The Second Moonlark: A KotLC Fanfic

Chapter Eight (Why Oh Why: School Dance Edition)

"Oh, wonderful."

Sonia had only been walking down the hall when she saw the flier on the notice board. She didn't ask for something like this. She read through the flier again.

Inviting all level Sixes to the annual winter solstice dance!

She couldn't read anything after that, even though the date was only a few days away. Sure, she knew how to dance, but the basic concept of it disgusted her. After all...

She banished the thought from her head. She knew she couldn't have stopped from thinking about it, but there was no way that Ruy would be able to go. She sighed. Things were much less complicated in her line of work without personal connections.

"Soni! Over here!" Her head snapped in the direction of the voice. Linh.

"Hey!" Linh nodded, and they started walking towards homeroom.

"What do you think about the dance?" Oh, Lodestar. Not this again.

"Meh. In Mysterium we don't really dance... for fun, at least. There we're all the Council's dancing monkeys." Linh stifled a giggle. "Anyway, I don't think anyone would ask me. It's a school dance, and I'm the new girl." Sonia stumbled. She hadn't anticipated the shoulder shove that Linh had given her.

"Don't sell yourself short, Soni. I predict that my brother's gonna ask you during study hall." Tam? Sonia hadn't caught anything that would suggest that he liked her, and she observed these people as a job. Keep your mind off of it. Keefe would notice.

She calmed herself and stepped into Lady Lyssa's room.

*****

"Hello."

It was study hall. Sonia had been quietly sitting in a corner, muddling over the history of the trolls, when Tam had sat in the empty armchair next to her. She looked up.

His face was red.

Looks like Linh told her first fortune. Tam cleared his throat multiple times.

"Would..." He tried again. "Would you like to go to the dance with me?" She studied his face. She was no Empath, but she had been trained to observe facial features so well that she might as well have been. He looked... Uncertain. Perhaps even a little shy. But he was definitely being sincere. She just had one question.

"Why?" She watched the momentary shock flicker across his face.

"Well... It's... It's like you're the only person I feel comfortable with- besides Linh, of course. It's like we can talk and laugh and you... You don't question anything. If I say that my parents were awful and horrible and all sorts of bad, you don't give me flack or pity or anything. You just... understand." He paused. "Pretty sure I was rambling there." Sonia laughed.

"Yeah, you kind of were. Okay, here's the deal. I won't kiss you, and we won't be going out after. But I will go." He relaxed.

"I can work with that."

*****

Sonia had almost completed her routine.

Wake up. Eat pastries. Go to Foxfire. Eat pastries. Finish classes. Go home. Get hovered on by Ruy...

Which, coincidentally, was where she was right now.

"What happened? Anything interesting? Any info? Intel?" Sonia sighed.

"Ruy. Personal space and calm, please. I'll tell you, but please wait." He immediately backed off, and she recounted most of the day.

Most of it. All that she mentioned about the dance was that she had found a 'good intel-gathering event' at school.

"That's all? He said when she was done.

"Yes. That's all. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to my room."

To pick out her outfit for the dance. Nothing else.

She definitely did not want to think about the fact that she was missing a major meeting with Gisela and Fintan...

Or that she hadn't given them any intel since last week.

*****

Sonia dreamed about Carnage.

She could feel her mind snapping underneath the weight of her own guilt as she listened to her friends screaming in pain and rage. How they'd never trust her again. How she was the worst elf that they'd ever met. Their cries of anguish gradually devolved into mindless babbling. And then, right before her dream self succumbed to the darkness, she heard one last voice.

Ruy.

And he said that it was all true.

When she woke up, she knew one thing:

This has to stop.

A.N. Plz comment what you all think the name of the third book in the trilogy should be. The Second Moonlark, The First Morpher, then what? The Third ______. Thx!