Chapter 4: All Fun Must Come to an End
The Festival of Fools. A day when everyone, gypsys, commoners and guards are at a mutual agreement. A day for everyone one to just have fun... almost everyone.
Mikado kept inching away from the gypsys that would pass her as she tried to keep in toe with her friend. Having had her parents murder by a gypsy, this was a day that made her feel uneasy to say the least.
"Here."
"!" Mikado stepped back as she saw a rose held in front of her face. She followed the hand up to the person to see an older gypsy boy with no ears.
He smiled at her taking her hand in his as he placed the red flower in it. "A sweet rose for someone so cute, my lady."
All she did was blush which caused the gypsy boy to smile more at her extra cuteness.
"Tokino!" He turned his head back behind him. "Can you please help me with Bambi shes wants to juggle!"
He gave the girl, Koda a look.
"Torches! She wants to juggle Torches!"
"Alright." He looked back at Mikado, squeezing her hand lightly. "Until we meet again my queen."
Mikado's mouth hung slightly ajar as he left, not knowing how to react to that. She knew it was probably just the common flirting some gypsys do but, no one had ever done something like that to her before. She looked down at the rose... "!"
"Seimei!?" She called as she realized he was gone. "Seimei?"
"Over here." Her friend appeared behind her with drinks. "Want one?" He held one out.
"Thanks" she took it quickly sipping it.
"Where'd you get the rose?"
"Um, no where."
...
Ritsuka looked all around. People were watching gypsys juggle, perform magic, dance, swallow swords, put fire in there mouth then blow out the smoke. Some people were trying to learn how to dance and juggle from the gypsys. Some people were even allowing the gypsys to bedazzle there bodies with rhinestones and tying multicolored ribbons on them.
Ritsuka laughed on the crate he sat on as he watched a commoner trying to juggle with Koda.
"Gypsy!" Ritsuka looked up in front of him and there stood the peasant girl he had met before. Looking at her he could tell she was enjoying the festival. Her pig tails were tied in big blue shiny bows, her kimono was bright and two toned, she had a rhinestone just under the corner of her eye as well as one hand with swirl patterns and the other covered with bangles. She looked like a gypsy, an over the top one but still.
"Wow. I almost didn't recognize you."
"Yeah I really like this kinda stuff." She shook her wrists. "But um I wanted to ask you. If you wanted, do you wanna hang out with me and my friends?"
His ears perked up no one ever asked him to hang out before. "Sure" he hopped off his crate. "And you don't have to call me gypsy all the time. My names Ritsuka."
...
"You guys this is Ritsuka-kun." Yuiko smiled as she introduced her gypsy friend. "Ritsuka this is Yayoi and Osamu."
"A gypsy!?" They both said in unison, though Yayoi sounded more worried as Osamu sounded more intrigued.
"Wait, you're that Loveless dancer, right?" Osamu asked stepping closer.
"Hai."
"You're good."
"Thanks. I've been tol-"
"But I bet im better." She smiled.
He smiled back at her "But im a gypsy."
"Really?" She teased.
They both started laughing.
"Yuiko-san are you sure hes okay?" Yayoi whispered.
"Of course!" She smiled. "Hey why don't we go get some treats."
"Yeah I kinda want a drink too." Osamu stated, Ritsuka agreeing as well.
...
"See Kouya, isn't this fun!?"
"It's better then it was last year."
"Maybe that's because you're actually down here and apart of it instead of watching it from that prison called a castle."
Kouya laughed at her girlfriend and went back to watching some weird puppet show. Feeling arms hugging her from behind she jumped soon relaxing noting they were Yamato's.
"You know you actually look really cute." She kissed her cheek.
She tugged at the bottom of her short steel blue dress. "I should, you're the one that chose my outfit."
Yamato giggled pulling her tighter. "Then I made the right choice!"
...
Everyone turned their heads at the sound of a piercing whistle, looking up towards the sky they saw a gypsy girl standing on one of the highest posts with just one foot (thats all the room it had). Everyone started gasping and mumbling things along the line of, "Oh my gosh" "What is she doing" and genuine words of concern.
Ritsuka looked closer at the girl "!" It was Chouma. "What is she doing?" he whispered just as worried and concerned about her as everyone else, probably more.
"What's wrong Ritsuka-kun?"
"Um nothing. Here." He handed his drink to Yuiko. "I need to go talk to someone."
"Wait, Ritsuka-kun!" She shouted as he left.
