Tallyho Abell's Story

Tallyho was a bit put off by being pulled out of the crowd by the younger teen. Who did he think he was? She had a job to get done and she wasn’t going to let him stop her.
“This is how the market is around here, you have to move with the crowd,” she hummed. Sure, the area wasn’t as spacious as it was in the main square with the bank and the bakery, but things on the bazaar were a lot cheaper. She turned away from the boy and made her way to her first booth. She only hoped that he followed. The blonde only waited at each booth long enough for the Jackson kid to buy something before she moved on to the next one.
To the earthlings, Tallyho’s purchases were essence minimalist. She bought a rucksack sewn from a discarded flour sack and in it she stuffed a simple blue dress she bought from a nearby booth. The earthlings might have been wondering why she didn’t think to buy pants. But it was simply because women just didn’t do that on Aires.
At least, not in the area where they were.
Eventually, Tallyho requested a generous pound of odd green leaves from a vendor. When they were being stuffed into the sack the older man was careful not to drop a single one—an indication of their importance. As he weighed it Tallyho glanced over at Jackson.
“Tooth leaves. You chew them, and they keep your teeth clean. In case you didn’t know. You have them in your world, right.”
She paid the vendor, but before they left, he asked if the boy was going to buy some too.
“If you want clean teeth. I suggest you do it.”

It had only been an hour before Tallyho had completed her shopping. Although she wasn’t quite as equipped as the others might have been by that time. Having a decent amount of money left, she decided to move towards the bakery near the inn.
After her exchange with the shop keeper, she pressed a few coins into her hand and was presented a steaming bundle wrapped in paper. She carefully placed it into her rucksack and gazed out the window. It was almost dark, though she was only out for an hour.
“I suppose it’s almost six.” She adjusted her bag as she breezed towards the door. “There are thieves that come out at night. Let’s go.”

Haru claimed a bed that was set apart from the others. He wasn’t exactly thrilled to be in charge of the teens. Especially since he had to be the one to introduce them to trusting their situation and each other. He groaned out loud. He wasn’t naïve; of course they didn’t believe them. But aside from dragging them along the only thing he could do to prove his point was to put them in another dire situation, and judging by their condition, that wasn’t going to happen any time soon.
He sunk down onto the foot of his bed attempting to analyze the situation. Although he did his research on each of the kids prior to bringing them to Aires, he still had to wrap his mind around what he was dealing with. First he had his own charge Tallyho, who he could already tell was going to be pretty defensive around the kids from earth. Two of the kids were a being a bit too optimistic about the situation. He liked their fighting spirit, but he was a bit concerned that they were confused about the reality of what they were about to go through. Then there was the younger boy who was attempting to escape earlier. He was going to be a problem for the others, he could tell. His thoughts were interrupted by the whining hinges of the door.
“Welcome back,” he huffed.
Tallyho walked in with dainty lily-feet. Her movements were eerily silent and she didn’t answer the cat guardian until she set her newly purchased items neatly on the floor beside her bed. “Haru… That is your name, right? Where exactly are we going? If we are saving the world then why do we sleep?”
The blonde then seated herself on her pillow. Her dress, which, when she stood, flowed away from her figure with grace, was bundled up into gatherings of cloth when she sat, which betrayed her figure. She lit the oil lamp on the end table before looking back to Haru for an answer.
“Well, Early in the morning tomorrow, I want to go up to the mountains to have you all trained,” he said,
“Trained?”
“Yes.”
“Why whom?”
“Another one of the guardians has an academy up there. It’s not extremely large, but he knows what to do with you.”
“What will we be learning?”
“I’ll talk about that when the others get up here.”


By the time the others came back, Tallyho was already chewing on one of her ‘tooth leaves’. She grinded it until nothing but and bundle wiry strings was left.
Haru allowed them to get settled and relieve their hands of their burdens before speaking.
“I feel like I could initiate this since it doesn’t seem like all of you are going to do it yourselves,” the man said before clearing his throat. “My name is Haru. I am from a continent on Aires called Hales. For you earthlings, I suppose that Hales is best compared to your Russia and Ukraine. I am a guardian, and because of my immortality I am hundreds of years old despite my looks. Now I want you all to introduce yourselves, so that everybody knows everybody.” He then looked over at Tallyho who averted her eyes. “I pass,” she hummed.
“Okay, then I’ll just come back to you,” he mumbled as he looked out to the others, waiting for someone to say something.

