TEA

Lexine was in awe. She had taken Sevin for an extremely kind person. At the moment, however, that seemed to be the total opposite as he glared down at her three kidnappers who were kneeling before him. "You are to leave my presence this instant and not to approach me unless I call upon you."

Sheea raised her head, her eyes wide in fear. She swallowed hard, tears pooling at the sides of her eyes. "Alpha, my beta duties..."

Sevin gave Sheea a cold look that shook her to her core. She should have kept her opinions to herself. "Will be overseen by Nemi till further notice. You are dismissed."

Sheea blinked back her tears and bowed her head, "Understood Alpha."

The three of them got to their feet and walked out of the room.

Only then did Christana fold her palm into a fist, extinguishing the ball of fire in her palm. She ran to Lexine and untied her. "Are you hurt anywhere? I apologize for leaving you. I simply did not expect this to happen. If they hurt you anywhere I swear I will make Sevin dismiss her from her post."

Artin made a grunt, "I agree with Christana. She is unfit for her post. You should dismiss her at once Brashwa. How dare they kidnap our housemate." Lexine rolled her eyes. The irony. He himself had kidnapped her from her home.

After getting loose, Lexine rubbed her sore wrists, she felt the bones cracking. "She deserves to be dismissed. They made me drop my cake." Lexine's joke was lost on Christana who nodded fast making Lexine worry that her neck would fly off of her shoulders.

"At once!"

"Hey! I am joking. For the record, they were worried about you, you halfwit." She directed her gaze at Sevin.

Sevin's eyes furrowed, not understanding what Lexine was speaking of. Why would his Beta be worried about him, and what did Lexine have to do with any of it?

Adley immediately understood the situation. She helped Lexine to her feet. "They were worried you had ulterior motives towards their Alpha?"

"Something about my smell. Do I smell weird?" She raised her hand to sniff herself.

Christana slowly pushed her arm down. "I believe it is your actions that are weird Lexine."

Artin laughed at Lexine's actions. The human was simply entertaining. "What she meant was your scent. All living beings have a scent that werewolves and drakons are able to pick up more clearly than any other species."

Christana sniffed the air around Lexine. "Now that you mention it, she does smell weird. I coupled it with the fact that she was human."

Sevin shook his head, a curious look on his face. "She smells quite different from other humans as well." Artin nodded, confirming his acclamations.

Adley took out a small book from a brown leather pouch strapped to her waist that was similar to the one that Lexine's gold was in. She scribbled something down. "Could it have something to do with the fact that she has an unusually high energy signature for a human?"

Artin and Sevin nodded. That could also be a factor. Maybe she was a mutated human and maybe there were others like her on earth. However, anthropoids were a form of the mutated human race, yet all of them still possessed low energy signatures. The explanations made Artin's head throb.

Lexine smiled at the housemates who had come for her. 'I do not trust them in the slightest considering two of them kidnapped me, but they did just save my life. The least I can do is be a bit nice.'

"Can we go back now, I am craving some tea right now. Do you guys even have tea in this world?" She missed her mom's tea. It was the absolute best.

She walked between Christana and Sevin. Artin and Adley stayed a few steps back, discussing something in low tones.

Christana answered in her usual bubbly tone. If anyone were to look at her at the moment, they would not believe that she could shoot fire from her palms. "Yes. It is not much though since we rarely drink it. It is kept in case Headmaster pays a visit to our house. He has a fetish for tea."

Lexine was glad. If they did not have tea, she would run back to her mother without looking back. Perhaps her daily dose of tea was the cause of the slight throbbing in her head. 'I am an addict thanks to my mother.'

Christana nudged Lexine. "Are you ready for classes? They begin the day after tomorrow. You have not had enough time to prepare, have you? Since you came late I doubt you have your schedule. I can take you to headmaster tomorrow to pick it after the opening ceremony tomorrow."

