26: saturday (a day of light)

tätä lukua kirjoittaessani minulla on ollut erittäin suuria vaikeuksia:D sain tämän jo itseasiassa eilen valmiiksi, mutta olen lopettanut tätä ties kuinka monta kertaa eri kohdasta ja aloittanut uudestaan - kuten tänäänkin tein. en ole siis edennyt tarinassa mutta saanut aikaan hiukan siedettävämmän kuuloista tekstiä. melkein pidänkin tästä, näin alkuun. tai noh, en mene vielä sanomaan mitään. :___D

tässä on kappale joka on inspiroinut minua flawlessin alusta alkaen ja jonka jostain syystä kuvittelen aina prologiin.

 

Chapter Twenty-six

“Fera!” I shrieked, but my yell was subsided by the rush of water which only got louder by the second. The surface was like liquid gold and I saw nowhere under. It was still as glass, without bubbling, wavering, like Fera didn’t breathe…

He didn’t breathe.

The surface broke and a golden figure emerged from the water, his ears and nose locked, mouth zipped still. Fera opened his eyes, and they were completely free of harm.

“Spit it out,” I commanded, fighting the urge to knock him down again. “Spit it out, you forsaken idiot!”
But Fera only parted his lips, a dry puff of air warming my face.

“Don’t say you just fell into the fountain for fun,” my face was chalk-white. Fera stayed silent. He was still up to his lap in the fountain water. “You did?”

And then I surged at him, my hands grabbing his neck and shaking him throughout. “Why? Mein Gott, ich hasse dich!”

“You what?”
“I hate you,” I said, but my tone resembled a laugh. “I hate you. Why did you do that?”

Fera smiled through the golden rain. “There was nothing concrete we found of the darkness city, don’t you remember? We only took with us the darkness we had. Now I poured it into the fountain.”
I didn’t know could it have a visible effect, but the water definitely hadn’t changed color. “You seriously had to do it so… suddenly? Even though you might survive well underwater, not everyone does. If I would have followed you, I could have died.”
“But you did not,” Fera said. “Help me up.”

My jaw dropped, but I offered my arms. Fera jumped out of the fountain, shaking the water off his soaked clothes like he was a wet dog. “The sun has risen. It will dry me up.”
Fera was correct. Without me really noticing the sky had turned from cobalt to the powder blue of dawn, and the sun shone on our backs. That was the moment I understood how unbelievably tired I was despite the constant sleep the last couple of days. Adrenaline was in my veins, but the effect wore of incredibly fast. I already felt my limbs losing touch.

“Well,” I sighed, staring vaguely at the fountain. “I guess we didn’t just lay and forget the world.”

Fera only smirked, a vial in his hands. “We must complete our task first. We must take the water to the city of darkness.”

I answered with a nod, but when I concentrated all my strength on drawing the wind, I could only see a faint trace of the wild streets of the darkness city before all lights went out.

When my eyes opened the first thing I saw was myself.

There were smudged circles around my eyes and my body lay in a limp, unnatural position, like I wasn’t fully in control of my own movements.

I knew nothing about time – the hour or the day, but judging on the tint of the light it was already late afternoon. In contrast however, I knew where I was.

The same familiar peaks of the room were all around me, just like in my dream. But this time Fera wasn’t next to me. My eyes went from my left to the right and the only things I saw were emptiness. Very carefully I forced myself up, my body weighing like I was built of metal instead of flesh and bones.

I rose up and stood in the middle of the chamber, studying the floor figures around me. It was completely clear – the perceivable lines had disappeared leaving nothing left but indefinable smudges where the peaks had been. I blinked, and when I opened my eyes, Fera was there.

“Fera,” I began in a voice full of uncertainty. “What time is it?”
Fera didn’t answer instantly. He studied me for a second his head in a slight tilt like he had pointed out something new in my appearance. “Seven,” he answered.

“Seven? It’s been eleven hours?”
But Fera said nothing. His eyes were locked on the floor figures. When my eyes got used to the light I noticed they were red – a dirty, faded shade of crimson like dried blood.

“This is the council,” I noted self-evidently. “What happened?”
“You blacked out when we warped to the darkness city,” Fera explained. A recollection came to my mind but my head pounded and I stopped thinking. “I carried you.”
“Whoa. Meine Güte. I’m so sorry-“

“Silence,” Fera said in an unfamiliar tone, and I zipped my mouth shut. “Look around you.”
I obeyed with bewilderment, staring at the same point Fera was. I could see the smudges weren’t arranged evenly, as if some of them were missing. “Your friends are down there. You must help me to open the door.”
“To open the door?” I repeated incredulously. “Fera, if you need to get to the first floor, I’m sure you could only use the stairs…”

But then my eyes flew at the double doors in the very edge of the room, a pair of doors I recognized instantly. They were open and revealed the council gardens bathing in a bright golden haze of the afternoon. They opened to reveal two pairs of staircases both swirling upwards, but none downwards.

