Planetarium

"What we can do is check out the terrain of this island we are in and see if there are other people in it."

Red extracted the flask from her belt bag and handed it over to Archer. She had been carrying it around ever since the first trial since it reminded her that even someone like her could accomplish something amazing.

It was like a trophy to her.

Taking the glowing flask from her hands as gently as possible, Archer poured out just a handful of the tiny specks of the moon onto his palm and opened the pocket watch, drizzling the shimmering dust onto the timepiece's façade.

He then proceeded to chant so fast Red wasn't able to catch up with the words he was saying. She could only see how his lips closed and opened, a steady string of vowels and consonants mushed together to conceive a language she could only surmise as Faey jargons.

Archer's hand hovered above the watch and Red saw the moon dust slowly rising and forming what she thought was the shape of the island in birds eye view. It was like watching an artisan create a sculpted masterpiece out of sand.

Sand castles.

It reminded her of creating sandcastles in the beach with ma and da. She looked at how Archer had closed his eyes in concentration, the sapphire blue iridescent glow of the moon dust above her watch creating a tinge of beautiful contours across his handsome face.

Archer had such a serene look into him when he was performing his magic and it was so captivating Red's heart contracted and he took her breath away.

He slowly took a peek and the light twinkled around his emerald eyes. He was just so beautiful and Red couldn't help but feel her overwhelming attraction intensifying.

'Gurl get your hormones right, we starting to think you might be bipolar.' Leah said at the back of her mind.

'Ohhhh… glowing flower boy.' Rhea cooed.

'Oh, my effin… you guys are dead. Yup, you are. I'll go ring the love alarm. We are going to war!' Leah shrieked.

Red's left and right brain was a mayhem of stupid and logical wiles. She brushed them off and tried to focus her attention on what was unraveling in front of her. It is not the time to have a mental clash with herself.

"Evicenzeas!" Archer spoke and in a matter of seconds Red was able to glimpse a portion of his immense knowledge in magic.

The moon dust expanded and formed the outlines of the island, the terrain of the seacoast a crescent shape. Two tiny orbs formed near one of the tips of the crescent's horns. That must be Archer and Red. They were both near the coast.

A huge mountain with razor like edges separated them from the rest of the island covered in tropical forest. At the opposite side of the mountain, there was a huge cluster of tiny orbs that congregated around what looked like the biggest tree in the island. Tiny specks of moon dust glittered around like stars projected by a laser planetarium.

"How did you become so adept in magic if you weren't born with it? I'm really curious." Red said just as Archer finished his incantations and the landscape of the island completely displayed, hovering mid-air above the watch.

"Well, for starters, all living beings have the potential to use magic." Archer started. "For the Faeys, it naturally flows and manifests when we are born -"

"So are humans capable of magic too?" Red asked in the middle of his sentence. "Oops sorry, do continue."

Archer cleared his throat and went about his explanation.

"Like I said, all living beings no exceptions. So naturally, humans too. What did you think of the Salem Witch trials?" he pointed out while raising a finger. "Those women practiced magic that was taught by either a Faey or another human that mastered High magic."

"Thus, to be born without an ounce of magic in me, I had to literally start from scratch like how humans learned to manifest magic." He explained further. "Took me a while since I turned out to be the wild one when I lost hope. Wandering from place to place never really having a certain goal in life."

"And you just taught yourself?" Red said as she went closer to inspect the projected terrain of the island.

"I did teach myself here and there, but I also had people who taught me more than I could by myself." His eyes gazed faraway, reminiscing the times he had roamed around and met wonderful people of every race and kind. Some became friends while others weren't as welcoming.

Sometimes his charms just don't work well.

"How long did you 'wander'?" Red asked, making quotation mark gestures.

"A couple of hundred years I guess in the human realm." He said as he scratched his chin, acting like he wasn't quite sure how old he was. "But enough of me, look what we have here."

Archer motioned for Red to take a look and she realized that there was something odd about the clusters of tiny orbs at the other side of the island.

Both of them peered into the glowing projection and Archer willed the terrain to focus on the giant tree. Red observed how the landscape shifted from the macroscale towards one area, creating a detailed 3D model of the tree in all its glory.

"It looks like there are other people in this island I say." He mused.

The tree showed magnificent branches that shoot upwards, gnarled and twisted with lush leaves that created a wide parasol. Its root system was all around, covering almost the entire island!

The tiny orbs were moving in erratic manner, like they were anxious or overly excited. Two of them were located at the middle of the massive trunk, motionless.

"What the fuck is the meaning of this? It looks like the tree is alive but is actually hollow inside." Red pointed out. "Assuming these are people like us, this tree could only mean one thing."

"A treehouse?" Archer joked.

Red only shook her head in exasperation.

"What do you say we check this one out?" he said.

"Teleport?"

"Yes, teleport. We can't cross that huge ass mountain by foot Queen of Sass. It would take days!"

"I know dumbo. Was just clarifying." Red retorted.

"Great! We can't waste much time; Ari is waiting to be saved!" he said then suddenly grabbed Red's waist pulling her close to him and chanted,

"Partio!"