Gwen had the time of her life fighting Percival. It was no different from her dummy back home. Pfft. Number One in knight class? It was more like Number Three. Gwen dodged her opponent's every move with flips, stealth, and pure agility. She smiled the whole time she did. In the meantime, Percy became so frustrated that he came at her with everything he's learned, but she still overpowered him. Clash! Clash! Clash! The echoing of swords clashing exploded into the atmosphere.
Artie thought this was the coolest thing ever. He wanted to be just like Gwen. He couldn't help but to laugh when she came at Percival with a side swipe and caught the end of his armor. He flinched and backed away from her, shocked by her power.
Chuckling, she held her sword's point up to his chin, asking, "Are you giving up after merely one mark?"
"Ha!" Percy flipped his hair, "I'm just getting started!"
"Really? Me too."
Unfortunately, Gwen's excitement ceased all too fast when from out of nowhere, Artie jumped between her and Percy and stole the sword right from her hand! He launched at the bully, but Percival, with one sword swipe, knocked it right out of his hand. SMACK!
The sword fell to the ground and rolled away from the fighting teens. "Artie!" Gwen narrowed her eyebrows to an angry position and shoved him to the ground with her arm, "What are you doing?"
"What does it look like? I'm trying to save you!" Artie crawled over to the sword and reached for it. Gwen chased him.
They ended up grabbing the hilt at the same time and started a tug-of-war. "I've got this all under control!" Gwen yelled at Artie.
"But I want to be just like you!" he argued back.
From where he stood, Percival yawned.
"Come, boys," he told Rex and Dex, "Let's go find somebody worthy of our time."
"Wait!" Gwen shouted. She let go of the sword hilt, and Artie fell to the ground when all the weight shifted over to him. The young lady hurried after Percival, but he waved her away and gave her the excuse he was going to go bathe. He left her and Artie behind.
Artie sat up from where he landed and casually placed the sword in his lap.
"Did we win?" he questioned. Did we win? What kind of question was that? Like before, a volcano exploded from Gwen's head. BOOM!
She narrowed her eyebrows to an angry position, yelling, "You-You stay out of this!" at the young boy.
"Why?" Artie asked with a shrug, "I think that went rather well. What do you think?"
"If you didn't butt in, child," Gwen shouted, "I would've sent him flying out of these school walls!" Artie cringed when he saw how angry she was. Who knew a woman could be this scary?
He held his hands out to her, as if protecting himself from a slap, and said, "Look, Gwen. I'm sorry. It's just, when I saw your sword skills, I had to try it myself, ya know?"
"Oh, poppycock." Gwen crossed her arms and turned away from the boy, "Who said a whiny, scrawny boy like you could fight?"
"Hm, let me think." Artie clutched his elbow and tapped his chin, "How about a certain imp named Arabella?"
"Imp?" Gwen's ears perked up, and she quickly whirled around to face her brother again, "How do you know her name?"
"It's a long story." With that, Artie pushed himself to his feet. He brushed dust off himself, continuing, "It's just, I can't tell you."
"What are you hiding, boy?"
"Nothing of interest to you, that's for sure." However, just as Artie said that, he heard a voice in his head.
Arabella. "Yo, kid," spoke her mystical voice, "Tell her the truth."
"I'd prefer not to."
"What?" Gwen gave Artie a funny look.
"Um," he stuttered, "What I mean to say is, uh...woul-would you play with me?"
"Play?" Gwen burst out laughing, "I sure hope you're joking, kid! You're too old to play all these childish games!"
"Maybe I am, but..." Sweat trickled down Artie's temples as he nervously started to fiddle with his collar, "I don't know how to say this." He sighed, "I-I like you." When she heard those words, Gwen's eyes widened. In all her seventeen years of living, no man has ever said that to her. Just hearing that, she came bursting out of her shell. Artie rubbed his hands together and turned away from her. "I understand," he spoke in a low voice, "You have other pressing priorities. The least you want is to play with a loser like me. I'll go now." As he started to walk away, Gwen held her hand out to him, but her lips could not form the right words. She thought for a moment, and after collecting her thoughts, she smiled. She was too shy to say this, but she too liked Artie. Dropping her hand, she tiptoed after him.
Artie headed back in the direction of the orphanage. Without looking back at Gwen, he lifted his hand and rubbed his nose. Little did he know, but she was following him.
She too rubbed her nose and thought about what he asked her, "Would you play with me?" Yep, he definitely had the qualities of a little brother. A big sister, even though she still had a hard time believing he was her brother, they always found a way to entertain the younger siblings. With this in mind, the young woman jumped into a trot.
Suddenly, Artie felt her tap his shoulder, and she yelled, "Tag! You're it!"
"Whoa!" he shouted as he paused right on his tracks. Gwen sprinted over to the fountain that had the reproduction of Bernini's David and turned to face him.
She ran in place, asking, "Well, are we going to play or not?"
"Really?" Artie felt a small smile creeping up on his face.
"Come on, kid. See if you can catch me." Gwen rushed away from the fountain and started towards Jualaline's main courtyard. As the excitement bubbled inside of him like molten lava, Artie took off after her.
Jualaline students stopped what they were doing and curiously watched the two when they entered the main courtyard.
Gwen dove into a tunnel in the castle that had a line of about five wooden windows. Artie stood in front of them and searched for her. He heard something behind him and whirled around to find the source of the noise. One at a time, Gwen opened each window and gave him a goofy smile. The young boy launched half his body into them, but by the time he was in this very uncomfortable position, she had already moved. While the two may have looked like adults on the outside, they were still kids on the inside. Honestly, they were having a lot of fun right now. This was the Baroque Period. They had to find some way to entertain themselves. After the window phenomenon, Gwen next hurried through each of the castle's corridors, with Artie close on her heels.
