Chapter Two: Drifting Memories

Author's Note: This was written the following morning to 'A Nonchalant Morning' so I hope I've typed it all up correctly. Also, future apologies for if I switch between first and third person a lot, tends to happen to me. . Anyhoo, enjoy!

I gradually came too, sitting up slowly whilst rubbing my eye with my wrist and following through to my fingers. I yawned and slipped back on the same loose clothes from the other night. I still hadn't forgotten about the girl and her 'magic' as she so termed it and her irritable prank which as she'd also termed it, terrified me. I sat back on the bed for a second, remembering how she looked in the dim light of the room, I didn't really talk to any of the local girls so maybe this would be good practice just to get to know her anyway.

I sighed and gently punched myself on the cheek, what was I thinking? This girl had awoken me in the middle of the night and shocked me for no real reason! There must have been something wrong in me for me to even consider liking her at all.

There was a knock at the door and I jumped a bit, still fresh from last night's incident. Then I calmed down when I heard father's voice at the door proclaiming that breakfast was ready. My father was a kind man, strong and built like a tree as so many of these heroes are said to be. But my father really was built well, he was a local merchant himself, albeit on a slightly larger scale than Francisca's father. I mentally kicked myself, Why am I thinking about her so much? There's really got to be something wrong with me. I shook my head in irritation and resigned myself to breakfast.

Upon reaching the table I realised that our guests were also eating with us, "Oh..." I started, "I didn't know you were still here." I said quietly to Francisca, pulling up a chair between her and one of my brothers. "Yeah we're going to be around for a few days, my father's got to talk to a few of the local people about setting up a branch over here." "Oh I see." I replied, not really caring. "Would you mind showing me around the town?" She asked suddenly. I was surprised a little at first and choked a little on a small bit of bacon out of shock, then I coughed a couple of times, trying my best to look as if I hadn't just inhaled part of breakfast. "Sure thing. We'll head out after breakfast okay?" I said, trying to make it look as though I had some grip on the situation. "Great." She smiled sweetly. This caused a chain reaction as it had when most girls smiled sweetly to me and I begun blushing crazily. I turned away from her, realising my face was turning bright red.

We set out right after breakfast, and when I say right after, I mean right before lunch. We got out to town late unfortunately because my mother had to give me a long warning about public safely and local crime and who to look out for etcetera etcetera. In any case, that late morning was cold, frosty. Even though it was almost the middle of the day, no one seemed to be about because of the chill. "It sure is busy today." I joked, she laughed lightly, "Maybe we're just here really early?" I continued, she laughed lightly again. "Alright, you should stop giving people in your town the 'Cold shoulder'." She retorted, quickly followed by a giggle. I didn't get it.

We stopped by the bridge that connected the two parts of town together, in the distance you could see a large mansion. "That's the princely estate." I pointed out, "Descendants of a branch of the Royal Family live there. But we seldom see them around town. Word is that their children fight all the time." I was right, I could even make out a broken window on one of the upper floors of the castle-like mansion. It was quite apparent that whoever these two were, when they got into a fist fight it turned serious pretty quickly, and often. I was glad I wasn't like that with my siblings, my parents would skin me alive if I broke a window.

"That's meant to be where my father's going for his business deal." I coughed again, feeling the bacon in the back of my throat even though it'd long descended. "He's going to that violent place?" I spluttered, then restabilising myself and clearing my throat, I calmed myself, "I hope he's prepared for the children there, if they can do that to a house then I don't want to imagine what they do to each other or other people." She giggled again, "My father's strong, he might not look it but he's been through much worse situations than this." "Oh?" I questioned, not really sure what she could mean. "Well..."

"He's a super secret spy in reality, dutyful and determined to save the world from the evil mafia across the country!" She enthusiastically explained with matching hand gestures and a finishing pose. I stared blankly at her again, "I don't get it." "Well if I told you'd I'd have to kill you." She said sweetly, ending with a wink. I blinked lazily, remembering the line from a Bond movie I'd seen a few months ago. "Right, whatever."

We had walked a bit further, and whilst walking I worked up the courage to ask her again how she had slipped past me the other night. "It definitely wasn't magic." I started snidely, "Oh but it was." She retorted in a sort of singsong note. "Close your eyes and I'll show you." We stopped for a second and I stared at her in disbelief, then closed my eyes as I'd been asked to. "Now open them." I did so, and she had vanished. I spun around trying to find her, she'd really vanished!

