Auctioned off to a School for Magic

Chapter Six: Fireworks

My mouth dropped open. “The officers are here?? Now?” Just like that, everything went to hell. “Where?”

Julie pointed to her left. “You can’t see them from here but they're two or three blocks down that way.”

“Well we saw Alice and Grace in the opposite direction so we should be able to get to them before the officers find us out.” Zander said.

I was afraid the officers were here looking for us until Julie said, “They’re just having fun at the festival, they don’t know we’re here yet.” 

“Come on let’s cloak ourselves and go find them.” I suggested and we all performed invisibility spells on ourselves.  We stayed together and looked around for Alice and Grace. We were rushing around until we found them. “Grace, Alice, make yourselves invisible we have to go!” I whispered which startled Grace causing her to jump in place. “A few officers are here.”

“Ruth?” Alice groaned. “Dammit fine let’s go.” They made themselves invisible and we rushed throughout the crowd trying to get out of the festival. We all started walking slowly when we started to pass the officers on our way out. 

“We want her to be on the advanced path to becoming an officer before she gets pulled out of our school.” We overheard one of the officers say. "If we can get her to becoming an officer sooner than we don't have to worry as much."

“Who would pull her out? I hear her father went into hiding years ago after not being able to protect her and losing his mate to the demon king.” Another officer said to the first. I knew they had to be talking about Jezebeth because her father was mated with my sister but my sister refused to be with him to stay with the demon king and there is only one demon king.

He shook his head. “Her mother is still around, I’ve heard about recent sightings of her.” Jezebeth’s mother abandoned her so I couldn't see why she’d come for her now.

We made it out of the crowd and left. We dropped the invisibility spells when we were far enough away. “God They had to ruin our fun. I don’t want to go back yet, I want to have fun.” 

“But what should we do?” Julie asked.

I saw Jezebeth walking away from everyone and I went to her. “Hey, I’m guessing you heard them too?” I put my stuffed animal away in my bag.

Jezebeth nodded slowly. “I did… my mother is somewhere alive and people have seen her. I don’t know how to feel about that Ruth I thought she was gone for good with no way to find her. I thought she was in hiding like my father.” She sighed. “My father didn’t want me, Red didn’t want me but my mother was the first to not want me…”

“Red does.” I put my hands on her shoulders facing her. “She wants both of us so much that she said if the order doesn’t want to release you to her then she’ll come in and take you by force if that’s what you want. Red is the most powerful psychic to date and maybe one of the most powerful witches too.”

Jezebeth shook her head. “I don’t want to live on the run if I have to depend on other people to protect me from the order. I want to run away with you and be strong enough to keep them from taking us ourselves. That’s not what I meant about her not wanting me. I meant Red never wanted me as a daughter, otherwise it wouldn’t have been so easy for her to leave my father. Maybe I'm just selfish...”

“I get it, my parents didn’t want me either Jezebeth.” I stared into her eyes and they were tearing up. “Instead of staying with me and my sisters my mother killed herself. My father sold me to a corrupt organization, they’re not as evil as they once were but some of the officers are still corrupt. They left me in a different way than your parents left you but they still abandoned me. Jezebeth our parents don’t matter okay? Because we want each other so the whole world can shun us if they want but we’re still going to rule it together oaky?” I let go of her shoulders.

She wiped a tear of my cheek and I wiped a few tears off hers. “Okay…” Her voice cracked.

“Guys!” Julie shouted to us. 

“We’re coming!” I shouted back then we started to compose ourselves. “Wait wasn’t there something you wanted to tell me?”

Jezebeth looked away shyly. “Oh… I don’t remember…”

I didn’t believe her for a second but maybe it wasn’t relevant anymore. “Okay come on, let’s go have fun.” I grabbed her hand and led her back to the group. “What are we doing?”

“We can find a nice spot to hangout and light these fireworks I bought from the festival.” Grace answered.

I smiled. “Our luck is looking up, that sounds great.” We all walked down the road until we saw a spot by a lake. We sat around the lake and started setting off Grace’s fireworks.

“Ruth, do you want to set these ones off with me?” Zander asked and I nodded so we walked a little away from the others. “Tonight didn’t really go as planned. I want to ask you out on a date. I know you don’t share my feelings but a date might change that. If after the date you don’t feel the same way then I’ll stop trying I promise. Even if you say no now I’ll stop trying.”

I stared at him for a little while as I thought about my answer. “Um, okay I think that’ll be fine.” It’ll just be like we’re hanging out one on one, not a big deal.

Zander looked really happy. “Good, you won’t regret it, I promise.” Then we set off some of the fireworks. No one could hear us or anything because of how far away we were from the rest of the group but I noticed in the corner of my eye that Jezebeth was staring at me and weirdly I liked it.