“We’ve looked everywhere, dad…” With a quick flick of the wrist, a bird flew away from a small girl.
…The bird had no news…At least no new news…
It was becoming more and more unsurprising, as the day’s went past…
Dipilo looked at his daughter and clicked his fingers, to make the map in front of him disappear into a puff of smoke, before it completely disappeared.
Walking up to his nine-year-old daughter, Dipilo hugged her and sighed, “Then we will just have to find another island, then!”
They had been somewhat stranded on this island for a week, looking for any type of clues upon which island, in this part of the large sea, would hold what they are looking for…
It helped that it was deserted, as they had been on a few islands that hadn’t been deserted, and they had to make haste to finish checking those islands before getting into trouble! And trouble was indeed something that they couldn’t stop from happening…As one time that they were searching and waiting upon Dipilo’s magic to be regained, they had been nearly used as sacrifices for a warlock! Not only did they have to get away from their life being sucked away from them, but they also had to remove another curse that the warlock had given them, that made them feel incredibly afraid!
Luckily…Luckily Dipilo and Sonico combined their magic and were able to break free and make their bear mount appear, to take them away!
On another island, a strange and old wizard had accidentally given them the wrong food for them to eat…Making Sonico gain a tail and Dipilo gain a lot more hair…
The wizard didn’t mean any harm by it, he had been most helpful in wanting to look after them for a few days, yet…That time when he had used his wand to get their breakfast, it seemed he had not focused properly…
Again, luckily, the wizard helped get rid of Sonico’s tail and Dipilo’s extra hair!
Then, on this island, they had seen a wooden thing that was just off the beach and stuck on some of the rocks in the water…But they didn’t know what it was…
After investigating it, they concluded that whatever it was, it had been there for a while, because it looked old and unusable, with moss and water throughout it.
“Have your powers come back yet?” His daughter, Sonico, asked.
Standing up straight, Dipilo replied, “Yeah, I will have enough magic to summon ‘Zebo’ tomorrow.”
Sonico finally smiled, not only because they could now state this island as not being the one that they are looking for, but because she liked the magical, flying lion, ‘Zebo’.
Her father had sacrificed quite a lot for Zebo, in the way of spirit stones and his own blood, but it has helped them get here in among the small islands quickly and helped them search. Sadly though, Zebo took a lot of magic to conjure up, making her father have to wait a whole week before being able to summon him once again.
If they had done what many others do and use magic carpets, they might have been better off, but we were well looked upon and my father honestly had looked into this flying lion for a long time. It was just one of the many projects that my father wants to do…
“Ah, my dear, let’s be merry on our last night here!”
With her father stating this, Sonico agreed and they summoned a fire and cooked their dinner in absolutely no rush at all…But…There was something missing…
Both Sonico and Dipilo felt at a miss and did not laugh as much, nor did they stay up too late. As much as they wanted to celebrate being able to move on and possibly get closer to what they were looking for, they felt saddened that they had not found what they were searching for yet!
Will they…Before they had to return back to school? As it was, they could only search one or two more islands, before they had leave to go back to the mainland…
Sonico wondered if things could be different, if she had not stayed back to go to magic school.
She was on holidays now and spending most of that time with her father. Her father had also been busy, unable to come here earlier, as he was one of the top sorcerer teachers at the school. Except, she was not in his class yet. She still had to become stronger to attend her father’s much more advanced class!
My mum was the best though, she thought, mum was the strongest!
It wasn’t just because her mother had been born from two, very powerful sorcerer’s, it was also because her mother had cultivated her magic to a point that she was one of the most powerful sorcerer's in the world! She had the strangest personality though, but people still seemed to accept her, especially her and her father.
Actually, Sonico loved her family very much, even though there was only the three of them. She felt very special and did not want to trade it in for anything!
Having to grow up faster, because her parents were quite famous, Sonico couldn’t help but take advantage of being the only one with them, when they were home.
Her father mostly taught her things to do with school and hugged her before bed…Her mum was the one that would play with her and be silly and do silly things. Having such a great, best friend like her mum, they would play tricks on her father, laughing hysterically upon scaring him or teasing him.
Once they had used their combined magic to summon a dragon…Making the dragon sit there like a pet of father’s…And since dragon’s hardly flew down to where we were here on the surface of the planet, father was frightened to it!
Really though, dad, she thought even to this day, It couldn’t hurt you! Didn’t you see that it was lulled into sleep!? Silly Dad!
Another time, Sonico and her mother had produced his dinner to look exactly like theirs, yet it had been hard as rock…Making Dipilo nearly loose a tooth and make the strangest face! His face, towards his silly family, was astronomically funny…Especially when he saw that the two of them were eating just fine and holding in their laughter!
They got up to so much mischief!
Just that…Obviously, her mother wasn’t here at the moment and she was just with her father.
Her father wasn’t as fun as her mother…He was more practical and enduring.
Sonico smiled and got lost in her thoughts…He was the rock though, he keeps our family safe and happy! He is the one that made sure I kept up with my magic training and made me do my chores! But…He was also the one that I could confide in about any troubles at school, especially if I was getting bullied and didn’t know how to react to it. He really was not just our families rock, but my rock as well!
…Sonico finally fell asleep, inside their small home, that they had made on the island.
***
Upon waking in the morning, Sonico let her father sleep more and she stretched and walked out of their shield, that had been their walls for their humble home.
