Malicious Tales

Chapter 1

    It had been five years since Salem Stone had found his new family. Since then, they’d been found at increasing rates by their enemies, so now they only had about three months in one given place before they were hunted down again, but Salem was okay with that. As long as he had his disjointed little family around, he figured he could get through anything.

    Of course, like in any family, there were arguments. A lot of them too. Usually not with Malice. Salem hated fighting with her, because as far as he was concerned, she had enough problems on her hands with keeping them safe. He could deal with the little Lolita kid, Fallon. She was a bit odd, but she never actually bothered him. Felix, however, was a whole other story. He always grated against the younger boys nerves, generally just by being in the same room as him. Not that it had anything to do with the fact that Salem thought Malice liked the half-Faerie better. Nope, it had nothing to do with that. Mostly. Salem liked to blame it on his cat-like instincts. That was the excuse he had made, and boy, was he planning on sticking to his guns.

    Speaking of Faerie-Boy, where even was he? Salem got off his chair, transformed into a little tabby cat and strolled off to have a little snoop. It was only after he’d turned that he remembered Fallon’s “kitty-cat” obsession, and it was far too late by the time he’d thought to change into something bigger, because next thing he knew, the little blonde girl was rushing towards him, squealing as loud as possible.

    “KITTY-CAT! Hello, Cat, how are you today? I’ve been a good Morph, I haven’t snuck up on Salem or Malice. Actually, I’m not too sure where Malice is really. Or Felix come to think of it.. Have you seen them, Kitty-cat?” she rambled on, pulling at the half-Daemon’s fur.

    “No, Fallon, I haven’t seen either of them all day. I would also appreciate it if you would stop pulling at me and put me down,” the cat sighed. Suddenly, Fallon’s facial expression went dark, as she realised that it was only Salem and not the cute kitten he appeared to be. She promptly dropped him on the ground and walked away, her doll-like curls waving as she went. Rolling his eyes, Salem turned back into his human form. After all, if neither Malice or Felix were here, there wasn’t much point in snooping. Sighing again, he plonked down onto the living room couch, wondering where his friends could have gotten to.

    Malice had left around four hours previously for one of her walks, that much he knew. Felix hadn’t mentioned leaving, but in hindsight, Salem hadn’t seen him skulking around in a few hours either. Salem was adamant that the current feeling he had was just curiosity, not jealousy. Definitely not jealousy. Perhaps the fact that they were both out at the same time was just a big coincidence. They probably went different directions, he reasoned. Malice always did say she liked walking on her own, but maybe she lied. Maybe the Necromancer just wanted alone time with Felix.

    Smacking himself on the head, Salem went to make himself tea. After all, anything was better than filling his mind with stupid possibilities.

    “They’ve really found us again that easily, huh?” asked Felix, after he’d appeared out of nowhere in front of Malice. The young Necromancer had yet to take her eyes off the spot where her half-brother had vanished a few moments before.

    “Malice? You can’t blank out on us now. You need to think clearly. We have to get out of the city as soon as possible, do you understand?” he said slowly, placing a hand on the girl’s shoulder. After a minute, Malice finally nodded, slowly so as not to whack anything with her black and red dreadlocks.

    “You’re right, of course. If Sinister is only warning us now, we should have a day or two before the Fallen actually get here, but we’ll still need to move fast. London, perhaps?”