Chapter 9

-- Lesson 2 for Teague: Get Serious! --

“Mr. Wikoli, I’m happy to say you passed your second lesson.”

“Whoopee…”

Yuki sighed heavily seeing he didn’t really care, which wasn’t a good factor when training to save himself from death.

They had been packed up for some time so all they had left to do was wait until they reached the docks of Korkis. As they did this, Teague was on Yuki’s bed and had his head in her lap with a smile, getting his white hair stroked like a dog. But although he had saved her, Orrin was as apathetic as ever and lying on his bed with his hands behind his head, staring up at the ceiling lazily.

“You act like you didn’t save me,” Yuki commented, giving an unimpressed look. “Most people would be extremely proud of themselves.”

“Except I don’t like you.”

“Well you sure looked worried after you finished doing CPR,” She pointed out in a matching tone.

Teague sat up confused and looked at Orrin surprised, “Did you really do CPR on her? Wow, Orrin, you really wanted to save her!”

The Fire Ghenyu just made an unsure grunt not really changing his expression, “Just because I saved her doesn’t mean I like her any. She stole my freedom. Besides, I don’t wanna die so I had to or else I wouldn’t be able to finish training for the Amulet.”

She gave a bit of an impatient stare but Teague just sighed heavily getting a hopeless look on his face as he laid his head back down to get pet some more.

“You’re so stubborn.”

“So?”

From outside the door they heard shuffling of feet and happy chatter going towards the deck, seemingly everyone at once, so Yuki got up and opened the door to see what was going on. Only a second after stopping a random passenger, she turned to her trainees with a grin.

“Get our things. We’ve reached the city.”

The stuff was quickly gathered onto Orrin’s and Teague’s back, but once they were on deck, they were stuck behind a crowd of people obstructing the view of the city. Teague was pouting and trying to stand on his tippy-toes to see the view but the crowd was too in the way for him to see anything.

“Aw, c’mon!” he whined. “I wanna see too!”

Yuki looked around and smiled noticing where Orrin was. He was a little ways away, on top of a barrel in front of one of the smaller masts, staring out over the view placidly while the wind blew in from behind him. Seeing this she pulled Teague over to him and he immediately understood and stood on one of the other barrels. But this one was to the side of the big thing of wood. Yuki quickly took the opposing one noticing a man about to take her spot, but when she stood on there the man growled and went to say something so she glared at him.

“Easy, boy. Ladies first.”

Orrin glanced at her with an unimpressed look overhearing that comment but returned his stare almost immediately to the approaching city. Yuki noticed that in his calm expression was a pinch of something more serious; almost threatened.

“Mr. Wikoli?” she asked.

“What?” he replied, not moving his stare.

“You act like this city is your death.”

He didn’t respond to that so she dropped it and turned her gaze to the overgrown and overpopulated settlement. Orrin saw a couple men in different parts of the crowd glancing at him funny, but then he ignored it figuring it was just because of the recent events and so, before he could say “I did CPR on my trainer”, the trio was on a thick line to get off the boat and into the port grounds.

Stepping off the boat, Orrin somehow sensed a high tolerance level for different races. He didn’t understand why at first until he realized that the Ghenyus of this city were mingling quite comfortably with the humans. But in the middle of examining this new place, Teague tugged on his sleeve a bit, getting his attention away from the crowd, then silently pointed in the opposite direction towards Yuki who was walking away from them. He understood what his partner was saying so he started after her with Teague at his side. He suddenly stopped though, and sharply turned around, showing caution on his face.

“Or—?”

“Sh.”

Teague eyed around warily, listening carefully for something unusual, but when Orrin turned back and started off again the Water Ghenyu scratched his head confused. Either way, even if he didn’t understand what had caught his partner’s attention, he followed after him.

Finding a good hotel willing without persuasion to shelter two Ghenyus was strangely easy and for some weird reason got a discount for the room. The manager, a Ghenyu apparently, even went as far as to honor the three with his own son’s personal room service. Orrin was a bit annoyed at first to find out he was only ten but only because he thought it was unfair for the kid to be working at such a young age when the business was doing perfectly fine on its own.

Even so, the kid seemed to enjoy working hard and was very curious about the two trainees; especially Orrin. The kid, when called the first time by Teague to bring a meal since he was engaged in a staring contest with Orrin, stayed since then, sitting on Orrin’s bed and watching him closely while he interrogated him. I suppose seeing some full-grown man just lounging around on top of bookshelves and tables was a bit eye catching.

“So you’re twenty you said?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow, and you just started?”

“Yeah.”

“So you don’t have much time to finish this training, huh?”

“Yeah.”

The kid tilted his head, giving him a weird look, “How come you’re so calm about this? Your chance of passing the test is almost non-existent.”

