Dinner

Scarlet and Kenny were seated at the table.

“How was it?” Scarlet asked me.

“It hurt,” I admitted. “And now I have two scars on my back.”

“Did you have to take of your shirt?” Kenny suddenly demanded.

“Yes,” I said slowly.

Danny sighed. “Kenny, I am not someone who would fall for a girl. You know that.”

That cleared up my confusion. “You’re jealous,” I declared.

Kenny blushed slightly, which I had never seen him do. I nearly burst out into giggles at the sight of that. “Maybe I was.” He scowled. “Just a little.”

“You’re so overprotective,” Scarlet said. “Danny’s not a little kid.”

Kenny had her by the front of her shirt before she could blink. “Did you just call me overprotective?”

Oh, great. Scarlet had touched the touchiest part of Kenny’s personality. And of course, she wasn’t going to back down. She relished a fight, no matter who it was with.

“Yeah, I did,” Scarlet said. “Just because your brother died doesn’t mean you have to be so bossy.” Kenny pulled back his fist, and Scarlet closed her eyes when I grabbed both of their heads and smashed them together.

“What’s gotten into you two?” I snarled. This would have happened any day of the week, but I had to act like this. It was the only way they would feel remotely sorry. “You’re behaving like two-year-olds!”

Instantly, they both looked ashamed. And I felt horrible about reprimanding them.

“I’m sorry,” Scarlet muttered. “I shouldn’t have mentioned your brother.”

“So am I,” Kenny said. “I shouldn’t have lost my temper.”

“You two looked like five-year-olds,” Nick said from a doorway. He walked forward, conjured a couch, and plopped into it. “Nathan said that he’s staying at Dragonside for a few weeks. There are a few kinks to be worked out with people wanting to cross the border.”

I nodded. “Thanks for telling me,” I said. Nick nodded.

“What did your grandpa say?” Danny asked me.

“He told me that we should hurry up and pick a side,” I said.

Danny frowned. “Really?”

“That was basically the point he was trying to make,” I said nonchalantly.

“Don’t try to lie to us,” Nick said. “What else did he say?”

Inwardly, I cursed at the way that they could read me, even though I didn’t give anything away. “He’s dying,” I said shortly. “He has been for some time now. Today, he decided to formally tell me.”

“And?” Nick didn’t press for any details about Grandpa.

“He wants me to meet him again tomorrow,” I said. “I have no idea why.”

“When?’ Scarlet asked.

“Same time,” I said. “Too much time to not do anything, and too little time to do something.” I sighed. “He really knows how to make things troublesome.” Scarlet and Kenny glanced at each other. “What?” I demanded. They said nothing. “Tell me,” I growled.

“Um, we sensed something this afternoon,” Kenny began.

“We all did,” Nick cut in. “Only Lords can’t sense it.”

That made me uneasy. What was it? There was something in this world that a Lord couldn’t detect?

“Tell me,” I repeated.

“Another Lord has been summoned into this world,” Danny blurted out.

I frowned. “Summoned?”

Danny made some random gesture. “The person originally housing its soul was killed, and the soul was stolen.”

“Are you sure?” I said. Danny nodded.

“That was this morning,” Scarlet said. “There was another one. On top of that, a second soul entered the same person. How can you not feel that?”

I was dumbfounded. Two souls of a Lord in one person, and they hadn’t died from one? And I couldn’t sense it?

“And the Spirits are acting weird,” Kenny finished up. “I visited them last night. They all seemed rather edgy.”

My eyes narrowed. This was not good, especially with a war brewing.

“We need to look into that,” I said.

“And then another soul was taken. It wasn’t put in the same person, but it was definitely put into someone,” Scarlet added.

I buried my head in my hands. “Wonderful,” I groaned. I looked back up. “This is taking immediate priority. Alert all of the other groups. We need to find these people.” I bit back a yawn. I hated wars, especially the beginning and end, where things were just so tangled up that they were a mess, and no one could make sense out of it.

“That’s probably why your grandpa wants to see you tomorrow,” Danny said.

“He could have just told me today,” I muttered. “Hey, what are we having for dinner?”

“We have decided to make this dinner special and go out for it,” Scarlet explained. “In honor of the end of the war, and the beginning of a new one.”

I frowned. “Are you sure that’s safe? We’re all wanted, and our auras are bound to attract attention.” My voice trailed off as Scarlet glared at me.

“Or you can just stay home and not take any risks,” she said.

“Which we know is not like you,” Kenny said.

I scowled. “Is Pablo coming?”

“No,” Kenny said. “Still hung up on Annie.”

“We all miss her, what does he not understand?” Nick muttered.

“Give him some time,” Danny said. “An adjustment like that doesn’t come easy.”

“Whatever,” Nick muttered.

“Shall we leave, then?” Scarlet said.

I stared at her. “Are you serious? In these clothes? To a restaurant? No way! Let me go change.”

Nick sighed. “Looks like we’re not getting dinner tonight.” I smacked his head on the way to my room. In my room, I pulled out so many dresses that everything in my room was covered.  Finally, I decided on a simple black strapless dress going all the way to the floor. I shook my hair out of my ponytail, put a pair of black and silver teardrop earrings in. After making my make-up perfect, I chose black heels and carefully hid a small knife in the folds of my dress. Finally comes the perfume. I walked out. Everyone else was ready. Thank goodness they had chosen to not look like street rabble.

“Not bad,” Nick said.

“Not bad?” I demanded.

Nick winced. “I mean, pretty good.”

“He means drop dead beautiful.” Kenny grinned at Nick’s mistake.

