necromancer. By the time Eamon got to his bodyguards, he found that Caleb was by Amelia’s bedside, sleeping and the Nicole had disappeared with Remel.

“Caleb! Wake up! Wake up now!” Urgently pulling and pushing against the boy to wake him up, Caleb only emerged from his deep slumber to punch Eamon in the gut.

“What now you annoying hermaphrodite?” Apparently Caleb did not take well with waking up unless it was Nicole pushing and prodding him. It took a few moments but Eamon gathered his breath in pain and tried to get back to telling the complete news that he had just learned. As he told the story to Caleb the boy paled in anger. “Son of a…figures that this temple would be corrupt.”

“You’re saying like it’s a common thing!” Eamon panted, and Caleb just shrugged his hysterics away, while folding Amelia up in blankets.

“It is, people are greedy, so guess what, even priests or monks of the worldly religion will give themselves up to the devil just for a little pleasure.” Eamon’s face twisted up in slight confusion and anger as Caleb rolled his eyes at him. “You wouldn’t know because you’re so filthy rich and ROYAL.” Caleb grunted, as Amelia’s body did not cooperate into being bundled up in hot and sweaty sheets.

“What are we going to do?”

“I’m going to get Amelia ready, you get Nicole and we’re going to bolt.”

“That doesn’t sound like the right thing to do.”

“Well what do you suggest? We’re in a place of illusions and our only eyesight is unconscious, it’s not like we can fight a priest, they take forever to take down even if you have them surrounded.” Eamon frowned as Caleb finally got Amelia in his arms completely and Caleb gave him a stare to go on.

TBC