Emotionless: (Prototype: Zero book 1)

by Shaina Anastasi

  I enjoy quiet places. It doesn’t distract me when I create a rune. I won’t feel compelled to listen to conversations that surround me. Silence clears my mind and lets me concentrate on rune creating. At least at this school, I wouldn’t be ridiculed or told off for doing runes in class. Mage Academy encourages us to use our powers if it is to the guidelines and health and safety of others.

  I read it in my spare time.

  Up the stairs and back on the flat surface, we went down the dusty, unkempt corridor and to the familiar o-d-h door, which doesn’t have a latch or a lock. Head Mage lifted his leg and tapped it. The antique door creaked open and clunked lightly against the wall. He leant in first, and I was a step behind.

  “Lawliet Clarintine, you have a new class member,” Mika said.

  I darted my eyes down instantly. I have never been great with meeting new people and introductions were never anything that appealed to me. I say my name, pronounce it and hide in a corner for the rest of the year and keep to myself.

  After a few moments of standing behind Head Mage, I didn’t hear a sound. There was no one here. Blinking slowly, I looked at the Head Mage who seemed irritated.

  “He was doing theory work over the holidays. I wonder if he is doing practical work now. Little doll, is it all right if I leave you here? This place will be your new classroom for the remainder of your school years. My teachers will not be able to teach you anything. You have already exceeded school level knowledge just by that small encounter. I doubt half the teachers even know how to create a three-point rune. I also noticed your little performance in Rune Wars. That exercise was to prove if you could be in an average mage class but I believe this will be best suited to your taste and understanding. What is left for me to do is have you learn from ancient and forbidden books that are in this tower classroom. I trust you won’t do anything you aren’t supposed to outside of this classroom.” For some strange reason, this doesn’t seem real. He sounds inexperienced to tell me to dabble in forbidden books. Wouldn’t he get in trouble? I shook my head, and he grinned. “Wonderful. Now there is only one thing you have to know before I leave. Lawliet doesn’t like to be spoken to, looked at or anyone in his personal space, but with saying that, he tends to do all three, which is strange. Though if you follow those three – Oh, Lawliet, there you are!”

  Head Mage looked up, as did I. There was someone I had seen recently before and he was laying on the roof as if it were the ground. He was sleeping on the smooth flat roof, his veins throbbed white with magic, and a rune on his shoulder wasactive. Peering at it, I noticed the large cursiveG to defy gravity. What an interesting rune tattooed onto him. Looking away, I looked up at his smooth, relaxed sleeping face, white hair and pale features before instantly going to the boots he was wearing.

  “I want those boots,” I murmured.

  “Lawliet, come down and introduce yourself to your new classmate,” Head Mage insisted. “It is rude. You would think three years in this tower; you would be a little more excited to know you have a new student that was joining you.”

  “Shut up,” he mumbled, and melancholy gold eyes opened slowly.

  “What is the matter? You look a little sad.”

  “Tired,” he said and then snapped his fingers together. The rune deactivated, and he dropped to the ground. Slamming against the bricks, he straightened up and stretched. “Who was I supposed to introduce myself to?”

  “Eileen...?”

  “The . . . fuck!”

  A strangled cry came from above me, as I reached for the boots and tugged them towards me. He lost balance, his legs kicked up, and he tumbled down. Standing from my crouched position, I slipped his boot off and walked to the nearest table while Mumbling, “Thank you for your cooperation.”

  “Well, I believe you two will get along very well.” Head mage's footsteps moved further away from me, and the sound of the door creaked. “I will check at the end of the week of how you two are doing. The cafeteria is also open morning until eight at night so don’t be afraid to eat. Until Friday, have a nice week.”

  The door closed softly, and I was able then to admire the boot I took from Lawliet. His face was close to mine, and he was sneering at me. His breath heated and smelled of ash. A strange scent that appears to have distracted me, so I turned slowly to stare directly at him. Our noses brushed against each other, and he leant back, straightened up the slightest and glared down at me.

