Baelynn's POV:

  "Hey, what's up with Wonwoo?" Bobby asked while biting into his hamburger.

     After the chair fiasco in Astronomy the rest of the day was spent with people giving me the 'odd eyes', and trying to avoid some of the glares that were sent my way.

     One of the best parts of today was meeting the rest of the Fairy brothers and some of the Werewolf cousins.

       When Hoshi first told me that he and DK were only two out of 13 brothers, I was super confused. But then he further explained that most of them were just half-brothers that shared a dad. I could tell by the way he said 'half-brother' that he considers them more than just that, so I didn't pry any further.

      And now, three classes later, we were all in the academy's grand cafeteria sitting around a huge oval table. Hoshi and Yunhyeong helped me order my food and then stuck me between them as we sat down. 

       At first it wasn't really super awkward, but the fairy brothers that I hadn’t yet met sported confused frowns until DK explained the situation and introduced me. When that was over they all smiled and welcomed me to the school.

       There were a total of ten fairy brothers at the table which left three off somewhere else. That is until Bobby pointed out one that was sitting near the huge window-wall and laying his head down on the table. I couldn’t see his face from where I was sitting, but judging how his shoulders were droopy even when hunched over like that I could tell he was depressed.

      "Oh, Hyung said that he finally found his mate." Minghao, a very cute boy with big eyes and pastel blue and pink hair, answered.

 “Mate?” I asked.

  “It’s basically another word for soul mate. A person that you’re destined to meet and fall in love with.” Hoshi kindly explained to me.

  “Ooooooh. Thanks for explaining me that.”

  “No problem. Anything for my new friend!” he replied proudly. I rolled my eyes in amusement and brought my attention back to the main conversation.

    "Really?! Wow! That's great!" Yunhyeong exclaimed excitedly. "Where is she? Is she in the school system yet?"

    "No, that's the thing." Joshua,  a tall boy with sharp, but kind eyes and an innocent smile, added in. "He kind of….. Lost her..."

 "What do you mean 'lost her'?"

   Wow. Even the great HANBIN wanted to know something that didn’t involve himself. Is this whole ‘Mate’ thing really that important?

    "Well..." Hoshi started to explain, until his phone started to ring. He gave us an apologetic grin. "Sorry, guys..." He answered it. "Hey! Woozi-yah! Where are you and Hyung? It's lonely without you two here!" 

    "Where am I?! Where the HELL are you?!" 

      The voice on the other end was so loud that everyone at the table could hear the conversation. Hoshi pulled the phone away from his ear in an attempt to keep his hearing. 

     "W-what do you mean?" Hoshi laughed hesitantly, slowly bringing the phone back to his ear in the process; which was a bad idea.

    "Father called for a meeting with some of the elder council and YOU are the only one NOT PRESENT!!! You better get your over here soon or else a certain you-know-who is going to be in a VERY bad mood!" 

  When the other finally hung up Hoshi shot up from the table and rushed to get his stuff together. 

      "Sorry, Baelynn. I wish I could show you to our next class but I gotta go! Fairy council business!" He quickly apologized and then left before I could say 'see you later'.

    I guess this happened a lot for the other brothers and my housemates weren't affected by it at all. 

      "I guess I'll pick up where Soonyoung left off..." Jeonghan, an older guy with long, red hair and wise eyes, sighed and turned to us. "Two weeks ago Wonwoo went out for a run, since it was a full moon..."

    “Full moon? Do Fairies get affected by it like Werewolves do?” Since Hoshi was no longer there, I had to aim my questions towards Yunhyeong who leaned over and whispered in my ear.

  "No. Wonwoo, the brother they're talking about, he's not a fairy but a werewolf. He's their father's step-son." 

   I nodded in understanding and sent him a silent 'thank you'.

    "He didn't exactly explain it in much detail." Jeonghan went on. "He just came home when the sun rose all exhausted saying 'I felt my mate, but then I lost her scent...' and then went to his room and cried. He's been like that ever since." 

     "Yeah! And I sure am getting tired of it too!" Mingyu, the tallest one despite his age, complained. "I want my best friend back."  Chanwoo turned to the older boy sitting next to him and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. 

    "What do you think, Hanbin-ah?" Jinwhan asked, bringing all of our attention onto him. "Think it's something worth looking into?" 

    Hanbin stayed quiet for a few seconds before nodding. "Yeah. The part about 'losing her scent' has me worried."

    "Why?" I regretted asking because he just shot me an annoyed glare. 