I swept past him. “Not bad yourself.” He really didn’t look that bad. Even more girls would fall for Nick when he’s wearing a suit, Scarlet looked gorgeous in a red dress to match her hair as well as her name. Kenny and Danny were dressed in suits as well.

“How are we getting there?” I asked.

“Like normal people,” Danny said. “With horses.”

I eyed him carefully. “This isn’t a road trip, right?”

“Relax,” Danny said. “We’ll reach there in thirty minutes.” We walked outside.

“Wait,” Scarlet said. “We don’t have horses.”

“I do,” I said. I put two fingers in my mouth and whistled. Diabla came soaring out of the sky and landed on the ground, where she turned into a black horse with glowing amber eyes.

“Lady Dragon,” Diabla said.

I grinned at her and turned around. “See?”

“Show off,” Kenny muttered. Nick and Danny did the same thing as me, and Scarlet and Danny made horses from their aura. We rode up a path running along the side of the cliff and rode through the woods. After a while, we reached the main road and began to ride towards the city. Right before we passed through the gates, I tugged on Diabla’s reigns sharply. Danny nearly rode into me.

“Shadow, what’s wrong?” His voice trailed off towards the end as he looked up where I was looking. There were five crosses hammered into the ground in front of us. There were people hammered to each one. We stared at them in shock. A guard saw us.

“That’s the warning!” He told us. “Those were mages that were causing a ruckus in the city! Snake didn’t like it, so he had the executed!”

“I thought that Snake isn’t the ruler,” I said.

“Not anymore,” the guard said. “Snake has assumed power.”

“What do you think of him?” Nick suddenly asked.

The guard wasn’t offended. “Just between us, Mortem better hurry up and come back to get rid of him. So many people are leaving, so many people are being killed. He’s a dictator, but unlike Dragon, he’s already got the whole world in his grip. He’s targeting mages. You had that look about you, like you were mages. Consider this your warning. The soldiers inside the city are extremely loyal to Snake. One wrong word, and you’re gone.”

I nodded. “Thank you for the warning,” I said. The guard nodded, and opened the gates for us. Before we rode in, I looked back, and prayed quickly and silently for the people on the crosses. The one in the middle nearly made me sick. It was Darren, the cannibal who led the reinforcements when we were fighting Pollux.

“Keep riding,” Nick muttered. “Don’t let them know about anything.”

I urged Diabla forward and fell into step next to Nick. “You recognized him, didn’t you?” Nick said nothing, but I knew that he was hurting the most. He had recruited Darren, after all.

We left our horses at a small inn right in front of the gates. Horses weren’t allowed in the city. After following Scarlet, we reached a very expensive and upscale restaurant.

“Do we have enough cash for this?” I asked.

“Relax,” Danny said. “Scarlet and I got it covered.” We were walking in, but something caught my eye. They were wanted posters, taped to the side of a building. I walked over and caught one that was fluttering in the wind.

It was for all of Mortem. Anybody who was affiliated with Mortem had a bounty on their heads. I looked all the way down, and found that our names had been listed separately. My bounty made my jaw drop. Did they think that I was that dangerous?

I walked back to Nick and showed his the poster. He stared at it, then folded in neatly and put it in his jacket’s pocket.

“Coming here was a mistake,” I murmured to him, smiling at him as if we were a couple simply flirting with each other.

“If trouble comes, then we run,” Nick said. “It’s as simple as that.” I nodded. Danny got our table. It was on the highest floor of the building. Everything below us looked like something out of a doll house. The city itself was beautiful, with wide streets, fountains, parks, shining lights, and perfect houses. But the divide between the rich and the poor was all too clear. It was like someone had drawn a line to divide them. On the poor side, it was anything but beautiful. Houses were crammed together, the roads weren’t paved, there was barely any green space, and it looked far dirtier than the side we were on. I tore my attention away from the outside to my menu.

Our waiter seemed rather nervous. “How did you get that?” He suddenly blurted out to Scarlet, pointing at her leg.

Scarlet allowed a flirtatious smile to flit across her face. “You were looking at my legs?” She purred. The waiter blushed, and she roared with laughter. “Don’t worry about how I got it. That’s for me to know.” The waiter nodded and left our table.

“You didn’t have to be so mean,” I told Scarlet.

“What? It was funny. Did you see him blush?” Scarlet took a sip of her water, and I rolled my eyes. We ordered our food and were eating.

“Why is it that fine dining is considered eating an anorexic amount of food for a high price?” Danny asked, examining his miniscule portion of food.

“Because that’s what it’s called,” Scarlet said. “That question made absolutely no sense.” They continued to bicker when I felt something was off. I frowned as I turned to look out the window. There was nothing, but as soon as I turned back to eating my food, I saw a dark shape out of the corner of my eye.

“What’s wrong?” Danny asked in a nonchalant voice. That was the first rule of being a world class soldier. If something was wrong, don’t let it show.

“I thought I saw something.” I answered back as if we were having a conversation.

Scarlet snickered. “I can sense something.”

“It’s probably bounty hunters,” Nick said as he took a bite of his food.

“Should we leave?” Danny asked.

“No,” I said. “It might be nothing that big. Keep eating like no-“ My words were cut off when the window next to us exploded, showering us with glass. We were thrown backwards, but we were unharmed except for a few cuts. The other people in the restaurant ran out screaming. Through the blasted open window, several people jumped through, dressed completely in black with masks, so their faces were hidden.

One stepped out in front of the others. He had a black mask with silver lines painted all over it. It reminded me of the mask of the Demon Lord. “Mortem.” He had a deep voice. “Do not resist capture. Come with us, and we will not hurt you.”