Zeph Malston: The Aether Mage

The rain finally stopped. It was the last weekend of summer, and it seemed like nature decided everyone should have some fun outside. A few clouds were in the sky, but they were white and fluffy. There was no rain expected for the next two weeks. Zeph decided it was the perfect time to try out his new pool. It was late in the morning, when he decided it was time to swim. He spent most of the morning sleeping in, and it was glorious. Bianca's training became even more tiring after she added illusion magic to the regiment.

With a pair of blue swim trunks on and a reluctant kitten on his shoulders, Zeph ran out the back door to the pool. He noticed that he wasn't the first one to have this idea, because everyone else was out in the backyard too. Even Bernard decided to take a day off from the lab to enjoy the sun. The back patio had a special area for cooking, with a stone oven and grill. His grandpa was using it to grill some chicken.

"Good morning son, I see you've finally decided to wake up." Bernard waved at Zeph with a spatula.

"Yup, and I see that great minds think alike." Zeph looked at the pool area and saw Alex and Keva relaxing at the shallow end. Ronan and Lili were swimming l.a.p.s. Eli was walking around the area growing plants. Bianca and Semara were sunbathing on a couple of lounge chairs. His eyes paused for a second when they passed over the shifter girls. He was used to seeing them in shorts and tank tops, and was well aware of how beautiful they were. However, this was the first time he saw them in a bikini, and he had trouble tearing his eyes away from the sight.

Bernard saw his grandson pause for a few moments when he saw the girls. It made him chuckle. "I see you weren't kidding when you said that you liked older women." He smirked.

Zeph sighed, 'Leave it to two pretty girls in a bikini to kick start puberty'. He decided not to shy away. "Yes, but can you blame me? They're gorgeous." There was a slight hint of red on his cheeks.

"Well, I know you like the pool." Bernard winked. "But what do you think about the rest of the mansion?"

"I like it a whole lot. The see through walls took some getting used to, but it's pretty cool when the outside facing wall is just a big window. My bedroom was a nice surprise. I love the bigger space and my new private closet/bathroom is pretty awesome. It's like I have my own mini apartment. We've only been here a few days, but it's starting to feel like home."

"Good, I'm glad you like it. Well, I got to get back to grilling. I'll let you enjoy the pool." Bernard sent Zeph a knowing look, "and the view."

Zeph shook his head as he walked towards the pool, unaware that the shifter girls heard his conversation with Bernard. If he paid attention to their ears, instead of… other places, he would have noticed them twitch when he said gorgeous. Right now, Semara was thinking of a way to get back at Bianca and Zeph. She managed to prank them once when she spiked their sports drinks with hot sauce, but she still owed him and the fox girl one for teasing her. Several ideas popped into her head, but she decided to save the pranks for later. Bianca and Zeph always managed to turn the situation around on her, and she didn't want to risk any plans going awry while she was in her blue two-piece bikini.

Bianca was watching Semara scheming. The wolf woman's nose always scrunched up slightly when she was planning something. Seeing a helpless expression on her friends face, Bianca realized that Semmy gave up on pranking someone today. That was good, since the fox-kin wanted to spend the day relaxing as well. She watched Zeph going to the pool, and noticed he would glance over every once and a while. It was a little confidence booster, because he never showed any interest when they were sparring. Semara thought the boy was a little too composed as well. His nonchalant attitude towards them made them doubt their own s.e.x appeal. Now that they knew he wasn't immune to their charms, he might just be easier to tease.

Zeph was mad at himself. He couldn't keep his eyes from wandering and he was getting self-conscious about it. Bianca saw him the last time he peeked over and winked at him. That made him blush, and she laughed pretty loudly about it. Her laughter struck a nerve. If they knew he was looking and laughed about it, then he had nothing to worry about. In fact, he came up with a plan to mess with them. Lifting Rin off his shoulder, Zeph walked over to the two women.

"Hello apprentice," Bianca said in a mischievous voice. Semara waved and greeted him as well.

"Hi Coach, hi Semmy." He started calling Semara by her nickname ever since the spicy drink incident. She was annoyed at first but came to accept it.

"Need anything?" Semara was being cautious. She knew the kid was up to something.

"Yeah, I was wondering if I could stare at you two for a while." There was no hint of embarrassment in his voice, but his cheeks got a little red.

Bianca's ears twitched. "Oh, and why would you want to stare at us." She was pretty surprised at his straightforward request.

"Well, I don't know what happened. When I saw the two of you today, I thought you were both more beautiful than usual. Now I'm having a hard time looking away. I figured that if I stared at you for a while, I would get used to it." Zeph shrugged.

Semara was a little stunned at the boy's forwardness. "You do know it's rude to stare at a woman right?"

Zeph smiled. "Of course, that's why I'm asking. I'm not sure why I feel like doing it. Do either of you know why?" He had an innocent look on his face. Rin was in his arms tilting her ears, adding extra adorableness to the scene.

Semara and Bianca didn't know what to say. Were they just supposed to explain puberty to this kid? The atmosphere became awkward. Bianca thought of an excuse. "You should ask your grandfather, he should know the reason."

