"So you just learnt about aura?" Rosa asked as the two sat in the library.

"I mean, yeah, but we also did some tests for my magic and stuff, but yeah, i guess that is pretty much all we did." Sugar said, trying to concentrate on the notes before him, which was hard when the words seem to swim before his eyes.

It was now halfway through the first term, and the termly exams were ever-looming. As a result, Sugar and Rosa decided to get a head start on studying, which seemed like a good idea at the time, but proved to be a bad one, as they wouldn't stop distracting each other. Besides, no imminent pressure meant no motivation to actually do the work.

"Bureaucracy is the worst." Rosa stated simply, as she flicked through her colour-coded Magic History notes. And Sugar simply nodded in agreement. Honestly, he was just kind of glad that Ignatio hadn't picked up on any of his nervous behaviour during their meeting. Probably since the man looked awfully nervous himself.

What was he even nervous about? Sugar was the student here. Though, from everything he had eavesdropped from the teachers' familiars, it was just a part of his personality to be apologetic and overly anxious.

He sighed and continued going through the uses of Dragon Tears. Why did he even have to learn this? Those were so dangerous, only fifth- and sixth-years were allowed to use them in potions.

"Hey, good to see you here! I thought you two might be here!" a voice called over to the duo, which was promptly met by aggressive shushing from Rosa.

"Knight, this is a library." Rosa whisper-shouted.

The boy frowned as he joined his two friends at the table.

"I thought this one was the exception for talking... The librarian seemed cool with it." Knight commented, scratching his head.

"That's just because he's too nice for his own good," Rosa said with a huff, "I don't think I've even seen him get angry at his 'fan club'" she said with a laugh.

Meanwhile, Sugar just remained silent, looking at Knight. He was still on the fence about whether the werewolf rumour was true or not, but he still couldn't help but view him with suspicion... was what he would like to think. But in truth, there was no way Sugar could ever see Knight being a werewolf.

"Aw, is that so?" Knight said, "Well, what are you two doing?"

"Studying..." Sugar groaned.

"Aren't the exams four weeks away? Why are you starting now?" Knight said, sounding genuinely confused, "you have time, don't you?"

"Well, it's good to get a headstart," Sugar commented.

"Sure, I guess that is a thing, but you should also take some breaks, you know," Knight said, one of his usual grins breaking out, "besides, being miserable while studying is probably not very productive."

"Sugar's not miserable," Rosa piped in, "that's just his resting bitch face."

"Hey!"

"Well, anyway," Knight continued, "I still think a break would be good, get your mind off studying for a bit. Ooh, maybe we should take a walk around the school grounds! I heard that there's a lake with mermaids on the grounds.

"Mermaids? In a lake? That sounds like a rumour made up by some seniors trying to trick you." Sugar was pretty sure that it was even common knowledge amongst humans that mermaids were saltwater organisms.

"No, it's true. There's an underground channel connecting the lake to the ocean," Rosa butted in, "You can see the mermaids, if you look, pretty much year round, but they return to the ocean during the winter."

"Oh," Sugar said simply, a little miffed at being wrong.

"You can actually see them?" Knight said, eyes wide, "I thought they would just live in it, but not really interact with us. It's still autumn, so why not go see them?"

Sugar looked out at the darkening sky. It was getting pretty close to dinner time, and he was not a big fan of the prospect of getting locked out the castle when the time came, but he was immediately outvoted.

"Why not?" Rosa closed the book she was holding with a snap, "Ever since Pedro told me about them, I've been dying to see them."

"Was that the oldest or second-oldest brother?" Knight asked apologetically, "Sorry, I kind of forgot."

"He's the oldest, but it's only by 4 minutes anyways, so I understand the confusion."

Sugar frowned.

"How come you never tell me about your brothers," he said with half-mocking disappointment.

"You haven't deserved that privilege yet," Rosa stuck out her tongue at him, "now get up, you grump. We've got mermaids to see."

✧༺✦✮✦༻∞　　∞༺✦✮✦༻✧

The lakeside was surprisingly populated, with many students gathered around and talking, sitting underneath the trees to read, and some were even practising their magic, taking advantage of the wide, open space which helped make sure that their spells didn't hit anyone else.

