#rosolio

“I’m here! I’m here!” Poe said out of breath as he ran up to the desk. The lady looked very unimpressed with his disshoveled state. The late duck quickly tied up his red ascot. It was still crooked in his gray shirt collar. 

“And do you both have the challenge you were sent?” questioned the old goat lady behind the desk.

“Yes!” Poe was quick to pull out the paper and hand it over. Magica pulled out her folded ‘invite’ of sorts. She gave Poe a skeptical look as he turned in his. She did the same while giving her brother a suspicious glance. 

“Ah, interesting. These don’t list who challenged you,” the desk lady muttered. She put on her glasses and looked over them both closely, “I wouldn’t think someone would forge challenges but I’m just going to give these another looksee. . .”

“Actually in the rules it says the challenging party does not have to identify themselves. It is a rare occurrence but allowed,” Poe stated, not noticing he had annoyed the desk lady.

“Well, since you know all the rules then you must know no wands imbued with pre-casted spells, no magical artifacts, no potions and no already made foof bombs. You are allowed to carry on your person any ingredients you need for casting while in battle,” the goat lady explained.

“Excellent, perfect! We are ready! Are the others already here? Can we already start this?” Poe seemed excited by the prospect to fight some unknown challenger in a magic battle. This gained an even more suspicious look from Magica. 

“We will call you up once the space is ready,” the woman replied before waving them off back to the waiting area seating. Magica grabbed Poe’s arm to pull him away. Once they were as far back as they could be away from the check in desk did Magica speak to Poe. She spoke in a whisper in a scolding tone.

“I thought the plan was for you to admit you can’t use magic so it would void the challenge!” Magica complained as softly as she could. 

“I didn’t spend five and a half years at Eldritch academy with no one figuring it out that I couldn't use direct magic just to let me be outed by common bureaucracy,” Poe whispered back before giving a slight glance around the waiting room over Magica’s shoulder. He was curious about who had challenged them in the first place. 

“Bureaucracy that's going to have you fight some foe we don’t even know who so we can’t prepare anything! And you can’t use anything you’re good at! Didn’t you hear her say no artifacts!  Magical combat isn’t a fight to the death but people have died from a wrong move. What are you getting us into?”  she managed to keep all her complaints still in a whisper.

“Don’t worry. I have it handled. I have enough magic for the both of us,” Poe said as  he then handed her a bag filled with several smaller bags, containing ingredients he knew his sister would need to make foof bombs and more, “This is the only way to find out who challenged us. If we voided it we would never know.”

Magica let out a sigh. She snatched the bag from her twin and grumbled, “Well it seems you have a trick up your sleeve so this better not backfire on us. I'll do this but I’ll complain the whole time.”

“Wow, you complain? That’s so different from what you ordinarily do,” Poe teased. In turn, Magica gave her brother a punch in the arm.

“De Spell Party! We are ready for you!” the lady at the desk announced.

“Oh Hecate, I missed anyone new coming in! We still don’t know who we’re going to face,” Poe groaned as he and his sister headed up to  a door behind the desk. Before they could enter though, a very burly canine security guard pulled out a large wand. He scanned it over the two De Spell’s like it was looking for something. 

“That wand is HUGE. Might as well just use a whole tree!” Poe stated. He squirmed a bit as the guard waved the wand  down the front of him and then his sides.

“It is checking for any contraband. You should have already been told the rules,” the guard muttered back.

“Ah hahaha, yes yes we know,” Poe sounded a bit nervous. Magica kept her cool as she was scanned next. She did not want to say anything suspicious so she was quiet. She was certain her brother would try to sneak something in but didn’t know exactly how. Without even being told she pulled out her wand for the guard to scan. 

“Alright, go ahead,” the guard mumbled again as he opened the door wide to let the two in.

Poe was very relieved that the challenge room was just a plain white room. There were some observers way up high in a window structure. He was expecting a Roman arena kind of setting. The magicless duck did not want to embarrass himself in front of a crowd so this was much better. 