The Fire Ghenyu sighed heavily, “Yeah, I know, but you need to have courage with these things.”

“I don’t know if I’d be able to keep from getting scared, like you somehow have.”

“I am scared,” Orrin argued calmly.

“But you just said…”

“I said I needed to have courage. And I do, just I’m scared anyway,” the Fire Ghenyu explained. “Anyone would be, which isn’t unusual or unnatural. But courage can get you out if you can keep it strong.”

“How do you do that?”

“Don’t look at the outcome. Look at the present and inspire with the possibilities of the future life you could have,” he answered still very apathetic.

The kid smiled, “Wow, Orrin. You’re really wise for your age. Most people around twenty are either extremely arrogant or embarrassingly submissive.”

“Really?” he asked, not really caring. “Tobi, you said your name was?”

“Yep.”

He looked over at the child with the same expression on his face but seeing the smile on the kid’s face, he sensed an eager to please in his stare, so he hopped down from the bookshelf casually and sat beside his young friend.

“So, tell me Tobi, when do you plan on training?”

He seemed surprised by the question but he simply shrugged and watched his feet playing a solo game of footsie.

“My dad says he’ll be sending me in a year or two. That way when I’m developing the most I’ll be training and therefore developing as much as I can.”

“Smart man…” Orrin grumbled, falling back to stare at the ceiling.

The boy gave him a confused look, “Something wrong with what he said?”

“No,” the Fire blood answered placidly. “Just training is… well, putting it mildly, it’s a pain in the butt. If there’s one thing you should know is not to kill a Reeban unless you have to.”

“…Why?”

“Take it from me. They may be insane, but they have relatives all the same.”

“Wow, you killed one?” the kid questioned amazed. “Did you enjoy it or did it feel funny because they were once a Ghenyu too?”

Orrin sat back up, staring at him with a bewildered expression.

“Enjoy it?!” he repeated. “I didn’t enjoy killing it because I wasn’t my life to take! You shouldn’t enjoy killing anything! Insane or not, only gods can seal their fate!”

The kid winced, staring back surprised, but then he smiled, “Sorry, Orrin. I was just asking questions. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

The Fire Ghenyu groaned as he fell back again to stare at the off-white paint above him, but then the kid chuckled.

“Jeez, you’re really fanatical.”

Orrin only grunted.

Yuki came into the room with a happy grin, but upon seeing the kid still there, she changed her expression to confused and raised an eyebrow.

“Didn’t think you’d like younger kids.”

Orrin simply grunted again, not really caring what she thought, but then Tobi looked at the woman curiously.

“Are you Ms. Yuki?”

She nodded, “Yeah, why?”

“Orrin said that you’re an annoying, stubborn, sadistic, self-centered mule and if he was stuck on an island with you and a pig and had to choose between the two of you to reproduce, he’d choose the pig since you’re too masculine and grouchy for him to stand being any where near you.”

Irritation immediately shot across her face and she folded her arms, closing her eyes to keep herself under control.

“He is entitled to his opinion,” she stated simply, choosing her words carefully. “By the way, Mr. Wikoli, you and Teague have to go supply shopping.”

Orrin groaned and stood up realizing that meant, “Get to it” so he walked out of the room, leaving the kid behind, but the moment he was in the hallway, Yuki shut the door, slamming it hard to warn Orrin to stop. He did, but never turned to look at her. She went up to him and roughly forced his face to look at hers. Her expressed spelled out anger in big bold letters.

“I’ll say this once. Clean up your attitude,” she ordered in a low voice. “I really wouldn’t care if you pissed off this entire city while shopping since this place doesn’t hold a grudge, but if you’re drawing attention to yourself anytime soon, we, meaning the three of us, could be in danger.”

The Fire blood groaned again, “Does this training always run into a dangerous situation?”

She sighed, losing the anger, “For the most part? No. Danger normally only rears its ugly head when I’m prepared for it. I have never had so much trouble with Reebans.”

He noticed as her attention fell downward, her entire expression saddened and in her eyes he saw her mind drifting from reality, but then he realized she was thinking over the boat incident. The moment she turned to leave Orrin noticed her eyes watering, so before she went anywhere he grabbed her arm. She didn’t turn around.

“Yuki, you shouldn’t be upset about last night,” he told her.

“I suppose I’m just scared.”

For some reason, he was surprised by this comment, but when she turned around, a calm, confident look filled her expression.

“I may be a sorceress and I may be powerful, but I am weak in my own ways too,” she started in the same smooth voice. “My anger, for one thing, can be a very deadly factor. Although it may not cause me to physically hurt you, it can be very easily manipulated to leave us vulnerable. My only fear is of my own weakness.”

