“S**t!” Chanyeol cursed. He thought his plan was perfect and easy. But he had forgotten to consider another thing.

  “What?” Kai’s shoulders stiffened; he knew Chanyeol would only curse in serious situations.

  “There are guards around the stage,” he scowled.

  “They don’t fear fire?” Kai raised an eyebrow.

  “No.”

  “Then this is really a s**tty situation.” Kai reached for the dagger dangling from his waist. “Well, good thing I have my – “

  “Kai, don’t.” Chanyeol stopped him before even touching the blade. “We can’t take innocent lives away.”

  “But that’s what they’re about to do.”

  Chanyeol hesitated. “Kai, we – “

  “Do you want to save her or not?” Kai looked impatient, but then suddenly all the color drained from his face. “I think you don’t have anymore time, brother.” He pointed to the stage. “They’re litting up the fire!”

  Chanyeol clenched his teeth, balling his hands into fists. “F**k… fine. But just – try not to kill them, okay? Just, knock them out or kick their most precious part. I hate blood; you know that.”

  Kai nodded as they heard fire meet wood. The cackling was loud, and soon enough, black, thick smog was everywhere. All the villagers had backen off faraway, some even on the mountain to witness the burning without taking the risk of being suffocated by the smoke.

  Chanyeol rushed up to the stage, looking frantically for the center of the fire, for the smoke was terribly thick. “Damn it!” He cursed. “Why isn’t she screaming? That way I could find her easily!” Suddenly he went still. “No… she’s not already… no – “

  A guard unexpectedly appeared behind him. But then Kai showed up and hit the sword out of his hands before it could hit Chanyeol. Kai stabbed the dagger into the guard’s left thigh, making him scream and fall to the ground, and turned to face Chanyeol. “GO!” He screamed over the loud cackling of fire. “Save her!”

  “I can’t find her!”

  “Yes, you can!” Kai screamed. “Follow your sixth sense!”

  Chanyeol closed his eyes, but he couldn’t concentrate. The smoke was suffocating, the cackling was too loud, and the thought of the girl already dead was killing him. He couldn’t understand why he had been drawn to the girl the moment he saw her being pulled out of her house by the guards, but he just had a strong feeling that he had to save her. All of a sudden, he heard a cough followed by a whimper. Although it was barely above a whisper, he still heard it. Snapping his head to the direction of the voice, he ran toward it. Expectedly, the further he ran, the clearer he could see a black figure in front. He ran up to her, amazed by how beautiful she still looked when coughing with her hair all over her face and fire catching on her clothes, but then snapped out of it immediately when he saw how lifeless she looked.

  The robe he was wearing was already on fire, but he took no notice of it as his hands started untying the rope. It a few seconds it came loose, and Eve fell into Chanyeol’s arms. He pushed her hair away from her face and put his ear next to to listen if she was breathing. But he couldn’t hear clearly, and Eve was limp in his arms like a dead body. “S**t!” He looked up and found Kai fighting off another guard near them. “Kai!”

  One second Kai was stabbing the guard in the back; the next, he was right by Chanyeol. “Why isn’t Suho’s rain working?!” He shouted as taking sight of the dead-like girl in Chanyeol’s arms.

  “I don’t know,” Chanyeol shouted, “but just get us out of here!” He grabbed Kai’s sleeve. “NOW!”

 [Flashback]

  “Hey!” A man in a red uniform holding a large sword called out to Eve. “Little girl, no one is allowed to enter the Forbidden Forest.” Eve just tilted her head like she didn’t understand what he had said. Frustrated, the guard bent down. “Didn’t you hear what I said? I said no – “

  Eve touched the guard’s forehead with her right palm. She didn’t know why she did it, but she just did. The guard froze, his eyes suddenly turning all foggy like it was being covered by a veil. I want to go in, Eve thought, not breaking the contact.

  “Yes,” the guard mumbled, “yes, you are allowed entry.”

  As soon as the words came out of his mouth, Eve dropped her hand and ran into the forest as fast as she could. After she left, the guard regained consciousness. “What…” he looked around him, “what am I doing here? Hm.” Then he walked away.

  That’s how 4-year-old Eve discovered her magic power.

  For the next 6 years, she visited the forest without encountering any difficulties. If somebody saw her, she would just put her hand to the person’s forehead and make them forget seeing her. Then she would run in and lie on the green grass, chase after some butterflies, pick some berry from the trees, climb trees… and many more, enjoying herself for hours. Alone, but happy and peaceful.

  One day when she was 10, as usual, she ran to the forest to play while her parents went to work. She was relaxing on the grass with her eyes closed, enjoying the chirping of the birds and the sound of wind ruffling the grass.

