Sundance slept in her bed for the night, entrapped in the blankets and snoring. Eve had barely been able to convince Sindri that he was their lost cousin that was desperate for a home. He believed her. Or probably didn't feel like arguing at the latest hour of day.
She flew through the pages of Sundance's spell book. Everything mixed alphabet and ancient calligraphy. All she understood was that first spell. But nothing added up. How could a kid shoot paint from his mouth? She'd never met anyone who could do that. Never thinking someone like that actually existed.
He said he was one of a hundred. She would have to team up with a child to defeat over ninety other mamodo like him.
Eve drooped in her seat and used the book as a pillow. From the table, she glanced through the window at the skyline that improved from rainy gray to medicinal blue to a comforting in-between color. It reminded her of the clean linen that her mother would fold on a Sunday morning, fingers as fragile and pale as the fabric in her grasp.
She clenched her fingers in her palms and waited until the sun came up to let sleep grab her.
"You owe me your life," Eve whispered to Sundance as she led them into the playground, bedecked in running shorts, a tank top used for sleeping, and her shower-soaked hair fixed into a baseball cap.
Sundance backed up to stop, holding his chest with both hands as if she had the strength to rip his heart out. "My life?"
She laughed and stroked the brim of her hat. "Figurative speech, kid,"
"That wasn't funny." He pouted.
"Just go play before we leave."
Sundance saluted her like a cruise ship captain before he went off to hit the swings and the curviest slides. She watched him for an interval of five minutes before turning to face the book, his book. Strange things were carved into the front cover, each page was thick and preserved.
She'd never been interested in school or books but something she couldn't read was tempting. Maybe it was a type of tribal language. Ninety-nine other books existed. Could she read theirs?
"Eve, look out!"
Sundance reached her side with the velocity of a dragonfly and pulled her off the bench, onto the dingy asphalt, she gave him a look that spat poison.
"What the hell, kid?" she yelled.
He only pointed. Where she had been sitting, a pool of green acid thawed into the wood and altered its color. She sat there, dumbfounded. Sundance wiped his dirty hands on his shorts and kneeled into a battle stance in front of her.
Before them, a dignified older man in polished leather shoes and a suit stood alongside a beige-furred anteater wearing sunglasses. In the hand of the man was a glowing silk white book, similar to Sundance's.
"So our first opponent of the morning is a weak one," the man said in a noble British accent. "I am sensing one more and nothing more." He turned a few pages in the book. "I say, this shall be fun. Won't it, Antsy?"
Antsy nodded and extended his tongue out leisurely.
"Antsy? Oh my God, that's so embarrassing." Eve snickered.
Both man and animal glared at her.
Sundance tugged on her ankle and inclined closer. "Eve, this would be a good time for a spell…"
The man beat her to it. "Ooma!"
A rush of acid blasted toward them and Eve reached the page of their only spell and shouted it, frantically. "Upra!"
Acid and paint collided, spotting the ground at their feet red and green. Sundance jumped away from the mixed color with a grossed-out scowl. She could've laughed at his expression.
"We can't waste time, Sundance! Upra!" Eve shouted, pointing toward the pair.
Sundance opened his mouth and out went another shot of paint, not having a shield in time, Antsy endured the hit but the red soaked into his fur and fizzled. He yelped in pain as Sundance looked on in triumph.
It was like fire, Eve realized in her thoughts. At least the spell can do something useful.
"You brat!" The man skimmed through more pages. "A stronger spell is needed! Defend yourself against this! Oomla Lulo!"
Antsy stood upright onto two legs as if he were human. His mouth parted and his tongue slid across his lips, lengthening, a vigorous pink road stretching closer to them. Sundance dodged it but not Eve. Antsy's tongue wrapped around her wrist and locked there.
"Ew, ew, ew, ew! Get it off me!" Eve shrieked and shook her captured wrist. Something on it sputtered and burned like a torch. She was more disgusted by an animal's tongue on her skin. "Sundance, Sundance!"
But when she looked around, he was gone. She was only left with the suited man and the anteater closing in on her, round black eyes on the book.
She fell onto her knees and grabbed a fist of sand, targeting it at the demonic animal but her hand wouldn't release it and grit seeped into her nails. How could Sundance just leave her?
The anteater's book owner swore and she heard a discrete call of her name.
Sundance waved Antsy's book from his post on a street pole. His hair was dusty and he had a bleeding scratch on his chin. A grin showed all his shining white teeth, a crack in a top tooth. "Eve, a spell! Hurry!"
Antsy released her wrist and went for Sundance, screaming the name of his partner in one undistinguishable bark.
Eve rootled to reopen her book. "Upra!"
