The Other King

Crow- New Masks

I woke up with my body aching, I found a new shirt and pants to wear, sliding my feet into the hard cloth shoes, flat rocks lined the bottom as support. I pull my arms through my vest and leave my room to the meeting room. Living off a few hours of sleep but still focused on this discussion.
I see the huge map laid out over the table. I examine it. It was a map of Alkan- The elemental region as it’s labeled. I see the four light kingdoms north of where we are. Ivery- Kingdom of Ice, top left, Lylerkry- Kingdom of Fire, top right, Raziel- Kingdom of Sky, bottom left and Darkwood- Kingdom of Forest, bottom right. Than The Other. But over the map are nine faint lines of red, directing toward the EndZone, in similar spots of where the four of us picked up the objects, from the light kingdoms and from off the page redirecting to The Other leaving a red dot that hasn’t moved, counting ten. Ten different objects.
Four came from the Light kingdoms, one came from The Other kingdom and five came from off the map, all to the End Zone before redirecting to The Other Kingdom. There’s more to see than what’s given. More kingdoms.
The object's ending locations seem to have five from Cyrenduen to No lands where we are. I pause. Autumn and Devanar couldn’t have drawn over it with red in such a small time frame, plus with what material? It’s like the objects are tracked onto the map. I shake the thought and look where the others are. Three are in Skull city, where the Palace is, and are marked with a label that says ‘Arena’. And two are on the other side of the city.
I look at the bottom of the page, seeing a list of objects. I recognize: The Demons Pearl, Deathrobed coin, magic wand, and witch’s bottle. But the ones I don’t recognize are: Dragons scale, Seed of Life, Sleep's Dagger, Angel’s wing, Orc’s tooth and Fire stone. The only thing projected by its name was the witch’s bottle so I’m hoping I don’t have to go against a draken, or a dragon, a speaking tree, naps, a handicapped angel, lopsided orc and fire. Half of those I experience on a daily basis.
I finish scanning the map when I hear knocking and the opening of doors. The first to walk into the room is Autumn. I watch as he drags his feet along the floor, eye-bags heavy under his eyes as if he didn’t sleep at all.
His shirt’s a dark shade of brown, his pants even darker and pulled up to his mid-calves, having the pants baggy over his knees down. I smile when he rubs his eyes cutely and yawns but when he meets my eyes his eyes stare into my soul with pure hatred. What the fuck did I do? I make a face and look down at the map, setting it aside as others walk in. Pylah’s holding onto Angelica protectively and looks at me warily. Great, everyone’s scared I’ll lash out.
Tharama seems to take it the most sensitively, his eyes are puffy and swollen. Fuck I knew he gets upset when I’m angry and last night I lost control. He’s probably been crying all night. I get up and quickly pull him to my arms, dopping to my knees. Poor, kid.
“Shhhhh..” I whisper. “I’m okay now, I am.” He’s shaking, this kid had major trauma. Mostly with his past at Darkwood and with Autumn and Pylah adding up. Every time I raise my voice he trembles as if I’ll lash out at him.
“You were so upset.. I couldn’t do anything.” He pulls into me, gripping the back of my shirt. I hug him tightly, shaking my head.
“It’s not your fault. I’m sorry I didn’t check up on you.” He takes a deep breath, calming himself. I nod, “Good boy. Keep taking deep breaths, that’s it.” He takes another and his hands start to loosen on my shirt.
I let go of him, he’s getting taller. Devanar walks in and takes a seat, everyone waits for me. I give a slight nod, asking Tharama if he’s going to be ok without using my words. He nods several times and wipes his eyes. I wiped his cheek, finding a tear that escaped. I walked him to his seat and found mine in the middle facing the door.
“As of yesterday,” I started. Everyone looked up to me.  “Autumn and Devanar found this map labeling the names and locations for the other five objects. Apparently they’re called objects of the gods. That means they’re dangerous and potentially another party wants and even has the others since counting there is ten. If another force is after the objects it's going to be a hassle to keep them safe and not kill us in the process.
“Closest locations starts at Skull City and past, leaving hours of walking and nights to stay. One of the objects stays at an Arena so I’m planning on entering myself. We don’t know how much time there is before it’s hosted but we need to be ready for a plan. The people of No Lands know us, the people of Cyrenduen know us from the possible rumors of visiting Krowel’s club. And the people of Suveron definitely know me so they know of you guys too. But-
“The people of Skull City don’t. We will have to make new masks so they won’t find out and will just think a new group formed. It’s average for groups of three to ten, we’ll be fine. If there’s trouble, we have Devanar’s ax and Pylah’s zero. Plus Autumn’s shadow-traveling and Tharama’s ability.”
“What about you?” Autumn says. “If you won’t be ready to fight in time then what are we going to do? Enter for you and kill ourselves instead?”