  Suddenly, she heard a crunch. A boot crunching a few leaves. Oh no, she thought, another hunter?! She bolted up and started backing into the trees quietly, until a hand covered and spun her around. Terrified, she started screaming into the person’s hand and struggled to get out of his strong grip.

  “Sshh!” It was a boy’s voice. “Be quiet or Father will find you!” She stopped moving, shocked by his words, and caught her breath as she glanced at the boy.

  He was a head taller than her, but looked only 2 or 3 years older. His brown, curly hair covered half his eyes, but she could still see them gleaming with curiosity, panic and fear. He was wearing a hunter’s outfit, with a bow slung over his right shoulder and some arrows on his left.

  He glanced behind her back one more time and leaned closer to her. “Run.” His chocolate brown eyes were luring, but the fear in them was strong. “Run away quickly or Father will find you and sell you away or even worse. And never return to the Forbidden Forest!” He hissed. “It’s dangerous for such a pretty girl like you.” He pushed Eve, stealing one more glance at her. “Go NOW!”

  Eve was drawn to the boy, but as soon as she heard a man’s gruff somewhere near, she turned and took off.

  “Did you find anything, son?” The voice was fierce and grumpy.

  “No, Father,” the boy answered. “Only a few squirrels.”

  Eve planned to go against the boy’s words and run to the forest again the next day, just to try her luck of seeing the mysterious boy again. But coincidencely on the same day she encountered the boy, her mother got fired and could no longer do anything but stay at home. And because of that, Eve couldn’t sneak out to the forest again.

  So she dreamed. She dreamed of looking for the boy one day. She dreamed of looking for him when she turned 18 and into a free woman.

  If she could stay alive until then.

 [Flashback End]

  Chanyeol was pacing back and forth, balls of flames appearing and extinguishing every few seconds in his palms.

  “Chan – “

  “Why isn’t she waking?”

  “Healing and waking are two different things, Chanyeol.” Baekhyun pointed to Lay who was snoring on a chair. “Lay had already drained most of his energy healing her.”

  “The fire and smoke damaged her too much, Chanyeol.” Luhan approached him. “At least she’s still alive. Just give her some time. Meanwhile, drink this.” He handed him a cup.

  “I don’t want wine.”

  “This isn’t wine. It’s something new we had discovered in China. It’s called ‘cha.’ Or ‘tea.’”

  “Tea?” Chanyeol looked at the yellow-greenish liquid in the cup.

  “It’s supposed to make you relax.”

  He took a sip. “Blah! Why is it so bitter? I – “

  “CHANYEOL!” D.O. rushed into the living room. “She’s waking!”

  Without a word, Chanyeol dashed to the only room that had a bed in this shabby, small cottage they were in. The door opened before he kicked it open, revealing Kai and Suho. “I heard – “

  “Her eyes fluttered a little, brother,” Kai nodded.

  “We think she’s about to wake up,” Suho said.

  Just then, they heard a feline groan, like a girl suffering from a bad headache. Eve’s eyes slowly opened. “Where…”

  “Are you alright?”

  For Eve, waking up with a bad headache was painful. But waking up in a place she had never been to before and hearing a boy’s voice as beautiful as a harmony but strangely deep at the same time, was even more shocking. After hearing another boy who seemed older than the other two in the room’s convincing words that she was in no danger and recovering from the shock, she started asking question, And so did they. Well, only the older one did. The boy with tanner skin did nothing but fold his arms and frown at her. And the other one, the one that looked disturbingly familiar, just looked at her with concern, his frown deepening the more she answered their questions.

  “I still don’t get it,” he finally said, his voice utterly familiar but very deep. “Why would they want to execute you?”

  “You won’t understand.” Eve closed her eyes.

  “Try us,” the boy, who claimed himself as Suho, said.

  “It’s…” Eve sighed, “just something that doesn’t belong to this world. A curse in me. Which is why although I’m grateful of you saving me, you shouldn’t have. I should’ve been burnt to death along with my curse.”

  There was a long silence.

  “You have magic power, don’t you?” The boy with the deep voice said.

  Eve’s eyes shot open. “How do you – “ The boy was now sitting on the bed by her legs, staring at her with a questioning look. But it wasn’t his sudden closeness or emotion that shocked Eve.

  In the palm of the boy’s hand was a ball of flames. Eve’s eyes widened. “Your hands… your hands! They’re on fire!” She started looking frantically for water to put them out, but to her shock, the boy just chuckled and the flames suddenly disappeared.

  And his hands looked just fine. Not burnt, not hurt, not… anything. Eve looked up to the boy with shock in her eyes.

