The Mystical Knights: The Sword of Dreams Read Free Page B

you.” The girl’s grin grew wider; something sparked in her eyes like delight.  Nia gulped nervously, noting the mischievous glint in her brilliant blue eyes. 
                  The girl held out her hand.  “Name’s Casey.  But you can call me CA.  Put ‘er there.”
                  Nia reached out and shook CA’s hand.  “My name’s Niambe—but just call me Nia.”
                  CA’s eyebrows shot up into the middle of her forehead.  “Well that's a weird name.”
                  Nia scornfully pulled her hand away as an angry flare of emotion sparked through CA’s hand and burned the inside of her palm.  This girl was really beginning to rub her the wrong way.  “What does CA stand for anyway?” Nia muttered sourly, feeding off of the dry bitter feeling that was slowly flooding her chest, and rubbed her stinging palm against her skirt.  Curious Asshole?
                  CA smirked at her and leaned back in her chair, apparently delighted by the confrontation.  "It’s actually an acronym for Cassandra Anne .  I was named for my Mom's mother.”  She laughed, although Nia didn’t think it was hardly funny.  “Did your parents want to name you Bambi and the nurses wrote down the wrong thing?  ‘Cause that happened to my brother Shannon-”
                  “It’s an African name—it was my great-grandmother’s name.”  Nia had a hard time saying that simple phrase without shouting.  She clenched her jaw tightly, urging herself not to make a fight.
                  CA seemed to be assessing her with those icy blue eyes once more, her eyebrows high above her brow.  “African, huh?"
                  “Thirty-three!” a nasally secretary wheezed out, looking around feebly over her wire-rimmed glasses.  “Number thirty-three!”
                  The rash, unfathomable anger consumed her as she stood up moodily, glaring fervently at CA  “That's me,” she said quickly.  Finding it hard to breath evenly, Nia strode up to the desk without a second glance at CA  She gave the nasally secretary her name, snatched her schedule from her hands and marched towards the door without even pausing to say goodbye to her new found ‘friend.’
                  She pushed past the other students, careful to not sense every bit of what they were feeling.  She was old enough now where she could filter the others' thoughts and emotions without being subjected to them.  And then again, as CA somehow ended up prancing along next to her, Nia sometimes wished that she could automatically block the people who effected her the worst.
                  “Aw, come on Niambe Bambi—I was just joshing you,” CA continued in a simpering tone.  Nia shot CA a deadly look, which CA seemed to calculate and shrug off too easily.  “What?”
                  “Are you always this rude?” Nia whispered out of the corner of her mouth. 
                  CA paused to think over the question.  “No,” she answered truthfully.  “Sometimes I’m worse—but seriously, you’ve got to learn to take a joke.  I’m just having some fun.  I'm letting loose before I'm stuck in ISS all day.”
                  “ISS?”
                  CA blinked.  “In School Suspension.  Jeez, girl, you have got to learn your inner school lingo.  Where’d you go to school before?  Prepington Academy?”
                  Nia was hard pressed not to knock CA into the lockers.  She didn’t particularly care about inner school lingo or if there even was such a thing.  “I went to Emerald Academy for your information.  It’s a prestigious school—one that you wouldn’t be able to get in to if you even dared to put your best foot forward.”
                  “I’d have to be dead first to go there to begin with,” CA