Ripping off

He danced away smoothly, his second long knife already in his hand, he extended them ready for action while his eyes was trained on the new stranger. A stranger that was silent and fast enough to sneak up on him.

She was small but she was she carried herself, the gently grace with which she held her sword tells of a person Femi knew he should be wary of. She wore a dark cloak that coved all her body except her head– and she was beautiful, her eyes were blue and her hair a black mass that had been coiled together in a braid.

"Which of you is Kunle?" Her voice was almost gentle if not for the steel that ran underneath it.

Femi glanced at the schooler who doesn't seems to be surprised that two assassins were in his room, instead the schooler pushed his glasses higher and clapped which smiling as if he had just done something great.

"Now that everyone is here I can....."

"Are you Kunle, two eyes?" She interrupted but her blade was not removed from Femi's direction even as her eyes narrowed at the schooler smiling at his desk.

Femi wondered what type of assassin she was that she didn't have have the picture of her target with her. No matter, he was sure he was going home with tonight target as his kill but he was also curious of this new development. This new assassin looked like someone that could hold her own. Is she a sage like him?

"Why yes I am, Master Yetunde," Schooler Kunle smiled wider as Femi noticed the woman stiffened and her eyes got narrower.

And why is the schooler calling her 'Master' could she be a master battle Sage like him? Femi doubt that, she looked skilled maybe even have few lesser Sages in her but worthy of Master? Sages that have upper Sages in them?

"Why have you called me?"

"Why did you come? Tell me you had been driven because you felt it in the air don't you? The coming of a great darkness and you feel that relentless in you as that one Sage in you awaken more and more," The schooler was facing the woman but his words were for the both of them.

Femi clenched his teeth, how does this schooler know too much about him? About his sage, Grim?

"I don't know what you are talking about but I know this, the Black fangs had been holding villages to ransom as of resent and they are gathering money. Tell me why," The woman's eyes flashed to Femi as he stiffened at the mention of the Black fangs. "And tell me about you friend here."

"All in due time. And about him?" The schooler pointed at Femi, "he's just the assassin Shadowed One, sent to kill him."

Femi felt the full force of the woman's– Yetunde, the schooler called her– eyes and he was expecting the usual curses and fear that came with his name, instead she said.

"Is that so, he didn't seem to be doing such a great job of it."

"Well, if you haven't interrupted me then maybe you would have meet the head of the schooler," Femi said lightly.

"You have a point but if I had met his head here then I would have had to kill you. In a way, me interrupting you save your life."

Femi also rocked back in surprise, did she just said that? To him? No one, even the handful of assassins he calls friends don't threaten him so casually with death, "Well, I like them with a little fire sprite in them, the more fun to crush."

She clenched her teeth and Femi could have sworn that her eyes got bluer.

"Now, now, now, no need to fight children."

They both looked at the schooler with raised brows, Kunle couldn't be more than few years older than forty.

"You have all been brought here because of a very important reason. You both– and one guy,I don't know him yet– are going to save the kingdom." Kunle clapped.

Femi was so surprised he opened and closed his mouth a couple of times. You say what now? The laugher started from the woman, clear and tinkling like morning sunlight. The idea was so ridiculous and her laugh too contagious that he began laughing as well and for some moments all they could do was laughed while keeping their weapons pointed at each other.

"I get it now, schooler. That's why you're not afraid isn't? You're crazy." Femi said, not bother to count how many things were wrong with what the schooler just said.

The schooler looked chestfallen then he looked at Yetunde but she only shrugged and pointed her sword higher, "what he said." It sounded as if the words were dragged out of her mouth.

"I see, but you have to believe me! You can't deny that you can't feel it, don't you?"

Femi loath to admit it but he had been feeling something in the air, some kind of heaviness and anytime he used even a little of Grim's power it felt as if the Sage in him was being pulled gently somewhere.

"And so? It's probably the Black fangs making such bold move." Yetunde said, even if it sounded like she didn't believe it herself.

"Does it matter? Haven't you wondered why you were born with your Sages and it wasn't passed by someone else? Or by you taming it?"

Femi felt a chill ran through his body, for as long as he could remember, he had been able to feel and use the Grim sage. He had been born with it. It hadn't been given to him. Or him capturing it.

"You," the sage pointed at Femi then Yetunde, "and her will play center role in what's to come. Haven't you heard? The shield and the sword, the prince who would be king brought both to the battle and the army of this world and the next put their sword with him. You, Femi of the Grim and you Yetunde of... My time's up, come to Irin mountains, come to the temples there and you shall know. See you."

The schooler put his hand around his own neck, smiling all the while and then ripped his own head off, the head came off with a little bit of his spine, splattering blood everywhere that made both of them moved away from the still body.

A thick silence before the woman started cursing, she said one bit about dramatic males and thinking and balls that made Femi winced.

She turned and started walking to the second window in the room, it's not his brain that made Femi called out.

"I would like to know more about what he's saying. At least about how I was born with my Sage."

She paused, then reluctantly, "me too. But that mountain is a death trap."

"Not with two skilled people, it's not." He put one of his blade away, noticing she had not put her sword away either.

"You're saying?"

Femi was curious about her, about the Sage she was born with.

"There's a traven down the street, what says you we meet later in the day? In the afternoon,on neutral grounds."

"Sounds like a great idea." And with that, she was gone.

Femi in the room, with a dead schooler on the floor smilled a smile that he meant.