Young Writers Society

Author's Note: When I was imagining how this chapter would go, I didn't expect it to be so cute and fluffy! But here I am, now thoroughly pleased with how much cuteness I was able to stuff into one chapter segment. I do think the second part came out better than the first, but I guess I'll just have to see what you guys think. <3

Words: 1,622

Last Line(s): Orpheus turned around, biting his lip as he started heading towards the doors. “I'm going to my quarters now. If you want to talk about Cassandra, I'll be there.” He glanced over his shoulder for the briefest of the moments, then turned his attention back to what was in front of him. “But if it's about me learning how to be royalty, I don't want to talk. I never signed up to become Telorum's new king when I started living here.”

He stormed off into the hallway, cutting off the sigh leaving Kartiel's lips with the slamming of the throne room's doors.

Chapter 10

Cass took a deep, unsteady breath and held her locket close to her chest. The metal was cool to the touch, but she could feel a warmth dancing across her skin as she thought back to her conversation with Aldonius. He must have known that she was his contracted; he would have recognized the signs with his superior knowledge. And even though they barely knew each other, and even though she didn't even really know what being someone's contracted entailed, realizing that hurt. If he had been so fond of the idea of contracts being a sign of a trust, why hadn't he trusted her with that information? 

“Cassie,” Aspen's voice suddenly called out. Cass looked away from the part of the wall she was blankly staring at, gaze refocusing as she felt Aspen grab onto her free hand and give it a tight squeeze. When she looked over at her best friend, her brows were knotted in worry—but she gave Cass a smile despite this. “What's wrong?” 

“I...I...” She took another deep breath, thought over what she wanted to say, and tried to tell Aspen as concisely as possible while not showing how upset she was. “I figured out who my contracted is.”

Her face immediately fell.

“It's Aldonius, isn't it?” she asked.

Her eyes widened. “How-How did you know?"

“I know how you are, Cassie,” she answered, giving her a small smile. She gave her hand another tight squeeze. “You weren't acting like you normally do around other people when you were around him, and he knew too much about contracts not to have one himself.”

The warmth grew in intensity, and she felt something moving around at her feet. “He lied to me, Aspen,” she whispered. Her eyes were beginning to grow moist, so she furiously tried to blink away the tears obscuring her vision. “He-He pretended that he didn't know who my contracted was. Does that-does that mean that he doesn't want to make a contract with someone like me?”

The smile faded. After a moment passed, Aspen bridged the little distance that remained between the two of them and pulled her into an embrace. It was only when she noticed Aspen stepping over something out of the corner of her eye that she realized why Aspen had been so quick to comfort her.

The darkness had returned.

It had burst from the ground in wild little strands, and grew in number and size as a jolt of terror shot through her. Her gaze glanced over at Lira. She had grown pale, and Cass immediately knew that she was the one at fault. The darkness shot up a little higher, brushing up against her and Aspen's knees. Lira was scared of her. She was scared of her. Aldonius's words didn't matter when someone was fearing her—how could her magic ever be a good thing when it made Lira look at her like that?

A tear rolled down her cheek.

Aspen's grip on her tightened. “It'll be okay,” she soothingly said, her hand beginning to rub Cass' back as she spoke. “You can't jump to conclusions about Aldonius just yet. You don't even know his last name. We'll figure everything out eventually. I promise.”

The darkness began to steady.

Aspen leaned back ever so slightly and looked right into Cass's moist eyes. Removing one hand from their embrace, she went to wipe the tears rolling down Cass's face with her wrist. “And if I was Aldonius, I would be thanking my lucky stars for ending up with you as my contracted.”

“R-Really?”

Warmth rose to her cheeks as Aspen drew her hand away, and her heart gave a little flutter when she received another reassuring smile. She felt deeply embarrassed that Aspen was seeing her cry again, but she knew that wasn't really the reason for the smile. 

“Yeah,” Aspen confirmed with a nod, her voice soft and gentle. She looked like she wanted to say more, but then she turned her head away and hurriedly limped over to where Lira was. 

Cass took her hand off of her locket and felt her warm cheek; the darkness cascaded to the ground in miniature, calm waves before receding back into the nothingness.