“But… this is the first floor. You told me you dreamed of the second floor.”
“I did not lie,” Fera said. “To get down there we must finish the ritual.”

And then Fera pulled a knife; a knife nothing like the ones in Nolan’s home, but a noble, reflective blade with a diamond-wrought handle. Before I could react he had brought the blade down and cut his palm. He pressed his bleeding hand tightly shut, spreading the crimson blood all over. Then he looked at the ceiling and pressed his palm onto the floor.

Suddenly I understood what the smudges in the floor were, why they were the color of dried blood. They were handprints of blood.

“Guardian blood,” Fera spoke, wiping his bleeding hand on his white shirt. “Is the key.”

“Guardian blood?” I repeated. “But I’m not a guardian. This… I don’t know… You said it would be nothing like this.”
Fera’s tone was reassuring as he spoke, reminding me of the way he had cooed me in my dream before reminding me my mamma was dead. “Cannot you see? Your friends have done the same to enter this place. Those are their handprints.”
Aes, Chyse, Circus, Talia. Earth, fire, water, darkness. The words of Aes and the twins ran through my mind. “She, after all, is a councelor in training.” – “He’s the councelor in training.” Was the blood of a guardian trained councelor enough to open the door?

But that had to mean-

“Look,” Fera continued, but I couldn’t hear his voice. My ears buzzed and I stared at my own shaking hands, as if they were already bleeding. “This is the only way… It will not hurt. Only for a while.”

That is not what I fear, I thought, but I was unable to say the words out loud. Fera had moved closer to me, his lips next to my ear. “I can do it for you. I know where to cut.”
“No,” I said, taking hold of the blade Fera had given me, but drying it of his blood first. It was sharper than any kitchen knife I had ever held, and the mirror-like surface reflected my shocked expression. “I will do it.”
“Be careful,” Fera whispered, and without looking, I cut a thin line of scarlet across my skin.

The wound burned as the blood interacted with oxygen, and I felt my head starting to spin. “Look up,” Fera instructed, and despite the stinging pain I raised my expression. From the ceiling another me stared back and I understood. The ceiling was a mirror – in my dreams I had been looking through it. The lines of the floor were shown only through it. Through it I could without trouble see the peak of wind on the opposite side of the chamber as Aes’ handprint. I walked over to the right spot, and closing my eyes, bended over to press my palm against the cooling surface. It accepted my touch as if it had been molded for me.

The air filled of a sudden electric hum and I was pulled aside as the lines on the floor started to crackle as if the floor was breaking. Dust filled the air as the crackles grew large and opened a passageway like a gaping wound into a torch-lit chamber below our feet. Fera took my hand with a smile, and our blood bonded as we stepped together down the hidden staircase.

While studying the chamber a mixed feeling of familiar and foreign flushed over me, like I was staring at a faceless person or a world without colors. The staircase rounded the walls in a hexagonal shape, and an innumerable amount of overlapping lines covered the floor. They reminded me of the lines on hospital floors leading onto different wings: guidelines. Each of them led into a corner of the room, and in every corner I saw one of my friends. Aes was staring straight into my eyes, but his expression was vague, as if he hadn’t noticed me coming. The look of him made me freeze. He looked exactly like the night I had last seen him, like nothing had happened to him. But why was he there? I wanted to run to him and scream until the world would fall around me. But when I took an instinctive step towards him, Fera caged me in his arms, staining my clothes with blood.

“Let me go,” I said, shocked by the calmness of my tone. “I have to get him out of here.”
Fera’s breath was hot on my neck. “We have to do this right.”
I froze. The roughness of his tone made my limbs melt, and I felt my knees giving way. “There,” he instructed, pointing at an empty spot between Talia and Chyse. Just like Aes, they looked exactly like the last time I had seen them – with the exception that Chyse had pulled on some pants. I stared incredulously into his icy blue eyes, and as Fera parted my side to stand in the circle in between Chyse and Aes, I saw something in Chyse’s eyes had changed. They were sharp and somehow very alert – despite his very dead figure, he had never before looked so ready, so alive. Close to her Talia had fixed her eyes on me, but she looked more through me. “I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “Talia-“
As she heard her name, her whole figure flinched and I startled backwards. The very second my back hit the wall the room flashed, and the torches flared alight like igniting stars. Right then I could see the overlapping lines on the floor had changed. Now they formed a hexagonal pattern just like the one I had seen through the ceiling mirror, and a flash like an electric current spread from the center of the room, hitting me with the force of a flushing tide and knocking the strength off my feet. I fell on my knees, and the very second I was out of breath, white spots dancing in my eyes.

