"I really want to deck that cocky smile off your damn face." Silas glared at him, roughing up the collar of his shirt.

"I really hope you do," Edgar teased, fighting the urge to push him against the railing and attack those soft lips of his that he had felt only a day ago.

     Ava's fight at the arena had been almost one sided. It had been a Kaymon. A Kaymon is a brownish dog-like beast with sharp razor claws. They can split themselves into three clones and just that had freaked Edgar out. However, Ava had easily been able to figure out which was the real one and had attacked it, easily stabbing into the fakes that tried to protect it. Ava had jumped, giving a good sidekick into the Kaymon's side and it whined before leaping at her. But Ava was ready. She waited for it to get close enough to her before wowing the crowd when she leapt in the air and brought her leg down on it. She took the monster's power, and watched it crumble to dust before looking up at the crowd which screamed her name in unison.

     Ava had been amazing, almost unstoppable. The power she had gained was buzzing off her and Edgar had felt it. It made his body squirm when he walked beside her.

Then a dragon came to pick them up to join Wyatt and the others. Edgar never made it and had passed out before he could feel Silas' fury.

However, he couldn't escape it when he woke up and went up to the deck for air. Silas had marched up to him and clutched him by the collar of his shirt, giving him a pointed gaze that had his stomach churning. 

"You really pissed me off, Edgar." His dark chocolates softened and Edgar felt the guilt hit him.

He placed his hands over Silas' and slowly pulled them away from his collar to entwine them. "I'm sorry. I was worried and, call me selfish, but, I didn't want to have to worry about you as well. If you had fought with me, I wouldn't have been able to focus and that would've been really bad."

     Silas' brows knitted into a frown and he glanced away from Edgar's face to his caramel coated torso before his eyes trailed to the bandages on the muscular boy's arms. He bit his lips worriedly then touched his right arm, where the runes were.

"I heard you caught a bloodboar. How do you feel?"

Now that he was being asked, Edgar realized he felt normal. Other than the occasional throbbing in his back and arms, Edgar didn't feel any different and he glanced down at the lower ring around his wrist. Wasn't he supposed to feel some kind of power surge? Something like he had felt coming off Ava?

"I feel normal," he admitted then let go of Silas to cover his wrist. "I can't feel anything in fact. Do you think it escaped?"

Silas started to respond but someone cut him off sharply. "I don't think beasts can escape from runes, love."

     Something dark blocked out the sun and they were forced to look up. A dragon with yellowish eyes and a puke colored body swooped down until a boy probably about twelve or thirteen years jumped down to the ship from its slender body. The boy looked up at it, meeting its eyes and they seemed to be having some kind of mental conversation before the dragon took off. The kid waved at it then turned to them.

He seemed awfully familiar. Either Edgar had met him at some point in his time here, or he looked like someone else Edgar had seen.

"Xavier? I thought you weren't going to make it."

     Wyatt walked up to him casually then surprised Edgar when he put the kid in a headlock and Xavier growled as he tried to push the man's arm off. That was when Edgar noticed the similarities between them, like the shapes of their faces, noses and lips. The only differences between them were their eye and hair colors. Wyatt's hair was a light shade of brown and his eyes, a stormy grey while Xavier's were both black. The kid's short curly hair ruffled in the wind before Wyatt released him and received a pointed stare.

"That's not how you should greet me when you haven't seen me in so long." Xavier huffed then looked away from him when Wyatt only gave him an amused smile. The kid's eyes trailed to Edgar and he smiled, walking up to him. "There you are; I was looking for you."

What amused Edgar about the kid was his dressing. He was decked in a full suit and Edgar wondered if he was dying from the heat.

"You must be Edgar and Silas. Reina told me all about you. How I know who's who... I watched your match Edgar."

There was an air of confidence around the kid that Edgar had this sudden urge to crush. Xavier was trying to be intimidating and although it was amusing, it annoyed him.

"Yeah. Well, you were saying something good about my rune. Something about my monster not escaping." Edgar rushed on, tightening his hand around his wrist. "What do you think is wrong with it?"

"Nothing. Well, the thing is, once you take a beast, it's stored in your runes. The longer you have your runes, the more it belongs to you and not the witch or mage that gave it to you. Since you aren't unconsciously shifting, it means whoever gave you the runes is subduing the powers of the beast." Xavier shrugged as Wyatt started towards them, playfully hitting one of his crew members in the butt before meeting them.

"Yo." He greeted coolly then threw his arms around his brother. "I haven't introduced you so, Edgar, Silas, this is my brother, X but call him Xavier. He gets cranky when people call him that. He's a dragon catcher."

"What?" Silas basically squealed, throwing his arms out to grip Xavier's shoulders. "D-dragon catcher? Oh my god, that's so cool." He instantly dropped to his knees in front of the kid and Xavier's eyes widened when he said, "Please, please let me be your student. I want to go dragon hunting too. I-I hope we don't have to kill the dragons though, I really don't want that."