He gave a bit of a saddened look hearing such a strong willed person telling him this, but then she chuckled unenthusiastically and looked away, closing her eyes to keep back a few tears.

“Remember what I said about all people being evil in their own way?”

“Yeah.”

She chuckled halfheartedly again, “I am evil too. I know I probably made myself sound to be a perfect woman but I didn’t mean to. I am evil through wrath. I am evil because I can’t control my temper and therefore I become, I hate to admit, sadistic. I think most everyone is guilty of the same thing to some extent, but that is how I am evil.”

Orrin opened his mouth to say something but she interrupted again, giving him an unsure look.

“This may be jumping topics but remember last night when the Reeban first grabbed me? How you used a spell to attack it?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you realize that you cast a sonic boom spell, an elemental spell of Air?”

He stared at her completely confused, but after rubbing his head a second he turned and started to leave.

“I’m sorry, Yuki, this is too much for me all at once,” Orrin stated loudly for her to hear. “I can’t be three different elements and still be a pure blood.”

She was baffled by him suddenly walking away, but then she realized he was leaving her right before she talked to him about something she’d been meaning to.

“But—!”

“I really should get that shopping done, so see you later.”

When Orrin opened the door to leave, she could only shout to behave before the door had closed, leaving her alone in the hall, but then she sighed heavily and looked at the wall with sadness as she reviewed the events of the previous night once again.

She touched her lips tenderly.

“What’s with the good mood?”

Orrin looked at Teague confused.

“Good mood?”

The Ghenyu of Water nodded, still looking at him curiously, “Yeah, you’re smiling and looking up at the sky with a bit of a distant look.”

The Fire Ghenyu just shrugged, not sure how to respond to that.

Although they had been out for ten minutes getting supplies and Orrin was carrying most of the things, Teague noticed a very positive attitude coming from his friend. Why, he couldn’t understand. Apparently Orrin didn’t either.

“Something had to have put you in a good mood! You can’t just be happy for no reason! Not you! Good day? Good night’s sleep? Something happen to make you happy?”

Orrin shrugged again, “Not really.”

Teague gave a bit of a pout, “C’mon! Tell me!”

This time the grumpy teddy growled, getting impatient with his buddy’s pestering, so before he blew up at the fragile guy, he took a deep breath and gave the Water Ghenyu a serious look.

“Teague, stop bugging me about it because I’m not feeling any different than usual,” he insisted. “Now, lets finish the shopping and get back to the hotel.”

Teague stopped walking a moment, watching his partner get ahead with a bit of a pout still caked on, but then he noticed some places up ahead that would have the next things in the list so he jogged back up to Orrin and told him. Teague ended up going inside to buy anyway since Orrin was carrying all the stuff, but when he came out of the last store, he noticed Orrin hovering around an area where some animals were caged. Upon seeing him sitting on his feet with a sad expression and fingers in the cage to touch the small creature, the Water Ghenyu realized it probably seemed barbaric to the innocent guy for harmless creatures to be caged.

He walked up to his Fire friend, stopping beside him and watching for a moment as the forest tiger hare licked Orrin’s fingers and let him stroke its head, but feeling depression start creeping into his chest from watching this, Teague touched his shoulder.

“C’mon, Orrin. We need to get going,” he reminded Orrin.

“You can go. I’ll stay.”

“No. We need to stay together.”

Orrin sighed heavily, “Fine. Just give me a second.”

A man came up to them noticing Orrin had been around for some minutes just staring pathetically at the creatures. This man had longish messy brown hair that matched his eyes and a scruffy looking beard and mustache growing due to not shaving recently.

“You want ‘em?” the man asked.

Orrin looked up at the scruffy, but confused looking man a bit confused himself.

“The hare?”

“Yeah,” he answered with a nod. “That lil’ guy’s been here a week and not a single pair of eyes has stayed on it for even a moment.”

Orrin stood up shrugging, “I don’t have my own money and my trainer would kill me for buying something with her money.”

The stranger chuckled, “A Ghenyu in training, eh? If that’s the case, take it for free.”

“Really?”

“Sure. Why not?”

Teague tugged Orrin’s sleeve like a kid, keeping a puzzled eye on the person, but when his partner turned to him with his usual calm expression, he shook his head.

“Master would find this very strange. That’s a healthy animal and that’s normally very expensive,” Teague explained. “I don’t think we should take it.”

The man heard but only gave a confused look, “I’m giving it to you ‘cause yer in training and its my way of showing support. The Test’s real hard. I almost failed.”

Teague looked at the guy puzzled, “You’re a Ghenyu?”

“Sure am. Can’t tell from just looks, but I’m of Earth.”

