Ravenfire

The night of the dance finally arrived. Truthfully, I dreaded it more than I was excited for it because I wasn’t used to social gatherings like this. I would rather fight another round at the Martial Club room than to be subjected to the awkwardness of upholding social graces.

I felt sorry for Emma though. She decided to skip the dance because Elliot was currently being monitored and couldn’t leave the school clinic. Instead, she busied herself helping me get ready so that one of us would at least have a good time. Thankfully, her makeup skills were not as disastrous as mine, so I came out looking decent for the event.

“Wait,” Emma stopped me before I left the room. She took a rosebud from her desk and made it bloom into a beautiful red flower, attaching it to my dress as an added embellishment. “There. It looks perfect. Good luck, Remina. Tell me everything that happens when you return.” She smiled sweetly.

“Thanks, Emma. I will.” I took a small dagger from my drawer and stuffed it into my bag.

“Remina…” She placed her hands on her hips. “What do you need a dagger for? You’re going to a dance.”

“A dagger and a lockpick. Never leave home without them. You’ll never know when something tries to kill you, especially in this academy.” I zipped my bag shut.

Emma didn’t argue and let me leave the room.

I walked to the statue of Meister Leu at the courtyard where I agreed to meet Lysander. I wondered if he chose this place because it was where we first met. When I arrived, he was already there waiting, dressed in an elegant tuxedo that made heads turn without him having to make any effort.

I should be looking at him dreamily with butterflies in my stomach. After all, it’s not everyday someone well-liked by everyone asks you out on a date. Instead, I was still filled with suspicion over his motives for selecting me as his date. It was too random. I was convinced I was either too dense to notice his interest in me or there was another purpose driving his decision.

“Are you alright? You’re looking at me like I murdered someone,” he said jokingly when I approached.

“Funny that you should say that, when you very nearly lodged a dagger through my neck before,” I replied.

He only laughed at my words. “You look beautiful in that dress. Shall we head to the main hall?” He held out a hand.

I was about to take his hand when the school nurse suddenly interrupted us.

“Ms. Ravenfire, Prof. Ariston requested to see you immediately. He wants to ask a few questions about Elliot. It won’t take long,” said the nurse.

Lysander agreed to tag along as I was led to the professor’s office where the old lecturer asked me some very specific questions about Elliot’s behaviour. When he was satisfied, he allowed me to leave.

“Professor, may I see Elliot?” I requested, wondering how the poor boy was faring. I hadn’t seen him since that morning in the secret clubroom.

“Of course. I’m sure seeing his friends will lift his spirits. He is in the clinic at the moment.”

We then made our way to the clinic where Elliot was sitting alone on one of the beds. I wondered where the nurse went and why they’d leave him unattended.

“Elliot. How are you doing?” I approached him.

Elliot glanced at Lysander uncomfortably before looking at me. “I’m alright. The professor wants to study my condition for a while so they can figure out a way to keep the phantom in control.”

“Where’s the nurse?” I asked, looking around.

“There was an emergency. She ran out immediately.” He glanced at Lysander again, looking a little guilty for taking up our time. “You have a dance to attend. Don’t let me keep you.”

I nodded. “Alright. Take care, Elliot.”

When I turned around to leave, I immediately heard an uncanny noise accompanied by Lysander’s silent look of fear. I had a feeling I knew what was happening behind me.

“Remina, run!” Lysander shouted frantically as I moved away from Elliot who was now a phantom again.

“I’m staying,” I replied.

“Are you crazy? He’s going to kill us!”

“If this doesn’t work, then I might be.”

He cursed and made a run for it, unable to fathom why I wanted to endanger myself. Perhaps if he had stayed longer, I would have explained it to him.

“Elliot, I know you’re in there!” I shouted.

I was taking a huge risk by staying. I’ll admit I didn’t really think things through. Now my feet were attempting to betray me, tempting me to just run as it approached me.

I met its eyes that were black like the void and said, “You’re not a monster.”

Then, something happened. There was a bit of a struggle before Elliot began to transform back again. He leaned against the wall for support as he regained his consciousness.

“Elliot!” I ran to him, relieved that my gamble somehow worked. “You did it! You seized control of it!” I was proud of him for standing up to his inner demon.

He stood there, a bit dazed. “How did you know it would work?”

“I didn’t. Good job.” I gave him a pat on the shoulder.

After the nurse finally returned to the clinic, I walked towards the main hall to look for Lysander. I had no idea where he ran off to, so I figured he might have gone straight to the dance after getting help. Half of me was relieved that I didn’t have to spend the rest of the night being awkward, but the other half was disappointed that he’d run away just like that.

