I cast off my disguise spell and took off my armour so I could rest comfortably. I was about to lay myself down to rest on the couch when my friend stopped me. "You can share my bed if you want, I don't mind."
"You sure that's ok?"
"Yeah, I don't mind" I was only wearing my pants completely exposing the top half of my tattoos including the ones on my face. There's a monstrosity on my left cheek glaring at an angelic being on the right with misty purple starry skies behind each of them creeping up the sides of my face but not covering it.
There wasn't really any muscle on my body to speak of but I'm by no means fat. She didn't cast off her disguise spell though, mostly because she didn't need to. "your marks look so different from mine."
"You think if I collect all of them, they'll tell a story?"
"If you get any more, they may just cover you up entirely"
She was wearing a simple nightgown the loose fabric thinly veiled her clearly stronger body. This won't be the first time I climb into bed with another person, but this may be the first-time restraint is actually an issue. As I sat down at the opposite side of her bed, she asked me something. "how do you see me?"
"Do you mean as a woman or as a friend?"
"Yes"
"Then that is my answer."
"You see me as both?"
"That is indeed what I just said."
"so… if I asked you to be more than friends would you be up to it."
I slowly slid over the bed and pulled her into an embrace once I had my head up to her ear and could feel her breath on her neck I whispered, "If you're ok with me." Her face turned red in a moment and she pushed me away a bit flustered by my sudden movements and when she looked into my eyes and saw me holding back laughter, she got a bit mad and lightly jabbed me in the shoulder. "Don't toy with my heart like that."
"I meant it though, your reaction was just too… what's the word… priceless"
"Either way I only invited you here to share my bed cause I know how uncomfortable that couch is, don't expect me to do anything that… close."
"It's cool, it's not like I can force you. You're probably stronger than me anyway. Maybe I should be asking you not to take advantage of me." Her face turned red again.
"Don't joke around like that." I had a bit of a laugh and after a bit of playful conversation we got some much-needed rest, and nothing happened. Not that there wasn't a way book told me I could convince her if I wanted to just that I'd rather take things slow and enjoy these playful moments while they last, you never know when you'll miss a wholesome interaction.
The next morning, I asked if she cared if we got dressed together and was promptly kicked out of the bedroom. After donning my armour and cape I cast my disguise spell again, so it looked like regular clothes, it's not that I don't have more clothes I just feel safer wearing armour when I know assassins are after my family. "Can you help me with the back straps of my new armour?"
"How'd you get them on the first time?"
"I didn't I just held my elbows close to my waist and prayed no one noticed."
"Do I need to teach you a telekinesis spell?"
"Maybe."
I walked into her room and found her to be mostly dressed except that her back was partially exposed. I could see where her tattoo wasn't hidden from this angle. Before she got mad at me for staring, I fed the belts through the buckles and asked her if they were too tight before helping her prepare breakfast.
"Eggs and bacon aren't bad but are you sure you want to use the boar we just killed when you were going to use it in your club?"
"It's fine it's only a little bit. And it's not like I was going to give the club all the boar meat we got."
After breakfast, we left for school a bit earlier than usual and I helped her deposit her catch into the clubroom's icebox before we went to class. This morning the girl who asked me the strange question after presumably poisoning me was introduced to the classroom as a new transfer student.
I figured it was coming but thought it'd be sooner. One of my friends was out sick today so there was a vacant desk near me though I have no idea what being close to me will do, I'm untouchable by conventional means, and I don't exactly do much during class. I might just be more boring than the lectures to watch.
She was very clearly a girl, the other day her face was obscured, and her hair was so short I couldn't tell, she must have also been using a spell to disguise her voice because I couldn't see a similarity between her voice today and her voice then.
She gradually grew closer and closer to me as the day wore on and I made no attempts to do anything. Until I got to the archery club that evening and began teaching their advisor more about the spells, he was having trouble learning. This girl joined the archery club and was teaching the other members how to curve the arrows as they shoot them so they can aim in one direction and land a blow from the side instead of head-on. Unfortunately, she had the students practice by aiming towards the door and an arrow nearly grazed my face.
The advisor shouted out to the students not to shoot at any of the doors berating them after he'd explicitly told them not to the first day of every semester. Most of the students hung their heads in shame except for the girl who wasn't even holding a bow, just picking up arrows from the targets while she had the chance. He didn't see the need to berate her as she wasn't holding a bow when he stuck his head out to complain and thought the other archers saying she told them to, was just them bullying the new girl.
I knew she was just messing with them. But if any of those arrows had hit me those poor archers could have been seriously hurt. Regardless I said nothing and simply let the archers sit in abject fear when they remembered what happened to the arrow that struck me last time. They probably don't understand the gravity of just the arrow being destroyed but they should understand that attacking me is a pointless endeavour.
As I was about to slip into a smug state of mind fitting for the room full of cowering archers one of the twins slipped into the room and walked right up to me. "Do you have a spell focus?"
"Yes but it's a necrotic spell focus"
"Does it work with other Domains of magic?"
"Yes."
"Then I'd like to borrow it."
I leant I to her without worry, not just because I could see that her future was to return it to me but because even if she didn't, I could always make another.
After receiving it from me she slipped it into her cleavage and disappeared into the crack in the ring I was still wearing from them… honestly, I must have forgotten it. I wasn't about to take it off now though I'll return it to her when I get the chance. After some more instruction with the archery club advisor, the twin returned with a pendant in one hand and my spell focus in the other.
"We collected the components before we fully learned the spell so we ended up making you one anyway. Don't think we've given up just because you rejected us we're going to come back and make you say we're worth dying for."
"I doubt it, but I welcome you to try."
"Challenge excepted."
After handing me the pendant she disappeared again. My focus was left on the desk. "Can I try it out?" asked the professor. "you have a spell in mind? you know where the components are?"
"Yeah." Taking my focus in his hand he began chanting while holding a bag at his side. Maybe he too wants to create a magic item, I thought to myself. After his chanting was done, he reached into his bag and smiled. Red lines with purple symbols began forming on his skin. I grabbed his arm and showed it to him. "Oh, that's it? I became a master caster like that?"
"You're either incredibly lucky or amazingly dedicated to your studies."
"I'm just that amazing, aren't I?" he walked into a small wardrobe he had in his room and walked out in poorly stitched mages robes that hung too far down. I took my focus back from his desk where he left it and put it away in my belt where it was. "Does this mean I automatically gain the knowledge in how to use the other spells?"
"Even if it did do you think you'd remember them all? And how do you know what those marks mean?"
"The friend who gave me the book told me about them… how do you know what they mean?"
"My parents are adventurers, more so my mother is a mage"
"I guess it is more of a mage piece of information than anything most people just mistake those markings for a monster disguising themselves as a person because monsters that can cast tend to have these markings far more often than humanoids do"
"The marks aren't specific to a race though and it's not like a monster can afford to cast spells safely."
"As opposed to people who cast them recklessly on purpose for power. Hey since you probably know more about these marks than I do tell me what they do."
"They let you cast without chanting."
"Really?"
"Yeah, but they end up glowing when you use them to cast."
"wow, do you know anyone else with marks like these?"
"like yours? Just one, marks in general? Yes." As he sat in awe of this new information, I began to look at my new pendant and pack up my things for the day. It looked like a pocket watch but, the outside was made of bones with a tiny skull in the centre of the cover. When I pressed the button to open it, I felt like if I had chosen a destination I've been to before it would have sent me there. Instead, it opened, and inside was not a watch but a map of sorts showing where I am and where I could be, like a map of every place I'd set foot.
So, it looked as though I had received a chronometer but instead, I received a map. This could prove useful.