“Hey! That is not fair! It is the same number as last time! You cheated!”
While Bruce was laughing, I finally saw the new kid; he had straight black hair and dark green eyes. I noticed that the shadows on the ground looked as if they were drawn to him.
“Welcome to our little group, new kid! I’m Bruce Wayland, the anti-social one up high is my twin Lewis, and the one with the scarf is my cousin, Ash Snowpelt.”
“Hi, I’m Bram Harker. Nice to meet you.”
Even though they were the same height, Bram was looking at his feet. I guess he was shy from being around so many new people.
“Before you sit down we have some important questions to ask you. What do you think about mages and werebeasts?”
“I think that werebeasts are all cool in their way and I am a mage myself.”
Bruce pointed to a chair as I took the scarf off my head. They started twitching from feeling the air again. One problem with having the scarf on is that it muffles my hearing a small bit. Bram started to laugh as Bruce flicked one of my ears and I smacked his hand.
“How old are you?” Lewis asked.
“Next month, I turn six years old.” The new kid is younger than I am and I was happy because I was no longer the youngest in the room. “What were you all doing before I got here?”
“They were teaching me math.”
“Cool! Does someone have a book I could read?”
Lewis tossed him a book as Bruce continued the lesson. After three more math questions, Bruce pulled out a map of the world to change the subject.
“Can you point to which country we are in right now?”
I pointed to the smallest country on the map, Draconia. It was easy to spot because it was the only island country in existence. It is made up of four islands while the other three are connected by one large section of land. Our country was also the least noticed of the Four Kingdoms, or at least that is what my mother says. I knew the Polar Kingdom in the north, Whitefall because my dad is from there. Then there is the Industrial Kingdom in the center, Silvermine, also known as the Rich Kingdom. The last kingdom is the Shadow Kingdom to the south, Duskwell, rumored to be in complete darkness all year round.
I think it was about an hour later when Bram sneezed, and then a dark cloud came out of the book and covered him. Lewis jumped down from his bookcase and ran out to get our parents.
“Ash, can I borrow you for a shield spell?” Bruce asked me.
“I’m not good at using my magic, but I will help you out by doing the best that I can!”
He grabbed my hand and started to focus. I did my best to focus my energy on him, but it got harder as the cloud started to thicken up around us. I took a deep breath and focused as much of the energy I could to send to Bruce.
“Cloud, cloud, don’t be so loud. Go away so we can see the day!” Uncle Fenrir said then it fully disappeared.
I ran to Bram while he was twitching on the ground. Uncle Fenrir put his hand on my shoulder.
“Could you calm him down? It would be better if it were someone his age to do it. Just long enough for me to make a potion.”
Bruce and Uncle walked away as I grabbed Bram’s hand. I could feel it getting colder. Uncle Fenrir’s magic is tied to the different rhymes that he can make.
‘Listen to the call of our hearts. Close your eyes and see the flow of time, to fly away to the faraway land. Find the drumbeats of our hearts, follow down the old river of mine, focus, and find my hand. To hold for all your pain to give, and to have all my happiness to give to you.’
He stopped twitching long enough to drink the potion, and I did my best to hold him still. I used a bit of my magic to drain some energy from him to stop him from shaking so much.
“Uncle, is he going to be okay?”
“I hate lying to children so I going to tell you the truth. He accidentally gave himself the vampire curse. The potion I made could only make it so he could also eat normal food and remove the sunlight death. Unlike other vampires, he will still have some of his warmth.”
Bram opened his eyes and I saw that his eyes took a light red tint to them. I watched as the red started to fade away from his eyes. The deep green of his eyes drew me in.
“Rest, my mommy says that sleeping is good after getting hurt.”
He closed his eyes again and fell asleep. I started lightly brushing his hair with my fingers. I watched as Bram started to lean into my hand. I could feel Uncle’s gaze on my back.
“Ashen, you did well for a one so young. You kept your head enough to keep him safe long enough to get him some help.”
“Uncle, why did your book do that?”
“My books are charmed against tampering. However, each time it is a random curse. Ashen, did he try to mess with it?”
“Maybe the ink ran after he sneezed on it?”
“That could do it.”
“Well, I don’t care that he is a van-pie-her, I want to be his friend,” I even puffed out my chest to look tough.
“Aren’t you a brave little bear,” he said then patted between my ears.
I giggled when I heard Bram starting to snore. I always thought that Uncle’s magic was weird because he has to rhyme to use it.
“Uncle, do you agree with mommy, that one day, everyone with being nice to every werebeast, vampire, and mage?”
“I don’t know, but first we must teach young ones like yourself to be kind to others so they could teach their children to be kind.”
Then Uncle Fenrir collapsed to the floor, and then I did what any six years old would do, scream for my mother. Luckily, he just fainted because he worked too hard with a ‘hangover’; Lewis told me that it has something to do with having too much alcohol in the body.
* * *
I kept my promise to Bram and the two of us grew up to be the best of friends. No matter how weird or insane our lives got, we always had each other’s backs. Sure, the fact that he was a vampire and that I was pretty much a walking blood bank made our friendship a little rough. However, we fought together to keep our secrets safe from all of the villagers.
At the end of every day, right as he got back from school, we would go to one of our houses and we would laugh at how superstitious the villagers are. It was always so hilarious how the two of us must have looked in public, me with my pure white hair and purple eyes, and Bram with his straight black hair and pale skin. My brother made a crack one time saying that we looked like a starry night together.
There was that one time when we were both nine years old when Bram almost gave out his secret of vampirism. He ran out of the blood and he would have lost control if I did not force him to drink my blood. He would have slaughtered some of the villagers then the rest could kill him and possibly his whole family as well. It hurt but I knew I was doing the right thing to protect him, but it was complicated to hide the bite marks. It is a good thing that I normally wear scarfs outside of the house.
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