Arcanus

[7]

Hi! I'm back from the dead. Here's a chapter!

The cottage the Enchantress lived in was...cozy, to put it simply. The bamboo walls were overgrown by gnarled trees, twisting in and out of cracks, and vines climbed the pillars. The floor was made of rough stone, and it was the simplest part of the house.
A large tree to the side's branches served as a stairwell into the upper floor. Nothing about the steps or the upper floor looked stable, and Katrina was mentally checking escape routes.
There was a steaming pond in the far corner of the house, a small waterfall pouring over rocks, the water crystal clear.
The cottage was big, Katrina realized. It was just overgrown by plants and trees, making it feel snug and tight.
There was a sofa to the right of Katrina, brown, worn, leather. A girl was dozing on it, her arms clutching a fat, old-looking book to her chest. A squished leather satchel sat in front of the sofa, on the floor, bulging with squares- probably books.
"Lis!" Seraphina shook the girl gently. "Lis, we have guests!"
Lis opened her eyes groggily. "What happened this time?"
Katrina noticed she was holding the book rather protectively.
Seraphina whispered something into Lis' ear, who nodded. She stowed away her book in the satchel, and plopped it on a table- a piece of stone supported by roots that had thrusted themselves out of the ground.
"Hi, I'm Elisabetta." Lis said shyly. "But everyone calls me Lis, so you, umm, can call me that too,"
Bat held out her hand. "I'm Bat!" She bounced up and down. "Where are we going?"
"We are going to get you a shelter." Lis replied softly. "The cottage is too small to host all of you, so we have to use the shed or something. Although the shed is full of Sera's old magic equipment, so probably not the shed."
She waved her hand at the dark forest surrounding the cottage. "We'll have to go into the Forest and get some sticks and leaves."
"Are you kidding me?" Bat said, clearly horrified at the very prospect of diving into the dark woods. Katrina was secretly glad that Bat had brought it up, since there was no way she, Katrina, was going to say she was frightened of the woods.
"Oh don't be a pussy cat." Lis snorted. "The Forest is perfectly safe." She made a pushing gesture with her right hand, and light flared up between her fingers, zipping into the darkness. A second later, a bright blue flame-like light had planted itself on a gnarled, thick tree trunk. A squirrel scattered, but other than that and the whooshing noise the light had made, it was silent.
"Oh great, another magician. Just what we need." Katrina muttered, her fingers creeping up to her neck where she had been leashed.
"Oh, I can't leash the Beasts yet." Lis said cheerfully. With a jolt, Katrina glanced at Lis, who was having an animated conversation with Bat.
Bat's face fell. "Can you kill them?" Lis shook her head. "No. Even Seraphina can barely do it, and she has to have the consent of the person with the Beast."
"Why do you want to get rid of your Bat?" Katrina interrupted. "It seems great."
"No one at the Eros Company takes me seriously." Bat sighed gloomily. "If I got rid of the Bat inside me, I'd get more customers. People don't trust Mutants."
"They must suck." Lis said sympathetically. Bat nodded.
"Do you have a special someone?" Katrina asked after a period of silence.
"Yeah...but she's another one of the reasons that no one trusts me."
Katrina digested the information, then realized something.
"She?"

:OOO BAT HAVE YOU BEEN LYING TO US THIS ENTIRE TIME!?

Btw, Bat's a girl. So that's the shocking reveal.