Updated 7/24/2009: I combined a few of the other chapters together for this revised version.

The Books of Magic

Chapter 2:

Remembering

"HOOOOOE! I'm soooo late!" Sakura wailed as she dashed down the street.

Kero had kept harping about the new threat, about a new enemy or ally and about the importance of remembering her Dream all morning that she had missed not only her breakfast but leaving on time for school.

It was extremely frustrating but try as she might, she couldn't remember a thing about the Dream at all. Well, except ... glowing eyes.

Slowly Sakura slowed her pace, coming to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk. She frowned thoughtfully as she gazed at the sky but her eyes were unfocused as her mind churned furiously. And she remembered. He was gazing at her. No ... not eyes, not really. In place of eyes, there was a pair of glowing orbs. He ... yes, it was a he was just one of them. There was another one, no two more?

"No ... there were four of them," she mumbled to herself.

"I KNEW IT!"

Sakura jerked whipping her head around at the totally unexpected cry. Then she felt her backpack wiggling and quickly removed it as a stuffed plushie stuck its oversized head out of her school bag.

"You remember now don't you!" Kero exclaimed eagerly

"KERO!" Sakura shouted in horror.

"Ahh ... that's better. No air at all in there," Kero remarked as he worked his way out of the bag and fanned himself with one stubby little arm. "You need to get a bigger bag, maybe one with decent ventilation..." he remarked as he flexed his cramped wings.

"You're suppose to stay at home!" Sakura reprimanded and tried cramming the overactive doll back into her bag.

"AAACCKK!" Kero gasped, "No, wait!"

Sakura muttered, "I don't have enough time to drop you off so you'll have to come with me today..." as she continued to squeeze the uncooperative little Guardian Beast into the confines of her school bag.

"Sakuraaaa! My neck doesn't bend that way!" Kero protested.

"How did you get in there anyways?" Sakura asked relenting for a brief moment to glance inside her normally full bag, "I didn't think there was any room."

"Oh there was enough after I ate your lunch," Kero explained helpfully.

"What?" Sakura shrieked. "My lunch?"

Kero straightened, puffing out his nonexistent chest and putting his hands on his similarly nonexistent hips and tried to look seriously stern. "Sakura!" he demanded, "What's more important? A new threat or your stomach!" he lectured pompously waggling an arm at her.

Sakura fantasized briefly of stuffing him into her bento box.

Kero folded his arms, "So do you remember your Dream now?" he demanded.

Sakura nodded, "Well ... some of it..."

Kero nodded, stroking his chin with a gleam in his eye, "Good, good. Now what do you remember about—"

"I'd like to hear about this Dream too," a new voice interrupted them.

Sakura turned and looked upward to see a man lying on a tree limb almost 20 feet off the ground. He was dressed head to toe in loose fitting clothing but apparently ruggedly made for traveling and even had on a cloak. A long staff topped with a red ruby crystal dangled casually from one gloved hand. His hair was strangely enough a dark purple. He grinned at both Sakura and Kero. "Please, go on, don't let me interrupt your fascinating conversation…" he remarked cheerfully as his eyes opened to reveal a pair of pale and perfectly normal purple pupils.

Sakura blinked. He turned to stare directly at her. A pair of glowing orbs instead of eyes gazed balefully at her—

Kero heard a soft choking noise from Sakura and whipped his head around to stare at her. She was shivering, her eyes wide and filled with fear. She took a trembling step and then whirled around to run away as fast as she could run. "SAKURA!" Kero called out and frantically flew after her.

On the tree branch, Xellos Metallium blinked in surprise and scratched his head as he watched the girl and her familiar race away.

"You scared her," a familiar voice remarked from above him.

Xellos glanced upward to see a tiny super-deformed Urd sitting on a small branch suitable for her smaller size and weight and peering down at him. He gestured towards himself in confusion, "I did?" he asked.

"Yes, you," Mini-Urd confirmed.

Xellos protested, "I didn't do anything."

Mini-Urd smirked slightly. "Oh, I doubt it was anything you did per se. More like that fact that you have this rather suspicious look about you. Particularly when you try to look innocent. Reminds me of Loki. Or an insurance salesman."

Xellos looked wounded. "Keeping an eye on me Urd-sama?" he asked politely.

Mini-Urd snorted, folding her stubby little arms across her chest and gave him a suspicious gaze. "Please. None of us trust each other. We're all on opposite sides after all Xellos. None of us even like each other. Only the fact that we all have mutual interests in keeping the girl alive is the only reason why we're siding together after all … well except maybe Pluto. She just wants to keep an eye on all of us without being too obvious."

