Lonna

  I charged into the forest, at top speed. My lungs were working overtime just to draw breath, and my head was pounding rapidly in time with my heart. My entire body was screaming at me to slow down, but I didn’t pay it any mind. The scroll of parchment I had clutched against my chest gave me all the motivation I needed to push past the pain, and keep running at top speed.

  Leaves, twigs, and branches crunched beneath my boots, loud enough to alert the entire forest of my presence. It was a pretty shameful showing for a girl who took pride in her stealth, but at the moment I didn’t care about that.

  The forest became denser as I went deeper. The trees’ trunks made it impossible to travel in a straight line and their branches blocked out the moon’s light. The darkness wasn’t much of an obstacle for me, but the trees themselves were becoming a problem. I was wasting too much time and energy going around them. I seriously wanted to bst them out of my way but I had to hold back. Inviting an investigation like that would be problematic, considering the trail I’d been leaving. And even worse, I'd have to listen to another of my brother's lectures about ‘being reckless.’ Ugh.

  Seeing no other choice, I gave in to my body’s protests and slowed. Unfortunately, my body was maybe a little more upset with me than I thought - the second I lost momentum, my legs started to wobble, and I ended up falling on my ass.

  “Rootrot!” I cursed, crossing my arms and gring down at my legs. My body in general was grateful for the break, but I definitely could have kept going if not for my traitorous lower limbs.

  Though now that I was actually looking around, I must have made it pretty deep into the forest. Deep enough for beasts to roam, monsters to hide, and folks to get lost. For someone like me, who could barely even navigate a city on her own, being here was practically a death sentence. …Good thing I left a trail for my brother to follow! Hopefully, Talith wouldn’t scold me if I acted like it was all part of the pn.

  Anyway, if I was this far in, I could probably just go ahead and start the casting process. I started with a minor healing spell - big enough to get me back on my feet, but small enough that I could recover the spent Breath while preparing for the main event. Once that spell had run its course, I unfurled the scroll I was carrying and id it ft on the forest floor, taking a moment to familiarize myself with the scroll. I already knew what sort of spell it was - it wasn’t like I’d stolen the thing without at least skimming it, or anything. I just hadn’t been able to rex enough to give it my full attention. Sneaking around the castle wasn’t exactly my idea of a leisurely activity.

  It was more like… Whatever the opposite of a leisure activity was? Or would that just be work? I mean, thievery was technically a sort of work, I guess, even if it wasn’t what I’d call a normal job, but… Ah, whatever, I could think more on that ter. Or better yet never! But definitely not right now, or I’d end up burning something out of sheer irritation. Which really wasn’t a good idea when I was in a forest with a precious spell scroll!

  Speaking of which, I still needed to actually read the damn thing. Starting with the introduction…

  You who seeks to summon a heroine from another realm, read carefully and know well the nature of this spell.

  The call you are about to make is one not of words, but of emotion, and it shall be responded to in kind. There are many types of heroines, but only one will answer your summons - the one who best resonates with your desires. Know your heart well, for the bond you are about to make cannot be shattered, or repced, for so long as you both live.

  Whether you came across this scroll by chance or by design, I wish you luck in this endeavor. May your yearning bring about a better world.

  …Alright. Pretty standard dramatic speech. Spell-crafters always took their work way too seriously. Though maybe this time it was warranted? Summoning a heroine from another world was a pretty big deal. As long as it worked, anyway…

  Unfortunately, I had no way of knowing whether it would without trying the thing. The spell circle beneath the introduction might as well have been gibberish for all the good it did me. I was better than most when it came to the magic tongues. Any Magi worth their salt would have familiarized themselves in two or three of them, but I was fluent in all of them and could interweave them on the fly.

  …But only verbally. For some reason, the words came easily to me, but the runes that went with them just refused to stick in my head. I struggled to read even the simplest spells, and this one? This one was the most complicated I’d ever seen. Besides the main circle, there were four subcircles, meant to add further context to the various runes - and another two sub-sub-circles on top! Even more ridiculous, it was made with five runic systems! Including dragon runes! What sort of blighted idiot put those in a spell? That went beyond flirting with danger - it was like they were kissing it on the lips!

  Not that it was going to stop me from casting the spell or anything. I didn’t need to be able to read the spell - or like it - to make use of it. Though I guess saying that was easier said than done - I needed to clear out some space on the forest floor to copy the runes, since I didn’t want to burn up the scroll. Then I’d have to actually copy them - though that was the easiest part, since I could just sort of burn them into the ground with some highly focused light magic. The real problem was going to be getting rid of all the dirt and twigs - not to mention fttening the forest floor. That was going to use up a lot of Breath.

  …Or some good old fashioned physical work. And lucky me, I could already hear a big, strong worker-type person making his way through the forest, and grumbling about me the whole damn way.