Without missing a beat, Zeph said, "but he's busy cooking. When you winked at me earlier, I thought it meant you knew what was going on."

"You winked at him? Why did you wink at him?" Semara looked curiously at her fox friend.

"I only winked at you because I caught you sneaking peeks at us. It was supposed to embarrass you and make you feel guilty." Bianca got a little fl.u.s.tered.

"I did feel embarrassed, but I didn't feel guilty." Zeph tilted his head. "Why should I feel guilty?"

"For thinking dirty thoughts about us of course." Bianca was trying to think of a way out of this situation. Maybe she could embarrass the boy so much, he'd leave.

"Dirty thoughts? I don't understand. I was just looking at you and wondering why you were so pretty. Is that dirty?" Zeph kept up the innocent act.

Semara saw her friend's distress. She had two choices, help Bianca out or…"You didn't do anything wrong Zeph. Bianca was the one having dirty thoughts. Seriously BiBi, he's only twelve. You even winked at him, and you were the one teasing me for being interested in little boys. Maybe you're projecting your own thoughts onto others." Semara chided her friend.

Zeph tried not to laugh. Bianca sat up quickly and tried to defend herself. "I did not have dirty thoughts, especially about Zeph. You're just trying to use this awkward conversation to mess with me. Don't listen to her Zeph. If anything, she's the perverted one. You should have seen her face when she heard you call us gorgeous. Her nose scrunched up like she was scheming something."

That rebuttal was the beginning of a small argument between the two girls over who was the real pervert. Zeph was amazed his plan worked so well. He just wanted to cause an awkward situation and then laugh at them, but this was so much better. The situation was escalating pretty quickly.

Bianca started to talk very loudly. "What about that time you walked around the mall without any u.n.d.e.r.w.e.a.r?"

Semara yelled back angrily, "That's because you stole them from me while we were trying on clothes in a dressing room. You perverted panty thief!"

After that last comment, Zeph couldn't hold back anymore and started laughing. The girls' argument stopped abruptly at the sound of laughter. It wasn't only Zeph. Bernard, Alex, Keva, Ronan, Lili, and Eli were laughing too. They all heard the two yelling some pretty embarrassing things about each other.

Blood rushed to their cheeks as the embarrassment and shame overcame them. Unfortunately for Zeph, it was quickly replaced by anger. Both the shifter girls looked at him menacingly. "Zeph!" they yelled in unison.

As they were getting out of the chairs, Zeph tossed a kitten at them. "Rin, I choose you!" The little kitten shot a blast of air at the two girls, pushing them back down. He ran away with the blinding speed of true cowardice.

Zeph ran to Eli with the two girls hot on his heels. "Help me, Eli! S.e.xy shifter girls want to do bad things to my body!"

Everyone's brain froze for half a second. Why did he have to say it like that? It was technically correct, but it felt wrong. It further emphasized the fact that his innocent act was all bullshit.

Eli stepped between the two parties. "Don't worry little dude, I got your back." He held his hand out to stop the angry women. "It's not Zeph's fault you two said all that crazy stuff. If you should be mad at anyone, it should be yourselves."

The backyard grew silent. Eli was right. They did bring most of it on themselves. Semara and Bianca looked at each other and nodded. The sound of two screams rang out as Zeph and Eli were thrown at the pool from several yards away.

Everyone watched as they made an impressive arc in the air and splashed right in the center of the deep end. Lili was holding onto the wall nearby. After half a minute, Zeph came up from out of the water and saw her waving at him. "Hi, Zeph! Wanna race?"

Zeph wiped the water off of his face. "I don't think so, Lili. I'm not in the mood at the moment."

"That's okay, I can just time you and see if I can beat it."

"That won't work Lili, I think I'm just gonna relax for a moment." He leaned back and started to float.

"It's fine Zeph, I'm pretty sure you'll swim as fast as you can." Lili shrugged.

"Why is that?"

Lili pointed behind Zeph. The boy turned to see two women behind him cracking their knuckles.

Eli stayed at the bottom of the pool and watched as Zeph swam away from the two shifters. They dove into the pool after him. A few bubbles floated to the surface, as he laughed. He joined in the chase and came up behind Semara. He jumped out of the water underneath her, lifting the surprised girl up into the air. Then he dunked her right back into the pool. Zeph saw his chance when Bianca was distracted by the scene. He dove underwater and did the same thing to the fox girl. The chase turned into a dunking contest with no clear rules, and the only goal was to drop someone into the pool. Ronan and Lili joined and caused even more chaos.

Alex and Keva watched from the shallow end while they floated together holding hands like a couple of otters. They chuckled and both said, "Kids."

Rin saw everyone having fun, so she walked over to the pool. She reached out her paws and slowly tapped the water a few times. The kitten heard them laughing and wanted to join. Squinting her eyes, Rin concentrated magic into her paws. Her paw was covered in a layer of wind magic, and she placed in on the surface of the pool. When it didn't sink, she tried another paw. Two paws were on the surface of the water and they weren't getting wet. That gave Rin the confidence she needed. Zeph was about to try and dunk Lili when he heard a loud meow behind him. He turned to see Rin standing on water with an excited look. ~Play!~

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