     "Because..." Jinhwan-oppa kindly spoke up for him instead. "Werewolves tend to have a sense of smell that's even better than an actual dog's. So if he lost her scent, then that would mean she's either protecting herself, someone else is covering it up for her OR-"

 "She's in danger..." Hanbin cut him off.

   Everyone at our table suddenly grew quiet at what he said.

    I looked over at the fairy brothers and could see the look over horror and fear masked behind frowns.

      The bond between them and their werewolf step-brother could easily be seen by how much they seem to care for this situation, and I was in awe of it. Grandma told me that, as a Guardian, it was my job to protect and help the other supernaturals in case of an emergency and of danger.

    Knowing that, there's NOTHING that's gonna stop me from helping these brothers out.

     "Hey, uhhhh.... guys?" Vernon, a boy with middle parted bangs and sharp eyes, spoke up and pointed at Bobby's wrist. "Why are your Jewels GLOWING?" 

    We all watched as Bobby's bracelet start to emit a dark blue-ish hue.

     Curiously, I looked down at my jade and saw that it too was glowing, but instead of blue it was white. I looked around and the others also had their Jewels glowing white. 

       Before I could ask about what was going on, I felt the chair underneath me disappear and I fell back, landing on something that felt like sand.

    I groaned and used my elbows to sit up and look around.

     I was in a sand-boxed play-ground with trees surrounding it in a circle. I heard more groans and some coughing, and when I turned my head towards the noise I found my house mates lying down like they too had fallen.

     Some were in the sand box like me, while others had landed on the hard ground outside of it. I saw them wince when they sat up while rubbing their backs. It must've really hurt.

 "What the hell just happened?" Junhoe snarled while rubbing his head. "And where the hell are we?!"

    "I don't know..." Donghyuk leaned back on his hands and looked around. "But I think we might've transported outside of the magical realm... And WITHOUT our bags too, by the looks of it."

   "Hyung~!" Chanwoo whined at Bobby, who just held his hands up in surrender. "I SWEAR it wasn't me!"

   "Well, if it wasn't you then who WAS?" Yunhyeong glared at him in annoyance as he helped me up. The suspicioned perpetrator just shook his head.

    "I'm telling you it WASN'T ME! Even I don't know where the heck we are!"

      "How about we all STOP arguing and start figuring it out for ourselves!" Hanbin yelled and everyone got quiet.

      He sighed and put his hand on his head like he had a head ache. I furrowed my brows and was about to step forward so I could ask if he was alright; but then I caught myself. Why would I be worried about him? He's still the jerk that practically treats me like an unwanted bug, so WHY should I care about him?

    I shook my head to get the now unwanted thoughts out, which caught Yunyeong's attention.

    I was replying to his weirded out expression with a sheepish smile when Jinhwan called for our attention.

    "Hey guys?" We all turned and saw him point to the trees.

     "There's buildings over there. Maybe we can find a place that will let us use a phone so we can call Lady Jeon."

     We all quickly came to an agreement that his idea was the best so far because Bobby, for some reason, couldn't use his powers to go any more than a few feet from us; It was almost like his Jewel wanted him to stay.

     So we walked in the direction he pointed out and soon enough found ourselves in a city filled with bustling people. At first we didn't know where we should go or what kind of store would have a phone. And as walked further into the city I kept having this weird feeling growing in my chest. Almost like some kind of pull.

    "Hey guys?" We all stopped and looked a Bobby, who had this strange, weirded out look in his eyes. He held up his arm and pointed to the right.

   "Can we try in there?"

      He was pointed at what seemed like a photography shop.

   The building was pretty big and the words ‘Belle Photo’ were printed largely above two glass doors.

  "Bobby-oppa, are you ok?" I asked. He was staring at the building with a confused frown.

   "I don't know...." He never took his eyes off the building. "I just... It's weird..."

     "What's weird?" Donghyuk joined in.

      "I feel like... like we HAVE to go in there. I'm not sure why, but there's this gut feeling that I have that's telling me that something important is in there..."

     I didn't comment since I sort of knew how he felt. Ever since I saw that building the 'pull' got a lot stronger. So I was the first one to cross the road and head strait towards it.

     "Noona!" I didn't have to look behind me to see that the rest started to follow.

       When I finally got to the glass doors I pushed them open and entered with Bobby trailing right behind me. Inside was just a typical waiting room; with leather chairs, a coffee table with magazines, and a front desk in the back.