Edgar watched Xavier go red at their closeness and he quickly looked away covering his mouth with the back of his hand. "Sure. Sure, whatever. Get up, you are embarrassing me."

The kid eyed the other crew members then shot Wyatt a glare when the man laughed loudly.

"Gosh look at your face." He sniffed, wiping a fake tear from his eye. "This is too much."

"Hey! Can you continue your discussion later? I'm freaking starving." Reina yawned, walking past them and stretching out as she headed for the dining hall that was on the captain's side of the ship.

     Groaning, Edgar turned away from them and followed behind her. He might be curious about what was going on with the runes and what they really were, but not nearly as much as he was hungry.
....

     The dining hall was spacious and the smell of assorted meats attacked his nose leaving him salivating. The large glass windows were opened with the view of the calm still sea, sending light into the room. Edgar, Ava, Reina, Wyatt and Benji were already seated at the circular table but it was the person beside Edgar that caught Silas' eye.

     He looked like a kid, yet there was something about him that made Silas want to respect him. The curly haired boy went to sit beside Xavier, and noticed him stiffen. He was on the verge of a smirk when he caught sight of Benji.

     Benji was wounded pretty badly. He had his body wrapped in bandages from his neck to his chest where the fang had bruised him. His eyes were swollen with dark circles underneath them. Benji looked nothing like he had when they had first met, however, Silas knew just how to get his spirits back up.

Glancing up at the wounded boy, he smirked and said, "Hey Benji, guess what I've found out?"

"Hm?" He didn't look up from his food and Silas smirked wider.

"Xavier here is a dragon catcher, he even rode here on a dragon! He just agreed to be my master so we will be going dragon catching once I'm done healing."

"I didn't agree, I-"

"You mean this kid?" Benji stared at Xavier warily then looked back at Silas. "Nice try."

"-who are you calling a kid? I am eighteen in human years, mind you!"

Silas froze. Eighteen. Even Edgar had stopped eating to gape at Xavier. The boy looked like a kid with his boyish smile and cute features.

"Tell me you are lying." The wounded boy gasped then turned to Wyatt who was scarfing down a large drumstick. "Tell me he's lying."

The man swallowed. "He's not."

"Then how old are you?" Edgar asked him.

Wyatt gulped down a cup of water then answered, "Thirty, give or take a few months." The man looked nothing like a thirty-year-old. He looked like a strikingly handsome man in his mid-twenties. He looked young.

Silas glanced at Reina who had already started to speak but Edgar shot her down, "Wow, if Wyatt's that old then I don't want to hear about your age, old lady."

"Oh, you stupid kid." Reina snapped then lunged for him but Ava quickly caught her around her waist.

"Calm down, Reina!"

Ava held the little woman away just as Benji sat up then glanced at Xavier, saying, "I want to study with you too. I will definitely be a better pupil."

Xavier's jaw dropped and he quickly shook his head. "No no. I'm not teaching anyone."

"Did you lie to me, Silas?" Benji stood up abruptly and glared at him then Silas smirked.

"He was contemplating it before you asked and now he's changed his mind."

"Why, you beast-less piece of shit! I should step on you for that. You're just lucky my entire body aches."

"Beast-less or not, I'll still crush you because I can, cheater!"

Edgar scoffed then said, "Can you guys keep it down? Some people are trying to eat."

The both of them turned to snap at Edgar but Silas never got the chance to joke about the swine monster he now was before something hit him upside the head and he fell into his food, knocked out cold.

     The next time Silas woke up, he was still in the dining room but his face wasn't covered in food. The bandages around his face and head seemed to have been redone because they didn't feel moist and his ears ached. He held his head as he felt pain and grunted, looking around the room. So far, everyone was still there but the food was missing, making his stomach growl.

     Placing a hand over his stomach, he glared at the wooden table dressed in a red cloth which had a jug of water placed in the middle.

"Oh great, he's up." Benji hissed and Silas took a quick look at him, amused by the distance between them.

The boy was seated opposite him just the way Edgar was seated opposite Reina who gave him a stare so cold that it could freeze the Mediterranean.

"Shut up, Benji. We don't want to cause another fight." Edgar spoke up, watching his friend before looking back at Wyatt who sat beside his brother.

"Who knocked me out?" Silas winced at how weak his voice sounded and he frowned as he reached for the jug. He poured himself a cup then downed it in almost a second. He looked back at them when they didn't answer him and frowned harder. "Why is nobody answering me?"

"Because we have something more serious to discuss, Silas." Ava said and he bristled before calming down and dropping the cup.

Silas just gave her a nod and she smiled at him before glancing at Xavier. "You can start."