"Over heeere..." I heard her voice sing earily. I turned to face a nearby frozen-over fruit stall, she was sitting on the sign, I sighed in relief, my parents would also skin me alive if I had lost a guest in town. I approached her but stopped suddently, I realised something was not right, there was no way that flimsy sign could hold her weight, even if she was light, it was still a thin wooden sign that was practically balancing on the pole that held it up. I blinked and stopped, trying to reassess the situation better. "Hm, why'd you stop?" She asked, I looked up at her finally, "How is that sign holding up your weight?" I asked, suddenly she blushed in annoyance and I felt a sharp sting on my cheek as if I'd been slapped and winced in pain, "Hey! That's rude you know! You shouldn't be talking to a girl about her weight!" I looked up at her in annoyance. "No I mean that thing couldn't hold a child, how's it holding you?" She stopped and froze.

"God I messed up again!" She began fading away and reappeared in front of me, I recoiled in shock. "What the...? What happened!" I asked, my eyes wider than they'd ever been. I'd truly never seen anything like this. She sighed dejectedly, "Well you saw through it, you figured out something that was wrong with my Magic and as a result you broke it." "I... broke it...?" I questioned, not really sure what it was that I'd broken.

We sat down at the side of the road, the midday sun now reflecting on the road, the town still quieter than it'd ever been. "It's real magic." She explained, stopping for a second to question whether she should be telling me thing then continuing. "Illusion Magic. When we're moving around so much, sometimes we don't have a safe place to sleep at night, so using this illusion magic allows my family to sleep safely anywhere." "So it makes you invisible?" I asked, still not entirely sure what it was. "Not invisible really. It just changes the appearance and properties of the environment around you to make us blend in. I can also create fake versions of us should I need to." I should've been surprised, but for some reason I wasn't, maybe it hadn't settled in yet. "So did you have to learn this magic?" She nodded a little, "Yeah but it wasn't hard. Father gave me this when I was little and I've been able to do Magic ever since." She presented a ring with a flat face and the numbers '666' on it. I still didn't entirely follow.

"So could I do it?"

She looked at me, not really sure how to answer. "Yes but it takes time to develop these skills." I grinned back wryly, I knew I could master this if I tried it, "Can I try?" She looked at the ring and then back at me, finally back at the ring again, rubbing it the whole time as if comforting a child. "Okay... but not here. Follow me." She took my hand and lead me to a nearby farm, we headed into an abandoned-looking barn. "Okay, now put this on." She said, slipping off the ring and handing it to me, I could see a pale patch of skin around her finger in it's place, it was apparent that she never took it off. I slipped on the ring.

"Now you've got to have an image of what you want to see." She explained, "Close your eyes and try to imagine, say a frog in the centre of the room. She stepped back away from the centre, leaving me standing there." I tried as hard as I could, but nothing happened. "Hm? Nothing happened..." She shook her head, "It's got to be a vivid image. Not just like something out of a book, but a real, living, breathing frog. You've got to imagine all the small details too, the skin texture, the colours, the sounds that it makes. Otherwise your illusion won't take form." I tried again, failing though. We kept trying for hours, but no matter how long I tried it, I couldn't get it to work.

Some five or six hours of trying later, I squeezed my fist in frustration, "Why isn't it working?" She sighed again, "I don't know, maybe you're just terrible at this." I looked down at the floor disappointed, she'd suddenly realised what she said and took my hand, "Or maybe you just need to become the illusion yourself." I nodded and closed my eyes, realising what she meant by 'become the illusion'. I imagined myself as vividly as I could as a frog, four legs, larger back legs, smooth but slippery skin, large eyes, large mouth, spots of colour, sounds, textures, smells. Then suddenly I heard a shriek. "What, what?" I opened my eyes and looked up, above me towered Francisca. Wait, towerered?

I looked at my hands and ran them up my shoulders, she clapped her hands and laughed, "You did it! I can't believe you learned it this quickly, this took me weeks to learn after I first tried!" I looked up at her, smiling, although you couldn't really tell. "That's great." I grinned, "Now how do I change back?" As she explained it, I hadn't really changed form, just used an illusion to alter people's perception of me. And it wouldn't always work, if someone saw a flaw in my illusion like I did with hers earlier on in the day it'd shatter the illusion, even the most mundane illusions could be broken in this way. It took another couple of hours just to teach me how to dispel the illusion.