“And you have the Amulet?”

“Sure do.”

The silver-haired guy suddenly got excited.

“Oh! Can I see it?”

“Sure.”

The guy pulled his shirt out a bit and reached a tough hand in through the collar, but then pulled out a very beautiful amulet made of bronze. It was well rounded for the most part but there was a clear, strange design carved into it. It had all the symbols of the four elements, looking distinctly like the first letter of their name, and its own little signature. For Fire there was a blaze wrapping around a fancy looking “F”, for Water there was a raindrop with a fancy “W” in it, for Earth there was a leaf also harboring a fancy “E”, and for Air was a cloud having a fancy “A” in it. In the middle of all those things were some fine carvings, the biggest letters being four numbers indicating the year it was won.

He made an unsure noise after the two stared at it for a minute, so they looked up from the beautiful thing to the man.

“It’s pretty but I gotta keep polishing it ‘cause it’s bronze. Tarnishes very easily, and I wanna keep this thing decent looking,” he told them. He looked at the Amulet himself with a warm grin. “Bronze is the lowest you can get or you fail. Silver is next up showing you have good skill and gold is after that proving you’re exceptional. There’s even a platinum from what I hear, but no one’s ever gotten that; or at least, not for the past four hundred years.”

“What does platinum prove? Why not just stop at gold?” Orrin questioned.

The man seemed surprised he asked but responded with, “Are you kiddin? You don’t know?”

Seeing Orrin’s face just becoming more confused the longer he stalled to answer, he sighed heavily, shaking his head, but then he leaned a bit closer to them.

“They don’t stop at gold because people at gold level aren’t balanced in their power. To help you understand better, if you get bronze it shows that you’ve unlocked enough of your power to keep from going insane but get platinum and it means you’ve completely mastered it,” He told him. “Just concentrate on getting gold though. You’re not expected to get platinum.” He suddenly smiled, leaning back again. “And just so ya know. That little critter likes lettuce more than carrots.” He unlatched the catch and pulled out the animal, handing it to Orrin before making a small, casual salute. “It was nice talking, but I have to attend to some labor needed to be done.”

“Good day, sir,” Teague told the guy smiling as he walked off towards the house.

As Orrin looked down at the hare lying comfortably in his arms, he recognized this creature’s tiger like strips.

“This is a tiger forest hare, right Teague?”

“Looks like it. Why?”

He examined the fur on its upper leg carefully noticing a strange disruption in the fur’s design but after carefully eyeing it he realized why this little guy looked familiar.

He sighed, “I can’t believe you got caught you rascal. I guided you home, remember?”

Teague looked at Orrin with a raised eyebrow overhearing his one-way conversation.

“What are you talking about?”

“I caught this little rabbit in a snare the day that Yuki came to my island. I felt so bad for it that I had to let it go and help it home,” he told his partner.

After listening to this explanation, Teague started walking away reminding Orrin that it was time to get back to the hotel, so he went to follow only for a hand to grab his shoulder.

“Orrin, right?”

He looked back and saw the storeowner there but with a very serious face.

“I must warn you. You’re being followed.”

Orrin nodded, “I know.”

“There’s two of ‘em,” the man explained. “I noticed them watching you and your buddy rather closely the entire time you were here.”

“Yeah. I’m going to tell my trainer the moment I get back to her.”

“May be too late by then.”

The Fire blood looked at him surprised but then looked back at Teague who was getting farther away, so he shouted for him to come back. The moment his partner was at his side he looked back at the man seriously, suddenly feeling afraid.

“What do you mean?”

The guy sighed but then motioned his head towards the little indoor shop. The moment the two followed inside, he shut the door, locking it and blocked out any light from the outside.

“They look like mercenaries. Either that, or hired assassins. They talked for a split second and one of the went ahead so I think they’re setting up a trap.”

Teague was hit with sudden terror so he grabbed Orrin’s arm, shaking it panicked.

“Orrin…” he whined softly. “What’s going on…?”

The man sighed, running a hand through his hair, “Be honest with me. Have you stirred up trouble anywhere else? Like Torna?”

Orrin thought a moment.

“When we were in Torna…” He answered as he thought more. “Well, I confronted two guards who were being nasty and when Teague and me were in the hot spring some guy punched him in the face so I punched him… uh… then his buddies attacked me… Then when we were shopping for supplies they came back again but this time our trainer just made them go to sleep using the Comorian flower pollen… I suppose that would piss a few people off…”

The man sighed heavily again, but instead of saying he shouldn’t have done that, he simply shook his head as he continued.

