Prophecy's Children
Chapter 7 - Completion
The night was beautiful. The stars shone brightly like little lanterns and the moon covered the world in ethereal silver. The trees absorbed the silver and became other worldly, making the forest fey and mystical. A night like this promoted silence, since most people would stare up at the sky and feel awe at the natural beauty of it all. Unfortunately, it did not apply to three boys in a clearing in the mystic looking woods. The moon was probably wincing like the two ladies watching the proceedings with increasing ire.
"I told you not to touch me!"
Sally felt her eye twitch. They had been at it ever since they had camped down for the night.
"I didn't touch you, Gorgeous! Do you think I want to touch you and incur the wrath of the Air Slicer or whatever?"
"Duo wouldn't touch you anyway! He has better taste!"
The three continued their spat, ignoring the ladies who were rapidly losing patience with them. Sally fumed while Noin recited the Dreamer's Pact under her breath. They could not kill Duo or Heero, they were the last hope for humanity. Still.. Sallycontemplated the finer points of maiming – nothing permanent of course, but she needed to shut these boys up. There was only so much she could take.
"SHUT UP!"
Heero, Duo and Trowa started and looked at Sally. They had been so engrossed in their verbal repartee that none of them had registered Sally's rising anger. Usually, the boys were more observant of Sally's moods. Even though Noin had told them repeatedly that Sally was the most composed person she had ever encountered, all three of them had experienced Sally's temper in the past week of travel together. An angry Sally was as formidable as a storm and the three boys had learned not to aggravate her and to watch for the tell tale signs of her irritation. But tonight, they had failed to pay attention.
"Must you fight like little boys? I can't stand for this kind of behavior! Heero, you are supposed to be a wall of silence! Go back to it and stop talking! And Duo, if you goad Heero one more time, I'm going to tie you to the tree with that braid of yours! Trowa, you are only here because Noin and I agreed. Don't make me disagree."
Noin nearly laughed when Sally finished her tirade. If Sally hadn't braided her hair, it would have stood on end like a pissed off cat. And the boys looked stunned. Finally, they were quiet. Sally stalked off into the woods, muttering to herself about boys and their inability to grow into men. Noin sat on her log peacefully and drank her tea. The silence was blissful and her ire disappeared. She sipped her tea for a while longer and the boys sat by the fire with sullen expressions. Duo looked like he wanted to say something but a look from Noin dismissed him back into silence. Trowa looked comfortable in the silence as if he did not like talking in the first place. Heero resembled a volcano about to burst. Noin chuckled into her cup – Heero probably had some nasty things he wanted to say to Duo. Into this rather amusing silence came loud noises. In the woods, there were crashing, cursing and a fair amount of blithering. Noin noticed that all three boys tensed as if getting ready to fight. They might have only been boys, but they were warriors. The crashing got louder and the curses came more frequently until two boys covered in twigs came out into the clearing. They noticed the small group and paused. Then the blond boy spoke. "Hi. We seem to be a bit lost. Do you know how to get to Jensia?"
Noin goggled at the newly arrived boys. One was blond, or at least he should have been if the twigs hadn't made a nest in his hair. He was also well dressed in a silk coat with golden scrolling climbing the sleeves. He was no village boy, but a noble. His green eyes were lit with a bit of embarrassment and consternation. The other boy, however, had no such inclinations. His dark brown eyes glinted in the fire light like a pair of tiger's eye stones. He was also wearing clothes that signified either wealth or status and his dark hair seemed to have been in a respectable queue before the incidents with numerous bushes. He looked angry, as if getting lost was entirely the blonde's fault.
"Jensia? That's at least forty miles from here. You're not lost. You aren't even on the same map as Jensia."
Noin cringed. It had to be Duo who had to speak and throw diplomacy out the window. The dark haired boy glared at Duo but the blonde did not take offense. Instead, he laughed.
"Really? We are that far off? I guess you were right, Wufei. We were never meant to go off on our own."
The dark haired boy, apparently Wufei, took exception. "Don't go around telling these strange people our names! For all we know, they are thieves, murderers, or worse!"