   We walked to the desk as an older woman came in and greeted us.

  "Hello! Welcome to 'Belle Photo'! How may I help you today?" She smiled at us.

    "Hello. Um. Actually we were wondering if you had a phone we could use." Jinhwan started to lie. "We were in charge of getting some supplies for our club and one of us accidentally dropped the only phone we had in a puddle...

    To make it more believable Yunhyeong and Chanwoo both smirked at each other and pointed at Junhoe, like he was the one who broke the imaginary phone.

     ".... And now we can't call our teacher to come and get us."

     "Oh dear." The lady gasped. "Yes, yes, I understand. Here let me get my cell phone and you can use that."

    She smiled one more time before disappearing behind the door she earlier came out of.

      Some of the guys decided to sit down while we waited and I was about to join them until the door opened again and a girl holding a stack of files came out.

     She looked to be the same height as me with light brown hair pulled up into a messy bun. Her small face sported a tired frown and I couldn't help but think that she looked familiar.

     She placed the files behind the counter and looked like she was about to leave but was stopped by what happened next. 

    One second Bobby is standing right next to Hanbin and Jinhwan, and then the next he's behind the counter, grabbing the girl's arm. When she turned around in response, realization hit me like a ton of bricks.

   Slowly, I started to walk towards them.

      "What are you doing?! Let go of me! How did you even get back here?!" The girl tried to struggle out of Bobby's hand, but his grip was firm.

     "J-Jaeyoon-unnie..." I whispered loud enough for her to hear me. She flinched and slowly turned to look my way.

    We stared at each other quietly and I watched as she looked me over from head to toe.

   "N-no way..." She mumbled under her breath. "B-Bae-rin? Cho Baerin, is that you?"

     I gasped excitedly when she said my name and nodded. After figuring out that Unnie wasn't going to try and leave again, Bobby let her arm go and she didn’t hesitate to jump over the counter so she could engulf me in a big hug.

   "Finally!" She cried with her head on my shoulder. "You came back! You finally came back! Just like you promised!"

      I felt tears in my eyes as I hugged her back; nodding at her words because I knew I would choke up if I attempted to speak.

      After all these years my best friend never forgot me or my promise. What does that make me? Was I the only one who forgot? How long have the others been waiting for me like this?

      My hug on her tightened as guilt and regret filled my heart and we stayed like that, crying and holding each other until I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see Hanbin staring down at me; the look that he gave me reminded me of the situation at hand and that the others probably had no clue what was going on.

   "Unnie..." The sound of my voice interrupted the excited rant that she had going on and she pulled away to look at me. "Yeah?"

 "We need to talk...."

      While we sat Jaeyoon down in one of the waiting room chairs the lady came back with a cell phone which Jinwhan used to contact Grandma. That was how we discovered that we were in Seoul and not even over an hour from the house. Grandma took note of where we were and told us to stay put because Mr. Joohyun would be there soon to pick us all up.

    As we waited, Hanbin and I took the chance to explain things to Jaeyoon. 

     I started off with how I lived my life in America until my Grandmother came and found me. It wasn't long before Hanbin cut me off and took over explaining how we all lived together due to certain circumstances.

   He deliberately left out the part about magic, which I'm glad he did because I was scared that she might not believe us.

     "I'm coming with you." she interrupted me as I was just beginning to explain the little expedition that we were on. 

    "Huh?" Hanbin and I both gasped in surprise.

  But Jaeyoon just crossed her arms and raised an amused brow. 

     "If my intuition is correct, if Baerin's back, then that means that she's looking for the rest of us." Her eyes traveled to Hanbin.

     "I don't know how you guys play in this, but I’m also guessing that you're, for some sort of reason, helping her. And, let me also guess this, I'm the first one you've found. Aren't I?"

   I slowly nodded and jumped when she suddenly clapped her hands together. 

    "Then it's settled. I want to find the others also, so if you were under the impression that you had to persuade me then save your breath. Now that I've met Baerin again, I am NOT leaving her side."

    She took my hand and squeezed it. "Not again."

   It took a lot in me to not cry and nod at the same time. 

       It didn't take long for Mr. Joohyun to find us and bring us all back to Grandma's house.

      It took even less time for Grandma to rush Jaeyoon and I into the same study room on the second floor where I got my Jade and then ordered everyone else, other than Hanbin, to leave us alone for a while.

      They were about to complain until Mr. Joohyun mentioned something about freshly made cookies waiting for them in the kitchen.