As soon as my vision cleared I noticed several things. I felt different, like a pressure I hadn’t noticed until then had been lifted off my chest. The world around me also was different. The stone walls of the staircase had changed into wall-long bookcases filled with countless books of power – maps, notebooks, some as old as Kaiya itself. In the middle of the room was a pouring column of light like a wall of glass, a wall I had seen in a vision. The room was no longer incomplete, and I understood. I had always wondered why the council, a hexagonal building with six ends and six seats for each elemental guardian had only five floors. But it didn’t. The sixth floor existed, only underground – it was where the archives were, a place which only the guardians knew of. But before I could understand why I was there I was already too late.

Next to me Talia had fallen on her back, her unconscious fingers gripping desperately at the empty air. Chyse leaned against a bookcase with closed eyes, and Circus and Aes both reached towards me, like despite their unconsciousness they knew I was still awake. Between them Fera studied the roof above us, his eyes like glass. “It’s time,” he whispered, turning into a blur of black and white. The next second he had pinned me between his body and a staircase wall which pressed painfully against my back. Behind him I could notice the shadows had started to shift, like the ceiling was sealing above us. Something cold and angled grazed my thigh, and I thought of the blade Fera had with him. A sharp pain stung my palm where I had cut it, and before I could fully realize what I was doing, I swung my fist at him. His palm deflected the blow, and my arm twisted in a painful angle. A pulsing pain jolted through my broken elbow.

“Don’t you understand what that means?” I spoke through my teeth. “It means ‘let me go.’”

“I cannot.”
Somewhere above I could hear a steady tone, footsteps. “Let me go,” I repeated. “Now.”

Fera freed my hand from his palm. “I have to do this,” he said, as he jerked my arms up with a single swift motion. “You have to understand.”
A bright bar of light like burning magnesium appeared in between his fingers, but it wasn’t that. It was light. My arms were tied together, and the footsteps got ever closer. Fera’s eyes were wild. “I will never hurt you again. I promise.”
“You’re a liar,” I cried, turning my head away. “I can’t believe you.”
“You have to,” Fera said. From the corner of my eye I could study the range of emotions passing his face – anger, hatred – but also pain. It was like he the world was falling before him, but he stayed only to watch its terrible beauty. His eyes went to the staircase above, and he stood up, letting me go. “Don’t say a word. No matter what, don’t.”

“He’s coming, isn’t he?” I yelled after Fera as he turned his back. “He’s coming to get the scrolls.”
Somehow I expected the world to rumble, but not a single thing happened. The wards are down, I realized. He’s here.

“I hate you,” I said, and this time I meant it. “I truly do.”

“Felice?” Someone questioned, and the familiarity of the voice brought me the chills. “Who are you talking to?”

Fera froze on his tracks, holding something sharp and glittery in his hands. A knife.

“There is blood on your blade,” a female figure noted in a heavy accent. She wore a gracious golden gown which hugged her curves and highlighted her tanned complexion. “Is it yours?”
Fera opened his mouth as if to say something, when a hand reached out from behind him and pushed him aside. Fera closed his eyes and drew back as if he was expecting to be beaten.

But with the sight of me my father only smiled, a pair of amber eyes narrowed like mine when I saw something truly interesting. “What a futile attempt to hide her from me,” said Tristen. “Was she so resistant you had to bind her?”

I leaned back half instinctively, rubbing my wrists against each other. Where the light touched the skin grew hot like I was burned by the sun. “If I were you, I would not do that. Look at your hands.”
I threw my arms powerlessly over my head, a sharp pain hitting my sight. I closed my eyes, and behind them I could still see the afterimage of light. “The more you resist, the brighter it burns. What is your name?”

Tristen approached me with a confident stroll alike Severina’s, lifting his chin in a theatrical gesture of vanity. It had to be forethought. He never does or says anything without further thinking, Severina had said. But everything else in him… just like peeling off an onion skin, under all those artificial gestures and expressions there was a skin which revealed his true self. And under his second skin… he looked just like me.

“My name?” I repeated, even slightly awestruck. If Severina had recognized me only from the eyes without knowing of my existence, my father had to recognize me. “Hilary.”

Tristen studied me carefully, his eyes at my eye level – either at my bridge piercing or irises. “It means ‘joyful.’”
I know what it means, I thought. But why the hell are you interested in a thing like it?

“Well, Hilary, I am pleased to meet you.”

I gave a laugh, and Tristen raised a brow curiously.