"Hey, I happen to be a thief and I'm a real nice guy. And what's worse than a murderer anyway?"Wufei and the blonde boy looked at Duo as if he had grown an extra head. Duo, quite accustomed to people staring at him, stared right back. Finally, when Noin thought that she would have to step in to stem the violence, the blonde stepped forward.
"You are funny. I'm Quatre. This taciturn guy is Wufei. How are you doing?"
Heero and Trowa made no motion to befriend these new arrivals, but Duo decided that he liked Quatre. "I'm cool. This is Trowa. Don't make fun of his hair, he can't help it. That's Heero, or as I call him, Gorgeous. Don't talk to him, he's really touchy. I'm Duo. You may compliment me any time." During Duo's lengthy introduction, Noin's brain kicked in. Gasping, she stood and spilled her tea onto the ground. Not noticing the tea, she staggered over to the introducing pair and sputtered. Holy Darkness.. And she had thought the night could not possibly get worse.
"Quatre." Noin said, her voice laced with disbelief, "Quatre Raberba Winner, the heir to the Winner Dynasty. The missing heir. You disappeared a year ago, along with your childhood companion."
Quatre blushed and Wufei became defensive. No one should have remembered Quatre, the long lost heir. "Don't let that slip, woman. If it is known that he's alive and well, there will be unpleasant consequences for him, as well as you."
Noin shrugged off the threat. She was not the type to be threatened easily. However, the mystery remained. What were Quatre and Wufei doing here? Even if someone got lost, they did not miss their mark by forty miles. Did the stars have something to say? Almost in a trance, Noin looked up into the clear night sky. As she stared at the sky, her jaw dropped to the ground and she lost all strength in her legs. She fell to her knees, her eyes still glued to the sky. Her jaw hung slack, as if they had lost their hinges. She could not believe what she was seeing. The stars had started to move. MOVE. The eternalcelestial bodies, as constant as the sun itself, were moving like fireflies in an open field. They danced and switched places, appeared and disappeared. Then they realigned themselves to form a message that sent her mind reeling. The stars had one message. The stars said completion. The Warrior Mages were all assembled according to her star reading. The Air Slicer in his infinite capacity to control air, the Water Glider in his mastery of water, the Earth Shaker in his dominion over the ground, the Mind Bender in his power to manipulate people, and the Fire Dancer in his audacity to command fire. All five were here, before her eyes. She could not believe it. She was too much in shock to feel Duo poke at her shoulder."Lady Noin, are you okay? Lady? Hello?"
Duo continued his prodding while the other four boys look at Noin with various degrees of concern, surprise and pity. Fortunately for Noin, Sally chose that moment to return to the clearing.
"What the hell is going on here? Who are you two? What have you done to Noin?"
Sally was very unpleasant, for she had thought that she would be returning to a peaceful scene. Instead of quiet boys huddling by the fire, she now had five boys who were whispering to each other about a suddenly comatose Noin. Her anger level which she had diminished with a great amount of effort suddenly spiked into danger area once again.
"Hey, we didn't do anything to her. She just fell. I swear, none of us did anything this time!"
Duo's desperate plea did not make a dent in Sally's rising temper. She began stalking over to Duo and the boys, her very body movements emanating a certain doom for all of them. Quatre and Wufei, who were new to Sally's temper, had no idea what was going on but knew enough to be seriously afraid. When Sally got close enough to Duo to smack him, Noin found her voice. "Stop, Sally. It's not them. I mean, it is, but it's not. Look at the sky, Sally. Just look."
Stifling a sigh, Sally did as instructed. As soon as her eyes reached the sky, they widened impossibly and she nearly fell over backwards.
"Holy mother of Darkness. They are the Warriors? Five fifteen year old boys?"
"Yeah, I know. I think the stars are crazy. Stark, raving mad."
Noin and Sally looked over at the five boys and let out a whimper together. The five boys merely stood and stared at them intently, none of them quite comprehending the momentous news the stars had given to Sally and Noin.
"The five Children of Prophecy have been found. Darkness have mercy on us."
Noin's quiet statement floated in the night air like a wisp, floating over the boys like gossamer wings. Up above, the stars twinkled mischievously, prophesizing amazing headaches for the two Star Dreamers.
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