“Hey, Lira?” she asked. “Cassie and I are really tired. Is there any place we could sleep for the night?”

Lira glanced over at Cass, giving a hesitant nod in response as she turned her attention back to Aspen. “We have some guest rooms.” Her hand trembled at her side, but she steadied it when she saw how Cass was watching it. “Do you want to share a room, or do you need two separate ones?”

Aspen frowned. “Why would we-Oh. We're, uh, not that close. We're just two really close best friends.” She nervously rubbed the back of her neck. “That's all.” 

Cass's face immediately turned an even darker shade of red as understanding dawned on her, and she frantically nodded in agreement. 

A ghost of a smile flickered across Lira's lips.

“Two rooms, then.”

xXx

She rushed through the flowering bushes, a giggle threatening to break free as her little bare feet dug into moist dirt. She bit her lip, fangs breaking through skin; she couldn't laugh. Not now! If she so much as uttered a sound, she'd be discovered, and the hours she had spent searching for the perfect hiding spot would be for nothing. It was of the utmost importance that she take this game seriously.

“I'll find you eventually, little star,” Daddy called out.

Even though her dad was great at seeking, she was even better at hiding. She dove behind a bush just as he was about to catch up, and waited until a minute had passed before running back into the plants that towered above her. She grabbed onto the necklace around her chest and held it tightly in her pudgy fingers. Mommy was going to get mad that she got her clothes dirty again, but then she would be proud of her for hiding so well.

She was sure of it!

She scanned the area for her tree. It had to be close by. She remembered smelling the sweet flowers when she had been looking for it earlier today, and they had almost made her sneeze. She wrinkled her nose. She was almost going to sneeze now, but wisely parted away the flowers and went darting through them until she reached the biggest tree of them all.

She dug through the pile of magenta and violet leaves at its base, hurriedly trying to reach bottom before Daddy came back around. When the hole underneath was finally revealed, she plopped herself down in it and promptly covered herself with large armful after large armful of leaves. 

Then she sat and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Just as she was starting get fidgety, she heard Daddy approaching her hiding spot. She held her breath as his voice cut through the night's silence; now being quiet counted even more than before. He started to call out her name as he walked back and forth in front of the tree trunk. A giggle finally broke free after he walked past for the fifth time.

A pair of warm hands burst through her carefully gathered pile of leaves, pulling her out from the hole underneath the trunk that she had spent her entire afternoon digging with the shovel she had gotten from the gardener. 

“Oof,” Daddy said, tickling her as he twirled her around in the air. “You're getting heavy! Someday soon you'll be picking me up instead of the other way around.” 

She giggled even harder and louder, the stars spinning and blurring into white lines all around her. She reached a muddy hand up towards it, eagerly grasping for something she couldn't yet reach. “I want to touch the sky, Daddy,” she declared. 

He held her against his chest. “You'll have to wait a little bit for that, my little star,” he said, affectionately tousling her hair. 

She frowned in response. “But I want to now!” When he put her down on the ground, she stubbornly stayed by him and tugged on the bottom of his pristine shirt. “Teach me how to fly. Please, please please!” 

He crouched down next to her. “I'm sorry, but only Mommy can teach you that.”

Her frown deepened, only to be quickly replaced by an excited smile as she ran around his legs “Then Mommy can come out and teach me!” she decided. She stuck her arms out wide, wings fluttering as she spun around and around. This had to be what flying felt like! As she grew more and more dizzy, she came to a stop and looked up at Daddy with a dazed expression on her face.

“Mommy can't right now,” he told her, and her lip immediately quivered. Just as tears were about to spill over, he added, “But she will someday.”

She sniffled. “When's someday?”

“Soon,” he promised.

“But when's soon?”

He chuckled and picked her up. She was upset that he wasn't giving her an answer, but she guessed that she could let that slide when he felt so warm and cozy. She leaned her head up against his chest, feeling it rise and fall and sleep quickly began to overtake her. “Let's go inside, my little star,” he said, but she had to think really hard to understand what was being said. Her eyelids started to close, and she snuggled more into his shirt. As they stepped out of the cool night air and into the warmth of her home, she could no longer stay awake. Her grip on his shirt loosened, and the world descended into a comforting darkness.