ONE (Book 1 in the Amnesia Archives)

Chapter 24

Sarphi didn't appreciate the fact I didn't follow along with her train of thought. She had let me return back to the others and go on watch whilst she moved and cuddled up with Prin. I was the last one on watch, with Senka falling asleep on my lap. I watched the sun rise over the trees with a crimson glow, which unsettled me immensely despite the beauty.

We didn't have much of a plan when we continued walking along the barely seeable path. It had been worn down by the weather and years of use. But I was still stuck in my thoughts about what happened here. The person said that the trap had been used years before we came here. I didn't know if that meant they were dead, and somehow were revived to tell me of my unfortunate kidnapping, or if they were still alive. If they were alive, then that didn't bode well for us, as they seemed to be a very powerful person.

Sarphi hadn't said a word to me, and I felt like Prin and Aknon knew something was up. We were usually the two loudest people in our group, bouncing off of each other as we joked and talked about anything random. This walk was silent, which only made me more agitated. It got to the point where I pulled out my guitar and began strumming and humming, just to fill the silence.

"Okay, what's wrong?" Aknon asked suddenly, turning to face us. I would've figured that he'd enjoy the silence but that didn't seem to be the case. He always told us to shut up and that every moment didn't need to be filled with chatter, but he appeared more grumpy than usual. "What did we miss?"

"Nothing" I replied automatically, which immediately told him that he had missed something rather important. "We just had a small disagreement."

Senka scoffed and yawned, stretching her limbs out, which looked very odd. I still wasn't used to her being a sentient doll, as I kept imagining the beans inside of her body moving like a nervous system. "Yeah right, if it were nothing then you would have told me good morning this morning." She huffed.

"We were awake this morning," I pointed out. "We woke up at four in the morning after our sleep was needlessly interrupted."

"It was your turn to go on patrol," Sarphi defended herself. "Or night watch, or lookout or whatever you want to call it." She crossed her arms and pouted.

"Prin asks if that was the case then why did you end up cuddling her?" Senka translated and wiggled her eyebrows. "Was someone a bit lonely?"

Sarphi blushed and stammered. "I was not lonely." Her voice was weak, and we all knew what that meant, at least I thought we all knew as I glanced over at Prin. She looked completely unaware of the hidden meaning behind that, as she just gave a concerned look to Sarphi.

"Look, nothing happened. We had a disagreement over what a crack in a wall looked like." She wasn't wrong, that was what we'd argued about, but there was far more than that. She didn't seem to want to tell the others, so I remained quiet, even when Aknon burst into laughter.

"Seriously?" he asked. "Out of all the stupid things you two have argued about, this is what causes silence?" The more he spoke, the more laughter escaped him until he was almost bent over, clutching his stomach in pain. "Oh, I should've used this years ago if this was all it took."

"Shut up, Aknon!" Sarphi yelled after a long while of his laughter, causing us all to go silent. Tears filled Sarphi's' eyes and she stormed off ahead of us, sprinting.

Onyx followed quickly after her with a bark, leaving a trail of darkness behind him. "Wait!" Senka called to her as Prin ran past me. I figured that Prin was the one who wanted Sarphi to wait. Prin couldn't keep up with Sarphi at all, but she was putting up a good try.

The path was flat, so it really wasn't possible for them to go out of sight, which was a very big positive. I didn't mean to upset her this much, but maybe she'd been thinking about what she told me for the entire time Aknon, and I were down in that trap.