The Lonely Bench

"Good morning, Uri, why are you in a rush?" She asked without lifting her eyes from her book, "It is a free day today, remember, weekend?"

"Wait, what day is it?"

"Yesterday was Friday, today is Saturday, tomorrow is Sunday," She spoke calmly, "You made quite a scene late last night when you collapsed at the foot of the dorms, are you feeling alright?"

"Y-Yeah, I think so, I was unaware of what day it was, that is, um, all," She held out a letter as she continued to read, "Um, what is this?"

"Paper held within folder paper, also known as a handmade envelope and a letter," Jennifer explained, "Someone left it for you."

"Do you know who?" She shook her head and looked at him, "Thank you, I will get ready or something."

"Are you feeling alright?" He nodded, "Good, I can get back to my plan for the day," She stood up from the stool and picked it up before smiling at Uri and walking down the hall, "If you feel unwell."

"Down the hall, I know, thank you, Jennifer," She gave him a thumbs up and disappeared around a corner leaving Uri with the letter as he entered his room. He sat down on his bed and looked at the writing of the letter. On the envelope was a rather simple handwriting and not one that stood out to him recognizable. All that was written was his name, in print writing. His finger slid to open it and it revealed a simple notebook page that was ripped out of a book and folded in two. His heart slowly sped up as he pulled it out and left it folded, who could've gone through all the effort to get him a folded letter? Was it a death threat from the trio of students that had attacked him? He slowly opened the folded piece of paper and began reading. It didn't start off as something that seemed aggressive or that would become aggressive.

Uri couldn't quite tell who had written the letter but they had asked to meet him later that day in a place they called the 'lonely bench', he hadn't heard of that bench before, "Well, I should get dressed then if they want to meet me later," In the back of his mind, he could be walking directly into a trap but he wanted to believe whoever gave him that letter wasn't trying to kill him.

Using the map he had from the first day at Mage Haven Academy, he tried to find the bench that could be the 'lonely bench' but none of them stood out to him. He put the map down and looked around, "This campus is huge, how could I find a random bench?" He heard a staff tapping on the ground amongst the noises of the students going along their day that made him turn. He spotted the headmaster walking towards him, "Hello, Headmaster Solven."

"Good afternoon, Uri," He sat down next to Uri, "How are you feeling?"

"I am doing better, yes, is that all you came to talk to me about?" The headmaster didn't look at Uri and shrugged.

"Not exactly, I talked with Helena, Ms. Rosewood, about the incident in class that happened back at the beginning of your time here," He looked at Uri and nodded, "I wanted to make sure you knew that if your family were part of that group, there will be more attention on you as you are a potential danger to others if they had any sort of mind control on your or whatever they could've done."

"I know that, I just didn't know it was such a bad thing to say, the whole magic and the Oik thing."

"Well, there are no official records of that, Uri," Benjamin Solven sighed, "For obvious reasons, magic is for mages, not mage hunters, new magic is here in Mage Haven, not the same as the curses that an Oik could conjure up."

"So they do or am I crazy?" Without wording an answer, the headmaster nodded and seemed to have a bothered face, "Why hide it?"

"Because it would be a cause of more bad than good, Uri, it wasn't my choice and that is how it is," He looked around before turning back to Uri, "This must stay between us."

"It hasn't left my mouth since the beginning of the year, it will remain that way."

"I am glad you are a reasonable, young man, Mr. Geld," The headmaster stood up and noticed the map on Uri's lap, "What are you looking for?"

"Um, something called the 'lonely bench', do you know where that is?" Headmaster Solven chuckled and indicated that Uri should open the map once more, "What is so funny?"

"I haven't heard that name in a long time, it is real nostalgia for me, the lonely bench," He pointed at the map and then drew a path that seemed to light up on the paper, "Just follow that path."

"Thank you, Headmaster Solven," The older man smiled and began walking away once more. The young life mage looked back at the map and nodded, "So it is there, huh, that is behind the sports fields, I should get going then," He stood up and, with the map in his hand, began walking along the path that the headmaster had indicated on the map.

He sat on the bench that he had been led to, it was the lonely bench. The bench sat alone on a small hill that looked away from the campus and towards the uninhabited nature of the campus forest paths and lakes. Uri could tell why it was called the lonely bench but at least it had a nice view on the nature around it, "Why did this bench even get put here in this way?" He thought out loud as he didn't pay attention to anything but the scenery in front of him and the bench he sat upon.

After a few minutes, he went to turn around and saw no one, maybe it was just some sort of intricate joke. He stood up before hearing the bench move after he had gotten off of it, "What was that?"

"What was what?" A familiar voice responded without him being able to see where it was coming from, "What noise are you talking about?"

"Okay then, I am going crazy," Suddenly, as if appearing out of nowhere, sitting on the bench was Kelly Solven who seemed to have pulled off a cloak made of the world around her, "What? How did you? Huh?"

"Invisibility cloak, well, it is supposed to be that," She giggled, "I guess it worked."

"Yeah, it did, that was creepy," Kelly tapped the bench and he sat back down, "Um, are you the one who sent me the letter?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, okay, um, what did you want to talk about?" He sat down and noticed that she seemed rather clueless as if she hadn't planned up until this point.

"How are you doing?"

"Better than yesterday," Uri noticed that she had her guitar with her, "Still have that guitar wand on you?"

"Always, I know it is a silly thing but a mage always carries their wand, and this is mine," She grinned and he nodded, "You haven't had those classes yet, have you?"

"What classes?" She tapped her guitar, "A wand class? No, I use my hands for the magic," She nodded slowly as if doubting what he was saying.