Sundance held up the book and paint fired at it. The book exploded into purple flames and Sundance dropped it before it could scorch his fingers. They all watched it crumble into ashes and Antsy glittered white and vanished once the book was gone. His partner had already fled.
So with each book burned, a mamodo disappears. If Sundance's book was burned, he would also disappear. She couldn't let that happen.
"That was good," Sundance said when he came next to her. She hadn't noticed the sore on her wrist until now. "The screaming thing was a good distraction.
Well, it wasn't meant to be a distraction. "Thanks."
"Hey, that was pretty good."
They both jumped. Sundance dabbed the blood on his skin with a gulp.
A man with black hair and brown eyes relaxed against the same street pole Sundance had balanced on. He was well-built and lean with a light smile. Wearing jeans, a T-shirt that said Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say, and an unbuttoned button-down with the sleeves folded to his elbows.
"Um…thanks." Eve said and held the book protectively under one arm. Had he saw the whole thing?
"I was about to intervene but you guys finished them off pretty fast," he continued, approaching them. Sundance glared at him doubtfully. "My name is Phil Howard and I'm also a book-owner." He held forward a spell-book. "And I also have a mamodo. Resh?"
A little girl peeked out from behind Phil's leg. She had silver hair and same-color eyes, donning a black knee-length skirt, a white shirt, and white shoes.
Resh blushed and nodded. "Nice to meet you…"
"We won't hurt you and aren't here to fight, seriously." Phil assured with an offhand wave. "Actually, we're hoping for the latter. It'd be better to team up and not fight. Call it an alliance. You guys seem trustful. What do you say?"
Sundance beamed. "Okay!"
Eve rolled her eyes and agreed. It's not like she ever had a choice with Sundance's nature.
And from another side of town, Caleb Borriello lifted weights to the sound of heavy rock. Having just returned home from his weekend-long trip to Italy, he tossed his luggage on the couch, changed into comfortable clothes, and found his dumbbells under the kitchen table.
His apartment was wrecked. Clothes of all kind thrown everywhere, food emptied from the fridge, water rings from deserted cups tarnished every wood surface. There wasn't much he could do. He could probably hire a cleaning lady when he felt like it.
The breakup of him and Eve was harsh but needed. Would they have lasted with all the argument? She threw plate at his head. That was a big sign of a breakup.
He flexed his arm with the weight, veins webbed from under his skin.
Whatever, there wasn't much he could do.
A fist pumped rapidly on the door, cutting through the music. He placed down his dumbbells and lowered the volume of his CD until it was barely heard. He was barely home for two hours and already someone was at the door. Maybe he should've stayed in Italy for an extra day like his father had suggested.
He slugged a hand through his dark hair and fixated his turquoise eyes on the door. He wasn't expecting someone either.
But he went for the door and unlocked it, pulling it open. A young girl with braided pink hair and round green eyes scuffled in her shoes. She sported a white romper with a fake leather belt and ballet shoes, looking like she just snuck out of middle school.
He was rational. "Who the fuck are you?"
The smile on her face dissolved and sulked into a pout. He noticed a pale blue book in her arms, something like a library book. She didn't look like the stealing type.
Then she threw him the book and he caught it before it fell. "Read it." she commanded with the sharpness of an ice pick.
"The whole thing?"
"Skim. Through. It." The kid had spunk.
He skimmed through it, very quickly. Eve had been more of a reader and a focuser in school. He was never.
A blue aura sparkled from the first pages and he turned to them, seeing gibberish and one sentence that he could actually understand. It didn't look like anything he'd ever seen before.
"'The spell that starts it all, Ralodo,"
The girl raised her hands and a little blizzard of snow fell around them, onto the carpet, onto the stairs. The sky became white and as plain as an easel. Caleb stared at her and the girl stared back.
All his memories trundled before him in a pinwheel of life. Bullied by the older kids in elementary school, punching an old friend for being stupid, losing his first tooth. Accepting dares and the money from them, the needle crossing his skin before each tattoo, the wrath of Eve's father and brother when they found out she dropped out for him. The gamble of his relationships, his parents telling him how proud they were of him, ripping his college applications apart, the hearty meal his mother made when he got his first A-plus.
Everything that was most memorable to him was gone.
It was like he was being reborn, granting him a good feeling.
He wanted to fight. He wanted to destroy.
The girl smirked. "I am Ophelia. Welcome to the battle, Caleb."
Aaaaand that ends chapter two. I really hope everyone likes this and I apologize for the wait. I've had endless homework and some trouble with this chapter. Everyone who has sent me OCS, thank you! It'd mean a lot if you can send more. To who has sent me OCs, I'll get to working them in slowly but I promise they'll all be in.
On another opinion, how did you like Caleb's view? It'll probably be the only time it happens though. I really don't like writing him.
R&R, please!