Descendants of Gibbous
Chapter 59: Lipstick

Chapter 59: Lipstick

Flappy scrunched his face in concentration. His hands were outstretched in the flame’s direction as he focused on the task at hand—putting out the fire. The flames were slowly getting engulfed by the leaves in their majestic greenness, but that was the problem—their growth was slow.

Damien looked around for something to help the dwarf put out the fire.

’Where the hell is the fire extinguisher?!’ He ran his eyes around but everywhere he looked, there were only mannequins and clothes. Although, the mannequin’s standing close to the raging fire had already moved away from it.

Loud thuds of rushed footsteps approached from behind the wooden statues, to reveal Eden and the old tailor whose eyes widened when they saw the raging colorful flames about to reach the ceiling.

"Move aside!" The old tailor cried at the top of his voice, rummaging the insides of his suit jacket before producing a beautiful purple wand that he pointed in the flame’s direction.

"Engorgia!"

A bright yellow light shot from his wand at the growing leaves, only to make them glow a healthy green and stop growing in an instant.

"Master!"

"Ah, shit, wrong spell. That one’s for making things beautiful and sparkly," he told no one in particular before yelling:

"Morphis Gigantica!"

This time he said it right because when the bright light hit the leaves again, they spontaneously shot out from the stick they were growing, engulfing the flames in the blink of an eye as if they were vines on a mad rampage.

Damien watched everything unfold before him in surprise, but all of it paled in comparison with the stalker boy who had started all of this. Who was he? Where did he come from? How long had he been stalking the boy And how did he know about Damien using the gemstone?

"What happened? How did the fire start? I heard you yelling from over there," Eden asked in a rushed voice, her eyes filled with concern when she rushed to where Damien was. She grabbed his hand the next moment, her fox eyes now but wide with what, fear?

"A thief that’s what!" Flappy scoffed loudly, now working on removing the dead tree leaves attached to the half-burnt black and purple curtain. "Yeh coward provoked ’em and the cack ran away."

"But we didn’t hear no doorbell ringing," Eden found herself tugging Damien’s uniform, glancing outside the shop’s window to see if the royal guards had taken some sort of action.

They always did once they noticed something or someone suspicious lurking close to the princess in any way. Looking at them standing upright and unfazed outside the shop made the princess puzzled since it meant that they hadn’t seen anyone suspicious enter the building —so how could a thief get in?

"What did he look like? Do you remember anything about his looks at all," Sir Foppy asked, flicking his wand and assisting Flappy. In an instant, the dead tree leaves the dwarf had yet to remove from the curtain vanished away from sight, leaving for the healthy-looking ones by the dead stick.

"I didn’t see his face," the dwarf replied before pointing at Damien. "But he might’ve."

The boy found himself freezing when three sets of eyes gawked at him, waiting for the thief’s description. He opened his mouth to speak, but to his embarrassment, no sound came out.

"Bloody coward he is. I should’ve known better than to let him touch the curtain," Flappy spat into the dead plants in his hands, glaring at Damien from the corner of his small round eyes.

"I’m not a coward you short son of a dwarf, I’m just shocked okay?"

"What did you call me?" the dwarf slowly turned to face Damien, his nose flaring.

Eden tugged at Damien’s uniform to stop him from replying but he ignored her. He’d had enough of the dwarf’s hate for a client.

"I said, I’m not a coward you short son of a dwarf," Damien repeated his sentence, matching the dwarf’s intimidating glare with his and baring his fangs just to show him he was mad too.

"One more degrading comment from you and I’ll send you flying out of this room through that glass with a kick," he added, pointing at the window where mannequins were on display by the entrance.

"I’d like to see you try—"

"You’re not going to fight with my clients in my building Flappy! Unless you want to lose your job that is," the wizard rebuked the dwarf and he immediately withdrew himself.

"Sorry, sir," he apologized, picking the dead leaves he had dropped and leaving the room in an instant.

The wizard then turned to Damien, an apologetic smile on his face. "Please forgive him, he’s a little short-tempered."

Damien almost rolled his eyes but stopped himself before he did. "That’s okay. But I’d advise you to train him well or you’ll end up losing a lot of your clients because of his foul mouth."

"Ah, I’ll take note of that," Sir Foppy beamed at him. "That said, do you still remember the thief’s face?"

Damien shook his head. "I didn’t see him. He vanished before I could open the curtain and left a fire instead."

"Ah, a distraction I see," Sir Foppy added, turning his head in the direction of the burnt curtain.

"Well, that’s a bummer, but there’s nothing we can do about it is there? It’s been a long time since we last had a thief here, what has it been, a hundred years?"

’Hundred?!’

Damien’s eyes widened at the old man as he turned to leave. He didn’t look anything like a hundred years at all—no, he looked around sixty at least.

DING!

The bell by the door rang to announce a customer’s entrance, making Damien and Eden flinch as they turned to look at it.

"We’re back," came Ahara’s voice as she walked in, pulling a large suitcase behind her. Such was the case with Kingston too, but that wasn’t what caught Damien’s attention.

It was their lips.

Eden seemed to have noticed too because she was now covering her mouth, her lips upturned into a smug smile as she looked between Kingston and Ahara.

’This day couldn’t get any more disturbing,’ Damien wondered just when Ahara decided to dash in his direction.

"Oh my goodness you two look so cute in those uniforms," she blurted out as she moved, oblivious to the curious looks the teens were giving her and Kingston.

The wolf on the other hand looked a bit too happy for someone who had spent an hour or so with the woman who was mad at him a while ago.

’You’ve got to be kidding me. All that fighting throughout the months for them to make up in a minute’s walk?’

Ahara grabbed her brother’s shoulders and pulled him to her, turning him around the next moment before tossing him to the side after commenting on the way he looked in his uniform non-stop. Then she moved on to the now giggling Eden.

Damien rolled his eyes at her and took a few steps back—towards Kingston. Once he was close enough, he nudged the werewolf’s arm and gestured for him to lower his head.

"What is it?" Kingston whispered at the boy.

Damien shut his eyes for a moment, cringing at what he was about to do, but he knew walking with them like that would be even worse; so he had to do this. Sighing, he drew his mouth closer to Kingston’s ears and mumbled:

"You have lipstick on your mouth corner."

Kingston’s body stiffened for a moment and he couldn’t bring himself to look into Damien’s eyes. However, he soon brought his thumb to the corner of his lips and ran it over there, before pulling away to look at it. Surely enough, Ahara’s red lipstick was on his thumb.

"I see you two had fun whilst shopping," Damien added, making Kingston’s face heat up as he moved his head away from Damien’s ear.

"I can explain," the man replied, standing upright just when Ahara turned to face him after Eden had whispered something into her ears.

’Tsk, that idiot.’

Ahara’s face turned red the next moment before she loudly slapped both of her cheeks, before letting out a low squeaky sound that matched a trapped mouse’s.