“Gott in Himmel,” I half-laughed, half-cried. “Stop this forsaken charade! It doesn’t interest you at all, does it? You’re just irritated because I’m here to thwart your plan of getting the scrolls. Which, by the way, is shitty.”

Tristen blinked as if he didn’t really believe the situation he was in. “I would not include the words ‘forsaken’ and ‘charade’ in the same sentence.”

My jaw dropped. “Go to hell, dad.”

A bright smile lightened Tristen’s features. If I wouldn’t have known what he was up to, it would have been a pleasant sight. “You are a bright one, aren’t you?”
“Enough of this,” I sighed. “If you’re going to kill me, then just get it over with. You’ve already used me enough.”
Tristen arched his eyebrows. “I am not planning to kill you.”

I shook my head incredulously. If I had a chance, this was it. Tristen had planned it all well – he would make sure the council would not know of him being there. But if I could delay him long enough…

“Let’s just… talk,” I said. “You know, there’s some stuff you really should clear up. Like what’s the thing with treating your kids like they were scientific experiments? e. + l. = w.? Or possibly d.? What does that mean?”
Tristen’s expression was indefinable. “’Scientific’ is not the right word to describe what I think of you.”

“Quatsch.”
“Höre auf dich,” Tristen laughed. “Deine Mutter hat dich gut gelehrt.”

“This conversation is ridiculous,” I stated. “Point one: I’m tied up. Free me, and perhaps we’ll achieve agreement.”

Tristen leaned close, and for a second I even believed he would do it. “No,” he drew back, crossing his arms under his golden robe. The rings of power and wisdom flickered on his right hand, but his ring of benevolence was gone. “I am afraid there is no time. But you are lucky to be conscious unlike your friends. There is something I want to show you.”

His sentence ended into a sudden pull of breath like before a deep dive, and Tristen penetrated the column of color like the walls of a soap bubble.

The very same second the walls around us started to shimmer. The six ends of the room wavered, and figures appeared at each empty wall like a flushing tide. My eyes flew next to me where the letters had burned themselves through the walls. They formed readable words, but the mere sight of them was painful, and even though I closed my eyes, I still could see them. No, my lips formed the word soundlessly. I was too late. My eyes flew at Fera, who had his eyes on me as if I was the only thing he could see. Why was he looking at me like that? To him I had been nothing but a tool. Somehow Fera had always been around when one of my friends went missing. Somehow Fera had known the way to the fountain of Light, just like he had known his way to my childhood home. My conscience had always been right. You will hate yourself, it had said. In the end you will.

Why had I not listened?

Inside the column of color Tristen had started chanting under his breath, something which sounded almost like a prayer. “Earth, I thank you for your fields and the gift of life you have given us…”

Severina, I thought. Her image formed behind my eyelids. If I would have concentrated enough, perhaps she would have heard me. And perhaps she did, but no longer understood. Severina, you have to come. It’s already begun.

But life wasn’t logical.

The world was full of odds, norms, consistencies. Human-created rules of order to prevent chaos. Winter lasts three months. The compass points north. Tomorrow it will rain.

“And Light, I thank you for your grace and the wisdom you have given us…”
Life wasn’t a mathematical equation. There was no solution. Perhaps Tristen treated the world that way: as numbers and figures, thinking, that if he knew the premises he could somehow calculate his moves and make the right decision.

But what if there came no winter? What if the Earth’s magnetic field would warp and the compass point south instead? What if the wind currents would turn and rain would never come?

Life was of movement, illogical figures and patterns, lifelines entwining: a constantly morphing entity of parting and departing particles, some that changed direction and went their own way, and some that despite how small the odds were, ended always meeting again.

When Tristen finally opened his eyes they were almost white, glowing with light. “The Elementals, I thank you for balance and the gifts you have given us.”

A blow like a pressure wave made the hairs on my skin stand up, and when I moved my eyes on Tristen the walls around him had dissolved and the glow on the scrolls had died.

For a mere second he only stood there raptly, as if the scenery around him had turned unreal. There was a moment I stared at the ceiling like a starry sky, imagining Severina descending the steps with her flowing platinum hair and taking me in her arms just like mamma had done, telling me all was all right.

Instead I heard Tristen call a command, and the next second I focused my attention on the room the walls were dead and empty, and my father had joined the woman in the golden dress in a passionate embrace.