Urd left it politely unstated that they all were quietly doing the same thing as Pluto.

Xellos smiled slyly, his eyes narrowed into slits as his purple pupils glittered demonically. "Indeed."

Sakura leaned with her back against a brick wall and gasped for breath. Kero looked at her concerned. "What was that about Sakura?" he asked, "Did you know him?"

She shook her head, "N—no. Not exactly. I—I dreamed of him and—and these other three people with him—"

A slender arm encased in an elbow high glove reached out to clasp Sakura's shoulder. "We need to talk to you child…" a tall and attractive woman said as she stepped out of the shadows, she held a staff of her own except this one was crafted out of metal although it too was topped with red ruby gem. She was dressed in a sailor uniform. Her eyes were cold.

Surprised Sakura screamed in shock. Fear lent her strength as she twisted out of the woman's grasp and darted away.

Annoyed, Pluto watched the girl run away, the small plushie flying after her. She huffed and rolled her eyes. "Perfect. Like I don't have better things to do," she grumbled, as she shoved a long strand of her green hair out of her face and stalked away.

"Never should have agreed to this stupid thing." Pluto muttered to herself. Killing the girl was looking like a better and better option all the time.

She was pelting down the street, her hair whipping behind her as she ran. She heard Kerebous shouting her name but she didn't dare stop. She didn't dare slow down. They were right behind her! They were everywhere!

At the end of the block, an electronics store with dozens and dozens of television monitors displayed in the window blanked out with static for a second before clearing with a dark tanned woman with white hair and facial tattoos was looking out from each and every single one of them. "Sakura! Wait! Don't run! We're not going to hurt you—!" the woman shouted in stereo.

Sakura froze.

All of the televisions went to static except for the central and also the biggest one which flared with light and abruptly, the woman began working her way out of the screen, bending down and shifting her leg and then her hip through and wriggling her torso free out of the confines of the screen. Sakura gasped and turned and quickly darted down a side street.

Urd uttered a curse and squeezed herself all the way out. "Hey! Wait!" she yelled and began the chase after her. She took one step and immediately crashed headlong into the glass window. "Owch!"

Urd bent over and clutched her nose. "Darnit. Windo. Fergot 'bout dat," she mumbled, her speech slightly slurred as she eyed the treacherous pane of glass.

Sakura was faltering as she ran down the tiny street and was panting heavily. She had just exited it and back onto the open when a hand came out of nowhere and grabbed her!

"GOTCHA!" a loud masculine voice shouted triumphantly.

Sakura twisted around to stare helplessly at the hugely muscular man with silver hair leaning against the wall as though waiting for her. She let out a piercing shriek.

The man grimaced, "Oww," he complained and stuck a finger into his ear with his free hand. But he didn't let go. He glared at her. "Listen brat, I'm not going to hurt you—"

"LET HER GO!" a high pitched voice demanded.

They both looked upward to see Kerebous glaring at the man. The man seemed to smirk. "Or what?" he asked.

In response, Kero inhaled, inflating himself into a rotund looking ball.

"Kero…" Sakura whimpered.

Kero exhaled, releasing a stream of fire.

The man seemed to almost chuckle as he reached up with his free hand and grabbed the flame, capturing it. He then released his other hand on Sakura. "Like I was saying before, I'm not going to hurt you okay?" he said in a gentler tone of voice.

Kero goggled while Sakura slowly nodded, feeling slightly better that he had let go of her.

The man patted himself down with his other hand. "OK, fine. Relax, the others will be here in just a moment. Now where did I—ah!" he exclaimed jubilantly as he pulled a cigarette from some pocket in his clothing. He immediately stuck it into his mouth and brought up his still clenched fist and opened it.

A ball of orange-reddish flames hovered in the palm of his hand. He light the cigarette with it and with sharply waved his hand through the ball of fire, causing the flames to disperse and then fade away. His task done, he puffed for a moment and then exhaled a cloud of smoke. His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Ah. They're here," he said.

Kero blinked. "Who are they—" he began and jerked startled as the other three popped into existence, surrounding them. "Oh," he said weakly.

The silver haired man smirked around his cigarette. "Well, hail hail. The gang's all here. Took you long enough."

The other three ignored his not so subtle jab and instead focused on Sakura. "Greetings Sakura Kinomoto," the white haired woman with the facial tattoos said solemnly.