“Now, I’m going to give you very clear instructions. When you go out into the street, since the crowds thin out at the next corner and the remaining stalker is following from about twelve yards, the very moment you turn that corner, and only when you turn, run as fast as you can to where ever you’re headed. Do whatever you can to make yourselves scarce. Turn extra corners if you have to. I’ll try to stall him by asking him to buy something but you need to get as far away as you can. I think the one left behind’s a sniper so be extra careful ‘bout that one. Now go. He might get suspicious if you’re out of sight too much longer.”

Orrin noticed Teague was staring towards him with fear in his eyes, asking what was going on, so he just quickly told him he’d explain at the hotel when they were with Yuki and not to look back no matter what. The man agreed with that so without much delay, the two of them walked out acting calm, but as they were leaving, the man shouted out it was nice doing business.

Orrin stroked the hare’s fur realizing the creature was also uptight but Teague was strangely able to keep a very happy grin on despite the frightening and incomplete news that someone was following them. Orrin, during this, also noticed where the one remaining of the two of the stalkers was, but that was right as they started turning the corner. The moment they were behind the cover of the building they jolted off.

They ran straight till they got to a turn and turned to the left then went straight again. A piercing boom sliced through the air, followed by a large crowd screaming but instead of turning to see what had happened, they both continued forward to the hotel. Another sharp blast was heard, only much closer, so Orrin pulled Teague roughly to the side in another direction only for another boom to go off and for something to spark against the stone with a clank where his head would’ve been right as the Fire Ghenyu turned the corner.

Teague was ahead by a foot or two, but it didn’t make a difference on how fast they both got back to the hotel.

They ran in, slamming the door closed, but even though Teague immediately laid down on his bed wearily, Orrin put down his furry friend then ran to the windows, closing the curtains hurriedly. Once he was sure no one would be able to tell someone was there, he plopped down on his own bed face down, letting out a loud, irritated groan.

“I hate life…”

“Just… don’t kill yourself…” Teague panted back.

The little hare crawled up to Orrin and sniffed his cheek so Orrin opened his eyes and lifted a hand up to pet it.

“I won’t, Teague. There wouldn’t be a point to it.”

It took a half hour or so, but eventually Yuki came in. The moment she laid eyes on them though, and noticed all the lights were off she raised an eyebrow at them, also wondering why there was a rabbit sitting on Orrin’s head. His face was shoved into the pillow, which told her something was wrong.

“Hello you two,” she told them casually. “What’s with the ‘dark’ atmosphere?”

“Ha, ha,” Orrin retorted sarcastically, pushing his head back up despite the bunny on it. “Yuki I know you probably wanna kill me by now, but there’s something I noticed the moment I got off the boat but neglected to tell you about.”

She sighed heavily, coming over and sitting on Teague’s bed where the white-haired man had sat up to make room for her, also staring at Orrin intently since he still needed an explanation too.

“You’ll probably kill me but…”

He then explained in detail everything he knew about the situation.

After he had finished explaining, Yuki had gone into meditation to supposedly send the Elders of the Black Wing a message, Teague was busily writing a paper about something, but Orrin had curled up in a corner with his hare—who he named Tigris— feeding her some lettuce.

“Eat up, girl,” he told her softly.

The moment she finished the leaf, she closed her eyes and put her ears back to sleep so Orrin smiled seeing this. But then a pair of feet stopped in front of him. He looked up and found Yuki giving a very serious look, so when she kneeled down in front of him he knew something bad was coming.

“Mr. Wikoli,” she started in a whisper. “I’m afraid two different people have hired assassins. Teague and I most likely won’t be killed, but you are their target. The Elders have ordered me to report to them immediately so I can get the proper help to protect you.”

He sighed, stroking Tigris’s back gently, but then averted his eyes to Teague still reading through books and jotting things down.

“What about Teague?” he whispered softly.

Yuki made an unsure noise, staying quiet, “I have to leave him with you. Is that okay?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

She gave a smile although it was easy to see concern in her expression, but then seeing his face darken and lower back down, she put a hand on his shoulder to get his attention. He slowly lifted his eyes back up.

“Mr. Wikoli,” she started again. “I won’t let anything happen to you. I promise, Orrin, I promise you’ll be okay.”

He made a small nod, ignoring the fact she said his first name, but then averted his eyes back down to the hare asleep in his arms.

She sighed, sitting beside him a moment and resting her chin on her arms as they laid on her knees, but after a moment of silence between them, she lifted her head back up and leaned against the wall.

“I know you don’t believe me when I say this but I really do want to keep you safe. It’s a scary situation for everyone who knows you,” She explained. Seeing his expression just continue to darken she stopped on that and looked at the rabbit. “Tigris you named it?”

“Her.”

She smiled amused for a moment, but then it fell back down into a serious look and she looked at the curtain.

“I must tell you something before I go.”