   They ran towards the first floor kitchen faster than I’ve seen the kids at the orphanage on Christmas morning.

      "Well now!" Grandma smiled and took Jaeyoon's hand. "I see that you're one of my Granddaughter's childhood friends, yes?"

    Jaeyoon smiled a bit shyly. "Yes, Ma'am. My name is Kim Jaeyoon. It's very nice to meet you, Ma'am."

    "It's so nice to meet you also." Grandma squealed with delight.

     "My name in Jeon Taeyeon. The boys here like to call me Lady Jeon, but you can just call me 'Grandma' if you want."

    Jaeyoon giggled. "Ok then!"

     Grandma smiled and let go of Jaeyoon’s hand as she walked around to the old familiar desk.

    "Now where did I put that box..." She muttered to herself as she rummaged through the drawers. The scene it's self-looked familiar to me. Almost like Deja vu.

     I silently shot Hanbin questioning look and he nodded. That was all the confirmation I needed to know.... Jaeyoon was going to get her Jewel back.

     "Ah-ha! Here it is!" Grandma shouted in triumph and pulled out a small ring box.

    "Jaeyoon, dear, I know you have MANY questions that you want answered, and don't worry they will be answered. But..." Grandma walked over to where Jaeyoon stood and held the box out so that is was between them. "Right now we have something way more important to do."

       Jami-unnie stared at the box. "What's this?"

      Grandma smiled and put her other hand on the top of the box. "This is a part of your life that needs to be returned to you."

  “Like what….” Jaeyoon asked. “A family heirloom? This looks like a ring box.”

    Grandma slowly shook her head. “No, it’s not a family heirloom. But it was made for you when you were born.”

     Jaeyoon’s mouth dropped open with surprise and, without any more hesitances, Grandma finally opened the box. Jaeyoon looked like she was about to say something again, but stopped when her eyes landed on what was inside.

  In fact, I think all of us couldn't help but hold our breath once we saw it. 

      Inside the box was a ring. The band was white-gold and held a soft white stone that was in the shape of a heart. 

      "White Star Sapphire." I jumped when Mr. Joohyun just suddenly whispered in my ear. I didn't even notice his presence behind me. 

     "White Star Sapphire? I asked him once my heart calmed down again. “That’s what her Jewel is?”

  He nodded. "Yes. And, I have to say, it's a VERY beautiful Jewel too."

    I had to agree with him on that. The White jewel was so soft in color and it actually looked like it held a star inside of it. 

      After another minute of silence, Jaeyoon brought her hand up and touched the tip of the ring. At first, nothing happened until I saw her eyes start to roll back and her knees buckle. 

     "Unnie!" I screamed in shocked as she fell to the floor.

     I started towards her but instead got held back by Grandma.

    "No, don't touch her!" Grandma warned me.

    "B-but Grandma!"

    "No Sweetie. None of us can touch her yet or else the trial won't work." Grandma kept on pushing me back until I sat on one of the study room sofas.

      The look she gave me told me to sit still and obey; which I did. I've seen her scold the boys once in the past few days and man do I not want to be the victim of it ever.

   "Jinhwan told me that, before you guys teleported, all of your jewels started to glow. Is that correct?" She targeted her question to both me and Hanbin.

    "Yeah, they all started glowing in a whitish hue." Hanbin replied.

    "All except for Bobby-oppa's." I added on. "His was like a dark blue"

   "Except for Bobby’s, hmmmm...." Grandma smiled and shared a VERY suspicious looking smile with Mr. Joohyun. "How interesting."

   Ok, is it just me, or does it seem like they're hiding something from us?

    "Hanbin, sweetie?" Grandma's voice grew higher in tone. "Can you do me a favor and bring Bobby here, please?"    

       He visibly shivered but nodded in obedience. I tried my best to keep it together when I saw the 'creeped out' look he had on before he walked out to go fetch the wanted boy.

   "Grandma?" I asked. "What's going on? Why do you need Bobby-oppa?"

   Grandma chuckled. "Oh~ I have a hypothesis that I want to try out"

  "Hypothesis?"

   "Yes, and it’s very important that I keep it a secret. But don’t worry, I promise that I’ll spill the beans when the other girls finally get here. Ok?"

 I hesitantly nodded just as the doors opened again. We turned to them and found only Hanbin standing there.

     "Huh? Where's Bobby-op-AHHH!"

     I screamed when I felt cold fingers tickling my neck. I swung my head back and saw the perpetrator.

