The Stelter City Saga: Ultranatural (13 page)

"The sprinkles make it taste
good!"

"The sprinkles are there to make it
look more appetizing! They do not affect the taste
whatsoever!"

"They do to! The green ones taste like
lemon and the orange ones taste like oranges-"

"They're made of sugar!" Ace cut in.
The whole crowd was enjoying their spat, and laughing tremendously.
Finally Ace sighed and said to the mic, "I’m arguing with my best
friend about sprinkles at his wedding. Wow, who can say they've
done that?"

Though the question was rhetorical,
hands actually shot up in the air.

Ace rumpled the back of his hair and
gazed out at the crowd once more. "Great, you made me forget what I
was saying. Again." he stood there for a moment racking his brain,
but as the moments ticked by, Ace finally said. "Bottom line is;
I'm gunna miss you like crazy. There's no one quite like either of
you and I'm just so ecstatic that the two of you are together. I
love you guys and wish you many long happy years
together."

He stood there for a moment wondering
what to do with the microphone. Then Rose stood up and took her
husbands hand. "That's enough talk. I think it's time to dance."
She guided her husband down to the dance floor and from somewhere
invisible, a DJ plugged in a slow song.

Ace handed the microphone back to one
of the hotel workers and took a seat in Rose's chair beside Lee.
"After they get done, do you mind if I dance with you?" he asked
kissing the top of her hand.

Lee glanced out across the dance floor
at the porcupine haired boy. He made daggers with his eyes then
pointed to Ace before slicing his neck with his finger.

Lee giggled, "Oh, I don't know. I think
you've got competition."

Ace glanced at the kid then pressed his
lips to Lee's. He held them there for a moment before saying,
"Alright, but save me a dance."

"I promise." she said then leaned back
in her seat. She watched the two dance around slowly across the
floor. The expression on either of their faces clearly portrayed
how madly in love they were, and Lee wished she could take a
picture.

The song lingered on, and once again
Lee found herself staring into the sea of faces. Most of them were
glued to the married pair, admiration painted across their visages.
Others were downing alcohol and waiting for the party music to come
on. But as her eyes skimmed, she came across a familiar looking
face. He was a tall kid, roughly her age, with dark hair. At first
Lee thought he just had one if those recognizable faces, but the
odd part was that he was looking right at her too.

The moment their eyes met, the boy
turned away and leaned in to whisper something to the girl beside
him with sky colored hair. She looked familiar too, along with the
short red haired boy and the brown haired girl beside them.
Baseball. She remembered it in a flash of lightning. The day she
was set free was the day she met those kids. Jared, the tall one.
Zoey was the blue haired girl, then Ian, and Kari. She was
surprised she even remembered their names.

Lee was about to nudge Ace when the
music stopped and was replaced by the loud bass of some Chad13
song.

"I hate clubs." Ace grumbled as he
watched the floor flood with grinders and hip-shakers.

"Hey, I'm going to be right back." Lee
said climbing to her feet.

"Where are you going?"

"I just want to talk to someone real
quick." then she was hurrying across the dance floor. When she
looked up, the whole table had vanished. Quickly, her eyes scanned
the crowd for a flash of sky blue hair or a tall burnet, but the
flashing lights were making her sick. Lee stood there for a moment
wondering if she should look some more, or if it was wisest to
return to Ace. Just as she concluded that leaving was the best
option, a finger tapped her shoulder. When Lee spun around, she
wasn't surprised to see porcupine-boy.

"Well hello," she smiled brightly.
"Would you like to dance?"

The boy nodded eagerly and began
hopping around with a fist in the air. Lee danced too. She
remembered the last time she partied like that, with her hips
swaying to the beat if the music. There was a nasty man who had
tried to shove his tongue down her throat. At that thought, Lee
stopped swaying then began throwing her hands up in the air in a
playful way. The boy said nothing at all. In fact, be just stood
beside her throwing his limbs around. He was a funny dancer, but he
had a lot of style which was commendable in Lee's eyes.

The music finally ended and morphed
into a slow country song. There was a small out roar from the
gangsters who wanted to fist pump; so instead, they evacuated the
floor until the music changed.

"It was very nice dancing with you."
Lee said holding out her hand to shake his. "What's your
name?"

"Curtis," the boy huffed.

"Well, hi there Curtis, I'm Lee. Thanks
for the dance, but I promised my boyfriend I'd save him a slow
song."

Curtis nodded though he only seemed
slightly upset. Then he gave a very polite bow, before hurrying
away.

Lee glanced up at the platform and saw
that Ace was already moving towards her. With a blissful beam, she
hurried in his direction. He was just in her line of sight when the
tall burnet stepped into view. Again he was looking right at
her.

"Do you want to dance?" Jared asked. He
looked even taller than Lee remembered and his hair appeared as if
it hadn’t been cut since that late summer day. At the sight of her
startled expression be leaned in and said, "I need to talk to
you."

Lee bit her lip. She had wanted to
speak to him also, just to see if he had any news about Larissa and
Zach. But the urgency in his voice was almost frightening. She
glanced past his shoulder and made eyes with Ace who gave an
approving nod. Even from all the way across the dance floor, he
could hear his urgent words.

Sorry,
she mouthed as Jared lead her to the center of the dance
floor. The boy spun her around; his touch was so unlike Ace's. But
he respected the fact that she wasn't his, and held her
reverently.

"So you remember me?" he began. The
country song was soft enough for their conversation to be a hushed
one.

"Yes, actually I do." Lee replied, "I
saw you at the Gobble Race and you played baseball with me at
Garden Park."