“I won’t ask you to do that. If I’m not strong enough then we sneak in and steal the objects, that was the plan anyway. But if I am strong enough, I’ll be the distraction, the entertainment while you guys steal the main mission. If I am strong enough then in the end I get my golds and we get the objects. Win win.”
“You and those stupid golds, man.” Devanar laughs, I join him but Autumn doesn’t think it’s funny. He’s staring me down enough that I awkwardly die my laughter down.
“If you're not strong enough, you're sitting out.” Autumn says sternly. “You basically just said you’re only going for the fun and the golds, not really a purpose in this plan. And we’re definitely not going to risk you dying over something we are fully capable of doing. Right guys?” Devanar and Tharama nod.
“It will be too dangerous. Why don’t we just keep Crow out even if he is strong enough? We can do this. I don’t want to see him get hurt.” Tharama says.
“Atta boy.” Autumn raises a hand for a high-five but Tharama flinches. Autumn laughs, so he thinks this is funny?
“Quit encouraging him, Tharama, and quit picking on him, you know he doesn’t like you.” I added.
“Bro, I was giving him a high-five. Stop being such a mom.” Autumn rolls his eyes.
“I think he’s right though, if you're not strong enough sit out.” Pylah’s soft voice was also strong as she took the attention of everyone. Now that I really look at her, I see her original black hair growing at the roots. It's good that it’s growing back.
I nod, if this issue takes the attention of the protector we have to obey no matter what. “Okay. Pylah’s right.” I decide. “But only if I’m not strong enough. When the arena is right around the corner I’ll have Devanar look me over and give me the okay sign, if not I’ll sit out.”
“But when we do find out the date of the arena, don’t try to cheat the system and push yourself. Then we’re definitely sitting you out.” Autumn argues once again.
“Oh come on, I’ll be as strong as ever with dark magic flowing through my veins in months time. I just hope the arena’s after that.” Autumn gives me the deadeye.
“Won’t the teacher stop him from doing that though?” Tharama asks Autumn.
“Nope, Darry will probably be pleased to hear he’ll have a higher chance of killing him.” Devanar jokes but mainly serious.
“What the fuck?” Autumn shouts.
“Can we stop talking about me not going to the arena and move on please? We forgot about another issue.” I look over at Angelica. “This mission is going to be hard, do you think you can handle it? We’ll try to protect you but we also have to protect ourselves.” She looks at all of us, one by one before signing something I keep forgetting to learn.
“She said she can do it.” Pylah translates.
“Good. We also need to know if these objects are still infected with cursed energy. Pylah, Autumn, can you sense anything?”
“I didn’t feel anything at the club. They should be okay.” Autumn answered.
“Just in case, De, can you do a protection spell after the meeting?” I stood up after he nodded, “Now, for the mask issue I mentioned earlier, I’ve been gathering some supplies I’ve been waiting to use.” I go to my room and bring out a decent size bag but it’s fucking heavy as hell. I hear the rattling of the materials inside, some are threatening to rip open the sides.
“What kind of masks?” Tharama said curiously trying to peek through the opening.
I take a seat and say “Teeth.” as I dump the bag over the table. At least hundreds of teeth of all sizes spilled before our eyes.
“Don’t tell me these are from our meals.” Autumn says and picks one up.
“Oh come on. I wash them.” I say in defense.
“Why didn’t you give these away with the rest when we traded them? Teeth and claws are worth more.” Devanar asks.
“Because I was saving.” I lie, I actually was just interested in the bones. I like the sharpness. I was thinking of using these in case I wanted to decorate my sword or make a spear. I say the suggestion out loud. “I was also thinking just now, because we’re making new masks, why don’t we make new weapons as well? I can get some steel in Suveron for blades and we can use these for the handles if we’re making daggers.”
Pylah looks up. “That’s a great idea.” She seems excited, I smile glad she’s not being so quiet anymore. Angelica probably made her come out of her shell.
“I call dibs on the biggest ones.” Autumn says, already making a pile.
I roll my eyes, “Don’t forget about the masks first.” I start grabbing the ones I want, I glance at Angelica as she grabs hers independently too.
I was going to hand Devanar my picks because he, Autumn and Pylah are the only ones with magic, but he was busy doing Tharama’s and Pylah was doing Angelica’s.
“If you make it look stupid I’ll kill you.” I say before handing my pile to Autumn.
He rolls his eyes and begins to cast the following: a Forging spell (forges the pieces together), a Damaging spell (it won’t break unless you undo the spell), a Placement spell (it won’t come off until the user takes it off themselves), and lastly a Shaping spell (the first time the user puts it on it shapes their face perfectly and smooths out the inside).
I busy myself with Pylah and Angelica. “How’s training?”
