I really shouldn't be putting up another story, but here it is.
Artemis does not own Shugo Chara!
"You will meet the love of your life soon after experiencing a life-altering event." I stated to the man as my amber colored eyes cleared, leaving me a bit dizzy, ad let go of his hand.
"Oh, Lady Amu, can you tell me more? I must know!" The mans pleading gaze irritated me. I sighed. People were just never happy with what they are told.
I grasped his hand once more. His whole life flashed before my eyes, none of it too pleasant, but I blocked it out. "You must close your eyes now, seeing the same persons future twice in a row requires much concentration." He closed his eyes obediently. Instead of looking forward as I had before, I deftly snaked my hands into his back pocket and took his wallet. It's not something I'm proud of, but whatever puts food on the table.
"I see... A happy family. A loving wife, and two beautiful, German children. You will live happily for the rest of your life." I made up on the spot. Hopefully he'd be satisfied with this. Oh, how I wish he would just pay me and leave!
"Thank you, so very much, Lady Amu! Here is your payment." He fumbled around in his pockets for a moment before looking up, stricken. "I-I'm sorry, but it appears I have lost my wallet!" I giggled internally but managed to keep a straight face.
"Do you have anything else of value upon your person?" He groped around his pocket once more and brought out a golden pocket watch.
"T-this was my grandmothers, but I suppose it's the least I can offer to the great Lady Amu..." I hastily snatched it out of his hands and put it in my pouch I strapped to my belt around my waist.
As he left the purple candle-lit tent I became restless. Almost time to pack up for the night anyway, I might as well leave now. I hitched up my purple skirts, making sure my white blouse was still tucked into it and my purple silk swatch, and adjusted my black bandanna on my head. I walked out of the tent, my golden anklet clanking the whole way.
As I made my way through our circus, I discovered most of us had the same idea of closing up our acts early, as there was a fire already started in the clearing north of us.
"Amu-tan!"
"Yo, Amu!"
I looked back as my friends Yaya and Kukai came running towards me, grinning. I smiled a bit myself as I stopped walking and waited for them to catch up to me.
As they slowed to a stop near me, I asked them "Are you guys done with your acts?" They shared a secret smile and grinned. Their acts were as clowns, you see, but they also love playing pranks on the audience and getting them involved as well. They could put anybody in a good mood. But the real star of their clown act was Rima. Speaking of her, "Where's Rima?"
At my question, Kukai burst out into a hysterical fit of laughter, and Yaya had to explain.
"See, Amu-tan, we tried to get one of the audience members to try the bala-balance and you know how she gets about that when anyone does it less than perfect."
I giggled a bit as well as the mental image if Rima yelling at a man for doing it wrong and bringing him close to tears with her passion about it.
Once our giggles had ceased, I started walking to the bonfire. I looked back. "You guys coming, or what?"
The both nodded and we all walked, happily chattering away, till we reached our destination.
"Gypsy. You will be dancing tonight, I presume?" Our manager Kairi questioned me. Pff what a stiff.
"No, Kairi-San I'm not going to dance on the night we break camp. And it's Roma." I replied sarcastically, strutting past him with a shake of my head, knocking my one golden hoop against my face.
"What!?" His face sent me into a fit of giggles. Kairi never understood sarcasm, and probably never would.
I turned around and stuck my tongue out and winked at him. "Just kidding!" I threw his wallet back at him, that I had nabbed as I walked past him. "Be more careful, you never know who might be around here!"
Kukai and Yaya both laughed at Kairi's shocked expression.
Kukai clapped him on the back. "Gotta watch out for little Amu here. Only 13 but the best gypsy in the whole nation of Germany!"
"I prefer Roma, Kukai, you know that." I say seriously.
"Yeah, yeah, gypsy, Roma, nomad, whatever. All the same thing!" His easy grin never left his face and pretty soon we were all laughing.
As the night settled, each member of the troupe started playing music on various instruments. Kukai on harmonica, Yaya on piccolo, Kairi on fiddle, and Tadase on the dulcimer, and so on.
As the music synchronised with the roar of the fire, I willed my feet to move to the music. As the music got more fast paced, my feet became frantic as I danced in complicated twists and turns around the fire, and then as the music died and rose again, my feet and rythym with it.
After a few moments, the younger members of the troupe came and danced in clumsy steps and awkward circles with me, never as beautiful as I, some say thought I deny it, but with a certain child-like grace that just adds to the magic of the night.
All of a sudden I stop dancing all together as I spot an on-looker in the woods. I think he's acknowledged I've seen him, as he turns to run. I slip on my silk fingerless gloves and run after him. The music, I noted had stopped.
"Wait!" I chase after him, when all of a sudden he stops and I crash into his back. I look up from my position on the ground and notice his pale face, and midnight blue eyes that seem to captivate me. His equally blue hair shields part of his face, framing it and adding to his feline-like beauty. I stare gaping until I come to my senses and give him a sly smirk. "Want to dance with me?" He raises an eyebrow and before he can object I grab his hand, noting thankfully that they're gloved as well, and drag him back to the fire.
I wave my hands around, signalling for the music to pick up it's pace again and grab the strangers hands andn begin to try to lead him into some complicated moves. He doesn't keep up very well, and I can hardly tell if he's having fun or not, but I assume he is, as he hasn't tried to run off yet.
I let out a laugh of exhilaration as the music climbs to an almost desperate tempo and suddenly stops in a dramatic final note, and me along with it. My hair in my face and probably a mess, and my skirts still swished about my body, I turn to the man I had brought and smirk, noticing he's standing there as if in awe.
"What are you staring at? Ain't you ever seen a girl dance before?"
"No, it's not that. By any chance are you a gypsy?" He has wiped his look of awe off his face and is now wearing a stoic mask.
I glare at him and toss his wallet back at him. "No, I'm a Roma. Get it straight bub." He merely looks annoyed with me as he catches his wallet.
"Whatever. I need a place to stay tonight and though this is the last place I'd want to stay, what with Roma" He stressed the word out to her displeasure "hanging around here like flies."
My glare deepened as I began to regret bringing him to dance with me. "Well, if you hadn't noticed, I'm the only actual Roma here. Everyone else is merely performers."
He merely stuck his tongue out. Ooh the nerve of this guy!
"Well fine, I can let you have my tent I guess. I'll sleep outside." I lead him away, but not before noticing everyone at the fire staring at us. I blushed crimson as I noticed Tadase staring at me, like he usually does whenever I'm done dancing.
"Here there's where you'll be sleeping tonight." I cleared off my bed that I usually never slept on of all my books and mediocre trinkets and herbs, dumping them all on the floor.
"Don't you ever clean in here?" He held his nose up in a snooty gesture.
"We just unpacked today! I kind of just dump everything in one corner of the room. What's your name by the way?"
"Tsukiyomi, Ikuto. And, it should still be cleaner than this." He began to pick up little things around the room. "I don't believe I've caught your name either."
"It's Amu. Just Amu."
"No last name?" He continued picking through my stuff. There goes my voodoo dolls... my herbs... my books... my pictures... Wait!
"Hey! Stop!" I hadn't noticed he'd taken his gloves off and as I turned to snatch my photo albums out of his hands and my hand was pressed firmly to his for a moment.
The images I got from his mind were terrifying.
People shot, in ditches.
Babies tossed into a fire.
Jews and Roma alike... enslaved...
And then with one more wide-eyed look at the man, I slipped into a black oblivion.