  “How – “

  “Brother.” The boy with tan skin standing at the corner finally spoke, his voice as rich as honey. “That was not wise.”

  “She has the right to know, Kai.” The boy on the bed scowled.

  “What right, Chanyeol?” Suho asked. “Because she’s supposed to no longer exist in this world?”

  “Because she is one of us,” Chanyeol shot back. Eve raised an eyebrow. One of ‘us’? What ‘us’?

  “Wait,” she motioned for them to stop, “what ‘us’? What are you talking about? I am not a part of anything. Like I said, what I have in my body is a c – “

  “Magic power.” Chanyeol looked into Eve’s eyes. “What you have is some kind of magic ability, or you wouldn’t have been sentenced to death as a witch. What do you do? I have the power of fire,” a ball of flames appeared and vanished in his right palm, “Suho can control water, Kai can teleport, Baek – “

  “No.” Eve squeezed her eyes shut. “Stop. Stop, please. This… this is just nonsense.” She started having a hard time to breathe. “There is no such thing as m – “

  “Are you sure?” Kai walked toward Eve. “You really believe there is no such thing as magic? Sorcery? Are you certain about that?” Eve opened her eyes and found his boring into hers, questioning her, suffocating her.

  Magic? Eve thought to herself. I used to believe I had magic talents, too, until Mother denied them as a curse. But of course, she never really treated me like a daughter after witnessing me convince the guard to stop beating her for money. She called me a monster. Then she called me a demon after seeing me communicating to our horse…

  “No,” she sighed, and looked at the boys, admitting defeat. “No, I doubt magic doesn’t exist. But is it all around us? I don’t know.” She started playing with her silver hair and took a deep breath. “I… I can manipulate people. And communicate with animals.”

  Eve expected frightened looks or even terrified ones from the boys. But to her surprise, they just nodded. dropped open. “I can make people do what I want them to do. I can make them forget things!” Her voice rose. “Shouldn’t that be terrifying?! Why aren’t you afraid of me? Backing away from me?! I can even tell people to kill themselves! Hurt themselves! I’m a demon, don’t you get it? I’m a monster! I’m – “

  Suddenly she felt herself pulled into an embrace. “Sshh…” Chanyeol’s deep voice was comforting. She then felt a little water on her cheeks, and realized she was crying. “You’re not a monster nor a demon. We aren’t demons, just special people chosen to be given special abilities to by God.”

  Eve hiccupped. “But – “

  “Me and my other 11 brothers are just like you. We have had our special abilities since childhood and have tried our best to hide them from our father, a greedy hunter. But eventually our magic abilities were discovered, so we ran. Ran from our own sentences of being sorcerers. Like you, we thought ourselves as demons, too. For months we had been depressed.”

  Eve’s tears stopped flowing as her emotions died down. “But then we found out something that had changed our lives.” A smile was easy to be detected in Chanyeol’s voice. “Our powers can destroy, but they can also help. So for the last 3 years, we have been traveling around the world, giving out helping hands whenever one is needed anonymously.”

  Chanyeol let go of Eve, tenderness written all over his face. “After hearing what your powers are, and since you don’t have anywhere to go anymore but run, for every villager knows that you had escaped, would you – “

  “Brother!” Kai’s voice was tense. “You cannot – “

  “Suho,” Chanyeol said firmly. “Can she?”

  Suho looked in thought for a moment. Finally, he spoke. “Ms…?”

  “Hallmington,” Eve replied. “Evelynn Hallmington.”

  “Ms. Evelynn Hallmington,” Suho stood straight and looked at Eve, “would you, by the means of your own safety and your own will, like to become our new companion? Travel around the world with us, giving help to people in need wherever we go with our magic abilities?”

  Chanyeol looked at Eve. “Would you like to start a new life?” He took her hand gently. “With us?”

  Eve looked at Suho, then at Kai, then at Chanyeol. His eyes were disturbingly familiar, but he didn’t give her an evil feeling. Instead, she felt warm and giddy when looking into those brown eyes. She didn’t know why, but she didn’t feel weird being beside these 3 boys. She didn’t feel like an outsider. She felt… comfortable. At ease. Like they were meant to meet. She couldn’t shake off the feeling of looking forward to meeting the other 9.

  She took a deep breath and smiled, picturing and imagining a new, meaningful life in front of her. She looked into Chanyeol’s eyes.

  “It would be my pleasure.”

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Woohoo!

Finished my first two-shot!!!!

Hope you guys enjoyed it hehe >________<

Please comment what you feel!

It's not really good so I need to know what you guys think or give me some advice *U*

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