We returned home, she told me I couldn't tell anyone else about the illusions as it was her family's only way of guaranteeing a safe night's sleep when they were out of the road. If it became common knowledge then it'd only place them in danger. So I agreed. Even if I was incredibly proud of my new skill, that was the last thing I wanted to do,

It was moving on to Nine O' Clock when we got back, the sun had already set and I'd lost myself in the day. At this point I realised I was starting to develop a crush, even though at the time I was still partially in denial. "Hey, maybe we can go out tomorrow too? I didn't get to show you much of the town." I said while blushing slightly, "Definitely. Would be nice to get to know you- this town better." She corrected herself, "Would be nice to get to know you and this town better." She corrected herself again and blushed ever-so slightly.

After tea I headed off to bed, somewhat hoping I'd have a visit like last night. Unfortunately I didn't but I still looked forwards to what lay ahead.

I awoke in a similar manner to the previous morning, albeit with a slight headache this time. After breakfast I headed on out with Francisca once more. But this was there the turbulence was about to go from light to heavy.

We had stopped on the bridge again, this time the town was more awake, the morning wasn't so frosty and cold and the town was alive with hustle and bustle as per the norm. I stood there next to her, leaning on the wooden railing running along the side of the bridge as the townspeople walked on past. I think we both wanted to talk more about the illusions, or at least I did for sure, but I knew that we were unable to as it was in a crowded place and simply wasn't safe.

Suddenly her eyes widened and her face paled. She blinked and tapped me a couple of time on the shoulder, "I'll be right back." She said just as suddenly, "Okay... bathroom?" "Yeah. I'll be back in a second." I sighed sleepily and looked across the lake, there was a man down the river on another smaller bridge staring back at me. He looked from left to right, then walked across the bridge. I could just make out him talking to a short brown-haired girl. Wait a second... I thought to myself, That's Francisca! I watched curiously, her eyes were wide and her face had drained of colour, something was very wrong. I walked back across the bridge, more or less retracing her path to reach them, but by the time I'd gotten there they'd gone.

I sighed, I was a little bit worried about her at this point. Some mysterious guy shows up out of the blue and it frightens the life out of her. I wondered what I should do.

"Yo."

I suddenly jumped forwards a couple of paces and spun around, behind me sat the guy she had been talking to. He was about average height and had strawberry-blonde hair and light blue, almost silvery eyes. "So you saw our conversation hey?" I blinked, "There's no need to be alarmed. I was just around and felt like saying hello to her." I blinked again, "So who are you exactly?" I asked a little bit threateningly, "Oh, don't worry, I'm not like her lover or anything." He winked at me, "That's your job isn't it? Enjoy the dates today and yesterday?" I blushed realising his implications, then suddenly shook my head after realising he knew about yesterday, "Wait, how did you know...? Were you following us?" "Oh no, nothing like that. You make me sound like such a stalker young Baka-chan." He replied insultingly, I didn't know much Japanese at the time but I understood 'Baka' meant 'Idiot' and I frowned in annoyance.

"Also, you should tell her that she shouldn't be teaching you illusionary magic any more." He grinned, "Otherwise it'll land you, and her, in a lot of danger." He said, still talking as if he was joking. He opened his thin fox-like eyes. And stepped past me as I stood in shock of how much he knew about the situation, "You do like her right?" I spun around to punch him out of my frustration. He was gone.

"Annoying guy..." I said as I began to walk back to the bridge, not finding her there I figured that she must have gotten hungry, it was lunch after all and must have gone back to get something to eat, so I started making tracks home.

I was right, at least for the most part. She was at home but she wasn't eating as such.

"I'm leaving."

I stood there in shock, I'd become attached and dare I say... I liked her. It was something that felt like a hand gripping my heart and squeezing the life out of it. "It's been nice getting to know you." I said, trying to act as if I didn't care, my initial works being a little choked. "It's been nice getting to know you too." She signed back at me. I could tell it was hard on her too. "You're my first real friend. Because I'm on the road so often I never really get time to talk to or spend time with anyone." She took my hand and squeezed it gently, "Thank you." She hopped onto the cart without making eye contact and it slowly rolled off and away into the town. Why do I always feel like the child...?