COBALT: The Red Phantom (Book One)

Chapter 24: A Midnight Stroll (Part 3/3)

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Cobalt hit 25k reads, someone get the sangria and sprite!

Or... I guess this is still PG13, so water?

Anywho, five chapters to go after this! It can still go anywhere for the little emo stick bug and his pet lizard. I'll try and get out as many as I can before the doomsday clock ticks down to my first day of school~

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          Truvius could tell exactly when Káel was nervous, because he came armed with a battlefront of stupid questions and blank stares. Now was one of those special moments for him, head peeking through the drawn window as he skimmed the night struck and shingled view. 

          "So the teachers really don't walk the halls after curfew?"

          "What do you take them for? Golems?" Truvius blurted, snorting with laughter at the flutter of confused blinks Káel was giving off. "They need as much sleep as we do. And why waste time with teachers when Tia doesn't need sleep?"

          "Well... I don't know." Káel replied, darting his nervous eyes back to the window. "I saw it in some movies..."

          Truvius laughed in disbelief, maneuvering around the darkened room to get Káel an empty bag. Movies were sounding stranger by the day coming from Káel's mouth.

          As he held the browned leather stachel up, the nervous twitch to Káel's lips returned, his mind hungry for another missing piece to procrastinate on.

          "You're sure you can scale down the roof, right?"

          Káel did a hesitant nod.

          "Because you dreamed you did it?" 

          Káel didn't speak, giving the shingles a sidelong stare as Puff made his disbelief known in a couple sharp warbles.

          "We can always wait another three weeks for Ray to go on his next mission. It'll probably give us more time to pla-"

          "No. No more waiting." Káel cut in, puffing his chest with a deep breath before squeezing himself through the window and onto the roof. With a curt nod he did a strange salute with his hand, heavily dropping his arm to his side like a stiff soldier. "If I'm not back by morning I died horribly."

          Truvius nodded. "See you in a couple hours then."

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          Saying Káel remembered the route would be an overstatement.

          Regardless, he'd made it down. His fourth and final slip in the treacherous climb ending with a mouthful of sweet grass and grime, and a cacophony of Phantom's cackles. 

          But if there was one thing his school counsellor had taught him well, it was looking on the bright side of the junkyard. He was on the ground in one piece, which meant he'd made it.

          Double checking for window peekers, Káel ran across the field, ducking into the overgrown and unkempt grass to fish out his ceptrum. He held it just before the dug up Ceptrum, the dried twigs and wiry grass crowning it keeping it inconspicuous enough around nosy students.

          He opened his mouth to speak the password, the familiar flattened voice of the ceptrum filling his head instead.

          Are you sure?

          Káel frowned. He had been pretty damn sure about his plan, if falling off the roof was anything to go by.

          You walk the path of my previous master. Many would whisper that The Light was his demise, and the creature that tails your shadow paid servitude to it.

          Káel paused, his eyebrows dropping the more he thought about it. The Light?

          It is as the dark is. Many a secret may hide in its brilliance, so will you trust its servant?

          Káel realised he was frozen, poised with a white rock raised to the heavens and a dumbstruck hang to his mouth. "Uhh... I trust Phantom... seeing as he isn't cryptic as all hell with everything he says."

          Very well master. 

          The voice left his head with an air of reluctance, leaving Káel to the peace of a quiet mind as he smiled at the milky white stone. He was ready to see the secret behind his strange montage of dreams. Ready to find another way back home.

          Ready for anything this wacky world could throw at him.

          With a nod entirely for himself, he squeezed his eyes shut. 

          "The Red Phantom."

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          Alestra muttered under her breath, eyes filling with relief when a translucent green bubble shrouded her. But a few seconds of silence was all the sound blocking enchantment could give, her inexperience rearing its ugly head as the spell shattered.

          She wasn't surprised. She'd only started on mastering the spell after the first day of school, when she realised her roommate with an incredibly forgettable name was louder sleeping than wide awake. 

          And until she could hold the bubble of green, she was doomed to depend upon mid class power naps and the kick of Kanux Berries. 

          Despite being unable to use the night for its typical purpose, Alestra had come to enjoy a new routine. It would have been smarter if she had her notes in hand, but the book of Garaean Plants and Poisons was definitely on the more interesting side of the reads she'd snatched from the library. 

          She set up her usual little den, tucked up beside the window with her white bedsheets cascading down her shoulders. The starlight was perfect at her angle, enough to cast a silhouette on the black letters, but not bright enough to strain her eyes.  

          She skimmed a few diagrams, temple rested against the chilled glass as she tuned out the snarling snores. The window had been kept ajar, the easily fogotten detail creeping up on Alestra and into the bundled cloak she'd made. With a shiver she moved to close it, her eyes wandering past the shingled roof to a strange sight in the grass.

          A mess of black hair bopping up and down as the boy it was attached to awkwardly squat crawled through the grass. The distance between them left some room for doubt, but the little white blur hopping through the waving weeds was unmistakably Puff.

          She moved closer to the glass, her nose squished against its surface to soak in as much of the view as she could. He had waded his way to the very edge of the forest, holding something up to the trees like a spindly statue.

           But to Alestra's utter confusion, after a few seconds of the strange pose the trees rustled with a gale of howling wind. The forest's sigh striking Cobalt with whining groans, a quick distraction tailored to mask the small line of trees that had scuttled away to form a path for Káel.

          And with only a moment to hesitate, he entered its merciless maws.

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