Glitches (Book 1)

Chapter 44: Claire

Before I begin with this next chapter, I would like to thank you all for getting me to 2K votes and almost 15K reads. This is the best Christmas present ever! I also have the first chapter of The Ice Queen of Lessaenes up for anyone who's curious about Saralee.

And of course, happy holidays to all of you awesome people who are reading this book :D

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"Stop!" Yelled the reg who sat on a stool at the bottom of the staircase that led up to the 51st floor. "Only Jade and Amanda are allowed up there."

"Amanda asked me to meet her there at 2:00 today," I told her.

"Hm, I don't see you listed on here," she said, looking down at her phone. "Did you receive an official summons?"

"Um...no," I shrugged.

"Sorry," she shook her head. "No summons, no entry."

"But Amanda told me to-"

"Sorry, Claire."

Ugh! How could someone as smart as Amanda overlook something like this? As much as I hated having to see her, I wanted answers. Soon, a really stupid idea began to form in my head.

"Remember this morning?" I asked, trying to sound like the confident rebel WGO thought I was. "Yeah, that's never going to happen again if you don't let me go up there."

"I do remember this morning," she rolled her eyes. "Let's see, I woke up, got dressed, and came to work. I think that's going to keep happening for the rest of my life, thank you."

"What..." I looked around fearfully, and almost as if my silent accusation had summoned her, I heard Amanda's voice from behind me.

"Let the girl go, Angela," she snapped crossly.

"Oh, of course," her eyes widened and her face seemed to turn pale as she handed me an orange wristband. "Wear this...at all...times so we know you're...authorized," she managed to croak out.

As I nodded and put on the paper wristband, she turned to Amanda. "What's going on? This is the second time this week!"

"Your job is to guard my staircase, not to question who climbs it," she said coldly. "Come on, Claire," she gestured to the stairs and I began to follow her up.

I felt electricity spark in my body as we climbed higher and higher. The light turned blue and blue dust coated almost everything. Somehow, I loved this blue dust. I wanted to roll in it and stuff it in my mouth.

"Sorry about the dust, I was practicing this morning," Amanda shrugged. "And please try to refrain from eating it for now."

"Why do I even want it? It's powder!" I exclaimed.

"Relax, it's perfectly natural," Amanda chuckled. "Newly Awakened Lessaenites always crave Aura dust. The more powerful your Aura, the stronger the feeling. They say Queen Saralee devoured five barrels of the stuff in a single day when she Awoke!"

"Now," she said, motioning for me to sit down at a thick wooden desk. "I know you have a million questions for me, and I know if I answer those questions you will just have more. So I'm going to do something better than answering your questions myself. I'm going to give you back your memories."

"My...memories? You mean my memories were...erased?" I asked, completely in shock.

"You're not who you think you are, Claire," Amanda said gravely. "You have unbelievable power within you, but you are also in incredible danger. There are people who would do anything to have your power for themselves, and most of them are not so nice."