During the time Poe was looking up at the few in the windows, Magica was tugging on his shirt sleeve for his attention, “Oh what is-”

“Our challengers!” Magica said as she grabbed Poe’s head to move it so it was looking directly at the two at the other side of the room.

 “Oh no,” he said as he saw Rosolio. He was a goose that had claimed to be Magica’s fiance even though she had no interest in him. Next to him Poe then noticed the red haired one eyed Macawber he had dated for a short stint in college. She did not look happy,  “OH NO!”

“At least we know it won’t be a fight to the death now,” Magica muttered softly to her brother.

“For YOU maybe!” Poe replied in panic.  

“Battle commences at the count of three,” said a voice from one of the above windows.

“No, wait wait, can we at least know why they want to fight us?” Poe yelled up to the window. He then looked directly at the two across the room. He yelled out to them, “HEY WHY DO YOU WANT TO FIGHT US???”

“One,” the announcement voice said up above.

Rosolio’s only response to Poe’s question was giving Magica a smile and a wave. While he seemed to be cheerful about the situation, Poe’s old ex was giving him a death glare.

“Two,” the voice counted above.

“IRIS whatever this is about I’m SO SORRY. I THOUGHT THINGS WERE ALRIGHT. IT was SO LONG TIME AGO WHAT IS GOING ON,” Poe yelled out to his ex.

“Iris? Iris Macawber?!” Magica looked to her brother. He gave a little nervous nod.

“THREE!”

Iris barreled over towards Poe with her hands flaming with magic fire. Even Rosolio looked shocked at how aggressive she was. 

Poe, despite having a plan, at that moment decided to run instead. There wasn’t anywhere to go  so he was about to be chased around the room by the angry Macawber. While that was going on, Magica walked up to Rosolio. He hadn’t taken any action to attack either of the De Spells.

“Rosolio! What is the meaning of this!” Magica scolded the goose. She pointed her wand at him. 

“It-it was your Grandma’s idea! She said maybe a little combat I could prove myself to you! That I’m a great warlock!” he said it partly whining, expecting to get hit physically with the wand. 

“Alright, and why is the Macawber here?” she questioned while holding her wand threateningly at the goose. 

“Uh, well, your mother was feeling under the weather so  I had to invite a partner and she’s a friend of a friend that offered to help…,” Rosolio said softly like that would get him in less trouble with the black haired witch. Poe was heard yelling a short distance away. A fireball from Iris had almost hit him. 

“And you thought a Macawber would be fine to bring to a fight with De Spells?” Magica waved her wand at the goose but did not seem to be casting an actual spell.

“I didn’t know she was one of the ones that didn’t like y’all,” Rosolio whined even meeker. Another cry came from Poe as he was about to get cornered in one of the angles of the room.

“They all don’t like us idiot. Don’t do ANYTHING. Stay here,” Magica sighed in frustration as she rushed over to her brother. Before she could do anything to block Iris’ fire blast, Poe did something himself.

“Scudo adesso, per favore!” Poe yelled out while also physically ducking down to hopefully avoid the fireball if the spell did not work. A shield of green magic did pop up to deflect the spellcasted fire. Magica looked shocked for a moment. She knew her brother was unable to do direct magic. This was a new development.

Iris looked surprised too. Magica was sure Poe hadn’t shared his magicless secret with her. However, the Macawber could have assumed some things from being around him in Eldritch Academy. The redhead wasn’t expecting magic from Poe as well.

 Poe just grinned, using the pause to cast another spell, “Mitä jos menisit kotiin!”

Iris suddenly was teleported back to the doorway she had come into the arena from. This time she seemed more angry than surprised. She went to rush at Poe again. She charged up fire in her hands also once again. 