The teens played for they didn't know how long, until they wore themselves out. When they decided to take a break, they hung out in Jualaline's garden where the staff and students grew apple trees. It was a beautiful, shady area that had a bench as well as a stone monument in the heart of it. The monument sat on top of some concrete panels, and colorful flowers surrounded it as well as water.
In the shade of the apple trees, Gwen and Artie sat on a bench and snacked on a few apples. By now, it was late afternoon. In about an hour, Artie would once again turn into a wolf. However, because he was having so much fun, he lost track of time. He and Gwen merely enjoyed their apples and listened to the cool, afternoon breeze as well as chirping birds in the garden's circular center.
Gwen, after examining the many different flowers that grew in the garden's heart, set her apple down on her lap and told Artie,
"Okay, I'll admit, Artie. That was fun."
"Uh huh," was his answer. To Gwen's curiosity, she noticed he was staring at the stone monument. Not only that, but he had one eye closed, and he positioned his arm as if he was about to shoot a bow and arrow. It was perfectly straight.
It looked like he was measuring something with his thumb. "What are you doing?" Gwen asked. She took another bite from her apple and crossed one leg over the other.
Not looking at her, Artie answered, "I'm testing the root-five rectangle."
"Root what?"
"It's an artistic term."
"Artistic. Right." Gwen had no idea what Artie was talking about.
He dropped his hand and hopped up from the bench. The young man headed over to the corner of the garden's heart and sat down in a swing.
He gently swung back and forth and thought to himself, "Perhaps pastel colors are the best way to go? Or is that too much like Mannerism?"
"What are you talking about?" Gwen's voice piped up from off to the side.
She stopped next to the young man and stuck the tip of her sword in the ground. "Do you not know anything about art?" Artie asked her.
"Ha! Now I wouldn't say that." Gwen spoke in a nervous voice. She scratched the side of her head as she tried to dissect his words, "I do know that if comprises of colors and pictures."
"You make me laugh, Gwen." Gwen blushed at Artie's words. She hated being wrong. "Art is much more than just colors and pictures," he continued. He gripped each side of the swing and pushed himself back until he was standing on the backs of his heels, "There's symbolism, emotions, drama, mathematical equations, perspective; the list goes on." While he explained this, Arthur let his feet go and swung forward, "Do you mean to tell me that you're so in-tuned to this whole musketeer training that you've never explored the world?"
"Let's just say I'm a farm girl."
"That doesn't matter. What matters is that you take the time to put your wants aside and focus on your needs. Here, come with me." Artie jumped off the swing while it was still swinging and landed on his feet in front of it. He gestured for Gwen to follow him, "I want to show you something."
Guinevere followed Arthur back to the orphanage building that housed older children. He led her into his room and shut the door behind them. Gwen explored it as he lit a lantern that rested on a desk, where his school books were. Despite that he was a loser at school, he actually had a pretty nice bedroom. There was a bookshelf in it, as well as a small wardrobe, and a chest rested at the foot of his bed. He had a reading section, in which there was a rug and chair in it, as well as a window and fireplace. Fur clung to the rug's surface as well as his bed, but that was just because he turned into a wolf every night.
After lighting the lantern, Artie gently pushed past Gwen and approached his fireplace.
Before doing anything else, he ordered in a gentle voice, "Leave your sword and shield behind. You won't need them." Gwen wondered what he meant by that. While she managed to take off her sword, she refused to leave her shield-like mirror. She loved it too much. "I said both your sword and shield."
"It's not a shield. It's a mirror." Gwen hugged her mirror to her chest and pulled it away from Artie.
He held the lantern in front of him and admitted, "That doesn't make a difference. It's a weapon, and I prohibit weapons to where we're going."
"What are you talking about?" Gwen only hugged her mirror tighter, "There's nothing here but a bed and scraps on the floor." That statement slightly offended Arthur. To show Gwen he meant business, he set the lantern down on the shelf above his fireplace and pressed a button at the end of it. The second he did, the whole fireplace moved off to the side to reveal a secret chamber behind it! Gwen's eyes widened when she saw this. What the heck? This loser had a secret chamber in his bedroom? Perhaps there was much more to Arthur than she thought?
The young woman slowly approached the chamber's entrance and peered inside. It was dark and creepy. She couldn't see anything.
Shivering, she asked the invisible audience behind her, "Okay, who wants to go into the creepy tomb first?" She sounded like Riley in National Treasure.
With lantern in hand, Artie pushed by her and stepped into the narrow passageway, "Well, are you coming or not? Remember. The mirror stays behind."
It felt awful to let her baby go.
Gwen's fingers shook as she hesitantly set it down next to her sword, which sat propped up against Artie's reading chair. "I'll be back, baby," she spoke, and she kissed her mirror goodbye. Artie rolled his eyes from where he stood, but he let Gwen have her moment.
After kissing the mirror for about the fiftieth, she finally joined him in the secret chamber. The second she had both feet inside, the fireplace moved back to where it used to be. Gwen faced the moving wall as it trapped her and Artie behind it. When it clicked back into place, she called after him when she noticed he had already started down the chamber, "Artie!" Little by little, the light of the lantern started to fade, but Gwen hurried after it before she could find herself in complete utter darkness. Many questions swarmed through her brain. What was Artie going to show her? What did it have to do with art? Who was he? By the rate she was going, would she ever reach Saudi Arabia, find Illusion, and become a musketeer?
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