In fact, a few familiar faces were at the water's edge. Jayden was standing right at the edge of the water, brow furrowed in concentration. As he summoned an orb of water from the lake, the water particles warped into tiny little illusions, of flying manta rays and sharks, swimming through the air. They flew through the air as long as the magic within them would allow, before dissipating into a fine mist. Looked like he was trying to fuse his water control and illusion magic. Beside him sat a rather irritated-looking Rina, and Sugar couldn't help but pick up on a few interesting fragments of their conversation.

"I'm telling you, he's super hot, why are you judging me?" Rina said, looking over the expanse of the lake.

"You're a second-year. He's a fifth-year." Jayden said with a soft chuckle, "you are living in delulu. He probably thinks you're a creepy stalker"

"Whatever. I ain't gonna take advice from someone who's gonna date a fis—"

A particularly large water orb suddenly burst over RIna's head, drenching them, and the sending the crow which had been perched on their shoulder flapping away with an indigant squawk, loud enough for Sugar to hear.

"Bastard human!!"

Then it was Rina's turn to rage.

"You fuck!" they jumped up, and immediately started trying to push the laughing Jayden into the water.

Sugar, now thoroughly invested in the fight, wanted to stay and continue watching, mainly just to see who would win, but Rosa dragged him away.

"Come on, get a move on, or we're leaving you behind." she said, disinterested (probably since Wendy was nowhere to be seen) as she pulled on his arm, leading him away, all the way to the opposite side of the lake.

Knight was already at the water's edge, squinting down into the murky depths.

"Where are they?" he muttered, probably not realising that he said the statement out loud.

"If I had to guess," Sugar said with a snicker, "they're congregating on that side of the lake," he pointed at where Rina and Jayden were once. Now there was only a victorious Rina, having successfully pushed the other into the lake.

Not that it had any real impact anyways. Jayden just sat on top of the water, still laughing. He had probably quickly slammed down a spell to prevent him from getting wet. And just barely visible under the water's surface, flicks and flitters of silver hair and scales, as the mermaids gathered to gawk at the strange occurrence happening on their home.

Mermaids were a strange type of magical creature. They were probably more fish than human, and lacked a human form, but they still managed to obtain possibly even more privileges than any other humanoid magical creature. In fact, many species were protected, and long prison sentences were to be doles out to anyone who dared to break those rules.

Sugar had always wondered why that was a case. How mermaids could be so beloved... maybe it was their lack of harmful magic, which meant that they posed less of a danger than their relatives, the sirens.

"Well, it certainly looks like they're having fun." Knight said, smiling softly as a few bubbles of laughter and mirth made their way to the surface of the water.

"Those two..." Rosa muttered as Rina lifted Jayden off the lake, both of them laughing now, "so annoying. Now we have to walk all the way back to the other side cos they lured all the mermaids there."

"Well, I think they're quite delightful people, y'know, they remind me of you and Sugar, always fighting, but you still have fun together." Knight said, laughing at the grimace Rosa made, and for once, Sugar agreed with him. Well at least half of the statement. He wouldn't call what him and Rosa did 'fun'. But that didn't matter, at least now.

"Are you sure you're not just disappointed Miss Wendolyn isn't here?" Sugar said with a soft nudge.

"One more word out of you, and you will be going swimming." Rosa said, gesturing to the water.

But any witty comeback that Sugar may have thought of died on his tongue, as a high-pitched scream rang out from the edge of the forest, across the academy grounds.

"I don't think that was a happy scream." Knight swallowed.

┌─── ･ ｡ﾟ★: *.☪ .* :☆ﾟ. ───┐

𝔸𝕦𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕣'𝕤 𝕟𝕠𝕥𝕖

└─── ･ ｡ﾟ★: *.☪ .* :☆ﾟ. ───┘

Nope, def not a happy scream pal. Also it has come to my attention people actually ship Knight and Sugar which is the funniest thing to me for reasons that will be revealed. But hey, death of the author is real lol.

~viva.