10: chaos

nyt saatte valitettavasti tyytyä pelkkiin lukuihin, sillä en ole kirjoittanut mitään pariin päivään eikä siis ole mitään uutta. hahmojen ulkonäkö on kuitenkin alkanut jonkin verran selkeytyä koska kuvataidelukiolaisena tietenkin olen myös heitä piirrellyt. mahtuihan mukaan myös jonkin verran random tuherruksia. ottakaa hei näitä katsoessanne huomioon kellonaika johon näitä tein - tuhertelin näitä puoliunessa siinä puoli kahdentoista maissa:::D onko teillä nyt ehtinyt tähän mennessä muodostua vaikka omaa suosikkia? tai kuvastaako joku sketcheistä jonkun persoonaa erityisen hyvin? oma suosikkihahmonihan on severina, mutta mielestäni sketcheistä chyse ja nolan onnistuivat parhaiten. mitä mieltä te olette?
  

now you'll have to cope with barely chapters, due i haven't written anything in few days so i don't have much new to post. however, my characters have started to form appearances because as an art stundent i've of course been drawing them (notice also the random sketches in the bottom of the page:::D) notify that when i drew these i was half asleep and it was half past midnight. what about you, have you got any favorite characters? or do some of these sketches represent a character well? my own favourite character is severina, but i think chyse and nolan represent themselves the best as sketches. and you?

Chapter Ten

“Aren’t you overreacting a little? She could have just warped away,” Nolan suggested, but Chyse closed his eyes and shook his head. “No. She never does that without warning.”
“And warping isn’t that stable right now,” Talia informed. “I and Hilary ended up in the most unlikely place – and got almost driven over by a truck.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“But it’s not the only thing,” she continued. “Two words: the Archives.”

Nolan and Chyse yelped helplessly, sounding almost feminine. “That’s a bad omen.”
“Thanks Nolan, for making me feel better,” Chyse snapped. Talia frowned restlessly.

“The elements are reckless here. Powerful emotions draw them.”

I suddenly thought of what Severina had taught me at the high council. What if Rilla had been so upset her element had gone out of control? It was like she had vanished into thin air… she wasn’t there anymore…

“It’s possible that in case she tried warping, it has taken her to a different location.”
The guess came from the three of us simultaneously. “The Archives?”
Talia nodded gravely. I had never heard of such thing as the Archives, but there were two things easy to guess: 1) it was something bad and 2) they were located at my old high-school.

Well, we were in another dimension, after all.

“We should take a cab,” Chyse suggested as we dashed out the open door. “Even though warping might take us where Rilla is, the elements change their moods quickly.” As Chyse spoke, the wind changed direction. “Just like that.”
“I’ll call one,” Talia noted, waving her hand at a distant, silvery object. The cab pulled over, taking us in. Somehow it was very disturbing to drive a cab in another realm, but I was positively sure the thing didn’t run on gasoline. “Take us to Aqua,” Talia commanded, offering the driver something I was sure wasn’t cash. Crawling into the tight taxi in between two guys and Talia wasn’t exactly easy, but at least we could talk without the driver hearing.

“What’s Aqua? Why didn’t you just say the-“
Talia shut me up with a gaze. “Aqua is a hotel near them,” she whispered. “It’s not safe to mention them here.”
“Why?” I demanded, making sure the driver didn’t give us angry looks. Play hadn’t been far from my school, so we didn’t have much time. “Is it really that bad?”
Chyse sighed nervously. “Trust me, it’s worse.”
Chyse turned expectantly at Nolan, who started to speak instantly. “The Archives are a sacred place of Kaiya’s elemental matter. They contained a large amount of ancient books, maps and material.”

“Wait a second, did you just say contained?”

“The Archives of The Cities exist no longer there,” Talia filled in. “But it’s still a sacred place of elemental power. Even in the times they were still there, only skillful guardians could enter.”
A tense grin spread on my face. “And? What happened to them?”
“They were broken into six years ago,” Nolan explained. “Nothing was taken, and there is no record of who did it – but the elemental affect on the place was traced instantly. The Archives were hidden, and no councelor knows where they are now.”
Why? But why – mein Gott, why did they have to exist in my old school? Finding my own corpse wasn’t exactly what I was looking for.

“What were they after?” I asked as we curved on a familiar street. On Earth Hotel Aqua had been named differently. It was a large, white building with three floors and numerous balconies by a pool twice the size, fountains sprouting water like gigantic showers. We took a turn on a small street in between two apartment buildings. From there I could spot my old school, empty and haunted, like my death had drained all life out of it.

“I better not mention it here,” Nolan breathed. The traffic had slowed down, but it only emphasized the impression the building gave me. My school had always reminded me more of a museum than an academy.

As we entered the empty building I was struck by a sudden pressure which seemed to weigh me down. The air was thick as oil, dusty and full of overwhelming power. According to Nolan, the doors were always kept open. Only few were foolish enough to enter.

