I was on my laptop, listening to the new theme song for Naruto, pointedly ignoring my best friend who was sitting across from me on the lime green sofa. She's usually so level-headed, thinking things through and getting mad at me when I don't, which is exactly why I want to punch her in the face. "I just don't get why you're mad at me," Alex sighed loudly, throwing her head back against the multi-colored pillow my grandmother made me.

I snapped my head up as the newest episode of Naruto began to play, narrowing my eyes. I was about to cuss out the hypocrite but before the first swear word even left my mouth, the front door swung open, drawing both pairs of eyes to it. My older brother, Adam, walked in accompanied by a strange boy. He was pale—almost blue—with a strange hairstyle—devil horns?—and he had a cat wrapped securely in his arms as he looked around his new surroundings.

I shot to my feet, stalking over to my brother—laptop securely closed and tucked under my arm. "She's an idiot," I told him, pointing at Alex who rolled her eyes. "Your girlfriend is an idiot!"

` Adam sighed, eyes moving from me to her and back again. "What'd she do?" he asked, sounding like it pained him to be dragged into another one of our fights.

"She…she-" I couldn't even say it, it was so infuriatingly stupid! I groaned loudly, stomping over to the sofa. Grabbing Alex's arm, I shoved up the sleeve of her sweater, revealing her biceps that were, up until this morning, perfectly porcelain. Now they were marred with a multitude of colors that merged to form a full picture.

"So, she got a tattoo," Adam said casually, not able to see it in detail from across the room. "Don't you have, like, twenty of them?"

"I have two," I corrected him, dragging her over to him. "Anyway, that's not why I'm mad; look closer!"

He leaned closer, taking in the ink on her arm and his eyes went wide. "What the hell?" he exclaimed.

"It's One Direction, see?" Alex explained. "I thought you guys loved them!"

Adam cleared his throat. "Not gay," he stated jokingly.

"I didn't mean like that," Alex rolled her eyes. "Dyl, you love them, so why are you mad?"

"One, I don't love them. Two, this is stupid because you'll regret getting this in a year at most, but since the damage is already done, I'll contend myself with saying the following: what kind of stupid? And you should have talked about this with someone. We could have talked you out of it and gotten you a cooler one that you won't hate in twelve months."

"Fair enough. I like it anyway…"

I rolled my eyes, flicking her on the nose. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw the stranger who came in with my brother walk around the front entrance, regarding the painting hanging on the wall with boredom. He lifted a finger, reaching out to one of the portraits. "If you touch that, I'll cut off your fingers and feed them to your cat," I warned him. He snapped his head toward me, sending me a glare that would have made anyone shiver. Anyone except me, of course. "I'm just warning you…Adam!"

"What?" he replied, walking back into the room with an energy bar.

"How'd that…thing-a-majig go?"

"What thing-a-majig?" He said through a mouthful of granola and fruits.

"You know, when you left this morning, you were all like 'oh, I have to go to Nairobi to see if I qualify for…' blah blah blah…"

"To see if I could become a Lord of Chaos?" he finished for me. I nodded. "Well, I left for that over a month ago, and I already told you that I'm a Lord of Chaos."

I blinked a couple of times. "Oh, I wonder why I don't remember that…"

"Maybe because you never remember anything anyone says to you?" Alex offered, jabbing her elbow in my side jokingly.

"Yeah, yeah," I shooed her away before the stranger caught my attention. "Hey, Adam, who's your friend?"

Adam looked over at the tall, lanky boy with a look of distaste. The boy laughed somewhat evilly, turning to face us. "Friend? We are work partners, and nothing more!"

"Well, then," I rolled my eyes again. "Adam, who's your 'work partner'?"

Adam opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off, once again, by the boy. "I can introduce myself, thank you-"

"You're welcome," I replied. He sent a glare at me (which I returned, thank you very much) before continuing.

"I am Klarion the Witch Boy. Lord of Chaos. Ally to The Light, and sworn enemy to all things justice, peace, and serenity-"

"Jashin, I just asked for your name," I groaned. "So there are multiple Lords of Chaos?"

They nodded. "Why are you partnered together?" I asked, looking from one to the other. "You obviously don't like each other very much."

"We were given a mission," Adam replied simply.

"What kind of mission?" I prompted.

"Our superiors," Klarion said with distaste (Adam also stuck out his tongue at the words). "Have decided that I am too 'off the wall' and I'm 'spoiled' and 'throw a tantrum whenever I don't get what I want'." He pouted, crossing his arms tighter over his chest, making his cat yowl in protest. "They think I can't control my power, so they decided to have Adam and I find a Goddess of Serenity."

"That's actually a thing?" I snorted. Adam shot me a warning look. "So then why'd you come here? There are surely no Goddesses of Serenity here-" I broke off, catching a shared look between my brother and Klarion. "Abigail?" I asked, my eyes widening. He shook his head no. "Abigail is the only one that's serene here; although I'm convinced it's a false front. No one is that perfect!"

"It's not just being serene," Adam interjected, knowing I could rant on and on about my goody-goody, know-it-all twin sister. "It's being reasonable and stubborn as well as calm. You have to be forceful but at the same time gentle-"

"I'm getting a Mulan feeling right now," I interrupted, Alex nodding in agreement.

"If you two start singing, I'll kick you," he threatened. "Look, I'm just trying to say that Goddesses of Serenity aren't always as they seem-"

"And how is that, Worm feed?" Klarion asked with a bored look on his face.

