A/N: The chapter after this will be a little fluffy and will have a bit of OCXD only on my OC's part. But I'm not telling you anymroe than that. I'm a total DS shipper and ain't no OC gonna change that :3
A Magician's Secret
Chapter Four
By the Fire
May had settled into the guest room rather quickly, really, seeing as she hadn't brought much stuff with her. Sam let her borrow some dry PJs which were just the right size. The two cousins were pretty much equal in stature and figures after all. After a few short minutes, everyone was in bed and ready for some well-deserved sleep. Well, sort of. Sam was still a bit freaked from the thunder and resorted to using an old trick her grandmother had taught her: counting how many seconds came between thunder and lightning. It wasn't working.
"1...2...3..." Sam stopped as the thunder sounded again. She curled her body up into a fetal position on her bed and clutched the blankets. "1...2...3...4..." The lightning came up, lighting up her room in a split second and dispersing without a second thought. Her room looked eerie in that ominous white glow. Her posters of bands seem to laugh at her, mocking her phobia. "Stop laughing at me," she hissed, sat up, and tossed a pillow at the nearest poster on the wall. Just then, the thunder sounded and she collapsed back down and pulled the blankets over her head, quivering. "I hate storms..." she mumbled softly to herself.
As the thunder rolling passed for the time being, she could swear she heard the sound of a floorboard creaking beneath the weight of the living. She froze. Her eyes widened and she bolted straight up on her bed. "Okay, Sam," she mumbled to herself as the lightning struck again, soon to be accompanied by the thunder. "You're losing it," she told herself, starting to lie back down, ignoring the thunder even though she had to tense her body to keep from having her reflexes kick in.
"That was nothing," she told herself, but could swear she heard further footsteps descending the stairs to the living room. Who could it be? She brought her pillow around her ears and pulled her knees up to her chest, trying to drown out the thunder. She should have taken up on Danny's offer to sleep in his room until the storm passed. Of curse the blush on her face and his own made them quickly rethink the offer and how it sounded. She squeezed her eyes shut, mumbling before hearing another creak fo floorboards, this time sounding farther away. "Probably just Tucker…" she told herself quietly. "Maybe he just needed to get something form his backpack….or maybe he wants a glass of water….yeah….that's it…"
It was dark all around, but she found the fireplace sure enough. Sighing, she quickly struck a match located above the mantle in a small box. Throwing it into the fireplace, the fire began to grow to its previous glow when she arrived. The ember illuminated the round, ivory colored face with its red light. She shivered and crawled closer, striking the flames. She pulled the thin blanket around her shoulders tighter, staring into the flames.
"I shouldn't have come here," she whispered into it. "I might mess things up…."
She sighed again and pulled her legs beneath her so she'd be kneeling into a more comfortable position. She closed her amethyst eyes and pursed her cheery lips, thinking this through and stroking the fire absentmindedly.
The fire seemed to creep up one corner of the blanket as it had fallen into a couple of still burning cinders. A strange warmth from near her foot sent the girl into a slight panicked state, trying to pound out the fire with her hand. The metal pole she'd used to stroke the fire fell with a clank onto the wooden floor, but at least the fire was out…
Blue eyes snapped open at the sound of something like a loud thud on the floor. He bolted straight up, brushing locks of black hair out of his face. He blinked. "What was that?" he grumbled, rubbing the sleep form his eyes. Did someone fall in the dark? Or was it just something being knocked over by an open window with wind blowing through?
At this, his eyes shifted towards the window nearest him. The rain still slit into streams on the window, falling with their pat-pat sound. The lightning streaked the sky and the thunder roared. "Wonder if Sam's asleep…." he murmured.
The teenager flipped the blankets off of his body and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He took a moment to listen to the eerie silence before moving to stand and take the few steps that led out of the room. He opened the door in one fluid motion, the hinges not even squeaking. He stepped out and made his way to Sam's door. But a strange glow caught his attention.
The orange light seemed to be coming from downstairs. He frowned, pausing outside Sam's room. Had they left the fireplace going? No: he made sure himself that all the sparks and ashes had been smothered. Unless someone had relit the fire, there was no way it could be that. He glanced at Sam's closed door, and decided he'd check on her on his return trip.
Slowly, he began to creep down the stairs, trying hard not to make the floorboards creak beneath his feet. The fireplace gradually came into his line of vision as he descended. Along with the fiery glow came the shadow of the person bundled in front of the hearth. He blinked. "May…..?"
E/N: Thank you for reading! Oh, and I've been up-dating this story 'caue I wanna finish it soon. I want to finish all my I-know-it-will-only-have-less-than-twenty-chapters stories. That includes: Doze Corazones, When Dentists Attack, Dear Ms. Trudy, and a few otehr,s I believe. Well, thanks for reading again!
--Airamé Phantom