I almost had expected seeing lockers, flocks of students or even my old principal – or at least a trace of the sweaty aroma the football team left behind. None of them were there. The building was as alien as I had never been there before. I was sure my school wasn’t designed originally to be a school. The roof was high and there echoed everywhere. The gym class would have looked more like a ballroom if all the equipment was taken down. The tiny windows let out only streaks of light; the sun made the dust whirl in shapes and contours.
I tried to take one step ahead, but it felt as heavy as I was walking on the moon. “What-“
“They are traces of protective energy,” Nolan told. “They feel overwhelming at first. But you’ll get used to them fast.”
“We should really get moving,” Chyse exclaimed. “Rilla might be anywhere. This building is huge. If we only had a map…”
“There might be a spare map lying around somewhere,” Talia commented. “If they left something behind.”
Nolan shook his head incredulously. “No. They left nothing behind.”
Oh, but we have a map, I thought. But this being-a-map-business was harder than I thought. I couldn’t just go blurting out the whole city was a copy of my hometown on Earth. There had to be some other way…

“What’s the most likely place she’d reappear? We can’t just check every corner of every single room.”
Talia sighed. “I don’t think so. The elements do what they want, unless-“
Chyse’s expression lightened, as if from within. “Unless they feel drawn to a certain location. Follow me. I think I know where Rilla is.”
For some reason I didn’t trust Chyse, knowing he possibly couldn’t navigate himself around the way I could. He kept on strolling ahead us, faster by every second – his limbs getting slowly used to the air around them. I had really no time to look around. Every room was similar. They were absolutely empty. They had no single trace of furniture: no trace of any kind of shelf, table or cabinet I would expect in an archive. Nolan was correct. Nothing had been left behind.

My school was a three-floor building with two floors over ground, one under. The third floor had most of the classrooms, nothing really special. In the second floor there were also the principal’s office, teachers room, gym hall and cafeteria. Floor one was in the basement – it was also where Ashley took me. It consisted of a few classrooms such as chemistry and physics, the library and the toilets. Just like I, Chyse wasn’t particularly interested in any of the regular classrooms. He walked past the third floor staircase without making an attempt to get up. “There’s nothing in there,” he explained, and we agreed. He, however, did lead us into the gym, shutting the door behind him instantly. “Did you feel that?”
“A powerful trace of energy,” Nolan agreed. “Malevolent energy. It is intentionally applied. A distraction, I dare say.”
“Why?” I asked, while I tried to ignore the spooky silence hanging all around us. My speech echoed around me like I was in a tunnel. “Why was this place attacked? What could they be searching?”
Nolan sighed, perhaps a glint of pity shining in his dark eyes. How much there was I didn’t know!

“I usually don’t dare to speak this in such a powerful presence of the elements,” he spoke, glaring nervously around, as if there was someone listening. Or something. “And I neither will this time. What do you think, Hilary? What would it cause, if someone had control of all six elements?”
“Chaos?”

“Correct. A draw for several elements is not disruptive if the elements are in harmony. But mixing two opposites causes chaos. They defy each other.”

“The Archives contain dangerous information,” Chyse added. “Through them a person can reach anything – gain unlimited power, wisdom, strength. But this destroys man. The answer can be found only if it is looked for.”
Of course it could: it was obvious, but what was Chyse aiming at?

Nolan filled Chyse in. “He means; to find what is right one needs purpose. The elements are sensitive, impulsive, also reluctant to obey orders given by mankind. They only give in when the purpose is good.”
No element deep down is evil.

If Aurora was there, she would use some sort of symbol to explain it to me. I, myself, couldn’t come up with one, but there was one thing I knew. This same single something – or someone who had broken into the Archives was searching for a way to control the elements, to use them for a purpose. There were unexplained things: the odd hunches I had time to time, the haze hanging over Kaiya… and above all the dream I had in the beginning.

The one broken into the archives didn’t have a good purpose. If not willingly, forcibly.

Without me noticing, my feet had started moving. Chyse had been already looking through a couple of doors. Some he didn’t dare open, like he knew what was behind them. It was odd to see him wrinkle his brows or gasp in terror as he saw what I had known as the principal’s office or literature class. Maybe those traces were there, also on Earth – only without me noticing them.

“She’s not here,” Talia winced, noticing we had walked through the whole second floor. “Are you sure there’s nothing up there?”
“Positively.”
“There’s also a basement in this building,” I blurted.

Chyse raised a blonde brow, almost curiously. “How did you know that?”
“Intuition?”
“If you carry a draw for three elements, I’m horrified.”
Nolan huffed so hard his dark hair fluttered in the blow. “That’s impossible.”

Impossible. That’s the only word this guy knew.