Lexine realized that Aurinda and Christana had slightly similar personalities, caring about the people around them. There was a limit Lexine could take before she suffocated and snapped at them though. However, they were trying so hard to be welcome. In the same spirit, she would also reign in her stubborn nature. "Thank you. I would deeply appreciate that."

It was late afternoon and the stalls were closing up. It seemed a little odd to Lexine, however, it was not like her school would let students handle food stalls after a student fight in the gym. In short, everything was odd.

They reached their house, taking the same path Aurinda had used that morning. Christana went to the living room. Lexine immediately made a beeline for the kitchen. "Adley, can you please show me where you keep your tea?"

Adley nodded and followed her. In the kitchen was Quira. She was cutting up fruits. There were two bowls in front of her where she added equal amounts of fruit.

"Quira? Is that for Desire and Taevlin?"

The girl hid her face behind her lilac-colored hair and nodded.

Without a word, she picked up the bowls and left the kitchen. Lexine's curiosity was peaked. "She does not speak much, does she?"

Adley laughed as she walked to the far right of the room. She went to her tippy toes and picked a jar from the top shelf. "She is a Sylph Lexine, none of them prefer to speak." She opened and glanced inside before turning back to Lexine. "However, Quira is really shy. So she speaks even less. Here is the tea."

Lexine thanked Adley. "Do you have milk and how do I operate this stove thingy of yours?"

The stove looked remarkably like the gas stoves back on earth. However, there was no gas canister and there were weird looking rocks in the middle of the iron grids that were used for balancing the rocks.

Adley smiled widely as if proud as she opened the fridge to remove a jug of milk. "Headmaster came up with these inventions. It is very useful instead of cooking things over a fire. This one keeps food cold."

'I am sure it doesn't work the same as the one on earth though.' Lexine thought as she watched Adley turn on the stove. Adley put her hand on the stove and her hand lit up a black color. The stones in the middle of the iron grids turned red in color and began sizzling. It was almost like coal but it did not burn out.

"These are mana rocks. Depending on the temperature you want, you give some of your energy to the mana rocks. The mana rocks produce heat after that. It is not highly depleting, so it is good to use. However, they are really rare. So you cannot mass produce these."

Adley's explanation was simple to follow. However, Lexine had no clue how to 'give' some of her energy to the rocks. Was she feeding them? 'Note to self, always have someone with me to turn on the stove.'

"Do you want some tea?" Adley was curious about the kind of tea the human would make so she nodded.

Adley watched as Lexine took the milk and poured it into a pot. She then placed the pot on the stove. She frowned when she saw the tea they had. It was just dried tea leaves. She had to work with this though. Therefore, she put a spoonful of tea leaves into the tea strainer and let it dangle on the edges of the pot, the net part sinking into the milk. The tea leaves gave the milk color and flavor.

Lexine removed it after a few minutes and tossed the tea leaves into the trash. She used the strainer to prevent the tea from spilling as it raised. After a few more minutes, the tea was shared into two glass mugs Adley handed her.

"Do you take sugar with your tea?"

'Sugar with my tea?' Adley cocked her head in confusion. She never used milk for her tea, let alone sugar.

She handed Lexine the jar of sugar Raveer used to make sweets."I can try..."

Lexine added two spoonfuls each and stirred.

"Voila!" Lexine gestured to the two mugs. "Thank you for helping me. I am sure this will make me feel much much better. I am going to let out my ever lazy, tea-loving tiger in the living room!" She picked up the bigger mug and walked out of the kitchen with her mug in her hands.

She left Adley staring at the mug, 'who uses milk and sugar in their tea?' Humans were an interesting species indeed. Sugar was very expensive, to say the least, and was only mostly used in treats like sugar apples, and cakes. Why waste money when you could forgo the sugar in the tea?

She picked up her mug and took a sip. Her eyes widened. She had never tasted anything like this. The taste of the milk was very potent, with an underlying taste of the tea that left a slight aftertaste in her mouth. The sugar gave the whole combination a sweet 'tang'.