  I’d give him something to really grumble about, soon enough!

  ***

  Talith***

  I cursed my rotten rooted sister under my breath as I picked up yet another branch, and threw it deeper into the forest.

  “I think we’re going to need to clean up a bit more,” Lonna said. “Getting this right is going to require as big an area as we can manage… Don’t suppose you could uproot a tree or two, could you?”

  I didn’t reply. I just narrowed my eyes at her, and waited a moment or two for her to get the message before moving back to my work.

  “Alright, alright, I’ll make it smaller,” she muttered, in response. “I guess I can just be a bit more compact with the writing, and it’ll be fine.”

  I grunted, clearing out the st of the twigs. Lonna had - at my insistence - worked on clearing up the leaves, too, so all that was left was fttening the area. An easy trick for a Lapsi like me - I just had to pound the earth ft, more or less. Though, that said…

  “I still think this is a terrible idea.”

  “Don’t you get bored of repeating yourself?” Lonna asked. “You said that about my st two pns, too.”

  “No. Coming back to Ife was a bad idea,” I replied. “Stealing from the Queen was a stupid idea. This? This right here is what we call a terrible idea. You don’t even know how this damn spell works!”

  “I know it’ll bring me the Heroine,” Lonna replied, rolling her eyes. “Pretty much all I need to know. Besides, if you didn’t want me to cast the spell, you should have stopped me from stealing it.”

  “I tried!” I pointed out. “I told you it was a bad idea! I pleaded with you not to do it! You even promised to think about it - but then you went and snuck out to do it anyway! Next thing I knew, I was being dragged out of bed in the middle of the night to summon your damn Heroine.”

  “Well, maybe if you’d chained me down like you threatened to do, we wouldn’t be here!”

  “You… that’s… Are you saying you want me to chain you down the next time you have a dumb ass idea?”

  “No,” Lonna said. “I’m saying you’re too much of a baby to even consider fighting me head on, and that you should just give up on trying to stop me from saving the world! Just think of it as Queen Sorissa giving me a birthday gift, alright?”

  I didn’t say anything. Mostly because I had no clue what the fuck to say to that nonsense. Lonna was obsessed with this the Heroine - the supposed woman of prophecy who’d be able to take down the evil queen. Obsessed enough to risk death breaking into Sorissa’s castle in order to steal what must have been a highly guarded scroll.

  “What sort of person do you think the Heroine will be, anyways?” Lonna asked, after a moment of silence.

  I didn’t reply, preferring to get to work fttening the ground. Lonna wasn’t exactly great at taking hints, though, so she just continued to natter on.

  “She’s probably super strong, and super kind - someone who really cares, you know? I bet she takes on tyrants for fun!”

  I grunted, but didn’t reply. I wanted to focus on my work, not my crazy sister and her insane pns. Pns that might get her killed, seeing as how we had no idea how much power this spell would take.

  Even if she succeeded, what then? Would she join the Heroine for her fight? Stand by her side when the queen was struck down? Watch the light fade from Sorissa’s eyes?

  “You know, you don’t have to be the one to do this you know.” I didn’t mean to say it. The words just sort of spilled out before I could stop myself.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Lonna demanded, gring at me. The expected reaction. The exact reason I hadn’t wanted to open my mouth to begin with. But now that I had…

  “I mean that you already got the scroll. Stole something nobody else could have, in your words. You don’t have to be the one to actually use it, though. Just like you don’t have to join the fight. I know you still care, deep down, about-”

  “I cared about Mom,” Lonna interrupted. “So go ahead and say what you were going to say. I dare you.”

  “...Mom would have wanted us to stay safe,” I replied. Not that I could even look Lonna in the eyes while I said it.

  “We’ll be safe once Sorissa’s dead,” she replied. “Now hurry up and ftten the ground so I can get to work. This is going to take a bit.”

  I grunted in reply, deciding to focus on the work and just… get things over with.

  “I wonder what she’ll be like,” Lonna said, not to me but to herself. “I bet she’ll be hot…”

  ***

  David***

  Arching my back, and stretching up towards the ceiling, I did my best to shake off the stiffness that came from sitting too long in one pce. The drawing I’d been working on, a sketch of a dragon fruit, had taken a lot longer than I’d expected it to. Though I guess a big part of that was how long I’d spent on research. I mean, sure, the teacher only asked us to sketch a fruit, but then he went and assigned me a dragon fruit. Call me a perfectionist, but I wasn’t going to draw anything that exotic without some reference materials. So, I’d done the only reasonable thing and looked them up - which… somehow led to me reading everything about them, from their growth cycle to their taste. I’d probably have gone out and eaten one if I could have, but… well, I was sort of strapped for cash. Plus, I didn’t have a car and the grocery store was a pretty long walk…

  So yeah. Somehow, my simplest assignment turned into three hours of research as I absorbed everything I could about the pnt’s biology. The downside of being a pnt nerd, I guess? I mean, I liked drawing, but botany called to me like nothing else.