After a few of the others went, the red head glanced over at Tallyho who let out a long sigh.
“My name is Tallyho. I’m from somewhere.”
Haru wasn’t totally pleased with her abstract introduction but there was no point in pushing at that point. With that, he moved on to business, “Well, obviously this isn’t working as well as I originally planned. Anyway, I would like for you all to get a good rest tonight. We will be leaving for training early in the morning and heading up to the mountains. There is another guardian there named Ryou who will be assisting you with that. You need to be physically capable if you even expect to make it here. It’s not all about your powers. Nonetheless we will talk about it when we get there.” And with that Haru stoped talking and made his way to his own bed.
Tallyho turned away hesitantly and slid under the blanket. Even if the others did break off into conversation, she wasn’t intending on joining in on it. She then stared idly at the ceiling, as she found that it was probably going to be difficult getting to bed. All she could do was wait for the morning hour.

The next morning was ushered in by Haru sweeping through the room, waking the teens up in with awkward nudges of the shoulders.
Tallyho finally opened her eyes which were still weak from sleep. Her locks were fanned out about the pillow, with random strands jolting up from her head in the most rebellious fashion they could muster.
“Hurry up and get your stuff together, and come down to the lobby,” Haru said before the hinges on the doors whined and the sound of Haru hustling down the stairs beat thuds through the room.
Tallyho slid out of the bed and caught her balance on weak legs before she stretched a bit.

Jackson stuck close to the girl throughout the shopping trip. He was listening to her despite his own feelings about anything, and he followed the crowd between booths. Ugh! How he hated crowds! By the time they finally gathered everything, he was well beyond his tolerance for people and severely missing his books. Why did he drop them at the park? Books were not able to be found in that market either. Probably reserved for royalty, according to his world civilization classes. That made this already unpleasant experience even worse.

He followed the girl back to their hotel, ready to snap. To avoid causing her trouble, he dropped his packages just inside the door to the barracks room and went back downstairs to relax by the fire, with a snack of his own, a warm mince pie. It wasn't made the same way his mother made it, but it was just as good. It was even better in that he usually had mince pie only on holidays. He was dragged to this place against his will, with a whole bunch of strangers, and then forced to sleep in the same room with those same strangers AND the guy who dragged them here. Hmmf! He deserved a little indulgence after that. With those thoughts, he tore into and devoured the pie.

Eventually the warm fire and good food reduced his agitation to a mere simmering and he felt sleepy. Reluctantly he headed back upstairs to sort through his stuff and repack it into the rucksack he bought. Hmm...People were introducing themselves. He looked around and said curtly, "Jackson. Fifteen." That was all they were going to get from him tonight. He removed one of those tooth leaves from the small pack he bought and chewed the weird spindly plant while he sorted his stuff and once satisfied he went to bed in a plain white t-shirt and jeans.

The boy growled at someone poking his shoulder early the next morning, and still half-asleep threw his pillow at whoever it was.

By the time everyone was down, Haru did a quick inspection of what they were carrying. “I sincerely hope that none of you bought more than what you’re able to keep up with.” It wasn’t like he gave them massive amounts of money but it they were bringing clunky things they might have to let them go.
They left the little merchant town while it was still dark. Tallyho wasn’t aware of her surroundings. Her vision clouded and blurred the navy sky with the horizon line and purple mountains. Haru didn’t bother to initiate conversation. It seemed that he was just as tired as the next guy, or perhaps even more so. She gripped the shoulder straps of her rucksack tightly.
Eventually they moved through toward the farmlands. They were getting closer to the base of the mountain. But there was some sort of cart waiting for them at the entrance.
Once they grew close enough, they were greeted with the vision of a very old man and a young girl mounted on the front bench of an ox cart. The old man driving the cart was quite the caricature. His skin was a beige-yellow with a gathering of liver spots on his neck and cheek bones. His eyes were squinted with the slouch of his upper lids hanging over his eyelashes. His nose was birdish— flat, and wide all at once with very large pores. A skinny old man, whose senile disposition made him seem extremely detached from his surroundings.
Then there was the little girl who sat next to them. She was small and spritely with a wry smile marked clearly on her face with a thin line of peach lips. Her beige skin wasn’t nearly as marked as her old companion’s and her eyes were dark with long lashes, but the oddest thing about her was that her hair was pink. Tallyho narrowed her eyes trying to make out if the child’s hair was natural. Hair dye didn’t necessarily exist on Aires so that option never really crossed her mind.
“You the month warriors?” she asked as she shifted her weight to lean back on her hands.
“And who is asking?” Haru questioned.
“I’m Karma. Ryou sent us down here to give you a lift. Looking at this group, they won’t be able to make a quarter of this mountain.”
“Oh, I see you’re one of his students,” Haru hummed.
“You can say that. Oh! This is Mr. Vo, the grounds keeper.”
The old man tipped his straw hat to the group, though he didn’t speak.
“Well don’t just stand there looking stupid, get in the cart,” Karma chanted to the teens. She pointed to the back where there was a reasonably sized cargo space and a floor lined with hay. Haru nodded to the others.
Tallyho made her way into the back first. She made a point of packing herself into the corner so that she could rest her head on the walls of the cart if she fell asleep.