“Oh please, I’m dying to know,” Orrin replied sarcastically.

She gave him an unimpressed look then stared at Teague jotting away on the paper.

“I’m afraid the reason I’m unsure about Teague staying with you is because he can either protect you or expose you.”

Orrin looked at her confused, “Why would he expose me?”

She shook her head, looking at the ground, “He has a problem with tackling a problem seriously. He goes for the charge, and right before he butts head with it, he changes heart and takes out some toys to play. Understand?”

“You could just say he doesn’t take anything seriously,” Orrin grumbled.

She stood up ruffling his hair, but then handed him a weird-looking whistle that was made of a strange ivory. After he looked over the snail shaped tool, he raised an eyebrow at her asking in his expression what in the world it was.

She smiled, “That is an enchanted whistle. It’s called En Gorugos Narsule or if you like translations better, a Sorcerer Call.”

“Like a bird call? Only instead of calling birds, it calls for sorcerers?”

She nodded, “Now, only blow on that if there’s a real emergency. For example, if one of the assassins is about to kill you. I will be very angry if you call me because you want money for ice-cream.”

He gave her a stumped look, “Why would I call you for that?”

She sighed hopelessly and shook her head again, “I don’t know, but I nearly kicked Teague out of training for doing that to me. I was gone for a half hour in an important meeting at the Black Wing and mid-meeting I hear my whistle. I think something bad happened so I go to Teague as quickly as possible to help him out of what I thought to be a serious situation, and I find him with a pout and showing me an empty wallet in front of an ice-cream stand.”

Orrin snickered a bit, but she sighed heavily, rubbing her forehead flustered.

“I almost lost my job because I didn’t ‘specify’ to him what was a serious enough situation to use it, so that’s the only reason I got mad,” she explained. “Thankfully, my reputation of ninety nine percent of my trainees passing helped me weasel into keeping my job; the only reason I didn’t throw Teague to the lions.”

She gave Orrin a quick nod and said good-bye, reminding him that whistle was only for serious situations, but as she passed by Teague she explained quickly what was happening. In the middle of it he heard her say, “Teague, here’s your next lesson. Get serious when you need to be.” then left through teleportation.

“Did she give you the whistle?” Teague asked, taking a break from his studying.

He nodded, “Yeah, and you can’t use it.”

He gave an innocent pout then sighed, “She told you, didn’t she?”

“Yes. I don’t understand how you thought getting ice-cream was a serious situation but—”

He stopped seeing Teague start jotting stuff down quicker, now looking a bit upset, so the Fire blood looked down at the whistle in his hand then at the window where he noticed a shadow pass by.

He curled up into a tighter ball, holding his little Tigris close, not removing his eyes from the window.

“Orrin, wake up.”

He opened his eyes and found Teague kneeling in front of him with a curious expression, but realizing he had fallen asleep watching the window and Tigris was now on Teague’s head, he rubbed his eyes and stretched out a little.

“What’s up, Teague?” he asked as he stretched.

When he was done he listened as his partner told him someone was at the door and asking for him, but the person wasn’t familiar. Orrin immediately had a knot in his throat when his friend finished, because after asking if he first checked who it was through the peephole his idiot of a buddy said no.

“You idiot!” Orrin whispered angrily, taking Tigris back. “That could’ve been the assassin trying to figure out where I was! Are you stupid?!”

“Well… if he was then… he’d have done it already… I mean he came in for a glass of water.”

At this Orrin grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him up close in a threatening manner, a snarl on his face.

“You stupid, idiotic—!! I don’t know what to call you!” Orrin screamed, forgetting about his danger. “You first don’t check the peep hole to see if you know them! Then after endangering us severely by exposing us to a stranger, you let him in?! What’s is wrong with you?! What part of your brain isn’t working?!”

Teague’s eyes started filling with tears quickly.

“You can cry me a river but that doesn’t excuse you!” the Fire blood continued to yell. “Now we might be in extreme danger because you weren’t thinking!”

“I’m sorry, Orrin…” Teague whimpered, his eyes overflowing. “I didn’t realize… I… I’m sorry…”

“Sorry?! You think that cuts it?! We both might die now! Have you not grasped the idea that this is a serious situation?! You can’t be so laidback around so much danger!”

Mr. Doormat broke down completely, sobbing miserably, but then he tried taking the whistle from Orrin’s hand.

“Let go!” Orrin shouted, pulling away while trying to pry his hands off.

“No!” Teague argued, prying his hands back. “This is a serious situation and Master should be here!”

“If you call her again she’ll get mad!” Orrin stated ripping his hands away from him.