She looks up. “It’s good, I’m teaching her to use that dagger you gave her. She told me loves it. I wish she could tell you thank you herself though. You should really learn how to sign. I brought you the extra books from the library, I’m pretty sure it’s still on your desk.”
“I’m learning.” Devanar says.
“That’s good.” Pylah says but when she meets Devanar’s eyes she blushes and looks away. Devanar glances at me and I wink, he rolls his eyes with a smile. They are like a married couple with a secret love child. I mean Angelica acts like that too. When Pylah hands Angelica her new teethed mask she immediately shows Devanar. The fact he wanted to kill her when we first met and now treats her as his own daughter. Bi-polar bastard.
I get hit right in the face with something hard. I look over and see Autumn threw it at me, I hold it up and damn it looks awesome. He used some of his pile for the bigger bones. Three sets of fangs over the mouth and sharp teeth around and facing toward the eyes. Autumn already made his, an ex over the bridge of the nose and fangs coming down the bottom of the eye holes. And pairs of fangs off the sides of the mouth making a giant scary ass smile. He picks up his mask and puts it on, I do the same.
As I place it on my face, a tooth pokes into my cheek but after a second the mask shifts and moves so it shapes my face with no imperfections. The inside smooths itself out as well. I pull it off easily. Autumn still had on his own, gods he looks so badass. His personality fits the mask well.
Autumn’s eyes smiled until they met mine and went dead again. He glances down at the small smile prying on my lips before looking away. I look at the others, mostly they’re finished, only having Pylah and Devanar left.
“Wearing these we need to be careful because they don’t have horns. We don’t want to have the hoods of our cloaks pull back and reveal more of our identities. Unless you guys can cast a placement spell before we leave for the arena?” The ones with magic nods.
Autumn and Tharama start scalping the handles for their new weapons, Pylah gets up to grab her long bladed swords. “I wouldn’t decorate weapons you use on a daily basis. After we leave Skull city we won’t be able to use the ones with the bones on them until our popularity settles down. Who knows what they’ll call us but after we destroy the masks and can say we stole the weapons after killing off the group.”
“In the meantime, we won’t wear these masks until we need to use them. For now, we’ll stick to personal training. Teaching Angelica, learning dark magic and for you two.” I look at Devanar and Autumn. “Devanar, did we figure out what the yellow crystal does for your ax?”
“It’s boring but useful. I can use it for defense and offense, using the newly sharpened edges it can cut through anything in an instant and if I swing in a direction without hitting contact it creates a wind so strong it knocks the enemy back. I tested it out in the Forest and nearly knocked a tree over. Should be good against Air abilities.” He says, I remember him saying the purple crystal can zero like Pylah, absorb or cancel out gifts. The red one can copy and now this one. “But only these kinds of crystals work and these three are the only types. I tried to look for strong ones but they're all dead in the market and won’t work because of their decreased energy. The only one I have left is the yellow, and fortunately it has a lot of juice left and dims its energy core slowly.”
“Perfect. Use that when we leave for the arena. Work on perfecting your light magic and healing power. Try to heal yourself without hovering your hand over, let the magic course through your body to the spot. It will be hard, but it can be done. Autumn.” He looks me dead in the eyes.
“Autumn and Pylah, can you put a curse boundary around our house? I want dark magic to protect the objects and make it fatal. I don’t want anyone coming in who doesn’t belong.”
“Understood.” Pylah says, leaving to get the spell book from her shared room. Devanar takes a leave through the front to remove the boundary he created when we first got here. Tharma leaves to train, leaving me with Autumn and Angelica.
I get up to leave for training and once I walk out of the meeting room’s door I hear Autumn exchanging a few words to the little girl. I stop and listen, leaning the side of my face to the opening to hear what he’s telling her more closely.
“Don’t be scared to kill. All souls go somewhere in the end, they just go to the underworld early. You're protecting your family and yourself. Use that willpower against your enemy by protecting those you love.” I hear a pause of silence and then a sigh from Autumn before hearing footsteps coming closer. I move away from the door, pulling the deer mask to my face and pulling my arms through the sleeves of my cloak as I walk out the door.
* * *
    Later that night when I came home,  the sun was now fully gone, I was fixing my bled-through-bandages, adding more. I didn’t want to wake up Devanar but this will be a pain to sleep in, I might wake him up later. I hear a door open in the hallway hoping it was Devanar but Autumn came out in the opening. He looked surprised.
    “Need something?” I asked. I held my side with a trembling hand, looking up with guarded eyes.
“Nah.. I’m good.” He spoke barely above a whisper. He looks like he wants to say something else.
I hear the front door opening and closing as Autumn leaves. I sigh, raking my fingers through my hair, before walking to Devanar’s room to heal me.