Jared nodded, "Yeah, well I go there
often." he hesitated for a moment, "Listen, when's the last time
you saw your friends?"

"That baseball game." she confessed,
"Ace set me free later that day and I've been with him ever since.
How are they? Is that what you wanted to talk about?"

"Yes, it was." he
r
eplied sharply. They
weren't even dancing now, just shuffling their feet to the slow
twang music. "Like I said, I go to Garden Park a lot. I think it
was almost a week or two after you left, but- Delilah? Is that her
name?"

Lee nodded. Yes, that was the name of
the headmistress.

"Well she brought the kids out to play.
Larissa was there but she didn't look too well."

At first, Lee was excited at the sound
of Larissa's name. But the words that followed sent her in a
worried plummet. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"She seemed tired and... I don’t know,
but we were playing baseball again, and all she kept on talking
about was how she needed to go to a bench somewhere."

"What?"

"Yeah, weird huh? We all thought it
was." Jared licked his lips, "Zach said she was having...
nightmares. They started shortly after you left. They were so bad;
she didn't even want to go to sleep."

Lee frowned. She couldn't believe she
was hearing all this now. It was upsetting to her to know that all
this had happened months ago, and there was nothing she could do to
help Larissa feel better. "Is she alright?"

Jared shrugged. "We haven't seen her.
Last I saw she had met this guy." Jared shut his eyes as he tried
to recall the past. "Brown hair, tall... That's about all I can
remember. His name was Amm... Something. Anyway, he promised her
freedom, then a couple weeks later, we went back to the park and it
was just Zach."

Lee gasped, "No way. Larissa is free?
What? How? Where is she?"

"Zach said the mayor took
her. That kid, that
Amm
kid- his way of getting Larissa freed was by getting the mayor
involved. I don't know why, Zach didn't even know why."

"When did this happen?" Lee
pressed.

"Before Halloween of last year."
answered Jared, "But there's more."

Lee didn’t know how she could bear it
if there was more.

"Zach," Jared began, "He ran away
too."

Lee literally stopped shuffling her
feet and gaped up at him.

"Before Christmas, that's all I know."
Jared continued, "One day we showed up to the park. All the orphans
here there, but there was no Zach. I have no idea what happened. He
never even said he was planning on running away. But we asked an
orphan and they told us that one day he was there, the next he
wasn't."

Lee's arms dropped from his
grasp and sank to her side. She didn't know what to make of it at
all. What had happened? She had always thought they were still
living their mundane lives at the orphanage, but they were both
gone now? Where? Who was this
Amm
kid? How did Zach do it? Why would the mayor want
Larissa?

"I didn't mean to damper your day."
Jared concluded, just as the last strum of guitar flooded over the
speakers. "Just thought you should know." he gave her a slight
awkward pat on the back before disappearing back into the
crowd.

Lee stood there for a moment hardly
acknowledging anything in front of her. What could have happened to
her best friends? How could they be gone already and where were
they?

"Are you alright?" Ace asked and Lee
finally looked up. Another slow song had begun, but this time Ace
didn't look like he wanted to dance.

"Were you listening?" she
asked.

Ace shook his head. "Eavesdropping
isn't exactly my thing. I found that Curtis kid and we ended up
having a conversation about belts and legos." he frowned when Lee
only gave a faint smile. "What did that guy say?"

"My friends... They're gone." she
briefly described what Jared just told her and Ace listened
intently. She was halfway done telling when a dancing couple nearly
ran into them. After that, Ace decided that their conversation
would be best on the windy rooftop. He found a bench underneath
some paper lanterns and he sat there listening to her
tale.

"So you're worried?" Ace
concluded.

Lee shrugged, "I don't know what to
think. I guess I’m actually kind of happy for them. Except I have
no idea where they are."

"But they don't know where you've been
either.” he stated.

Lee nodded, "What would the mayor want
with Larissa? Wasn’t the mayor the one who wanted you dead? What if
Larissa was involved in that too? And- ughh, there's just so many
questions! Did Mirage mention me finding anything out in
Heleow?"

Ace considered, and then
answered, "She just said I'd find a lot of answers in Heleow. But
by
a lot of answers
she could mean there are some for you too."

Lee sucked in a big chilled breath. “I
sure hope so.” Her voice was drowned out by the breeze and the
faint hammering of another upbeat song from the pavilion. “There’s
something else I haven’t told you.”

Ace eyed her skeptically, “What is it?”
he asked in surprise.

“
That morning when the guy
tried to kill me,” began Lee. She was gazing up at him now and
adoring how the rocking of the paper lanterns sent warm glows
sliding across his face. “He told me why he wanted to kill
me.”

There had been no time
between Lee’s recovery and the planning of a wedding for Lee to
relive that day.
A
ll she knew was that his blood had healed her to the point
that nothing but a faint pink scar decorated her thigh. What Ace
didn’t know was why he had to heal her in the first
place.

“
He said the King wanted to
kill me.” Lee finally exhaled.

Ace’s brows folded. For a
moment all he could do was stare back at her. “How? He…?” Ace
sputtered then ruffled the back of his dark hair in frustration.
“How does he even know who you are?” he finally exclaimed. “You’re
not even a super- and why would he want to
kill
you?”

Lee massaged her temples and took a
deep breath. “I was wondering that myself.” She hadn’t realized how
numb her fingers had grown until she pressed them to her neck for
warmth. "Is this how you feel all the time?" she asked. “Frustrated
and confused?”

Ace chuckled and shook his head, "Not
all the time. I try to forget about the headach that comes with
these questions. We are at a wedding after all, and who knows? This
might be our last carefree moment together before
Heleow."