Instead of Lysander, I found Salamander sitting alone on a bench in the hallway with his snake. He looked as annoyed and miserable as I was, so I decided to join him.

“What happened to your date?” I stopped in front of him and asked.

“We had an argument. What happened to yours?” he replied without even looking at me.

I sat next to him. “Ran off at the sight of danger. Coward.”

He stared at me in disbelief. “Lysander? The Summer student known for being the closest embodiment of the brave Meister Leu? What the hell did you do?”

“It wasn’t me. Elliot turned into the phantom again and he couldn’t handle it.”

“Nevertheless, you have a knack for making people lose their best qualities.”

We noticed Toad from afar attempting to flirt with Prof. Alice. It was hard to tell whether Prof. Alice was interested, bored, or busy thinking about peas. I suppose he at least succeeded in getting a dance with her.

“At least one of us is having a great night,” Salamander remarked with a sigh.

I suddenly had an idea. “Since we’re both bored and dateless, would you like to...”

“I’d rather swallow poison than be your date.”

“Ew. No. I was going to ask if you wanted to steal the tray of desserts.”

He gave it some thought. “I have a better idea.”

“Sabotage?” I guessed.

He smiled mischievously. “For once, we agree on something.”

“So, what are you thinking of?” I had a feeling he was about to say something interesting.

He lowered his voice and bent forward, “Headmaster Scheep is going to give a speech after the performances. There’s a ball full of confetti right above him. I say we fill it with flour and paint him white.”

“You’re just asking to be expelled.” I smirked. “Alright. I’m in.”

He was delighted. “Come on, let’s head to the kitchen.”

Sneaking out a bag of flour from the kitchen was easy with nobody around. The hard part was distracting the nearby people at the hall so we could swipe the ball of confetti and stuff it with flour. I had to use my time magic to make one of the dancers trip just to buy us enough time. We slipped out unnoticed, but had obvious white powder stains on our clothes.

Now that everything was in place, all we had to do was to find a good spot on the empty balcony above and enjoy the show. We broke into a laughing fit once the flour came down on the headmaster after he made such a grand speech. He furiously marched off the stage, determined to catch the culprit. Soon, the incident died down and students gathered on the dance floor to dance the waltz.

Salamander looked down on them from the balcony with a glass of juice in his hand. He looked almost like an evil villain. “Look at all these people being so prim and proper with their waltz. It makes me want to summon a hailstorm over them,” he spoke with contempt.

I stood beside him. “You sound like a bitter old man. Who hurt you?”

“Shut up,” he hissed.

We shared a toast and drank our glasses of juice.

“Does this have alcohol in it?” I noticed the unusual taste.

“Toad spiked the drinks with his rakija.”

“All of them?”

“Yup.”

“Damn.” I refilled my glass with the juice pitcher we stole from downstairs.

He suddenly spoke when I returned to my place at his side, “You know, when I first met you, I hated you. You were intolerable,”

I smiled, remembering how he was attacked by birds. “It was a lot of fun.”

He frowned. “You still are intolerable actually.”

“Good to know.” I took a sip of my drink.

He appeared slightly annoyed. “Look, are you going to let me finish or not?”

“That depends. Are you trying to complain or say something nice?”

“Maybe both.”

“I can’t promise you I won’t laugh if you say something cheesy.”

He shook his head in disbelief. “You really are intolerable.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll hear you out. Come on, just say it.” I urged him.

He was getting frustrated at his own embarrassment. “I just… wanted to say thanks. I’ve never had a friend like you before. I grew up with just my older sister around, so this is all sort of new to me. I’m so used to doing things on my own. It’s nice having someone watching your back.”

“Friend?” I repeated.

“Yeah. After everything we’ve been through, I think we’ve at least reached that point, right?”

Holy shit. Salamander and I are friends? My brain was still catching up.

“I suppose.” I smiled and realised I was no different from Salamander. Before I came to this academy, I didn’t have a group of friends and I always did things on my own. I didn’t think it was necessary to befriend others back then. “Thank you. I don’t think I could have solved this mystery on my own. It’s not so bad having you around, Salamander.”

“Ugh. I can’t believe those words came out of my mouth.” He was disgusted with himself.

“Just wash it all down with another drink.” I offered him another glass, but he pushed it away.

“No way. I might start spouting out mushy nonsense. I won’t be able to live with myself.”

The sound of a melancholic violin replaced the upbeat and bright orchestral music. I recognized the tune of an old tango that was part of Bartholomew’s playlist. I wondered if he had something to do with this.

Salamander held out a hand. “We’re missing out on all the fun. Come on.”