Dorian sat up groggily, rubbing his eyes tiredly after being woken up. He hadn't slept well that night, which wasn't extremely surprising. Dorian slid out of bed, slipping on his new shoes and bundling up in his coat. There wasn't much to pack with most of his few things already in the bag he'd purchased the day before.
The walk towards their destination at least woke him up some, and he was grateful for the quiet because, as a rule, Dorian was not a morning person.
The ox cart and its two occupants did come to a surprise, but not entirely unwelcome if only because Dorian has expected they were going to have to climb the mountains themselves earlier.
The old man- Mr. Vo- seemed normal enough, but the little pink-haired girl- how did she have pink hair? Regardless, she was certainly a character and not necessarily one he wanted to deal with this early in the morning. So, he too climbed into the cart, towards the back near Tallyho if only because he didn't want to be completely surrounded by people.

Karma rolled her eyes at the boy who kept yelling about her hair and generally just ignored him. When they got there Tallyho noted that the academy wasn’t nearly as large as the ones built to train armies but it did look official. They followed a straight path of cobblestone to an expansive courtyard. Students socialized as if the cart of distraught teens never existed. The academy looked almost like a university with a few quirks. The students went on about their business with interactions ranging from gossiping and walking to class to comparing daggers and showcasing battle scars. In the center of the courtyard was a fountain where a group of exceptionally pretty girls sat and giggled with one another as the cart passed, eyeing the assortment of new males.
The building seemed to be built around the courtyard, forming a bracket around the center and allowing the front of the academy to be guarded by a gate rather than a set of walls. Off to the side of the east wing was an ominous trail leading into the forest, and there seemed to be more males near the east building and more girls near the west. The cart looped around the fountain and halted in front of the main building.
“Well, we are here. Ryou should be out soon so that he can show you where you will be staying and what not.” Once everyone was unloaded. Mr. Vo gave another tip of the hat, and sent his cart off.
Tallyho took a look around what was more than likely going to be her home for a few months. She glanced at the others to see what they thought, but looked away for fear that they might see her gawking.

Haru took a few steps back after being tackled. His hand, by instinct pressed onto Ryou’s shoulder so that he could keep his balance. Once he got himself together, he smiled slightly. “Hey man.”
Once she caught a glimpse of Ryou outside, Karma threw herself at the older man. She pounced dramatically, trusting that he would catch her.
“See! There was no reason for you to be worried. Your daughter had it covered. Got em here nice and safe!” the pink haired girl cooed.
Haru raised an eyebrow. Daughter…? “Ryou you never told me you had a woman.” He attached slight laughter to his statement. It was obvious that the topic caught his interest. He looked Karma over she had to have been about six or seven. “When was this? Is she here?”
Tallyho stared skeptically. That was their teacher? The blonde dusted her dress off and crossed her arms.

“Oh! Well where is she?” Haru questioned as he scanned the courtyard. “It wouldn’t hurt to meet her.”
As the two guardians jabbered on, Tallyho went digging through her back in search of the bread she bought the day before. She bought about three loaves and took out one before she casually bit into it.
“Banya…” she huffed quietly. When were they going to show them to their rooms?

"Hell if I know," Ryou said with a shrug. "I've never met her myself. Or Karma's father." So he had been teasing Haru after all, which, Dorian realized, was probably more telling about his personality than any getting-to-know-you activity could ever show them. "I'll tell you about it later." Ryou winked at Haru before turned towards the group again, not put off at all by the general grumbling and interruptions.
"To start off, yes, we have a library," Ryou said, his smile, even at the face of Jackson's personality, a testament to his patience. "And, before Karma and I give you all the grand tour, I have one question for all of you. Have any of you ever fought before? Doesn't have to be professionally, it could be anything."

