"That took you long." Vibia told her granddaughter when they came back. She had just finished explaining about marks that many supernaturals with magic uses.
"Sorry for the wait. I was caught by mum." Alek hastily took her seat as Gemma bowed and left the room.
"What did you say to her. She is going to think weird since you are wearing that. You are wearing different clothes." Bia spoke.
"She pointed that point, so I told her that I met grandma after the movie. She also had a little chat with Gemma." Her sister replied and removed the book from her chest place. The twins widened their eyes but, Alek didn't give a damn. "This is the family heirloom of Minazuki."
"It has been a while since I saw this." Vibia looked at the glass and gold designed book. "She told you to write your name and, you will be able to see it, right?"
Alek nodded and opened the book. She looked for a space in the two pages of autographs and chose the place next to her great grandmother's place. Alek brought out the pens she had and picked up a black ink pen. Before the pen could touch the paper, she froze.
"What's wrong?" Jin asked from across her.
"Am I allowed to use this pen? Is it okay to use an ink pen?" Alek raised her head and asked in a serious tone.
"Seriously." Bia spoke.
"Yeah." She turned her head around and nodded with a serious expression.
"Just use any pen." Kai had his face in his palm.
"I think I should use a pencil." She put a lid on the black pen and looked for a pencil she always had somewhere in her bag.
"Why?" Rin asked his cousin. He had forgotten how Alek was like when she was a child.
"So that I could rub my name afterwards. Where are you?" She answered without looking at him. She was still struggling to find the pencil.
"Oh dear." Vibia pinched her nose bridge.
"Why don't you just call grandma to be sure." Jin suggested.
"Oh yeah." She stopped looking for her ghost pencil and brought out her phone. She dialled Mikoto's number, but she didn't pick up. She instead texted her but, it took some time before her grandmother replied.
[You can use any pen that you want, hon.]
[Any colour?]
[Any colour.]
[Okay. Thanks. Bye.]
She brought the pen that she took from her best friend months ago because he took her pen. It was a violet pen that had a tinge of green. When she was about to write her name, she froze again.
"What is it this time?" Kai asked.
"Should I write my full name?"
"..."
"Some people in here wrote their full names and, some have not. Grandma wrote her full name but, she has only two. Does that mean I should write my full name too? There might be someone named Alektrona Minazuki in the world. I can't risk the other 'Alek' to read this book. Who knows what kind of intentions she has." Alek hastily explained the situation like she was sure of the other existence of 'Alektrona Minazuki'.
"If you don't want that to happen, just write your full name." Rin told her. Good thing he didn't have to go through that.
"In Japanese or English?"
"Whichever you wish. You can mix maybe." Jin told her.
"Okay." Alek swiftly wrote her name in a cursive font she loved. She wrote her middle name in Japanese and the rest in cursive English. "I'm done."
The book seemed to absorb her name because it became tattooed on the page.
"I think you can read the book now." Vibia told her and drank a sip of Irish cream.
She flipped pages and found words written on the pages. She kept on flipping the pages with fascination. How was this hidden from her all this time?
"That's not the way to look up for what you want." Lady Mutsuki lightly put her hand on the next head of Minazuki and stopped her from searching through pages.
"Then how?"
"You ask. You ask the book." Vibia shrugged her shoulders and removed her hands.
"You can do that? I've only seen those in movies about witches..." Alek mumbled but did as she was told. "How to activate one's animal."
The book flipped pages on its own when it heard the question and opened the page where it was. It was written in the really cursive font of old English but, Alek had no problem reading since she had studied it in university.
"Did you find it?" Kai asked.
"Yep. But I need Kiryuu for this and it says that it can take away one's life... Let's do it." Alek stood up. She knew that spiritual animals wouldn't be the size of real animals that exists in the physical, human world. Plus, she was turning into her other ancient form, which would be bigger than the modern form.
"Wait. You are not thinking this through?" Bia grabbed her sister's arm in instinct.
"I have thought this through in three seconds. Plus, there was also a huge risk for me to first shift into Kiryuu but, I turned out okay. I'm really sorry for what happened, though." Alek looked at her brother and her cousins. "So yeah."
Bia loosened her grip on her sister and let her sister stand up.
"Grandma, I don't think I should shift in the building."
"I agree. We would shift somewhere else further away from the city and crowded place." Vibia called Gemma and asked her to bring Destiny.
"Hold, my hand please." Destiny asked with a soft voice. She was blushing because all the unwanted attention was on her.
After a minute, the guard and the new witch came into the room. They had all risen from their seat, ready.
"Sure." Jin almost took her hand if it wasn't for his brother taking her hand. She blushed even more if that was possible. The place where they were connected was burning. The temperature there was at the melting point of iron in Destiny's point of view. How the heck did she get into this situation?
Pollux didn't realise what he had done until he saw Iris staring at him. She wasn't exactly staring at him, though. She was staring at the joined hands.
He didn't want his sister to make the girl in his hands uncomfortable so he took her hands with his other hand.
Others had already taken the spot in a small circle. Kai carried the book for his sister and, they all stood in a circle, holding hands.
"You know where to?" Vibia asked the witch.
"Yes, ma'am." Destiny nodded and murmured a spell. The surroundings became solid in seconds and curved as if they were one big ball staring into from the ball's point of view.
They didn't know that they were already there until Destiny told them to let go of the hands. As soon as she said that, the weird painting-ish, weirdly round surroundings began to crack. They felt like a chick hatching from the egg. The shell broke off vanished into the air before it touched the ground.
They were surrounded by trees when they stepped out of the shell. They could hear birds chirping and insects singing. The forest was bright enough for a heavily condensed area.
"Where are we?" Alek asked. A wind blew and she shuddered a little.
"In a forest where my lady found me six months ago." Destiny answered.
She doesn't remember what she was doing there for how long. She remembers being hungry from not eating for days and was finally found by Vibia when she was about to lose consciousness. Mama Mutsuki took her in ad provided her with food and clothes. She wanted to know her name but the girl didn't remember so Vibia also gave her a name. She asked witches to know what she was and that's how they knew that she was a witch. They didn't ask anything further into her past since she doesn't remember it.
"It's safe and deserted. Humans sometimes come into this forest to suicide." Destiny looked at the small cave where she had been found. The cave had rabbits living in there and, it made her smile. At least, she wouldn't have to remember the cave with sad memories anymore.
"Thank you for the information." Alek smiled.
"I didn't mean to scare you. But I just know that this place is safe from humans from my experience."`Destiny laughed it off. She couldn't believe so much had happened six months ago. She was ready to hunt for humans and eat them when she was rescued. Thank goodness that didn't happen. Plus, she didn't think about how she was going to hunt for them when she could barely move.
"Okay. So what am I supposed to do?" Kai opened the page when his sister asked. It was easy to find the page again since it was like it had a bookmark.
"You are supposed to mix your blood and Kiryuu's. Then drink it."
Iris covered her mouth from doing the vomiting gesture. That is disgusting.
"How much?" Alek asked after sighing. She didn't like to get hurt but, she remembered that Kiryuu was in pain because of her.
"The solution must be about half a cup." Kai continued to read the book.
"Do any of you have knives?" Alek asked. Bia hesitantly brought out a leaf-shaped earring she sometimes wore to school and occasions. It was about the size of a thumb and, it was pretty. She bit her lip and removed the right side of the leaf. It revealed a knife that was perfectly hidden from the stem.
"Thanks..." Alek received the knife with wide eyes. Did her sister want to kill her? Well, then she is damn well prepared. Was this the reason why she always forbade her from touching her accessories? First of all, where did she get this and why?!