It starts with a dream.
iA card with a face holds a brush, painting roses. Roses red. I watch the scene, a club and a space, painting roses on a rose tree from white to red.
"Painting… the roses?" I ask, but no one hears me.
A girl in black and white steps up, curious, large eyes watching them paint. "Why are you painting the white roses red?" The innocent voice of a young child.
"We planted white roses, not red!"
"The queen wants them red, and if they're white-?"
"It's off with our heads!"
The girl walks to another faced-card, a three of Clubs. "Is that so…?" Curious as can be, bright-eyed…
"It is! That's why we're painting the roses red." They respond to the curious girl who wandered in.
Her brows furrow. "But why…?"/i
There's strange banging on the door, rousing Grim and I from slumber. "Wasn't I—sleeping…?"
Grim grumbles, waking up himself. "Why is someone bothering us at this hour…? A ghost? Ugh, I give…" He's grouchy too.
Well, since they knocked, it's clearly not Direly Problematic Crowley.
I doubt the ghosts knock, too.
I get to the door, and yawn again. "Who is it…?"
"It's me, Ace! Let me in?" We just saw him a few hours ago. I yawn, and go over to the door to let that idiot in. He probably got lost or something. Dumb ass, I can't help with that. I know jack shit.
"I am a merciful god." I mumble the meme to myself as he bursts in.
Grouchy Grim narrows his eyes as Ace comes inside. "Ace? Why's he here? EH?! What's with that collar?!"
My brows raise, he's wearing the collar they put on Grim at the opening ceremony. Wasn't that from the boy with red hair…?
Riddle?
"Forget it! I'm never going back to Heartslabyul! I'm transferring here!" I give him my most unimpressed expression, because let's face it, I have zero desire to deal with this at a late hour. I'm probably an hour from my sleep quota, and that makes me cranky.
"Do you have paperwork for that?" I'm not funny with this little sleep.
I gesture him into the lounge, it's still messy, but I haven't had as much time as I would like to get down to it for cleaning. Basically, part of the kitchen, the dining room, and the room Grim and I share is what I'd call cleaned up—not really sorted yet, but cleaned up.
"So, why are you wearing that collar…?" Grim is asking the appropriate questions given the situation.
"I ate a tart." He replies with his arms crossed in a pout.
Fine, I snickered.
"That's it?" This place is bonkers.
"Yeah. That's what happened. I was hungry—so I went into the dorm's kitchen… there was a tart chilling in the fridge. No name. No nothing. I was starving! After all we went through, I needed something to eat before bed, or how was I going to make it to tomorrow? So I look in the fridge to find something, and there's this amazing tart just sitting there! No one's name was on it, or on ANY of the tarts filling the fridge—so I got a slice and it was really nice and sweet."
Oh boy. Those tarts were probably for something, "And that's when the TYRANT Riddle comes up, saying that it was made by Trey and everything he makes is amazing. I didn't really care—and I told him it was delicious. BETTER than store-bought. Then he crosses his arms going, iYou have a lot of nerve to take things that belong to me./i Then why wasn't his NAME on it?! Unnamed food is fair game!" Okay, his impression of Riddle was a little funny.
Ace continues, "Then he starts quoting some sort of rule, 69 or something about never eating tarts without his EXPRESS permission. Like, what kind of rule is that? It's stupid. He goes on raving about how tart theft is iunforgivable/i. THEN he screams iOff with your head!/i and put this collar around my neck! ALL for eating a piece of tart! Do you know how much this sucks? I can't use ANY magic!"
"Wow. How horrible." Sarcasm drips from every pore of my being.
"T'ch. Look! I got this over a SLICE of tart, and there was like, three, or a dozen in there! No one can eat all of that alone. Selfish!" That's clearly not the point.
"Maybe, maybe the magic seal is overkill." I will give him that. I would've had him make another tart in exchange. It could be for a party, or something? It was probably for something important with that overreaction. "The tarts might be for something, I don't know." But he mentioned this iTrey/i made them. Is that super special? That might be part of the offense. I would've killed a man over grandma's pies.
"Right?! It is!"
"Maybe… but if there were so many… maybe they were for a party?" Grim's got the right idea. "Like a birthday party? I'm just nosy~" Why is he already more awake than me?
"Birthday…?" Ace considers a little.
"Did you apologize at all for this? Maybe explain everything that happened?" I'm trying to be the mature adult about this situation. I let him rant it out, and now it's time to dig into the problem and try to fix it.
I'm starting to this Ace Trappola's middle name is itrouble/i.
"Um… No." Yeah that was his first mistake.
"You took something that wasn't your's, Ace. You should've at least apologized even if Riddle probably overreacted a bit. You could've made a replacement tart tonight, it would've been ready by morning if this party or event or whatever is tomorrow."
"Seriously?" He gives me such a bratty look! I WILL smack that heart off his face one day if he keeps this up.
"Look, let's go apologize tomorrow when everyone's gotten a chance to sleep and calm down." I sigh, ready to go back to bed. It's too late to do anything now.