I kept thinking about Chyse’s words. What did an elemental draw have to do with finding a basement? Unless…

My heart pounded as Chyse led us down the staircase I had walked often my last day on Earth. It was all dark without the fluorescent lights, but I knew where we were going. Only as we entered the hallway I suspected if we really were there.

I was already used to the lockers not being there, but as I turned around to face where I and Ashley had entered the bathroom doors, I only saw a blank wall.

I swallowed to loud everyone around me must have heard it.

As fast as it had taken over me, my agony was gone, suddenly replaced by an odd lightness, like a burden had been lifted off my shoulders.

“Dang,” Talia cussed. “I can really feel it in here. The protective spells have been completely removed.”
“Don’t get excited too fast,” Chyse notified. “It’s very much possible that…”
He was interrupted by such a piercing, high-pitched scream of torment it ripped my soul. Chyse’s eyes glassed with fear. His nod was as robotic as his speech. “That’s Rilla.”

We found her from the room I knew as our library.

Before we even could enter the room I saw shards of glass all around. They had tossed all around, so far from the doors they couldn’t be broken by human hands. The whole set of double doors was in shards. Behind them a set of heavier doors had flung open like from the impact of an enormous blow. Rilla lay in the middle of the room, twisting and turning, as if tortured. Her yell was deafening. There was nothing there with the exception of her. The sight terrified me. I could sense nothing inside the room, but reading from the look on the faces of Chyse and Nolan, they definitely could.

“What’s it? What’s wrong with her?”
My voice was harsh and sharp with fear, cutting the two awake like with a razor. Talia looked helpless, but she seemed to know what was going on.

“This was the most sacred place of the Archives,” she spoke, a haunted tone behind her voice. “The scrolls were-“
At the word scrolls Talia’s screaming turned wild, reaching a peak, her pupils turning upside down like she was possessed. Chyse shot a ferocious gaze at her, his eyes burning. Ignoring it, Talia continued. “She’s attacked by Fire, isn’t she? That’s how you found her, Chyse. You can sense draws!”

An awestruck expression pulled on my face. Guardians were all capable of this – sensing when an earthling of their element ends up somewhere. The instant moment balance shifted I knew you were coming. Could Chyse also-
“Can you sense tips in balance?” Talia breathed, almost in wonder, as if she was forgetting Rilla was being tortured in front of her eyes.

“It’s not the right time,” Chyse cried. “But yeah, you’re right. She’s possessed by Fire.”

I winced at the thought, remembering everything Aurora and Severina had taught me of the elements. Without control they were chaotic. My eyebrows furrowed in anguish as I knew the answer. We couldn’t help her.

I saw of Chyse’s eyes he couldn’t take it anymore. He was about to take a step towards Rilla, comfort her, futilely. But even before he could take a step a blow of energy made us tumble down, knocking us on our knees.

For swifter than a second the elements materialized. I could suddenly see Rilla burn – a dazing bonfire of flames around her, reaching up to the ceiling. In the speed of light they were struck by a force which resembled a building tide, and the two elements combined into pure energy, darting each other, continuing their everlasting struggle in the Spirit Realm.

It was complete stillness.

Exhausted, Chyse dragged himself across the floor, bending over Rilla. She was breathing, but there was a bestial glow in her eyes, like she was more animal than human. If I were Chyse, I would have expected Rilla to bite her any moment.

I turned my back, noticing Talia’s unconscious body next to me, along with a sixth figure joined amongst us.

“Circus!” Nolan’s voice filled with relief. “By all the Elements, why did you come here?”

Circus looked different – her usual blue guardian dress had changed into skinny pants and a long, flowing top. She, like I, was on her knees, barely awake. “Stay conscious,” Nolan cooed. “Don’t fade away.”
Circus? Was it her who summoned Water?
“I used all my power on that,” she croaked, sounding like someone had drained the saliva from her mouth. “I think I have to…”
But before she could pass out, Nolan took hold of her head and gazed straight into her cyan eyes. “Wake up,” he said, so persistently it made Circus open her eyes and stand on her own feet.

My head whirled around so fast I lost my sense of direction. Rilla, still stunned and unmovable under Chyse’s watching eye, unconscious Talia, Nolan waking Circus up with his mere words-

I let out a pure scream of ignorance.

Nolan’s focus turned instantly in my direction, his eyes full of the same kind of concern they were with Circus, like he was used to situations like these. “Did you get struck?”
My eyes flashed. “Struck by what?”
Nolan sighed. “So you didn’t.” He gave me a hand, helping me up. “What is it?”
“I’m so confused!” I held my head, like to prevent it from falling off. I really had a major headache. “What did just happen?”
“I knew it might be a little much for you. You just arrived, after all. This isn’t common. Don’t let it concern you.”
That’s what I thought. Seeing the Elements suddenly materialize in front of your eyes wasn’t exactly the everyday experience.

