Silver: The Lost Royal

5| Unexpected Guest

THE conversation played over again like a tape stuck on repeat as she rode back home with her hand, occasionally finding her necklace through her shirt.

If Gema's words were true, then it was a high-risk gamble. Like Zack said, what if they weren't what she thought? What would she have done to them? Would she have let them go free with all that information?

According to Karyn, only dangerous people cared little about risks because they knew what they could lose and yet still went ahead. This would most likely be because they would have a way of making up for that loss, no matter the cost. And what Gema took was a colossal risk.

Half of her found solace in Gema being right about her and Zack, while the other half drowned in worry over Gema's words as her mind drifted to one person.

Elowen. Her best friend for over six years.

The laugh she let out when Gema had mentioned Elowen was, in part, out of concern. A part of her wanted to believe Gema, but she held more doubt than belief.

She doubted, not because she knew Elowen so well—as she implied during detention—but because she couldn't believe that her best friend would keep such an enormous secret to herself, after all these years.

The thought made her feel like a hypocrite. If she could hide the fact that she could see her dead sister, then why couldn't Elowen hide her princess identity? Yet she sought justification that she hid her ability from Elowen for the sake of their friendship. It was awful to think that her very first friend might distance herself when she learned Karyn could see ghosts.

Without Elowen knowing about Kara, their friendship remained perfect, and she was intent on keeping it that way. But the question remained. How was she going to prove Gema right... or wrong?

She couldn't go about it the same way she did when trying to get information from the trio of new students. That was way too obvious. She would have to be more discrete this time, especially since Elowen could read her like a book.

In the next moment, guilt washed over her. It felt as if she was conspiring against her best friend. Why couldn't she just come clean and ask Elowen? She could do that, but she doubted Elowen would tell her the truth. She placed herself in Elowen's shoes and imagined if Elowen came up and asked her if she could see ghosts, would she be truthful then? Without even thinking, she knew the answer.

She had been so lost in her thoughts that she forgot to come up with an excuse to tell her aunt. She let out a weary sigh, realizing she had no choice but to tell them she'd gotten detention. The last time she did, it ended up with her aunt yelling at her for not being home early enough to prepare dinner while her uncle watched in silence before heading to the room once his wife finished.

She walked into the living room expecting to see her aunt, all red-faced, with barred teeth, and ready to yell at her, but the person she met threw all images of her angry aunt out her mental window.

What the—

"Jamie!"

He sat on the opposite couch facing her aunt.

"Karyn?" he responded, before he twisted in his seat, his eyes widening for a second before they blinked back to their normal size.

"What are you doing here? You two know each other?" she asked, not bothering to mask her shock as Jamie did.

"Jamie, you didn't tell me you knew my niece," her aunt said, pronouncing the name more like 'Jamye'. That too, in a pleasant voice, one she hadn't heard in forever.

What was going on here?

"I had no idea Karyn was the niece you were talking about..."

They were talking about her?