Tigris suddenly jolted under the nearby dresser cowering to the very back until she was against the wall, so while he held Teague back with his knee, he bent his head down to look under there to see what was wrong, but the moment he moved his head something ripped through the wall of the outside and pierced the wall where his head had just been. With that both of them froze stiff.

“Was… that… a gun…?” he heard Teague whisper.

Slowly, after staring at the floor wide-eyed a moment and short a breath, Orrin lifted the hand that had the whistle in it and put it to his lips. Right as he started to blow into it another thing pierced through the wall, but this time hit the whistle, knocking it away towards the door. This time instead of staying still, they both shot to their feet running towards the whistle, Teague being in the lead.

Right as he grabbed it someone knocked at the door so he immediately ran towards it grabbing the knob quickly.

“Teague! No!!” Orrin screamed.

He swung open the door anyway hoping it was Yuki but almost immediately a big man came in with a drawn sword so Teague put the whistle to his lips only to get his hand smacked, throwing the whistle across the floor again. The man took no time to grip his throat and pin him to the wall so Orrin ran at the whistle only for something to grab his ankle and have him fall over on his face. He pushed himself up a bit and looked back to see there was a strange green vine with large thorns wrapping around and stabbing into his lower legs.

“Orrin Wikoli?” the man asked Teague.

Being too scared to do anything but stare terrified, the man growled irritably. Just then another person came in and holding something that resembled a cross bow but had a strange metal barrel instead of a bow; a gun. He only glanced at Orrin before returning his attention to Teague. This man seemed leaner but not much else could be told because he was wearing a trench coat and hat, and the other larger man had on a hooded cape.

“I have restricted the “complication” from going anywhere,” the smaller person stated, giving the Fire Ghenyu one more glance. “So I assume that’s our target?”

The big guy chuckled, “This is him. He’s the only Ghenyu besides you in the room.”

“Kill him so I can go home.”

“I was ordered to do it slowly, though,” the man stated pressing the blade against the Water Ghenyu’s skin.

Orrin noticed Teague about to get his face slashed at so he looked up and found the whistle not too far away so he reached out as far as he could only to find it just out of reach. He looked back and found Teague with a deep cut running down his cheek and the big man’s sword at his chest so he turned his attention back to the ivory tool with panic. He reached out again extending his arm as far as he could, barely touching it with his fingertip. His lower legs were bleeding and in pain due to the thorns stabbing into his flesh and ripping them up the more he tried to move.

Finally after glancing back at Teague’s tear-drenched face, he snarled at the whistle—his eyes turning blood red—and he transformed only his arm into its True Form, grabbing the whistle with the moment’s extended reach, then right as they would’ve rammed the blade through the Water blood’s torso he put the tool to his lips and blew as hard as he could, creating a long, high pitched screech. Even though his ears hurt extravagantly and the two assassins had turned to him in surprised agony, hands clamped over their ears, he blew again twice as hard.

When they approached him to shut him up Orrin threw the whistle right past their heads so Teague caught it.

“Run, Teague! Run!!” he ordered him.

The Water Ghenyu immediately ran out blowing the whistle one last time, but although the big man went to run after him, the smaller one stopped him, staring closely at Orrin.

“Hold on.”

“What?! Our target is getting away!”

“No he isn’t.”

The big man was bewildered but before asking, he examined the man’s steady stare at the guy in front of him then looked at Orrin a bit surprised. But that expression melted fast and a glare grew, aimed at his partner.

“He’s not a Ghenyu!”

The smaller one growled, “You idiot. Don’t you have ears? He called the white-haired one “Teague”.”

The big man smirked, chuckling as he averted his attention back to their real target, “Sneaky. They did tell me you were a sly little weasel.”

“Well, they’re pretty stupid then,” Orrin retorted. “I would think they’d know the difference between a weasel and a Ghenyu.”

The big man growled but the other smiled in an amused manner and knelt down next to him.

“I wonder what you could be. You smell of Fire, Earth, Air and Water. I can even smell a bit of human. I guess no one will ever know for sure.”

Orrin’s eyes went wide seeing them both pulling out a weapon. As one lifted a sword and the other a gun to kill him, his eyes turned red and he transformed again, a wall of fire flaring at them violently, but seeing the vines had burnt off, he jumped out the window, shattering the glass and ignoring the four story drop below.

He reached the opposing building and leapt off from it back to the other barely dodging a bullet, then once he touched the first building again he leapt back off missing another bullet. After repeating that a couple more times he fell onto the streets, but the moment he did, the people around immediately screamed seeing Orrin, so he looked around confused, wondering why the streets weren’t empty. He then realized it was only sunset and curfew for most people was after it at eight.