Sakura hesitantly nodded. "H-hello," she said nervously. "Who are you guys anyways?" she asked.

All four nodded gravely. "Good question," the perpetually cheerful man with the purple hair said winking at her.

"Very good question," agreed the white haired woman beaming.

"What's so great about it?" muttered the shaggy white haired barbarian puffing his cigarette. The other three ignored him.

"We have many names child," the green haired woman said with a bit of nasty bite on the word 'child' as though she had run into something slimy and disgusting that needed to be cleaned at once. Sakura got the feeling that the woman didn't care too much for children. "I am called Pluto," the darkly tanned woman said softly.

"Pluto?" Sakura repeated, her nose wrinkling in confusion. "Like the planet?"

"Something like that," Pluto said evasively.

"Not much of a one though," the purple haired man remarked with a smirk, "I understand they're calling it a dwarf planet these days."

"It's a planet!" Pluto snarled at him, barring her teeth threateningly.

"A very, very small planet," he corrected holding up a hand with his thumb and forefinger a millimeter apart.

Pluto muttered something rude about astronomers.

Sakura raised an eyebrow at the brief interplay. "That's not your real name is it," she said, in a tone of voice that proclaimed it was not a question but more of a statement.

"Good instincts," the white haired woman said clapping her hands together and giving Sakura an approving nod, "Very good. That is something very important to remember Sakura. Names have power. It is a very wise thing to make sure that you never tell anyone your real name."

"But … you already know my name," Sakura said confused.

The white haired woman shook her head, "But not your true name. Sakura is the name your parents gave you. Your true name, your real name is the name of your spirit, the name for your very soul. For the most part, most people simply accept their birth names and never ever question it and eventually, that name becomes them. It both weakens and diminishes them," she explained with a dismissive wave of her hand.

Sakura frowned. She wasn't sure if she quite understood what this woman was talking about. "So … then what is your name?" she asked the white haired woman.

Pluto snorted. "Weren't you listening child? You never ask for someone's name. Whenever you meet someone, ask what they would like to be called."

"Errr … alright. What are you called then?" Sakura asked.

The white haired woman reached up and touched herself with the tips of her fingers. "I am known as Urd."

"You can call me Xellos," the smiling man with the purple hair and the staff said with a friendly wave.

Pluto muttered, "…and we call you namagomi."

Xellos' smile seemed to freeze for a moment as he glanced sidelong at Pluto but then his expression cleared and he returned to his normal, jovial appearance.

Sakura glanced at the last and final member of the quartet. "And who are you?" she asked.

The tall and powerfully built man reached up and pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and ground it out his palm with a hiss, "Men call me Dark Schneider."

And what do women call you? Sakura wondered to herself but kept her comment to herself.

Schneider then shrugged, "If you want, you can call me D.S."

Kero settled down on top of Sakura's head. "So what do you people want with Sakura?" he asked looking at the four suspiciously. "If you want the Clow Cards, they belong to SAKURA now so…"

"We're not interested in her cards," Pluto snapped irritated. "If we wanted them, we could certainly take them. This is about her." Pluto said with a disdainful gesture at Sakura with the tip of her staff.

"She is the Heir to Clow Reed and appears to be destined to be a major force of magic in her own right," Xellos remarked. "We're … interested in making sure that she develops properly."

Urd continued as she gazed at Sakura, "You have discovered a realm of wonders and enchantments that the rest of the world has forgotten or struggles to ignore. We are here to educate. To instruct. To pass on our knowledge and wisdom to the next generation of magic. To you," she finished.

Xellos adopted a serious mien. "But there be warned here and now, child," he said softly although Sakura didn't mind the child from him as much as she did with Pluto. "Once you step onto this path, you will never be able to leave it. It will forever dominate your life. You stand on a threshold. A single step in any direction will forever change the course of your life. You haven't taken that first and final step. Yet. We're just going to show you what lies ahead if you do chose magic. A sneak peek so to speak."

D.S. snorted, "I'm just along for the ride kiddies. So are we going or what?" he asked impatiently.

A/N: For those of you wondering, the word namagomi that Pluto calls Xellos is Japanese for raw garbage. Filia Ul Copt, a Golden Dragon and Priestess in the Slayers Try! anime series often referred to Xellos by this, much to his annoyance. Oh and when I first wrote this story, Pluto was still considered a planet whereas now they're calling it a dwarf planet these days and when I was updating this chapter, I suddenly felt the need to poke some fun at that.