  Maybe I should have been a bit more careful with how I spent my time though? Seeing as how even now that I was done with the sketch, I still had a few hundred pages of reading to do for my other csses, as well.

  Well, whatever! It was Friday. I could afford to take some time off. Maybe nap? Though that would probably turn into sleeping through the night… Unless I napped in my chair, maybe? I’d done it plenty of times before - though usually by accident - and I always woke up after a few hours. I was also usually pretty sore afterwards, though.

  Actually, hadn’t I put some undry in the washing machine before I left? I was pretty damn sure I had, which meant it was probably finished… like, two hours ago? Not exactly ideal. Also kinda rude, since someone else might need to use the washing machine.

  Well, there was nothing for it but to go get it! Maybe I’d take some time to py on my ptop, after? Maybe I’d even stay up to eleven! I mean, it was the weekend…

  “I don’t get it, man?” came a voice, causing me to freeze in pce.

  Not because I didn’t recognize it - I did, which was sort of the problem. It was my assigned roommate’s voice, and it was coming from the kitchen. In fact, now that I was actually listening, I could hear the faint sound of bottles clinking against each other as Anthony rummaged through the fridge.

  You know, the fridge I stocked, and which he treated as communal property? Something I really needed to bring up, one day… I mean, it really wasn’t cool! But… well… Confrontation hard?

  “Why can’t I get id? I thought college was supposed to be a smorgasbord of horny chicks!”

  “...Maybe it’s because you say stuff like that…?” I muttered. I thought I was speaking low enough to avoid being heard - which is why I nearly had a heart attack when Anthony turned around.

  “You say something, man?” he asked, tapping the gray earpiece he was wearing. “I’m on the phone.”

  “I…” I swallowed, taking a deep breath. I hadn’t meant to be heard, but… Maybe I should have? I mean, this was my chance to stand up against Anthony, not only for the sake of all the women on campus who weren’t there to defend themselvers, but for my own sake as well.

  With that in mind, I opened his mouth, took a deep breath… and looked away, so that Anthony wouldn’t see the scowl I was making. “...I said I need to go check on my undry.”

  “Ooooookay? You gonna check in on me about your bathroom breaks, too?”

  “Sorry…” I muttered, moving towards the door.

  Anthony didn’t reply. At least not to me. He just went back to talking to his friend, and by the time I actually made it out of the room I’d already heard a few disgusting theories on why the ‘girls’ on campus weren’t into ‘real men.’

  I didn’t say anything, though. I didn’t have the courage to. Instead, I just made my way towards the stairwell, and down to the basement. Of course, considering the fact that I lived on the third floor, there was plenty of time for me to think about everything I’d heard and how little I’d said the whole way down… Anthony was terrible, but so long as I cked the courage to stand up to him when he said shit about women I wasn’t sure I was that much better…

  I guess thoughts like that were why it didn’t take me all that long to reach the basement in the end - trying to run away from them gave me a real boost of speed. It also cost me most of my admittedly cking stamina, leaving me out of breath and leaning against the washing machines.

  Looking both ways to make sure nobody was watching, I reached up and wrapped a few strands of my hair around my finger, before tugging hard enough to hurt. It was a bad habit of mine - one my Mother was always getting on my case about - but it honestly did a lot to calm me down, and help me think. Maybe because it was like… transting my mental anguish into the physical? I didn’t know. I’d only ever taken one psych css. I just knew that it helped - made my problems feel small and insignificant, rather than complicated messes I couldn’t put words to.

  Today, it wasn’t helping much.

  “...I'll say something,” I muttered to myself. “Next time, I'll definitely say something.” You gotta be the kind of person you want to see in the world, after all.

  With that decided - or at least dealt with to the point where I could ignore the matter - I pushed myself upright and twisted around to get a good look at the washing machine. Except, when I opened it, I quickly realized that something was… off. I mean, it was sort of hard to tell with the clothes all pstered against the side of the washing machine, but I was pretty sure I didn’t own as much pink as I was seeing here.

  Reaching in to grab something only proved the matter, as what came out wasn’t a teeshirt but rather a pink bra.

  .“This… Is definitely not mine,” I muttered, staring down into the washing machine. Something flickered at the edge of my vision - light? But I was a little distracted trying to figure out what had happened to my clothes. “Did someone move them?” I wondered, gncing at the bra in my hand.

  With a shrug, I moved to toss it back into the washing machine - but before I could let it go, the light I’d half-noticed earlier suddenly engulfed me, causing me to cover my eyes.

  A moment ter, the light cleared, but… I was already gone.

  EmilieEmber