"Don't call me that!" Adam snapped, angry energy crackling in the air around him before he controlled himself. "It's just that, usually in life the Goddesses of Serenity tend to be a little chaotic, if you know what I mean-"

"No, we don't," Alex and I said in unison.

Adam sighed, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "They're more chaotic than you would expect. Usually they're off-the-wall hyper and don't let anyone tell them what to do-"

"Then why are they called Goddesses of Serenity?" Alex asked, crinkling her nose. "Seems like a misnomer, if you ask me."

"I agree, and good use of a vocab word."

"Thank you-"

"Because when they do focus—especially when they meditate—they are so calm and forceful that anyone and everyone will have to do as they say," Adam said. "It's an enormous power. Some people think that the Goddesses of Serenity are more powerful than the Lords of Chaos-"

"And others," Klarion interjected with his sharp, high-pitched voice. "Still believe that men will always be superior to girls no matter how 'serene' they are-"

"Well, then it's a good thing that you're not a man yet," I snapped and turned around to face my brother. "So then why'd you come here?"

"Because those higher than us," Klarion said, stepping in between the two of us. "Have tracked them all around the world and the one that was closest was here. Now, which one of you is it?" he demanded, looking from Alex to me.

"Well," I glared at the witch-boy. "We have many sisters, actually, so there are many possibilities as to who it could be."

Klarion glared at me as he brought up his hand, a flame forming over his palm. "I'm in the right mind to end you and your annoying attitude, brat," he spat at me.

"Why don't you try it, Little Boy Blue?" I growled, narrowing my eyes.

With a yell of fury, he threw the ball of fire at me. Raising my hand to protect my face, I dissipated the flame. I smirked and looked at him. He looked furious. "You tried to kill me," I shouted as my brother screamed, "You tried to kill my sister!"

"She deserved it," Klarion insisted. "She dared to insult a Lord of Chaos-"

"If you're such a big, bad Lord of Chaos," I instigated. "Then why do I have yet to see some chaos?"

He yelled. "I'll show you chaos!" I laughed and dodged out of the way as he threw random household products at me. None of them hit me (and Adam said it would be useless to take that How to Be a Ninja course!).

Klarion's cat jumped out of his arms and made its way over to me, rubbing against my leg when it got there. "Teekl," Klarion growled. "Get away from the disgusting mortal girl."

The cat looked at him indignantly, and then meowed somewhat sassily. "What is wrong with you, Teekl," Klarion said as he made his way to me and scooped up the cat. "You've never acted like this before."

As Klarion stood up with the cat—Teekl? Was it?—in his arms, he glared at me. "What did you do to Teekl?" he demanded to know.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I replied stubbornly, crossing my arms over my chest and turning my head away from him. In actuality, I thought it was kind of bizarre seeing as most felines I've come in contact with hated me.

"You Lying. Insolent. Mortal!" he screamed. "What have you done to my familiar?!"

I turned back to him, my brow furrowed. "What's a familiar?"

"Don't play dumb," he said before losing interest and changing the subject. "Show me to my room."

I gave him a who-the-hell-do-you-think-you-are-trying-to-tell-me-what-to-do look, and turned to Adam. "What's he talking about?"

"Oh," Adam scratched the back of his head nervously. "My—our—bosses told us that we had to stay here until we found Klarion a calming mentor or whatever. Until we find the Goddess."

"So we're stuck with this brat?" I whined, making no effort to try to hide my annoyance.

"Who're you calling a brat?" Klarion piped up. "Teekl, get her." The cat looked at Klarion, and shook her head. "No? Teekl, what's wrong with you?" Teekl meowed. "She what?" Teekl meowed again. "Teekl, I can't understand you. Why are your words so…blurred together?"

The cat rolled her eyes as if to say "I told you so." Again the cat jumped away from Klarion and came to me, but instead of rubbing against my feet, she swatted me gently with her paw, and then walked back to Klarion.

Klarion gratefully took her back into his arms. "Come on," I groaned. I led him upstairs and to a door that read "Dylan's Room/Do Not Enter/Learn How to Knock/I'm Naked" in big, purple letters. There were pictures of me and my friends and the rest of the door was covered in the notes from my friends.

"This'll be your room…for now," I said. "Don't get used to it."

"But it has your name on it," Klarion objected, contorting his face in disgust. "I refuse to share a room with a worthless mortal-"

"Don't make that face," I snapped, flicking him in the nose. "If the wind blows wrong, it'll stay like that forever. Anyway, we will not be sharing a room. This is my extra bedroom."

He seemed to stop and think. "Well, I guess that makes more sense."

"Yeah, it does," I replied. "Dinner's at six, most of the time…sometimes…rarely…yeah. Someone will come up and tell you."

I start to walk away when he cleared his throat. "What time will we start our search?" Klarion demanded to know.

I spun around. "We? Our? Never! You and Adam are searching. Not you and me. So-"

"Am I supposed to go to school?" he interrupted, changing the subject again.

"I don't know-"

"When do I have to go to bed?"

"Eight," I replied.

"Eight?!"

"Yes. That's what I said."

"No! That's not fair," he yelled. "I don't want to go to bed at eight!"

I sighed. "Fine. Then you'll go to bed at six."

"What? No fair!"

"Then you go to bed at eight!"

"Fine!"

"Come down for dinner later," I muttered before turning on my heel and walking down the hall.