"Where's he going?" Yayoi looked over at Yuiko and seen her sad state. "Yukio whats wrong!?" He asked panicking.
Osamu smiled as she rolled her eyes.
...
Kio leaned against wall watching as his sister leaned forward and with a hop replaced her foot with her hands.
"Kio!" Ritsuka ran up to him breathless.
"You shouldn't shout my name so loud Loveless." He pulled his cloak more to cover his face. "The last thing we need is for me to be recognized. Especially in the middle of Chouma's performance." He smiled at the young one.
"Sorry, but what is she doing!? She's gonna get hurt!"
Kio chuckled. "Just watch. Its would be no fun if I spoiled it for you."
"You know what she's doing too!"
He smiled "Of course, now watch."
Chouma flipped from her hands back to her foot. Reaching into her laced shirt, she pulled out a rope and threw it towards another post just as tall as the one she stood on. There another gypsy, Bambi, grabbed the rope and tied it around the post tugging at it to make sure it was secure and safe. She looked back up at Chouma with a slightly worried face. Chouma just nodded as she tied her end of the rope on her post. Bambi went back and untied the rope and redid it again. After finishing she undid her sash and used it to slide down another rope onto the floor. Chouma once again went back to her hands and slowly started walking across the rope.
More people started gasping and covering there mouths. Half way through Chouma switched to her feet and "fell" quickly catching her self with her hands, she pulled her self up and swung her legs up so that she was back to handstand. The crowd and everyone started to clap and cheer as she slowly took away one hand.
"Ready?" Nisei looked over at Meko.
Meko pulled a match from the back of her teeth forward effectively lighting it. "Hai"
Nisei looked up at Chouma, their eyes met and she smiled. She pushed her self up and flipped to land back on her feet which caused the rope to untie.
Everyone gasped and screamed as they saw her fall. Then a huge ball of fire engulfed her mid fall and she was gone. Everyone was dumbfounded, speechless, some were still looking around to see if she had hit the floor. Kio was the first one to start clapping which caused everyone else to scream, cheer and clap in an uproar.
"?"
"Still confused Loveless?" Ritsuka ears flatted as he turned around to see Nisei with his arms crossed leaning where Kio had.
"Where's Kio?"
"Who knows. He probably disappeared into the crowd." He smiled. "That was some show though wasn't it?"
He looked back over to the posts where Chouma had been. "She was safe the whole time right?"
"Eh, kinda."
Ritsuka snapped his head back at him.
"Calm down Chibi. She safe now." He laughed. "Come on, lets dance."
...
High in the castle two girls sat on a balcony looking over the Festival, talking and laughing at what they saw.
"I bet watching this bring back memories for you." Nagisa looked over at her friend. "Doesn't it, Nana. From when you used to dabble in magic." She wiggled her fingers.
"A little." she stated nonchalantly.
"There hasn't been anyone better then you since you left." Nagisa looked over at the main stage where Loveless and Beloved danced. "In magic anyway."
"Hm? You actually paid attention to me back then?"
"Duh, everyone did. You were the only gypsy in the school. People just pretended not to care." She placed a grape in her mouth.
"What can I say, my parents wanted me to have a better life."
"Better? Working for our creep of a king is better?"
"Ahem"
Nagisa and Nana turned around to see the king himself, Ritsu.
"What? You expect me to take it back?"
Ristu rolled his eyes not wanting to deal with the childish women. "What are you two doing? Dont you have work to attend to."
Nagisa stood up, her hands in fists at her side. "God dammit Ritsu! Can't we have a break! We do so- "
"Im done with what I need to do today."
"What!" Nagisa looked back over at Nana, who had gone back to watching the shows.
Ristu looked back over at Nagisa waiting for her to say something.
"Well im still taking a break." She turned back and sat down.
Ritsu walked over to see what chaos the gypsys were making. He watched as they ran around dancing, singing, chanting, laughing and doing a bunch of idiotic things, and he watch as his people were loving it, laughing with them, throwing money and flowers at them, and try to learn from them.
"These gypsys have too much power."
Nagisa laughed at him. "You're paranoid Ritsu. Gypsys have no power and if they did, it would just be on this one day."
"It needs to be stopped."
"What, you're gonna cancel the Festival? You'll be hated. This Festival isn't only for the gypsys, but for our peoples amusement and stress relief too."
"It's not the Festival that needs to be stopped."
Ristu had no intention on canceling the Festival. He just wanted to do something in order to keep the gypsys more controlled and in their place and he knew just what to do, after all he had done it once before to a well known fire breather.