Feeling the heat and bright light suddenly, Sonico shielded her eyes and waited, making her want to go back to bed!
“Oiiii!”
This strange noise startled Sonico and she tried to open her eyes to the light, having to wait for a moment before finally seeing something out into sea…
What was that!
Something was…Drifting in the water and had some cloth looking gear on it…
Raising her eyebrows, as the curiosity that she got from her mother overcame her, she heard the yell again, “Oiiii!”
Over the next few minutes, Sonico stood there at the beach of the island and watched as this floating, wooden thing, slowly came closer and closer.
To Sonico, this…Thing looked vaguely familiar…
“Looks like a visitor is coming…It’s good that we are leaving.”
Sonico turned to her father and saw him looking out to sea, thinking that perhaps he was right…
As they both turned around and stored away their makeshift home, they then looked out towards the wooden floating thing again, that was now even closer than before…
“Oiiii!”
Laughter could be heard from the person yelling out and both daughter and father were stunned, just standing there upon the beach.
Could they believe it?
Was the person…On that strange contraption…
“Madellion?” Dipilo asked, even though the person on the boat couldn’t hear him.
Sonico thought the same thing, and said, “Mum?”
Could it really be true?
“Haha! My family is here, fancy that!” A yell came to the two stunned people at the beach.
As soon as Dipilo got over his surprise, he smiled and summoned a bridge over the water and started to cross it towards the wooden floating thing, Sonico following close behind.
“Mum! Mum!” Sonico yelled, running.
“My child, husband…I have…Returned!”
Taken into big hugs from her family, Madellion laughed again, even though she saw that the ‘boat’ seemed to hit something, because of the bridge that her husband made.
“We were looking for you, Mum!” Sonico cried, hugging her mum tighter.
“Aye, look, I was floating on water! Did you see that!? How great is this thing!?”
Silence overcame the three of them, upon all of them seeing water start to come onto the wooden contraption…Was…It going to sink into the water?
Both Sonico and Dipilo finally remembered the other wooden thing that they had seen earlier and were sure that this thing might end up exactly the same way!
Seeing that they still had time to disembark this contraption, Dipilo turned back to his wife and sighed in relief. He didn’t know how worried he was about her until now!
“Madellion, were you really on your way back?” Dipilo asked. He was helpless against this woman…Even now, from when he first met her, he was completely helpless!
“Yes, ah, I wanted to see my baby! Oh, look…”
Appearing upon her hand, was another strange devise and Sonico waited for her mother to say something, yet…Just like always, her mother waited for both her husband and daughter to become impatient and want to know what it was, before she continued, “They call it…A compass! Watch this!”
With a smooth motion of her hand, the strange pointing thing in the middle turned, going along with her finger. “Isn’t it great! I can change North whenever I want to!” Of course, Madellion knew there was a trick involved but she didn’t want to share it! It’d be so much better seeing their faces like this!
And just as Madellion was thinking this, she saw the curious looks upon her families faces…
“…Madellion, I think in that case, it would be broken…” Dipilo added, taking the compass from his wife…To see that the middle pointer…Thing…Stopped moving after pointing the North that he knew. He used his finger, just like his wife, but it didn’t move!
Putting it into his pocket, Dipilo decided to experiment on it later…
“Oh, then this…This, I got for my baby. Here…” Passing a box to Sonico, Madellion smiled.
Sonico looked upon it with interest and then looked up at her mother, “What is it?”
Madellion smiled and turned a piece, hanging out of the back of it a few times, then opened the box…To show a little made person go around in circles, “I swear, that isn’t magic! It’s working all by itself! Isn’t it great!?”
Sonico smiled and looked at the box, thinking that it was indeed special! “Thanks mum, it is good!”
“They call it a jewellery box! So, now you don’t have to make your jewellery disappear into your universal bag, instead, store it in there!” Madellion thought it was great! Even though it would be much easier to steal jewellery, it was nice!
“Did you become more powerful then? Isn’t that…Why you left?” Dipilo looked at his wife solemnly.
“Well, I couldn’t work out that thing, the jewellery box. So, I still need to become more powerful! But I learnt this…” Madellion took out a large piece of hard fabric…Or was it paper? She then did something with it, that looked like a cone, and put it directly into her husbands face and yelled, “Oiiii!”
Dipilo put a hand to his ears and felt like they were still ringing from the yell minutes later! He had not expected that it would be so loud like that!
Madellion laughed and waved her hand, making the extra wind disappear…She had used her voice, and the wind, to yell out, having made it hard not to hear probably on the whole island!
Indeed, Dipilo wondered if he had heard this noise before, even from another island!
Taking the device away from her, he threw it down upon the wooden floating device and took her into his arms, “You…We are going home!”
You couldn’t blame Dipilo thinking this way, if they stayed too much longer upon this thing, they might sink with it!
Madellion laughed and took hold of her daughter, and nodded, “Alright, I missed you both very much!”
Without much ado, a flying lion was then summoned, and they all got on and flew away, towards their home.
No longer did Dipilo stress about his wife, since she was now with him once again. No longer did both he and Sonico feel like there was something missing. No longer were they aimlessly looking for their special treasure, that they didn’t want to live without.
Having found what they were looking for, there was no other reason to stay…It was time to return back home, where they can continue their lives with their precious people by their side!
