Scroll of Starlight

Chapter Twenty Four

 BRANWEN

"You sure you're okay to bike?" Adrian asked me, concern written all over his face.

His house was the closest to the beginning of the pathway, so we met up at his house a few days later after the Cave meeting. We all had activities to partake in after school and didn't want to raise suspicion, so we decided to wait a little and then continue our search. Well, that and I wanted to rest my legs a little more.

I blinked a couple times, turning to look at him. "What? Oh, yeah. I was fully released to activities yesterday, I just have to be a little more careful than normal."

Adrian nodded, leaning back on his couch and allowing the sun to run through the windows to highlight on his dark skin. It was winter time, so the sun didn't cast much of a golden glow so much as a slight illumination. "Alright. Then you better be extra careful when we go out there. I'm guessing at some point we're going to have to walk."

I looked down at my blue watch. "I'm sure I'll be okay with you guys there. Also, Dean was supposed to be here a couple minutes ago, where is he?"

At that exact moment, a knock sounded from our left. Adrian instantly hopped up from the couch and pranced over to the door. As soon as he opened the door, Dean lifted his hand in hello.

"Sorry guys, I needed to do something for April really quickly." He said while shifting his weight from one foot to another, the wind slightly ruffling his hair. His eyes slid over to me and I hopped up, grasping my small bag from the couch.

"It's fine. I'm ready to head out anyways," I looked at Adrian. "Are you good?"

He seemed to be staring off into the distance, but wiped back into reality when I called to him. "Oh, yes." Shifting on his feet, he looked up the stairs hesitantly. "Let me just tell my Mom we're leaving."

Adrian quickly headed up the wooden stairs and I turned back to Dean, who leaned against the doorframe. "April? Really? She only gets home later on weekdays."

He crossed his arms over his chest, staring down at me. "Sometimes I hate that you know us well." I waited for him to continue to talk and he groaned, finally giving in. "I had to reschedule the therapist appointment for today."

"Dean! Why didn't you tell me? We could've done this tomorrow or another day!" I protested, slightly pushing his shoulder. "That's important too, this isn't worth losing a day over."

He glanced over my shoulder and sighed. "It's going to be raining for the rest of the week, Branwen. And the fact that I can't talk about this to her would kill me, so I need to complete this first."

I looked at him warily, but nodded in understanding. Keeping something from someone you are supposed to tell everything to can lead you down a bad track. I just hope that today we can find something different.

"The plan is a go, my dear friends." There was a sound behind me as I turned to see Adrian hopping down the stairs. "Let's get to finding something juicy."

Walking outside, we climbed onto our bikes and he took out the map he printed out. Since he was going to be the one leading us around, he decided to stay in the middle to show us the map. "Alright, so we are currently here at my house."

He pointed to the blue highlight on the map that supposedly was his house. Around that was a red pathway drawn to the end of the bike ride with an X. "I think that's about a 20 minute bike ride, are we okay?" I could tell he was directing that question towards me instead of Dean.