  “You’re the girl who was committing suicide,” he huffed a little breathy laugh and looked away. “Decided to change your mind.”

  “Boots,” I mumbled, leant down, slipped mine off and raised it all the while was staring at the beautiful rune work on the sole of his boot. “Jump rune. Trying to see how high I can jump is all.”

  “This rune designs.” After looking at my boot thoroughly, he placed my boot on the edge of the desk and leant in, so that his intense gold eyes stared intently into mine. “Get out of my classroom.”

  “Ok,” I responded, and he tilted his head, confused.

  I stood and walked out with his boot in my hand. I wanted to get away from his intimidation stares when my throat clenched up. I didn’t see it coming, as he grabbed my arm, not too harshly, but enough to make me stop walking and stiffen. His hand was warm, as he twisted my arm and forced me to turn towards him. After I had faced him, he released his grip and raised his hand. This mage expected me to give back his boot. I don’t think I would be able to without looking at it a little more. Ever since I noticed them when I jumped, I wanted to see the design and texture. That was all I could think of.

  “Fine, a deal,” he muttered, grabbed the chair that I had been on and dropped in it. “You can look at the rune, but my shoe has to be on my foot.”

  “Ok.”

  Therefore, I sat there, under the table with his foot propped up on my tucked-up knees. He didn’t squirm or complain when I twisted his foot left to right. Some part of me believed he was sleeping, I couldn’t necessarily tell. However, for the first two days, Sunday and Monday, we didn’t speak to each other, look at each other, but he would comply when I crawled under his table to look at the rune and draw theS of this different rune that only seemed to exist on the sole of his boot.

  It was the beginning of an intense unimaginable friendship; we just hadn’t seemed to know it yet.

  Tuesday morning, I woke in an unsightly manner. Hopper left late last night, strict orders from Mum and Dad to pick up some items they require immediately. We don’t know when he was coming back and that bothers me because I don’t trust Isilies with making our breakfast and either way, he was hardly at home. Leaving early for class and coming back later at night with more paperwork to fill out to repeat it Monday morning.

  Tuesday morning, Isilies left to prep class, so it was I, Donte and Nixon and a loud irritating noise that came from the front door. I knew it wouldn’t be for me. I don’t have friends yet. I isolated myself in a tower with a Highborn mage that does his own thing without any interruptions. Doubt it would be him. When I get to class, he is there and leaves later than I do. So far, we have mutual respect for each other’s privacy. Unlike the mage that was going to be walking into my home at any given moment.

  The door to my room opened quickly, thudded against the wall, and I peeked up to see Charlie mesmerised by my room. I don’t understand. It was a straightforward and white room. There was no colour unless I counted the runes that I drew on the walls with curiosity.

  “Dude, your home is huge!” She gasped while I tried to adjust to the early wake-up. It was even earlier than when the tweet stirs me. Louder as well. “I live in the dorms, so my room looks like a tiny box compared to this lush apartment. Can I live with you?”

  “No,” I responded dully, and she laughed.

  “A joke. Have to remember you don’t get jokes.”

  I do get jokes; I simply just found that to be a horrific excuse for a joke. Envisioning her waking me up this early in the morning is no joking matter. Sounds e
ven worse than tweet and Hoppers constant whining for us to get dressed and out the door for school. The evil bunny, annoying tweet and strange mage that considers her my friend.

  That technically means I have one friend at this school and she happens to be the loudest most obnoxious creature to this day. I suppose she was, considering whenever I walk from the cafeteria to the class she tries to wave me over to talk. She sits with Donte, Nixon and a few people who accepted them without the care for status. I merely assumed she was their friend. I didn’t know that they included me into this friendship.

  “Oh, that Mongrel of yours told me late yesterday afternoon to wake you early to eat at the cafeteria,” she said while she touched a picture frame on the bedside table of my brothers and parents.

  The bunny is evil. Never trust the bunny.

  “So, get dressed so I can show you the grub they call mage food downstairs.”