Tallyho listened half-heartedly. When she was asked if she knew how to fight, she only shook her head. She didn’t necessarily feel like talking with a full mouth.
Karma laughed, “I figure that most of them can’t! Look at them, they are all twiggies! Are you sure this is worth your time?” Karma chirped.
Tallyho furrowed her brows but she didn’t say anything. Although she anticipated the Jackson boy would.

Tallyho didn’t hesitate to move to a room immediately. She entered the hall which seemed to be empty because there wasn’t the slightest stir Perhaps it was because the others were in class. The blonde ventured down to the end of the hall and turned into a room where the rice paper door was wide open just as Ryou said it would have been. She wasn’t very surprised that the room was so simple. It was basically a rectangular room the size of a casket. However she didn’t complain, she merely set her rucksack down in the corner.
Haru approached Ryou once the teens broke off to get into their rooms. “Well you really had me fooled,” he said as he sent a glance towards Karma who ran off to go follow a group of older students. “So ah… What exactly do you have planned for these kids?” The red head hummed. He wasn’t sure where to begin when it came to talking about their personal lives, but business was a good start, for him at least.

Tallyho decidedly left her bag in the room and quietly made her way outside after Ryou came through yelled. She approached Ryou and took a spot standing next to the boy who sat next to her on the ride up. Dorian was his name? She didn’t bother to make conversation, or eye contact, however. She looked over at Ryou questionably, concerned about what was going to happen first.

Thankful for something else to do besides watching dust particles float around the room, Nia eagerly jumped at Ryou's announcement.
Navigating through the halls, she soon found herself standing outside with the others. Taking a spot towards the edge of the group she sized up the other two who were already there, the tall dark haired boy and the blonde.
Neither said a word, each waiting for Ryou to tell them what was going on.

Autumn placed her cards back in her bag before walking outside. She decided to stand next to Dorian and the other blonde. Just what as going to happen? Autumn fidgeted as she looked at Ryou. The man seemed kind enough, but this was supposed to be some sort of training academy. And if she was going to be a warrior, she would have to fight. The very thought made her a bit uneasy.

Tallyho remained aware as they marched through the brush. Karma was trotting at Ryou’s side while Haru brought up the rear. He didn’t want anyone getting lost after all. When they arrived at their stopping point, Tallyho’s eyes narrowed. She wasn’t particularly excited about the sight of the waterfall. She couldn’t even get a clear view of the bottom.
And then within a blink of an eye’s time that Ryou jumped. Tallyho took a step back, she couldn’t control the shaking ‘no’ motion of her head. She wanted to protest out loud but her lungs wouldn’t allow her to. The blonde eventually backed up until she was pressed against a tree in the background. Perhaps she could have even ran? It didn’t seem like anyone would have noticed.
“Yes, that’s right,” she rasped to herself as she turned to escape. But Haru took a firm grasp of her shoulder.
“I would at least try if I were you,” He hummed. But Tallyho desperately rejected, pushing his hand away with weak flicks of her hand.

Dorian was reasonably sure that Ryou wasn't trying to get them killed. There were a lot of easier ways he could do it, after all. But it was hard to convince his body that since he was also so far from the water below. Also, it was hard to concentrate between Autumn and Tallyho royally freaking out.
He tightened his hands into fists, took a quiet breath, then slowly relaxed his hands.
"I'm jumping," He said plainly and stepped a little bit closer to the edge of the waterfall.

Tallyho wasn’t going to. She absolutely refused to.
“I can’t swim,” she shuddered. She and water just wasn’t going to work. With a sudden burst of energy and ripped away from Haru and plowed towards the forest, although she didn’t get a step far because Haru stopped her immediately.
“Do really want to eat nothing?” The cat guardian questioned. “When Ryou says you won’t eat for a day, he really means for a week.”

Tallyho couldn't swim? Shouldn't that be taken into consideration- He stopped thinking for a moment when there was a presence next to him. Dorian was more than mildly surprised when Autumn grabbed his arm. The general concern from an almost perfect stranger was a little strange, if not a bit touching...? Or was it creepy? Regardless. This was probably going to be the easiest thing asked of them for a long time, and if he couldn't even do this...
"I don't like the idea of jumping off of a waterfall either," He said plainly, "But if this is what it takes to get through this, I intend to do it." He intended to survive this adventure, thanks.
"If you're too scared to do it alone, I'll hold your hand or something. I'm going to do it regardless." It didn't sound like a kind offer, just from the way he spoke and the sharp stare he leveled on Autumn. But that was probably what it was.