“Fire – Rilla – is she okay?”
Anyhow, Nolan seemed to pick something out of my stutter. “Ah, she’ll be fine. She was just in the wrong place in the wrong time. There are still powerful traces of the energy here. As Rilla entered, it was as if she was launching an animal trap. She couldn’t get out.”

His eyes turned to Talia, who lay in my feet as unmovable as she was dead. “I see she got struck, too.” He got on his knees, lifting Talia the same way he did with Circus. “Talia. Wake up.”

After a second her eyes opened sleepily, darker than they used to be. She blinked, waking up with a cough.

“How do you do that?”
Nolan grinned at my direction. There was something similar in him and Chyse, after all (eliminating the good looks.) “Just transferring my elemental strength into her.”

I took a quick look at Rilla, who seemed to be slowly regaining consciousness. Her words from our first meeting rang in my head. Nolan, for example, shows unusually good strength.

Without me noticing, Circus had appeared behind my back. She, together with Nolan, helped Talia up, and only Rilla remained. “How did you know we were in trouble?”
Circus smiled at Nolan’s question. It was a shy, little smile, like she wasn’t used to it. “I was at the hotel pool when I saw you go by. I followed you. Entering the Archives without permission is not a good idea.”
“Actually, it’s never a good idea, permission or no permission,” Nolan stated. “But what done is done.”
I turned at Circus, smiling in gratitude. “You saved her.”
But her look was blank, indifferent. “I don’t think so. Fire would have left her by time. I don’t think she is hurt, either.”

I raised my brows in awe, as Circus’ words came closer to right. Slowly but steadily Rilla rose on her own legs, with no trace of physical burns or pain. It was only in her eyes. They were bloodshot and in tears. Chyse offered her a hand, but she pushed it reluctantly away.

“You came after me,” she wheezed. “You knew where I was.”
“Thank Chyse,” Talia praised. “He can sense draws.”
Rilla’s bloodshot eyes seemed to clear for a while. “Really? For how long?”
“Longer than you think. It’s why Hestia accepted me to her council.”

It was funny, how the Kaiya teens were so similar but so different to the ones on Earth. Times they talked about relationships, fashion or just the juiciest gossip, but times their topics went to serious, mature stuff like the elements, awkward council terms and historical happenings. It was a whole new world I had claimed to know. But there was nothing I knew of it.

“Are you all right?” Talia continued. She had turned into some sort of hybrid of mom and teen Talia. “The screaming-“
“I screamed?”
Circus nodded knowingly. “I told you she isn’t hurt.”
“But… Fire possessed you. Do you remember anything? What happened?”
Rilla looked at all of us like it was something uneasy she didn’t want to bring up. As she began to recite the happenings, I still sensed she left something out. “I’m not particularly proud of my past on Earth. It keeps haunting me time to time. It sort of came back to me at the café. I felt really nervous and uneasy, so I went to the bathroom for a sec. All the thoughts and memories came flooding back to me. Then it all went blurry and I knew I wasn’t there anymore. The next thing I knew was I was burning. Fire… Fire showed me what would have happened if I had stayed.”
Our expressions were all equally enthralled. Before we started to ask any questions, Chyse pointed out or location and we walked out, now resistant to the energy around us. Yet, as we entered the cool evening air, the difference was like switching from a hot tub to an ice dive. We returned to the chilly Aqua hotel pool, taking seats by some fast food stand. Chyse and Nolan hurried instantly to take a bite, trying to persuade Rilla with them. She, however, remained silent, shaking her head and taking a quieter seat by the fountain.

My appetite was long gone. I hadn’t really eaten anything the last couple of days, but my concern seemed to wash my hunger away: my mind took over my needs.

“Rilla?” I called. A twilight sky hung over us, painting the fountain in my favorite colors. Water sprinkled on my face, forming vapor all around. I wondered, if I really would try, could I turn it into snow.

“Hilla,” Rilla answered, her voice breaking. I rushed to her, sitting on the water-drenched bench.

She raised her expression, light-blue eyes framed with pink whites. Her eyeliner had spread, making her look like a lost panda. She waited, the voices around us draining into the rush of water.

“Why, Rilla?”
She shook her head anxiously, auburn hair falling on her face.

“Do you know the feeling, when you feel sorry for something you shouldn’t?”
Her voice was crackled, an unrecognizable, almost grievous tone. I thought of her words, but couldn’t come up with an example. My mind was only blank.

“No,” I answered bluntly.
She turned her gaze into my direction, eyes boring onto mine. “Then tell me, Hilary, why is it that you are here?”