  Nodding, I walked out of my room and went straight towards the bathroom. Donte peered out of the gap in his and Nixon’s place. The bags under his eyes means he isn’t fully awake and comprehending anything. He stared daggers at me as I opened the bathroom door and took a shower.

  Once I finished, I grabbed the spare clothes I often leave in the bathroom draws and dressed in the school uniform while a brush entangled the snares and knots in my hair. Once finished, I flattened the hair with my hands, opened the door and stared directly at Nixon and Donte who seem to be in a foul mood. Stepping aside from them, they swung bath towels over their shoulder and walked in together. The sound of the shower and the bath went on simultaneously as I walked down the hall and into my room where Charlie was lying sprawled on the unmade bed.

  She rose from the dead with a vibrant energised gleam that not even the pendant around my neck can keep me from being totally drained by it.

  Linking arms with mine, she dragged me out of my home. I only had enough time to grab my grandfather’s scrapbook on the way. Outside of the home, my eyes moved to Lawliet’s door out of habit before I hobbled down the stairs two at a time because Charlie seems to be a rushed person. I was even more surprised - even knowing I cannot show it - at the number of mages in the cafeteria. Almost all of the tables were floating in the air, while some of the mages in it stayed firm on the ground.

  She took me to the line and two plates lifted off the stack and dropped into our hands. I was Instantly interested. I flipped it over to see a tracker rune stamped on the bottom of the plate. Flipping it back over, we stepped forward in a fast-paced manner when a kitchen mage came closer and with a flashlight in her hands. She moved it across both sets of eyes at the mage that was in front of Charlie. When finished, a docket spat out of the other end, and she handed it to the mage who slipped it into the machine at the line. The computer scanned it, and various items of food were listed and flew towards him and dropped on his plate.

  I am not in the o-d-h world anymore.

  “Scan your eye here,” she told me after Charlie had hers done and various foods randomly went on her plate.

  “But . . . I don’t want to,” I murmured and the lady lowered the flashlight and ushered me through to get my food.

  Puffing cheeks, I grabbed a jelly cup that has many ice flakes shining like glitter on the inside of it as well as a mud-mud cake and bottled water. I went to leave the line when I heard disruption two mages in front of me.

  “Hey, fire-breathing Highborn, need water to cool your burning throat,” a Lowborn mage laughed bitterly.

  Lawliet scrunched his water up, the lid popped and liquid rushed down his tense hand.

  “Lawliet,” one of the chefs called his name, and he glared daggers at the chef who was pointing towards the exit. “Leave, and we will bring you up something to eat later.”

  “I just wanted a fucking water,” he muttered. A shaking hand dragged through his white hair and pushed the strands away from his face. “Discriminative bastards.”

  “Frosty, what’s wrong?” Charlie asked.

  I shook my head, grabbed another bottle of water and followed Charlie to a small table with a boy and girl, Lowborn of course. Charlie slumped on the seat while I modestly placed my food down before I shuffled in mine. Lifting my legs up, I set them on the edge of the seat and poked at the jelly when the girl with a spiky boy haircut spoke first.

  “My name is Lollie, and this is Kent. We already know who you are. Your brothers talk highly of you. As well as Charlie, the other day when Head Mage was evaluating you.”

  “I see,” I murmured as I picked apart the jelly with my fingernail and nibbled on the nail.

  “How is it studying with the dragon?” Kent asked. He has that smile that broadens a little too large for his face and an odd build. Broad arms that remind me of trunks off a tree. “He punched Rokk close to two weeks ago,”

  “Why?” Charlie asked. Her eyes widened with curiosity while I sat there and was trying to figure out how he created that rune. “He looks like a hot head.”

  “That’s why we call him the dragon. Annoy him, and it is literally like he is breathing fire!” Lollie snickered. “And he punched Rokk who had to get healed for a broken nose because . . . Well, there are a few rumours about it. Rokk was walking in dragon’s line of sight. Accidentally bumped into him.”

  “Yeah. One was that Rokk said something to tick him off and it escalated from there,” Kent nodded. “Either way, not our problem. I’d stay out of Dragon's way and don’t join in with mages mockery.”

