Faye sipped her hot chocolate carefully, not wanting to burn her mouth. Lorna had decided to take Saffron to a coffee shop after their tour, and urged Faye to join them. So now, here they were, talking about whatever crossed either Lorna or Saffron's minds.
It made her feel odd to be the only one with hot chocolate at the table by the window. Saffron had ordered a complicated beverage of some sort, though she was somewhat sure that it was at least coffee. Lorna had gotten a latte with some gingerbread sprinkled in—she loved gingerbread. Out of all them, Faye did have the most boring drink, but she was content with boring.
Saffron and Lorna had just finished talking about how odd their individual experiences at both Signal and Asylum were compared to what people considered the norm, when Saffron turned to Faye. "Faye, why do you do that?" Saffron asked.
She shifted in her seat. "What exactly?"
"Why do you keep your hood up all the time?"
It was true that she wore a hoodie a lot of the time when she went out, and that she kept the hood up for most of that time. She wondered why Saffron cared though. But she had to offer an explanation, so she said, "I keep my hood up to hide my feathers. I hope you understand."
"I do," Saffron said. "But you shouldn't hide who you are."
"Saffron, don't bother," Lorna said. "I had this talk with her when she was fourteen; she didn't budge."
"Well, I just think you shouldn't hide who you are," Saffron said. "I don't wear high heels to make me look taller, and you certainly don't cover your fox ears."
"Well, that's mostly because I can't hear that well with my ears smushed against my hair, and ear holes are even weirder." Her left ear twitched slightly. "It gets really inconvenient when it rains, and I have to carry an umbrella all the time."
"Still, you shouldn't hide your heritage all the time, Faye," Saffron told her.
"I suppose," Faye said. "But I still prefer to wear the hood."
"Well since I can't change your mind, and pulling your hood would be too overbearing, I guess I can't do anything about it." Saffron leaned back in her chair and started looking around the coffee shop. "Oh, look at that, two people are coming over here," Saffron said, sitting up. "I wondered what they want."
Faye followed Saffron's gaze, and saw Storm being led to their table by a redheaded girl in black, both carrying drinks. The girl was about his age, and very pretty. There also seemed to be a discoloration on the ends of her sleeves that looked like paint. Who was she?
Storm was the first to speak. "Hello, Faye. Hello, Lorna." He looked at Saffron. "Hello, whoever you are." Saffron laughed.
"This is Saffron," Lorna said, gesturing in her direction. "Saffron, this is Storm." She glanced at the redhead. "Now do you mind introducing whoever this is?"
"This is Patricia, an old friend."
"Well hello, Patricia. I'm Lorna," Lorna said, shaking hands with Patricia. "Can I call you Pat?"
"Um, no, I'd really appreciate it if you didn't."
After a couple seconds, Faye put her hand forward. "My name is Faye."
"Well, Faye, I'm glad to finally meet you. Storm has told me a lot about you."
"He has not told me anything about you." She glanced at Storm, and noticing her gaze, he shrugged.
"Well, I guess that's Storm; he tends to talk in the present and never in past," Patricia said.
"Do you want to join us?" Saffron asked, half an offer, half a request to move on.
"Nah, I don't like to sit with people I don't really know in coffee shop." That was specific, though she had the same problem. "Well, goodbye." Faye, Lorna, and Saffron gave their various goodbyes, and Patricia and Storm walked off.
Once they were gone, Saffron turned to Faye. "Well, they seemed like a nice couple." Faye glared at Saffron, and she seemed to jump back. "What are you angry about?"
"He is my boyfriend!" The words seemed odd coming out of her mouth, but they were true.
Saffron shook her head regretfully. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have opened my mouth. I just tend to ship some people when I see them. It's a bad habit."
Faye was still a little sore about Saffron's comment, mostly because she was afraid it might have at one point been true. She really did not know much about his past. Then again, as far as she knew, Storm did not know much of Faye's past. Both of them would have to correct that later on.
"Oh my gosh, look," Lorna said softly, pointing to the TV on the nearby wall. A news report was on concerning Haven Academy. What was Haven doing in the news?
The anchorman said this: "Lionel Forester, headmaster of local Haven Academy, was killed in an attempted arrest earlier today. According to police, and the Mistral Council, he was suspected of conspiracy, but they are unsure if those accusations are in fact true. When they went to arrest him, he resisted, killing several policemen. He was only brought down when Lord Dustin Taryn himself fought and killed him.
"Due to the possible corruptness of Forester, the council is now having the entire staff investigated. It is currently unknown how this will affect classes."
As the news went on to another topic, the girls turned to each other. "Can you believe that?" Lorna said. "Forester's dead."
"And he was killed by Crystal's father," Faye added. That certainly explained his presence at Haven earlier that day.
"Wait, I forget. Who is Crystal?" Saffron asked.
"She was in the tournament," Faye replied. "She is the leader of team CCRE, and… something of a friend of mine, I think."
"Green haired gal," Lorna said.
"Oh, now I remember her," Saffron said. "It's obviously dyed, you know. Her eyebrows are brown."
"Can we stay on topic?" Faye said. She rarely got like this, but she had been pushed to it.
"I don't know; we pretty effectively covered that."
Lorna looked at Saffron tiredly. "No, we didn't."
"Well then, let's talk about it." After Lorna did not say anything for several seconds, and both of the other girls were quietly waiting for her to talk, Saffron said, "Nothing? Well, that's too bad."
"You know, you've got a real attitude problem," Lorna said slightly angrily.
"I've had to develop this to work with Redell," Saffron replied. If Faye was remembering correctly, Storm had a cousin whose name was Redell—one of the few things she knew about his background. She would have to ask a little later if they could be the same. "When we were put together, it didn't take me long to realize that he wouldn't be easy to manage. He wouldn't do anything I told him to, even asked him to do. Eventually he let up, but I had to get some attitude to get him to do anything. It's just stuck with me since."
After waiting a few seconds, Faye asked, "Is that Redell Sapphire?"
Saffron looked at her questioningly. "How'd you know?"
"He happens to be Storm's cousin."
Saffron laughed. "Wow. Does he give as much trouble to your team leader?"
"He is the team leader."
Saffron laughed even more. Between gasps of breath she said, "Wow, if he's anything like Redell, I feel sorry for you."