????'s PoV
I dust off the top of the desk. I would cough if I had inhaled the dust, but I'm wearing a mask kind of like a surgical mask. Why? Because of a large cut on my face that left a scar across my mouth, how? Joey, the king of corruption or some shit. I fuckin hate it and how it looks, but the King of the plains, that's right, the KING, gave me this face mask. This new king guy is much nicer than his father. His father wanted all of us scavengers dead, he called us worthless, thinking that would help with us not having money, but Jordan, the new king, he cares for some reason, he gives us shit to sell, whatever he finds and doesn't need, and he knows how much some People want his shit, and unlike his father, won't sell it himself. That fuckin king I wanna hate him, I wish I could hate him, but he's indirectly helping James and I keep Burren alive.
My friend Burren, he got attacked four months ago by the corrupted king, Joey, that mother fucker almost killed him, and now Burren is always sick. Food and basic medicine is all we can do for him. His legs are also hurt, we assume from a spell of some kind, but the cost of it to help his legs is over 500 diamonds. It sucks, he's constantly asking us to just let him die, it hurts man. Your best friend, not even in physical pain, but because he feels like a burden, is just asking you to leave him to die. He knows how expensive even basic medicine is for us, for people who look poor. I just want him to be okay, I want him to get better, or course I could ask Hank for help, but I don't want to make it seem like I don't have it under control. Fuck, I'm tearing up, I close my eyes tightly to not let one year drop.
Once I'm in the clear and won't cry, I search the desk I'm at more. I can hear James in the basement. James, the only person who keeps me from crying whenever Burren gets worse. I've known James ever since I was a kid, he's almost like my older brother at this point. He's got a kinder heart than me, whenever we find things that one of our friends might like, he just gives it to them, not asking for emeralds or money or anything at all. As much as it pisses me off, I can't stop him, the bright smiles we get from people, Niki's face whenever we can get her tarot cards, Gold whenever we can grab him a pack of crayons or a colouring book, even Dinkster when we can get him a spare piece of quartz.
Oh, right, I should talk about myself to some degree, the name is Pokay, or Poke, I'm a scavenger, my parents died while I was 12, leaving me alone, but a 16 year old named Michael took me in as he was all alone as well. Now we're both older, and I have to act older. There are a few things in life that make me happy, the fact that Tubbo, a kid who was almost dying on the street, but Jordan took him in. That was the moment I started to trust Jordan.
Now as a scavenger James and I go to abandoned places and yoink the shit that looks expensive, then we sell it, pretty chill and nice if you ask me. We sometimes have to run away from wolves and bears, that's when it's not nice or chill.
I trace my fingers along the side of the desk until there's an oddly shaped bump. Upon closer inspection I notice the bump is something I can easily grab. While it takes a few pulls to get the thing out of its right place. But it's a book, with a flame and a crown on it. "What the fuck?" I mutter, my voice being muffled by my mask. I open the book but it's written in another language, maybe James will know better then I do. I remove my mask for a second to call out to him. "James!"
"Yeah!?" He calls back to me, I can barely hear his voice.
"Get up here! I need your help with something!" I yelled before I put my mask back on.
After a couple of minutes of probably trying to find me he walks over to me and I hand him the book. He carefully looks at the pages. His red faded hoodie has dust all over it, there's even dirt all over his pants, but it's barely visible because his pants are black. He takes off his sunglasses for a minute, He wears them out of fear, he has this thing where his eyes are golden, meaning he can perform witchcraft like Hank or Yammy can, but he doesn't. Now the fear part to that, Mr. Joey, or the King of the corrupted land, He wants every wizard and witch to work for him, and James just can't do that.
"It's the same language in Hank's enchanting table, I can get a few phrases here and there like, 'The Phoenix princess will rise', 'Every Tuesday take her out', and 'Herobrine will rise'." He shoves the book in his bag and carefully puts his glasses back on. "Come one, we should head back home to give Burren his medicine."
I nod and stand up. He makes sure I don't fall over and we walk out of the abandoned house. Not only was I able to get that book, but I was able to grab a few pencils, a couple of pens, a necklace, and a purple ring that I'm gonna give to Kara, she loves fancy things like rings and bracelets, I'll never know why. While walking I find that James found a lot of diamonds, gold, and emeralds, so that'll help us for a long while.
Once we reach the outskirts of the mainland village we head to our house first, well, not really a house. It's a small almost cabin like place made out of jungle and oak wood. There's only one big room, we have a kitchen area, a small living room area with a couch where Burren has been, the couch is near a fireplace and we don't know what to do other then keep him warm. In the farthest corner there's two mattresses for James and I.
Once at our home James slowly pushes open the old spruce door. James instantly goes to the kitchen cabinets to grab Burren's medicine. I put my bag on a hook on the back of the door as I closed it.
Once I look at Burren who's sleeping, at least I think he is. His face is paler than normal, that might not be good. I walk over to him and check his pulse, still there, thank god. I let out a big breath and shook him to wake him up. His eyes slowly opens and he looks up at me.
