Four Hearts

Chapter 5

Zain
He woke up in a strange place. He remembers the night before. Zain had packed all his belongings into the bag that his uncle had given him. Everything except for his clothes. His uncle promised he was getting new ones. Zain had been so excited that he was leaving that he slept, holding his bag in his arms. Now he was somewhere completely different.

He was in a small room with one door on each side. Two ways he could leave if he wanted. He was sitting on a velvet seat that took up the entire length of the room. On the opposite side was another empty seat that was just like his. Each door had a hole that was filled with glass. What he could see beyond the glass was incredible.

Greenfields were moving fast past the small room. In the distance, Zain could see black rectangles, all of different sizes, that seemed to be topped off by a triangle. A pentagon, that's what Uncle Alex had called that type of shape, Zain thought. The sky was a brilliant blue, and in it was a bright yellow light that was shining down on him surrounded by white blobs. It was a beautiful sight. Zain could stare out the glass for hours.

Suddenly, the fields stopped moving. Zain could hear movement from outside the door. It suddenly hit him like a sack of bricks that he had probably been kidnaped like the characters in his favorite stories. He got as close as he could to the center of the seat, trying to form himself into a little ball.  He hears footsteps approaching the right door. As they get closer, he slides to the other side of the room. Zain presses himself up against the other door as if that would stop his captor from getting to him. The footsteps stop. Zain waits for the door across from him to open. When it doesn't, he sighs in relief. Guess they forgot about me. That's when Zain falls backward, hitting the dirt path that was right outside the small room. Above him was his uncle. Next to him was a man holding open the door that he fell out of.

"What are you doing on the ground, my?" Uncle Alex asks.

Zain comes to his senses and scrambles to his feet. Uncle Alex shakes his head and sighs as he pats Zain down to rid the dust and dirt on his clothes. The other man closes the door to the room and goes to the back of where he was staying moments ago. After getting a look outside the small room, Zain saw that there was another room next to his that the man and his uncle must've been in. The entire building was on wheels.

"Uncle Alex, why is the building on wheels?" Zain says with his head tilted, "Wouldn't it just roll away?"

That's the point, my boy." Uncle Alex grabs Zain's shoulder and chuckles, "You see, this here is called a carriage. It's used to being people from place to place. It's magic-powered, just like the lamp you had in your room."

"Fascinating," Zain declares with wide eyes.

"Yes, we had to leave early this morning to get to Ravenwood on time, and you were still sleeping, so I just had you carried onto the carriage. Today's a big day, and I wanted you to be well rested.".

"Where should I put these, Sir?" the man that had opened Zain's door asks from the back of the carriage. In his hands were leather bags in varying sizes.

"Just bring them to the boys inside, they'll know what to do from there," Uncle Alex instructs.

Then Uncle Alex runs to the back of the carriage where the man had gotten the bags from. He digs through the remaining bags and boxes, taking out a thin, black box. He hands the box to Zain, who stares at it in his hands not quite sure what he's supposed to do.