"Wait—I never got my can of tuna from the headmaster!" Grim suddenly bursts out with a topic from left field. I furrow my brows because I do not necessarily care right now.
"Yeah, yeah… I should go apologize…" GOOD. Ace is seeing REASON! HE can be helped. "But since it IS your idea, can you come with me...please?" I feel like a mom taking their four-year-old to apologize.
"Fine. I'll go with you, Ace." I resist teasing for now.
"Okay! Now that we're done with that—where can I sleep for the night?" Oh good, we can finally sleep.
"You really want to stay here?" Grim, c'mon, I've done some. "Every room is messy except our room. If you want to sleep here, you have to clean it yourself."
"Ew! I'm not cleaning! Hey~ let me stay in your room—I'm small, right? I won't take up that much space."
I point to the sofa. This is highly inappropriate. "You can sleep there. On the sofa. It's cleaned off… enough." There's already a blanket on it, too, from earlier.
"Fine! Stingy…" Ace scoffs. "I'll sleep non the couch all alone, by myself! Good night!"
I give him what I know is a very perplexed expression. Maybe it's draftier in here than I thought? Grim's a powerhouse heater, so… not my problem.
"Night, Ace…" I yawn, and head back up the stairs, flopping into bed the moment I can. I'm out before my head hits the pillow.
There's banging on the door that wakes me from my slumber yet again. But at LEAST people are knocking now.
I hear Ace shouting as I get out of bed, tiredly. His words aren't entirely clear but the sound of his footsteps makes it clear he's opening the door. Who the fuck is pounding on it with that much force anyways?
As I descend the staircase, tiredly, I see Deuce and Ace talking at the doorway.
"You're pretty stupid-" I catch Deuce saying. And maybe that makes me smile because cauldron, meet pot.
That works better than I expected.
"Shut it! I don't need to hear shit from you—but… is he still angry?" Ace is concerned, at least.
Wait. How do they know where I live?
"No… just frustrated, I think."
Ace doesn't buy that. "No way! He's definitely still angry!"
"Look—look. Okay, boys. I need to get ready, and we'll head to class. Then, after, we'll go visit Dorm Leader, Prefect, whatever the title is for Heartslabyul." I give a big yawn.
"Oh! Morning No!" Deuce greets.
I head upstairs and take a quick shower, prepping the best I can for my first day. Sure, my hair is still damp, but I have a bag with pens and paper I've found—and my new camera. Since Crowley wants photos, I guess that's what I'll take. I also need to ask what I'm going to do when the photos run out? If it can? Ugh, I'll see the warden eventually, so, there's time for that later. I've only taken… three or so, so far. I might have seven or fifteen left or something. I think grandma's old camera had fifteen at a time?
It's magic, maybe I never need to… do anything?
Grim is all sunshine and lollipops when we get down to the school. I'm utterly exhausted from the past two days of chaos, and hungry. I'll have to figure out how to get food for the dorm today. I've found money while cleaning the dorm, hopefully it's the right currency.
He's basking in the sunlight as he walks. "Oh, oh, step aside everyone! Starting today, I'm a student at Night Raven College! Look at this amazing collar, Headmaster Crowley made it JUST for me!" I need to figure out how to curb that ego of his or he's going to get us into a lot of trouble. "Anyway, Ace—you're still magicless, right?" Smug.
Ace scowls.
"Grim, less trouble, more student." I shake my head…
"Remember when you could use magic? Hah! And here I don't have to clean the school either!" Grim is definitely causing trouble.
"Hey! You should remember what happened yesterday when I could use it…" Yeah okay, these two are hotheads.
"The headmaster told us yesterday not to make a fuss." Honor student Deuce has the right idea.
"And I've had enough craziness for a few days, if you two don't mind." I grumble.
Deuce frowns at Ace. "Classes won't be easy with that magic seal… You should apologize to Rosehearts and he'll take the collar off."
I flinch. How are Grim and I going to work together? I'm assuming I'm taking the hands-needing tasks and reading while he gets practical application.
"Fuck, why do I have to do this…?" Ace groans.
"Ooo! Classes don't start for awhile! I want to see other dorms!" Grim's so excited, too… "While Ace apologizes, we can look around!"
"It's NOT a fucking show!" Okay, for some reason that hit Ace's nerves?
"Ace. Look, if you apologize now, then you can get your collar off and attend classes today as normal. Isn't that the goal here? And I already agreed to go with you like you wanted. So let's just get this over with since we actually have time, instead of the end of the day. Doesn't that make it better for everyone?" Maybe being reasonable will work.
Ace huffs a little, but he nods. "Guess you're right, Prefect…"
I smile a little. "C'mon, lead the way—I don't know how you get to the other dorms anyway."
"It's called the Hall of Mirrors." Deuce explains as we make our way there. "It has mirror-portals to all the other dorms. It's—it's grand. And it's not that far away, either!"
He points to a building. Oh—well. On our way we go.
Maybe this won't be another dramatic adventure… maybe.