I hesitated. “We can’t just go down there. They’ll find out we did it. We have white power stains all over our clothes.”

He glanced at the masquerade half masks left behind by some dance performers. “I have an idea.”

We certainly stood out with the masks and the white powder stains on our clothes as we made our way to the dance floor. Heads turned our way as we joined the very few dancers in the middle.

Salamander was rather adept at dancing, which was a surprise because it seemed like an activity he’d dislike. He was no master like Bartholomew, but he could certainly lead. It wasn’t hard to pick up his cues, which was great for a beginner like me. I followed along and soon I naturally went with the flow, unafraid to add a little embellishment here and there.

“I taught her those moves,” Bartholomew proudly told the professors beside him as they stood by the buffet to watch the dance.

At one point, our faces were inches away and we stared into each other’s eyes. He had never looked at me like that before, the total opposite of a glare. I never realised how beautiful his eyes could actually look. I hated that it made my heart flutter amidst the sweet music.

“Damn, Salamander. Where’d you learn to dance like that?” I said the moment the song ended. Inside, I was relieved that we were no longer standing intimately close to each other. I wanted to stab myself figuratively with a dagger for finding him attractive for a few seconds.

“My annoying older sister is into ballroom dancing. She always forced me to be her dance partner. I hated it. Especially waltzes.” He then eyed me suspiciously. “I’m surprised you’re able to dance.”

“Let’s just say a certain demon gave me dance lessons.” I glanced at Bartholomew who smiled at me and raised a glass.

“Shit. Scheep is looking at us. Run!” Salamander began to panic and grabbed my hand to make our dramatic escape from the dance floor. We made such a scene that the hall was filled with chatter as we left the room.

We continued running as the flour-covered headmaster angrily chased us for ruining his night. When we finally made it to a safe area outside where we lost any pursuers, we took off our masks and broke out into laughter.

“That was amazing. I can’t believe we got away with it,” he said in between bouts of laughter.

I couldn’t stop smiling. “Hopefully, they won’t figure out our identities. We should probably change out of our clothes soon.”

“But before that, I want to finally get this over with.” He dug through his pocket and pulled out a vial of blue liquid.

“What’s that?”

“The Potion of Clear Visions from the diary. I finally made it.” He offered it to me. “I need you to drink it and see who kills me in the vision.”

I stared at the clear blue liquid in the vial as I received it. I took a deep breath and immediately drank it. It tasted terrible like burnt chicken. He then took both my hands.

“I’m going to recall the vision. Pay close attention to every detail you can catch, alright?” he instructed.

I nodded. “Got it.”

I saw the vision through Salamander’s eyes. I could see it taking place somewhere at the academy, but the detail that really struck me was the person standing right in front of him. It’s me? I saw myself hesitating before stabbing him with the dagger I usually carried around. There was no doubt about it. It really was me.

The one who kills Salamander is… me?

Despite all our banter and dark humour about killing each other, it didn’t actually make me feel good knowing that my future self would kill him for real. I hated to admit it, but Salamander grew on me. I didn’t know what I’d do without him around to argue with. But what reason would I have to kill him? What exactly happens in the future?

Salamander’s anxious face was the first thing I saw when I woke up. “Remina, what did you see? Did you see who did it?”

I looked at him, terrified. I couldn’t bear to tell him that it was actually me who was the culprit.

“Remina, what did you see?” he repeated.

“I…” I tried to speak, but nothing came out.

So, I did the next best thing, which was to run.

“Hey! Come back here!” He shouted.

Salamander chased after me. He cast an ice spell on my feet to freeze me in place, but I melted it with my fire and kept running. I accidentally bumped into a student as I ran through the hallway and back outside.

“Sorry!” I shouted without stopping.

I ran into the hedge maze, which was the first thing I saw. The dormitory would have been a safer place, but it was too far to run to without exhausting myself. Heels weren’t exactly great for running. I knew I would get caught eventually, but right now I just wanted to keep running until I’ve thought of something that could help me. But my mind was blank.

Upon finally reaching the gazebo in the middle, I had to stop and catch my breath. My feet were already aching. Suddenly, Salamander was behind me. I didn’t expect him to be that fast.

“Tell me what you saw!” he ordered.

I shook my head. “I’m sorry. I can’t tell you.”

“You won’t have to.”

He seemed to be casting some sort of unfamiliar winter spell. I knew he was forcing his way into my memories to see.

He looked at me in terror like I was a monster and slowly backed away. “It was you…”

“Salamander…” I had no words to defend myself with.

“I can’t believe I was working with my murderer this whole time!” He then ran away.