"How did you break David's spells?" He looked at her with confusion painted all over his face, "I am observate, you spoke and the spells broke as if you had cast shatter yourself without a casting circle or moving your hands, I saw you do it."

"Um, I actually don't know, I didn't even remember what happened," He tried his best to lie about what had happened, fearing what her reaction would be if he told her the truth. Kelly responded with the same slow nod, "I don't remember how I did it."

"Alright, I'll accept that for now, I want to see it happen again one day, it was pretty cool," He shrugged, "I think you are a pretty nice guy," She added out of the blue.

"Huh?" Uri looked at her with another confused expression, "Where is this coming from?" She shrugged.

"You aren't afraid of me or intimidated despite knowing who I am," She had a soft smile that made her look very pretty. He had never really looked at the details of her face but in that moment he could really see them. She had a soft, friendly smile, a small scar on her cheek that was a little paler than the rest of her skin. Her eyes were blue, contrasting heavily with her crimson red hair, "Like, you called out to help me the first time you saw me and you seem like a friendly guy."

"Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?"

"I mean, yeah, sort of, I don't know," She shrugged once more, leaving Uri with little to no extra information about what she really wanted to talk about or if this was it. The two sat silently on the bench for a few moments without either saying a thing.

"How is it being the daughter of two important people in the academy?"

"Pff, I don't know, people seem to either fear it or hate it, no one really has a neutral stand on it," She sighed, "As if I am some sort of spoiled brat."

"I don't see it that way."

"You don't? That is what I thought."

"You saved me yesterday and were willing to go against three students to protect me even though you could've just ignored me entirely, you are a good person," She began blushing and covered her face, "Sorry, I didn't mean to embarrass you," Uri quickly said as he didn't know what was wrong with what he said.

"That is the nicest thing someone other than my parents have ever told me," Uri stopped and wondered if that was really the truth, had no one ever told her that she was a good person? Was she serious?

"You are kidding, right?" She shook her head, her hands still covering her face, "Oh."

"Yeah, when you are the daughter of one of the most powerful mages, you know, you get a lot of things just assumed about you," He sat silently as she began to rant, "Also, have you seen how friendly he is? How could I ever emulate that or be like that? I couldn't be the headmaster of this academy in the future even if I worked my whole life to get to that point," He didn't say anything and just smiled as he acted as a verbal punching bag of sorts for Kelly, "Not to mention my mother who is extremely harsh on me, making me learn everything about this years spells at the end of last year and the time in between and then also pushing me from the vert first day I became a mage and she will probably continue until she dies, not that I dislike the motivation but at times I would want it to stop and just be myself and not be a perfect student or a perfect mage, I am only twenty afterall, I don't know why I would have to be so much like her."

Kelly continued to rant and talk for a few minutes. She seemed to not realize how much she was talking, not that Uri cared, she was one of the rare people who had chosen to talk to him and reached out towards him instead of having the opposite happen. Even if she was mostly talking by herself, Uri couldn't care less, he was starting to enjoy spending time with her. Only after a few more minutes did she realize that she had been monologing and Uri had just been listening, "Oops, sorry, I went off on a tangent."

"I don't mind," He smiled and she began to blush once more, whether it was from embarrassment of not realizing that she was talking too much or his comment about not caring about her talking by herself, Uri couldn't tell, "It seemed like you needed to talk to someone."

"You really make it easy to prove my points, Uri," She smiled and leaned back on the bench, "How did you find the bench? I just said the lonely bench and I completely forgot you were a first year student and probably didn't know what it was."

"I asked the headmaster after he asked me what I was looking for," He pointed at his map, "So yeah," She nodded, "What are you doing later?"

"To be honest, not much, my mom wants me to be studying but I am here at the moment," She shrugged, "I already know what is going to be covered next week and I could already get started on the fourth year stuff if I felt like it."

"Why don't you?" Uri asked as they both looked off at the nature in front of them, "Wouldn't it make it easier?"

"It is easy enough already," She sighed, "When you have one of the best death mages in history as your father and the best fire mage that you know as your mother, it is hard to not succeed."

"My parents were a little different."

"How were they?" Uri instantly regretted bringing up his parents, "How is it back at home?"

"I am an orphan now, so my parents are nothing but memories," Kelly's expression revealed her discomfort with having brought up his parents after he had told her that.

"Are they dead?"

"Pff, no clue, last time I saw them I was like, five or six, nothing that is very memorable," Uri shrugged, his comment seemed to make Kelly seem less uncomfortable with the conversation, "I just try and be the best I can, without a role model, but it has gotten me here already."

"That's pretty cool," A small moment of silence followed in which they once again just looked out at nature in front of them. Uri could feel that Kelly wanted to break the silence but with what, it seemed she couldn't quite find what it, "How is being a life mage?"

"I have learned just one spell, and it really isn't the most impressive, not like your Dragon's Breath," Uri replied, "Apparently the only spell first year life students learn that can be used to effectively attack is Angel Call, but we haven't learned that one yet."

"Oh, that is cool, I remember that we learned a lot of spells in first year for fire, the whole spellbook is rather large."

"Michael told me that there were only twenty five spells total," Kelly stood up from the bench, "Do you need to get going?" She nodded, "Alright, well, um, it was nice talking with you."

"It was mostly me talking and you listening."

"I didn't mind that," He stood up and pointed at the cloak she had brought with her, "How is it invisible on one side?"

"You apply a potion onto one side and it renders it into a very useful tool that is invisible on one side and visible on the other, of course there is a spot that is also invisible on the inside to be able to see through it," Kelly showed him proudly, "I made it and I am glad it works."

"That is pretty cool," He mentioned as she placed it on her shoulder and they began walking back. Uri was happy and it seemed that talking with him had made Kelly happy as well.