"Hey dude, how are you feeling?" I ask my voice shaking, god, I knew he wasn't dead, it's just the thought, it scares me too much.
"Like I always do. Did something scare you?" He sits himself up and crosses his arms.
"I just fell a couple feet earlier, I'm fine tho." That's a lie, but if I tell him the truth, he'll just feel like a burden again.
"Here, eat." James walks over to us and hands both Burren and I a piece of bread with butter. Burren has an end piece because we've been using the bread to soak up his medicine so it tastes better. Burren's got sensitive taste buds or something because before he couldn't taste his medicine without it almost hurting him.
"So, what are we gonna do with the book?" I ask James.
He shrugs. "No idea." He grabs a small bit of old newspaper and throws it into the fireplace to keep the fire going.
"What kind of book did you find?" Burren asks after finishing his bread.
"It's about a fire Phoenix princess or some shit. It's written in a different language." I mutter part of what I say, trying to not sound annoyed.
"Why not just give it to Michael, he's a fire dancer and might just enjoy having it." Burren suggests smiling. He's right, Michael does like fire things. And as much as I want to charge him emeralds for it, I know both Burren and James want to give Michael the book for free.
"I have something to give Kara and Angel tonight, I can give Michael the book tonight." I suggest.
James looks at and raises an eyebrow. "Okay, but if you even dare-"
"I'm not gonna charge him anything, except maybe ask him to come visit us one day." I cut him off.
He smirks and gives me the book. "Here you go then."
Niki's PoV
I gently sweep the makeup brush across Michael's face, adding a pink colouring to his eyelids. We're sitting in the audience area of an outside stage where our friend Wilbur is figuring out how to use his guitar and how to use the mics. Another one of our friends, Kara, is helping with the soundboard.
I'm Niki, a fortune teller and a makeup artist in the mainland village. I've been called a witch before due to having pink hair, but honestly I think it's some sort of mutation, but I don't quite know, I was an orphan since the age of 7, I don't remember much about my parents. But then again, not many people I know do, Kara still has her mom, and Wilbur has his dad, but that's it.
"Hello, is thi-" Wilbur speaks into the mic and cuts himself off once the speakers make a loud feedback noise.
"What the fuck did that?" I hear Kara mutter to herself trying to find the knob to fix it.
"There should be one that says mic 3, try that." Michael says to Kara looking away from me. I use my hand to move his face back to where I need it. "Sorry." He mumbles to me.
"No. It's fine, just don't move too much." I softly smile and return to what I was doing.
"Try again." Kara calls out to Wilbur who nods.
"How's this?" Wilbur speaks into the mic, it's getting a bit better, but it's still a little loud.
"Hey fuckers!" I hear a voice from behind, of course it's Poke. I notice his hair is up and he's wearing a bandana, that's new.
"Hey Poke." Wilbur smiles and speaks into the mic. It's barely audible though.
"Be louder, pretty boy." Poke smiles and walks over to us.
"So why are you here?" Michael looks at Poke and I rest my arm down.
"I've got gifts for you little gremlins, and a letter for Wilbur from some random ass old guy, so better read it with us around just in case it drugs you." Poke says as He sits down beside me.
Kara and Wilbur walk over to us. Poke hands Kara a purple ring, he gives me a box, He hands Wilbur the letter, and tosses Michael a Book.
As Kara thanks Poke I open up my box, inside is an eyeshadow palette, I open the palette and It's completely brand new, with it is a couple of highlighters, blush, and 5 lipsticks. "Holy shit." I mutter under my breath.
"You like it?" He asks me. All I can do is nod. These things are so fuckin expensive, I don't know where he could've got it. "We found a bunch of diamonds and gold today, so I thought I'd get you something nice." I don't know the words to say to thank him so I just hug him. He freezes for a moment then hugs back.
After a couple of seconds we let go of each other and Michael speaks. "So what's this book about?" He holds it up confused.
"A Phoenix princess or something, it's written in another language, I was gonna sell it, but then Burren suggested that I give it to you." Poke shrugs after finishing speaking. Right, Burren, Poor guy got sick after some bullshit from mr. Bitchass Joey. "You should come visit at some point, it's been a couple of months." His voice gets quieter, we all know what he's thinking, he might never get better.
"I'll come over in two days, tomorrow I'm gonna visit Ant and see if he can help me read this book." Michael smiles.
"So, what does the letter say?" I ask Wilbur who's reading his letter, hoping that will make this situation less tense.
"It's from Joey again." He sighs and crumples up the paper into a ball.
"Again?" Kara looks at him confused and concerned.
"Yeah, remember when he sent me that offer to work with him?"
"Yeah."
"Well he hasn't stopped, and now that he's the ruler of the Tropical kingdom, he thinks I'll say yes."
"What happened to Lauren?"
"She rules over the corrupted kingdom now, which means we have two enemies."