Giving her a quick nod, he stood up and took off his jacket before sitting down with half of his bottom on the table. "Okay. Now that I know where the four of you got your runes from, I will explain how you can use them. Normally, the runes are still attached to the witches or mages who cast them. It takes more or less a week before the witch can no longer control a rune they have cast. It is within that time that they can take it back from you. If Benji or Edgar had gotten their beast maybe a week later from now, your bodies would be in extraneous pain because they would want to quickly shift to the beasts they have taken. My mother has pretty much locked the power somewhere deep inside you so you'll need a trigger to break the lock."

"Aren't runes like containers that store up powers or whatever so we can use them later?" Edgar asked, leaning forward to listen to him.

"That's just putting it vaguely," he replied, running a hand through his hair. "They are more than that. They don't only contain powers; they also help adjust the body to those powers. If you get a Steel for example, and you punch a wall and it cracks, your fist wouldn't feel the pain as a normal person without runes would feel it. It would feel like a bump which would mean you haven't even used your full strength. However, a person without runes wouldn't even notice and would think that is his full strength because of the bruise on his fist."

Xavier met Edgar's strong gaze and said, "Like in your situation, if you had gotten the power of a handyman or Steal or I don't know, any beast with strong skin, your body wouldn't be as damaged as it is right now. The rune would let you use your beast's protective skin and that swine wouldn't be able to hurt you so easily."

"Ouch. Thanks."

"You're welcome." He shrugged then ruffled his hair again. "So far, you won't be able to use your powers without a trigger. I could call my mother to unlock it but she probably wouldn't answer. Do you know where she went? She and dad?" he added, looking at Wyatt as if he held the answer.

The man just shrugged and then a knock was heard from the double door. A raspy voice spoke, "Hey Captain? Are we stopping by Omar or are we going down to pirate territory?"

"Pirates?" Silas sat up at that and he looked at Wyatt.

The man didn't seem bothered by his comment and said, "We are stopping by Omar. Reina said something about shopping and festivals."

"Okay Cap'."

Everyone waited a few minutes before Silas spoke up, drawing everyone's attention, "Pirates? You have pirates?"

"Yes. Don't you have them in your world? I believe it's something that just cannot die." Xavier added with a frown and stood up. "Anyways, if you don't have any more questions, I shall take my leave."

"Wait," Edgar stopped him before he reached the door and the boy sighed and turned. He quirked a brow as if asking him to continue and Edgar did. "Trigger. You said something could trigger it. What would that be?"

Xavier tilted his head and licked his lips before he met Edgar's eyes and gave him a bored look. "A near death experience. It's the only time the link between the witch and the rune can snap."

Edgar stiffened and Xavier gave him a lazy bow before leaving the room in which a disturbing silence, one that Silas hated, was slowly growing.

     There were a lot of things Silas didn't understand and a lot of things he didn't know. It only made him more frustrated when he couldn't figure out how to ask about them.  Where should he start from? Their age? Their powers? Was Reina only a psychic? She had shocked him when she locked him in his room. The part where she locked it wasn't the surprising part, it was the fact that the door didn't have a lock. How had she done it? It was when they had begun to sail that the door had opened. Could psychic powers do that?

"I have a question." Benji rose a hand and Wyatt looked away from the nails he was nipping off to stare at him.

"Ask away, we have a couple more hours before we reach Omar."

"Your ages here are pretty weird. I'm sorry, I couldn't keep my mind off it." He took a quick look at Edgar and added, "We'll get back to your near death experience later."

Looking back at Wyatt and Reina, he continued, "Xavier said something that bothered me. He said he was eighteen in human years. Why did he specify? And how is he eighteen?"

"Hm," Wyatt leaned back on his seat with his hands clasped behind his head and propped his legs on the table but this didn't last long because Reina pushed them down. He rolled his eyes at her then said, "That's because he's not. Xavier is thirteen in Domus years. That is, the years of the realm. I'm only twenty-five here but in your world, I'm thirty." He went on to say how they opted out of the human world's calendar because their bodies matured slower than they did when they were in the human world. At first, the earlier Domus people thought it was an effect of the realm but the generation after still grew like that so they decided to create their own calendar.

That might have answered a lot of questions for Silas, but he felt like something was missing. They weren't telling him everything. He would love to do the math but he wasn't exactly bright enough for that. Math was one of his weakest suits.

"Captain, we are approaching Omar!" The raspy voice from earlier shouted through the door and Wyatt thanked him before turning to the people in the room with him.

"Hold on to your seat because the road to Omar can be a bit-"

Wyatt clumsily bit his lip and Silas gasped then the ship tilted upwards making him swiftly clutch on to the table like the rest of them.

     From the window, Silas could see the ship was still moving and his jaw fell open at the view. As they ascended, Silas caught sight of the bright blue sea and something swimming beneath it. It wasn't until one of the animals blew out air from its head that Silas realized what they were.

Whales. There were so many of them and they were synchronized when they blew air out of their blowholes. It was beautiful. Now he couldn't wait to see what this 'Omar' held.