7

"What do you mean she escaped!"

An injured Griffin huddled against the far wall of the room, as far away as he could possibly get from her fury. 

"She-She wasn't alone you know!" He wailed in despair, "There was a Roc--"

"You should have been able to kill it you incompetent fluff-ball!" A rare and expensive bit of gnomish glassware shattered just over his head, then with a single glance from the dark woman, it flew back to her hands, completely in tact. She threw it again.

The Griffin shrieked in terror and made a break for the door, but with a single glance the woman closed and locked it from across the room. 

"When I ask you to do a job, I want it done properly. In fact! I just want it done! I thought you could handle taking a human girl from her human friends! But apparently I overestimated you, just as I did the manticore. " She paused, and with a hushed syllable, a glowing net of power surrounded the unfortunate creature, preventing any and all thoughts of escape. "And you will be dealt with shortly," she spat at the cowering griffin, "just as I did the Manticore."

The Griffin whimpered in fear as she left the room, beckoning two silent cloaked figures to follow her. 

They entered a Quiet room, no sound could enter it's walls, and none could escape. It was usually meant for noisy prisoners, but under the circumstances, it was perfect. 

After making sure the door was locked, the woman turned to her two companions.

"What I am going to say to you are for you and you alone. This girl has beaten two of my finest beasts and survived. Her powers are like nothing I have ever seen before. I want her, and I want you to bring her to me." 

She paused for a breath, and one of the figures raised a hesitant hand.

"Yes, I need her alive."

The figure lowered its hand, disappointed. Its companion shared the feeling. The woman continued.

"Go, and do not fail me."

The two figures bowed, and in perfect unison recited

"Your wish is our command."

*******

  I was awake, and it still wasn't a dream. How amusing.

That morning, Jasymuri had decided to partner us off for chores and watch shifts and such. Alder was paired with emma, theo with sophie,

which left me and shadow. oh Joy. *sarcasmsarcasmsarcasm*

We started off with cooking duty, so the morning sounded like this.

"Go get some water."

"You go get it."

"No, I asked you."

"Well, who died and made you king?"

"Cricket, will you just go get the -- you don't even need to get it!! You have water powers!!"

"So?"

"So?! You can just, like, get it out of the air!!"

"And if I don't feel like it?"

"Why on earth wouldn't you feel like it!"

"I just don't."

"AAGH!! You are so... ANNOYING!!"

"Annoying? I'm not annoying. If you want to see someone who is really annoying I can go get you a mirror."

"Jasymuri! Cricket is being a pest!"

"Well, Shadow is trying to boss me around!"

"Am not!"

"Are to!"

(Insert sounds of cat fighting)

Later, it sounded like this.

"What on earth are you making?!"

"I'm trying to make pancakes."

"Those are supposed to be pancakes?"

"Yeah. Okay so they look funny. They'll still taste the same."

"Funny? They don't look funny, They look nasty!"

"Well, I'd like to see you try to flip pancakes with a plastic fork. I can't believe no one thought to pack a spatula."

"If you'd let me try, I'm sure I could get them looking better than that."

"Nuh uh!"

"Yeah huh!"

"Jasymuri! Tell Shadow to leave me and my pancakes alone!"

"They aren't pancakes! They're Gross!"

"They are not!"

"They are to!"

"Go Away!"

(Insert sounds of more cat fighting, mixed with the sound of Shadows head being whacked by a frying pan covered in pancake batter blobs that happened to be handy.)

Jasymuri took us off cooking duty, surprisingly, and sent us to gather fire wood. This at least was a little better, we didn't have to do that cooperating thing quite so much, we just went and got dead wood out of the forest. It didn't even have to be dry because Alder could get anything to burn.

The trouble was when we got back to camp.

Alder was getting ready to do the fire when Shadow and I came back, each with a load of wood.

"Great timing you guys! I was just getting started!" he reached into Shadow's pile of wood, pulled out a log, and frowned.

"Okay, I know I said that the wood didn't have to be dry, but it didn't have to be soaking wet Shadow!"

Shadow frowned, confused, and picked up a stick. It was dripping.

"This wood was perfectly dry when I picked it up! How could it possibly... Cricket!" 

"What?" I said innocently, finding the soup and bread Theo and Sophie were making suddenly very interesting. "Can I help you guys? I promise not to whack anyone."

"Cricket, do you know anything about this?" Alder asked.

"Possibly." I conceded 

"Why?!" Shadow asked, exasperated.

"Revenge." I replied.

"What?"

"It's my Revenge."

"For what!?"

"You wouldn't apologize."

"Umm... Again, for what!?"

"For insulting my pancakes."

"They weren't pancakes! They looked like they were going to come alive and eat us all!"

"Shadow! You are Impossible!"

"You're a pest!"

"You're Annoying!"

"You're insufferable!"

"SHUT UP!!!" Everyone else yelled.

We did.

"Is there any possible way that you two could get along?" Jasymuri asked.

"No." We both answered at the same time. We glared at each other and said "Stop copying me!" also at the same time.

"Can we please change partners?" Shadow pleaded, I nodded fervently.

Jasymuri sighed in a long suffering way. "I'm afraid not. Although I would if I could."

"Why can't you?" I asked, confused. 

"It was not my choice to put you two as partners."

"Who's was it?" Shadow asked, equally confused.

Jasymuri closed his eyes for a moment, as if trying to think of a way to explain his choice.

"Have you ever had a feeling to do something, and if you did it, even if it was ridiculous, you never regretted it?"

We both nodded.

"Well, I had a feeling like that. it told me to put you two together. I'm just as confused as you both are, because obviously this isn't working. Can you two just try, really really hard to get along?"

We both sighed, glared at each other, and nodded.

"As long as she doesn't douse my fire wood again."

"And as long as he doesn't insult my cooking."

"And as long as she doesn't force me to eat it."

"And as long as..."

Jasymuri sighed, it was going to be a long trip.

Reviews

[Rieja Thorn]

I love it especially the last part it's good to put some humor occasionally in books and this was a classic example