    "Bobby-oppa! Not cool!"

      The person, now sitting next to me, started howling with laughter. "Hahaha! Man, Baelynn! I got you good! Now! What's up, Lady Jeon? Why did you need-..."

     He stopped talking once his eyes landed on the person on the ground. "What happened to her?" His voice got so serious so suddenly that it gave me goosebumps. 

     "We gave her back her jewel and now she's going through her trial. She's going to stay like that for a while so we wanted you to bring her to her room so she can properly rest."

     After hearing Grandma's explanation, Bobby’s shoulders dropped along with the frown on his face, which let the original playfulness come back.

  “Why me and not Hanbin?” He slightly pouted.

 “Because the rest of us in here are about to have a small meeting and I need his opinion on a few matters.” Grandma explained with a little smile.

"Oh, ok.” I almost jumped in surprise at his response. I had honestly thought that he would have put up a much longer fight or something.

“So which room are we gonna give her?"

   "Well, since Hanbin and Baelynn have rooms that are right next to each other, let’s give her the free room that's next to yours!"  Grandma responded excitedly.

  “What?!” The hat on Bobby’s head fell off when he jumped in alarm. “Why next to MINE?! Why not let the girls live next to each-“

  “Because I said so.” She said firmly, but I could see the hint of amusement in her eyes. “Now, get going! We don’t want her to wake up with a sore neck, now do we?”

  Bobby was obviously still pouting but obeyed anyway. He carefully picked Jaeyoon up into his arms and waited for Grandma to slide the ring onto the unconscious girl’s finger. For a moment, I thought I could see a red light illuminate from it, but then he teleported them away before I could get a good look.

  “Well, now that THAT’S settled, let’s get on with our meeting.” Grandma clapped her hands and looked at both me and Hanbin. “I have a very important question that I need to ask you two.”

  “W-what is it?” The seriousness in her voice was making me nervous.

“What kind of food do you think Jaeyoon likes? I want to make it for when she wakes up!”

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    The “Meeting” that we had didn’t last very long. All that we did was answer opinions to the questions that Grandma had about Jaeyoon. Then, after she finally had asked about ten questions, she dismissed us so we could go eat.

    That’s how Hanbin and I ended up walking together quietly down the hall towards the first floor kitchen. It wasn’t really awkward. But I think that’s because we were both trying to figure out what just happened back in the in the study.  

  “She planned this all along.” Hanbin said suddenly and we both stopped walking.

“Huh?” I raised my brow. “Planned what?”

   I pretty much expected him to roll his eyes and not tell me, so you can probably imagine the look on my face when he did the complete opposite.

  “When we all first started living here…” He started off. “She made sure to give each of us a room that would have a bathroom connected to an unused room.”

  “So wait. Our rooms aren’t the only ones like that?” I gasped.

  He shook his head while staring at the floor in thought. “We always did wonder why she did that, and now I think I know why.”

  “It has something to do with the girls?”

  I don’t know why, but my question somehow made him smile. It wasn’t really a happy smile though, more like a ‘I’ve just been tricked my whole life and only just now realized it.’ Smile.

 “Heh! More like something to do with the ‘Opposites’ that she told us about.” 

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 A/N: And now I am officially DONE with editing!! XD Now I can write the next chapter! Which... might take a few days.... But! I'll be worth it! 

   And now to point a few things out.

the Fairy brothers (aka, Seventeen): they are just main side characters in this story, but I have been thinking of a making them have their own story where they are the main characters and the guardians are just side characters. But it'll be a while before I make that.

Mates: Just about all magical creatures have their own verson of a soul mate. Werewolves have mates, Vampires/gargoyles/fairies have fated ones, etc. most magical creaters have mates that are the same speciese as them, but sometimes they also have human mates. When this happens, it's the magical creater's responsability to get to know the human mate and introduce them to the magical world. In order to, not only protect the secrets of the magical world, but also keep the mates together, the human mate must move in the the magical creature and also go to the same school as them. Because of this, the school has special classes for the human mates so that they get the same curriculum as any human school along with special classes that help them understand more about their magical mate's species.   

about the jewels: I don't know if ya'll have noticed yet. but the jewels have not only their own personalities, but also a mind of their own. which might have a hand in the Hanbin and Bobby-oppa acting out of character at some points. But I'll get into that later. :)

Kim Jaeyoon: this is her ring. :)     

If ya'll have any questions for me then feel free to ask! I'll answer them to the best of my ability!

 

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