Die Alone

Chapter Sixteen

Amber Young
Orphic

The streets were just as busy in the morning as they were in the night. The village seemingly never slept.

Outside a small cafe, they were eating breakfast and chatting. The breeze was chilly but nowhere near as bad as the Niveous Kingdom.

The sky was grey and indicated it was going to rain. The clouds looked like no clouds Amber had ever seen. The sky altogether looked pretty normal but it was as if something was off. Maybe it was the whole being in a different world thing.

As if on cue, a drop of water landed on Amber's nose. Everyone began to eat a little quicker, except Sebastian, who had already scarfed down his meal.

Amber turned her direction to the table conversation.

"Would locals know her enough to know the name?" Sion asked.

"It's likely. She seemed important," Niamh shrugged, taking a bite of her food.

"So are we just going to go up to random strangers and ask?" Judyta asked, sounding opposed to the idea.

"Is there anyone you know here?" Amber suggested. The rain was slowly growing heavier.

"I have an Aunt in a town a bit away from here," Niamh said. "It would take all day to go there and back though and we have errands to run today."

"Why don't you go with Sion and Sakiya and the rest of us will run errands?" Amber secretly wanted a break from Sion and Sakiya's bickering.

Niamh shrugged, "Yeah I suppose that works."

Everyone finished eating before the group divided into two and headed their separate ways. Without Sakiya or Sion, the group of four was pretty silent. Judyta eventually started to quietly hum to herself. It had slowly become a weird sense of comfort for Amber. She hated silence.

The rain started to pour heavily which began to soil the paper she held, containing a list of errands. As she walked, Amber could hear the small sack of coins pocket Niamh had given her.

They passed by a tall cobblestone building and Amber instinctively stopped. She could tell it was a library, which was confirmed by the golden plaque with the words, 'Pax Library'. She looked over to Adrian with puppy dogs eyes and in return, he rolled his eyes.

"Fine. But we can't be here long," Adrian said.

Amber noticed Judyta got a little more excited. She looked over to her with a confused glance.

"We're in the Animus kingdom, there's going to be so many Animus books," Judyta said. She had a huge grin and her voice was much higher pitched than usual.

Amber tried not to show her smile. "Well, let's go in."

The boys walked behind her but she gave no attention to them. Next to her, Judyta was glowing with excitement which was an unfamiliar sight to Amber. Judyta was usually very quiet and reserved.

They walked up the steps and entered the library. It had two stories, the second story jutting out like a loft around the perimeter of the building.

As much as Amber was enjoying watching Judyta's glee, she couldn't help but stare at the shelves. She was sure if anyone saw her right now, her eyes would be sparkling.

-

The four sat in their small motel room, reading and waiting for the others to return. The boys sat on the couch reading. They'd yet to go back to their own room, which Amber was quite grateful for. At this point, the group had yet to be in this strange place without each other. Amber laid on her back, watching the light from the candles flicker on the ceiling. She was struggling to remember a night where they didn't rely on candles to see. She missed home and was anxious about what the future entailed now. Life felt like a twisted fairy-tale. The books that you read as a child and spend all day imagining.