A Magical Life

It was a nice and clear evening as a figure flew across the sky above the realm of Harmos, flapping its wings every now and then to catch the wind and soar higher to reach the tip of the structure that towers above all Harmos. Once it reached the peak, it perched on the building and quietly gazed over the city, tilting its head as it observed the population below.

Elegant, serene, and efficient. These are just some words that it would use to describe the town at which it was casually gazing down. Much like the insides of a beautiful grand turret-style clock, everything and everyone just worked in constant unison.

The store owners, factory employees, and artisans, who were all in pairs, concluded their work for the day and trotted off to their homes. There were a handful of couples enjoying an evening stroll while lazily glancing up at the stars. Not one thing was out of place. It was just like magic.

“But of course!” it thought to itself while tilting its head towards the opposite direction.

Afterall, Harmos is no ordinary realm; it is a realm of magic. The people here can use magic freely. In fact, they rely on magic to live harmoniously. To the citizens of this realm, it is such a sweet deal. They are all fated to live out the perfect carefree existence. There is only one catch: each one must have a compatible partner with whom to build a functional magical household.

“Ludicrous!” it thought again before it flew away.

The next day was a warm, clear, and sunny summer day. Though the adults of Harmos behaved in-sync, the realm was no stranger to mischief—and it always came in the form of children.

“Get him!” a child yelled to his two friends as he chased the target.

“He’s a freak!” one of the other children screamed as he threw a rock at their target.

“There’s no way we’re letting him get away!” exclaimed the third child.

“What a bunch of sore losers!” Yami thought to himself as he darted across the field, away from his pursuers.

“All I did was prove that I had better magic than any of them!

How was I supposed to know they’d be such jerks about it?”

However, Yami had known it would end this way. As a matter of fact, he wanted it to end this way. Throughout his short life, at least so far, other children had always treated him differently. Whether they were turning away from him or lashing out at him, they were clearly afraid of him.

In terms of physique, there was nothing overwhelmingly scary about Yami. He was of average height and weight –not a dominating presence whatsoever. Often, he was unkempt from running around outside practicing his magic, but so were most of the boys his age.

“It must be my hair.” he thought.

Yami’s hair did make him stand out from the rest of the children. Outside of its unusual teal color, it was spiky in an unusual way. No matter how he tried to fix it he would have two spikes of hair sticking out on both sides of his head.

“They think I’m a monster! And if that’s what they think, I’ll show them how monstrous my magic is!” As he thought this, he closed his eyes in frustration.

“This is nothing, I’m used to this anyway!” Just then, tears started to form in the corners of his eyes as his mind continued to push those thoughts deep into his heart.

It was also at this moment that he realized that he should have been watching where he was running.

He felt a sudden snag on his left foot as it got caught in a loose tree root.

“DRAT!” Yami yelled as he tumbled down several feet, coming to an abrupt stop as he hit a fence.

CRUNCH!

“Man, that root came out of nowhere!” he exclaimed to himself.

As Yami got back up, struggling to stand with broken fence planks under his feet, he heard several footsteps stop just above him.

Looking up he saw a huge stone hurdling toward him. He felt a sharp searing pain right in the middle of his forehead followed by a cool stream of red liquid falling across his face.

“Finally got you, devil boy!” a silver-haired boy puffed as he stood above the little hill from which Yami fell.

“Way to go, Evi. You got him right on his noggin!” said the second boy, who had brown hair, not far behind him.

“Yeah, Evi! Show him who’s boss.” said a girl with dark hair.

“Shut up you two! Let me handle this!” Evi yelled back at them.

Turning to Yami, he said, “Not feeling so hot now, are you? You monster!

I don’t know how you were able to copy my cutting magic. But as far as I know no one outside of our family can use it!” Evi’s voice grew louder as he poured his rage out at Yami.

Yeah! Your family is known for just low-grade crafting magic. There’s no way the Fates would let someone like you to do that. That just proves you’re a monster!” screamed the girl with the dark hair.

“Sandra! I told you I’d handle it!” Evi screamed.

“It wasn’t you he insulted! It was MY magic that he copied.”

“Hey Evi, do you think it’s smart to taunt a cornered monstrous kid?” Yami said as he glared at the children above him.

Yami’s look made Sandra’s and the other boy’s skin crawl. Evi, however, just scoffed back at him. “Me, frightened of you? Please. With my family’s influence we can convince the Fates to bury that lowly craft store of yours and send you and your good-for-nothing parents to the Outskirts, where monsters like you belong!”

Yami flinched upon hearing this. He knew what Evi’s family was capable of.

“Ahh so now you realize who you’re dealing with, huh? Now be a good little monster and accept this fateful stoning that you deserve!”

Evi threw another stone at Yami. Yami closed his eyes and braced for impact.

Suddenly an orange blaze intercepted the stone thrown and charred it to a crisp.

“Now isn’t that very unbecoming for a family of such high stature, Using the Fates’ name in vain like that?” a girl spoke from the other side of the fence that Yami hit earlier.

Yami opened his eyes and quickly turned around to see a beautiful little girl with short blonde hair and blue eyes staring back at them.

“Stay out if this! This is not your concern!” snapped Evi.

“But I think it is! You have chased this boy into MY family’s property so that means we settle disputes in this area,” responded the girl confidently.

“Evi, let’s turn back for now. This is the Zo family’s property, and they supply a great deal of magic to the Council of Fates. “Sandra said as she pulled Evi back by his arm.

“Tch. Fine! You’re safe for now, devil boy! Let’s go, guys.”

As Evi and his friends began to leave, Yami was left with a clueless look on his face. As he struggled to comprehend the situation, he suddenly noticed the girl standing in front of him with her hand held out towards him.

“Oh, my that’s a nasty bruise! Here, let my help you up!” Yami grabbed her hand and as she helped him up he felt a sudden tingle in his gut that he didn’t quite understand.

“My name’s Raia, Raia Zo. What’s your name?”

Yami, still in awe, just stared back at her, finding himself unable to speak. For some reason he felt his cheeks grow warm.

“Oh, do you not speak?” Raia asked.

“Let’s see.” She thought for a moment and then started speaking more slowly and using hand gestures to emphasize her words.

“MY… NAME…. IS… RA…” she said while gesticulating.

“YAMI!” he shouted. “My name is Yami Hitsu. And I speak!”

“Oh, hahaha, well why didn’t you say so?” Raia chuckled.

Yami couldn’t fully explain why but he felt weird and as though needed to yell back at her for her to hear him.

“I was just shocked ‘cause I didn’t expect this to happen!” he replied.

“For what to happen?” Raia asked.

“For you to be so nice! Thank you for the help!” said Yami.

Raia was taken aback by his response and found herself laughing.

“You’re interesting, Yami Hitsu! Let’s be friends, OK?” Raia said similing.

Shocked yet again, Yami resoundingly responded, “YES!”

Yami still didn’t understand how it got to this point, but he also didn’t care. He was just filled with joy and happiness because his sad lonely life seemed to have just gotten a little bit more magical.

***