  “Agreed,” Lollie nodded. “Ugh, speaking of Dragon reminds me of Mrs Robertson’s lesson yesterday afternoon.”

  “What!” Charlie said with interest.

  “How to gain immortality was so boring. She was saying how some mages drank the blood of Dragons, vampires or winged creatures? I think she said Valkyrie, a type of angel. I don’t know. It was boring. They taught me that in seventh grade. How drinking their blood could put five years on your life. It is illegal as well as, Dragons are hard to get, Vampires left for darker places and angels . . .” she left it hanging.

  “Are extinct.”

  “What about Valeria the last?” Charlie asked.

  “Myth,” Kent answered. “A story to scare kids away from staying out late at night.”

  “Damn. They were good stories. She had a powerful defence mechanism. Um, shit, what did they call it? Oh yeah! The ge –”

  “Why’re we still on the ground?” Lollie asked suddenly.

  “Because we’re waiting for Donte and Nixon – oh, here they come,” Charlie waved at them, and my brothers ended up coming this way.

  “Bye,” I murmured, pushed my half-eaten jelly cup, nibbled on the mud-mud cake, and grabbed the bottles of water.

  Charlie called my name a few times, but I just ignored her and walked towards the exit and up the flight of stairs to my classroom with what they call ‘the dragon’.

  A part of me believed that he wouldn’t necessarily be in trouble if that Lowborn left him alone. For the past two days, because we don’t talk or annoy each other, he hasn’t seemed to strike a nerve. However, with saying that, I don’t know him at all. He could be that filled with rage that he explodes when someone does look at him. I wouldn’t know so I cannot take sides, but I can believe that at least some anger would be towards mages who say mean words. It would annoy any Highborn to the extent of violence. Donte always says cruel words when anyone, in particular, says something about the betrayal. We only want to be accepted. Not merely creatures that are going extinct because of what happened many years ago.

  Puffing cheeks, I walked along the small hallway that gets to the door and pushed it open to see Lawliet slouched in his chair. His head was resting on his arms as he partially bent on the table and slept. It oddly feels like a ritual. He would laze around while I stare at his boots he refuses to take off, so I would always end up sitting underneath the table with my book and pen, calculating what part of the rune design I need without outright copying it from his shoe.

  Today seems to be d
ifferent. I have all the elements. I just wonder if on the crooked nearly broken bookshelf there was something about creating your rune without the classic mandatory symbol in the middle that makes sense.

  I walked towards the table that he was sleeping on, lifted a bottled water and gently placed it on the edge of the table. The cold liquid sloshed inside when I released the light grip I had on it. Not bothering of waiting for a ‘thank you’ or for him to wake up, I went to the bookshelf and stared intently at the rows of books I have never heard of before. Almost most of them look like master mages books. It is something a teenager shouldn’t be reading. Head Mage mustn’t be that smart to leave it in the hands for me to see and understand.

  Running a finger along the line, I picked one from random and slipped it out. Dust already stuck to fingertips. Taking a step away from the bookshelf, I rested the book on my arm and opened it up. Satisfied with the various descriptions and index of knowledge, I sat down and read without looking up for the whole day, only to grab something to eat and repeat the process.

  By the time that I finished reading the book, it was already becoming dark outside through the small arched window near the blackboard. Closing the book, I stood with my grandfathers and went to the board, chalk in hands. I have analysed and processed every part of that rune and broke it apart and with the help of that book. I think I am ready to create my non-existent rune that was similar to Lawliet’s rune. To walk on walls and ceilings with boots that stick. It sounds easy in theory, but when the chalk pressed against the board, I was empty of how this is going to work. Do I start with the symbol and work around the activation rune circle, or to start somewhere and hope it makes sense? Puffing cheeks, I decided to start with the SK I initially thought.

  Drawing the curve of the s, a soft barely their voice cut through my concentration, and I turned to see Lawliet at the door, quarter empty water bottle gripped in his hands. He had the door open with his foot while he stared at me strangely.