He only could think on that for a split second because a bullet whizzed down and pierced his upper back on his shoulder so he screeched in pain, falling to the ground a moment, but then he pushed himself up and ran. Even though he was running as fast as he could and turning as much as possible, he found loud booms following and bullets dancing around him.

He felt himself losing his energy, so he quickly made his way towards the docks he had first come to the city in, but the moment he turned the corner, he saw the boat he knew Captain Brigard to be on was closing up. He ignored that, still zigzagging the aim of the bullets. Something pierced his leg and he bit down a screech, but upon reaching the boat, he leapt over the blockade keeping people off and landed clumsily on board. The crew people immediately got defensive seeing him, but he ignored that and panted heavily, trying to catch his breath enough to speak. As he did this he realized that blood was dripping from his mouth and that even though he had only been there a second, he already had a pool of blood forming around him.

“Captain… Brigard…?” he barely wisped but seeing them get even more defensive he tried again. “Is… Captain… here…?”

“Orrin!” someone shouted.

He saw someone run up to him from behind the men and hug him, which he figured was his buddy and partner, but he couldn’t see if it was him for sure since his vision was going out on him.

“Teague… the whistle…?”

“Y-You need it?”

“Blow… Call… Yuki….”

He fell over, losing his energy, but Teague immediately started blowing like crazy on the ivory relic. The crewmen by now were whispering in confusion, one fetching the Captain, but the blockade blew up and there in the entryway were the two assassins, both looking really pissed off. Upon seeing Teague with their target, they smirked.

“I see our enemy is buddies with the dear Captain.”

The men immediately ran down deck leaving Teague and Orrin alone with the assassins, but the two immediately charged at them ready to kill. Teague cowered, covering his head with his arms and balling up, but Orrin stood up weakly, staring at them coming strangely lacking panic in his heart, which confused himself.

As soon as the enemy reached the two trainees, they swung their weapons down upon their heads… only to get blown back. Before he knew it, Orrin was watching someone totally beat the living snot out of them then use some sort of spell to throw them into the water.

Once taken care of, the person came up to Orrin and put a gentle hand on his forehead, rubbing his scales lovingly.

“Lightning of Earth and Air, reenergize.”

Hearing Yuki’s voice, he closed his eyes as he let her use a powerful spell to give him back energy, and after only a couple seconds, he opened his eyes again to find his vision cleared and Yuki smiling, although worry was filling her eyes.

“See? You’ll be okay,” she reminded him. “Even if you have been shot fourteen times.”

“Fourteen? I thought only twice…”

She seemed surprised but then shook her head, “No, two to your left leg, three to your right leg, one to your right arm, two to your left arm, and six to your back. That’s fourteen.”

He felt his energy leaving quickly again, so he sat down on the ground, reverting to human form, but then Teague came up to her trembling.

“A-Are we safe…?”

She shook her head, but then a dragon landed beside her that was about the size of a bunk bed in both height and size. It had laid back horns and strange green eyes that contrasted the bright red scales, but Orrin noticed it staring directly at him.

She stroked its neck, grabbing the dragon’s attention, but Yuki smiled at the two of her trainees.

“This is Wrean, my loyal friend who I’ve known since childhood. He’s willing this time to lend us a hand in transportation.”

“Don’t expect it all the time, Yukiko,” he added.

“I know. Well, c’mon. We need to get going before those two come back to get you,” she finished, climbing onto the beast’s back.

Teague quickly followed her onto his back since he didn’t want to deal with the assassins anymore, but Orrin didn’t move so they watched him confused, except for the dragon who simply stared.

“Are you waiting for me to take off to follow?” Wrean asked.

Orrin looked at the ground darkly.

“Mr. Wikoli,” Yuki stated. “Get on.”

He sighed pushing himself slowly to his feet and biting his lip a moment as he adjusted to the pain then limped up to the beast’s side. With some help from Teague and his trainer, he managed to get up onto his back.

Wrean kicked off before opening his wings and thrusting them down, but it took no time for him to plummet up into the air and start at a fast speed inland towards the sunset. Teague was holding onto Orrin tightly since that’s who was in front but neither Orrin nor Yuki were nervous. Yuki kept her eyes ahead and Orrin had his head tilted back and eyes close like he was relaxing.

“O-Orrin! How can you be so calm being so high up?!” Teague asked.

Orrin simply shrugged not shifting position, but right after that was said, Yuki saw Wrean giving a strange stare towards her second acquired trainee.

“Wrean? Something the matter?” she questioned, giving a warning stare.

The dragon gave her a second’s glance before looking up ahead. “Nothing.”

“What about Tigris?”

She looked at Orrin a moment, staying silent but then she sighed, “The rabbit? We’ll go back to get her later.”

“So where are we going?” Orrin asked, feeling his conscious fading.

“To the Black Wing.”