“Duratus invasor!” Poe said as a blast of ice then formed in between his hands. Iris expertly dodged it. Poe started running backwards away from Iris’s fire blasts. During this, Magica was busy mixing up a foof bomb. Poe barely dodged one of Iris’s blasts. A bit of his hair became singed as he ducked again. The magicless warlock used a previous spell since it worked well the last time, “Mitä jos menisit kotiin!”

Iris was once again teleported away from Poe. When she found herself at the front entry of the arena again she let out a short frustrated scream. Rosolia stayed put  like he was told. 

“Hey hey hey so can we talk about this. Why are you angry at me?” Poe shouted across to Iris. The redheaded Macawber just started running towards him again. Charging fireballs as always. 

In her mid run she did not notice Magica toss a foof bomb in front of her. The bright flash of light blinded the Macawber’s eye and stopped her right in her tracks. She closed her singular eye. Iris then turned off the charging fireballs in her hands so she could rub her eye with  the back of her hand, “Oh you know what you did!”

“I… don’t?” Poe said, ending the don’t with an unsure higher pitch. 

“You can’t just break up with someone with a note. You could have said it to my face!” Iris grumbled as he struggled to open her eye.

“You’re the one that wrote ME a break up note,” Poe quickly replied. He took a few steps forward since he did not expect Iris to attack. He gave Magica a glance and nod to silently tell her to have another foof bomb ready. Just in case. 

“No, I didn’t!” Iris replied, her eye was open but it was blood shot, “You left me this convoluted note saying I could to better and that the anyone in the house of Macawber deserved- oh no.”

“You know, I didn’t think about it before because it was written in your usual green gel pen, but the way the note I got from you read it was very- written by a three hundred year old plus man,” Poe stated, realizing the same thing Iris had. 

“Uncle Moloculo…,” Iris sighed.  Magica casually walked up to both of them.

“So, are you forfeiting so we can end this?” Poe’s twin stated.

“I’m not forfeiting,” Iris stated, “You might have been tricked into thinking I broke up with you but the pie incident you did after was still unacceptable!”

“Alright but, you were a jerk while we were dating and you kinda did deserve it…” Poe said despite Iris charging up fire blasts yet again.

Magica let out a sigh and yelled to the warlock goose,“ROSOLIO! FORFEIT!” 

“Alright dear,” Rosolio replied meekly and waved his hand to one of the people up at the window, “We forfeit!” 

Iris had an opportunity to ignore the rules and still make a pop shot at Poe. Instead she huffed and turned to exit the arena from their team’s side. 

“So ah- can we maybe go out for coffee later, or-” Rosolio tried to step near Magica as he addressed her.

“NO!” Magica yelled before grabbing her brother’s arm to leave the arena as well. She was so frustrated by the situation she forgot her magicless brother had casted magic right in front of her. It wasn’t until she had him outside in the whole building when she remembered. 

She turned to ask Poe but he interrupted her with the answer before she could even speak.

“I took a huge dose of tatuaj trișa potion,” Poe stated as he unbuttoned his left sleeve. 

“A tattooing potion?” Magica raised an eyebrow.

“Really a glamor spell that allows someone to take a drawing and place it on their body and then, boom! Instant temp tattoo. So I thought hey, what if you lay an object on after taking that potion…  and I worked my way up from there,” Poe explained as he rolled up one of his sleeves. There was an image on his feathered arm of a wand that had icicles at the base. A wand that would have let him cast the freeze spell he tried to throw at Iris, “I actually wasn’t sure it would get through security. But hey, it did!”

“You put the artifacts on your body? Poe! That's genius!” his sister replied, truly impressed. 

“Yes yes, I know. But we need to get out of here quickly. It’s about to wear off, and every time I used an artifact’s power it REALLY nauseated me,” Poe made a disgusted face before a sudden clunk of metal was heard in his shirt. The shielding artifact he had placed on his chest was now out. 

“I swear if you throw up on me while flying home on my broom I’m just going to kick you off,” Magica stated, though she was joking. For the most part, “also, what was the pie incident?”