The Rising Star - Alexia Putellas

Part 130

The moment we stepped inside, the light switched on. In the middle of the room was a huge carpet with a table. On it were eighteen cups with letters in them. Nine in the upper row, three in the middle and six below that.

There was a chalkboard on either side of the door we just came through and two more on the other side of the room. On our right there was a small cabinet hanging on the wall but obviously it was locked. On top of it were candles, just like in the corner of the room with a fire bowl and matches.

We all started to investigate the room, looking for clues, listing everything that could be one but it was taking us nowhere till Jana said something.

"Patientia est virtus." She read the sentence that was spelled in small cups on the table.

"Patience is a virtue." I said without paying it any mind, looking for clues.

"Of course you would know." Leila scoffed and playfully rolled her eyes.

"Okay, and what do we do with it?" Jana looked at me again, this time I did turn around but I shrugged my shoulders but that's when I noticed something.

"Maybe we have to fill the glasses?" I pointed out. Ana got closer and just like me noticed that they weren't completely filled.

"Ellie's right. We should fill them up completely." The Swiss grabbed a bottle that was standing on the side and started filling them.

"Alright, that's all of them. What now?" Mapi clapped her hands together, maybe a bit too loud, causing Leila to jump and glare at the defender.

"Patientia est virtus. Now we wait." I told them and kept staring at the glasses.

It only took a few seconds for some of them to turn black, only leaving four letters. T, E, S, T. Leila rushed over to the small cabinet and put in the code to open the lock.

Inside the cabinet was a battery and some steel wool. Leila took it out of the cabinet and curiously looked at it. I, on the other hand, immediately knew what I had to do.

"We need to make a fire." I grabbed both the steel wool and the battery and placed the wool inside the fire bowl. Carefully I held the battery against it, successfully setting the wool on fire.

"Queenie, you really are a genius!" Ana kissed the side of my head and lit the candles around us but now the question was, what do we do with the candles?

We were moving the candles around, looking for something, some clue but nothing happened, that was until Mapi stood by one of the chalkboards too closely.

"Mapi, stay still!" I yelled at the defender when she was about to move. I held onto her wrist and lifted it closer to the board. Leila saw what I had seen and immediately grabbed a candle and did the same.

"Search." I pushed Mapi's hand, in which she was holding the candle, closer to the board.

"Help." Leila read and then told Ana and Jana to do the same with the other two boards.

"Inside." Jana read and Ana finished, "The basement".

"Yeah, no, that's a hard pass." Leila placed down the candle on the table and crossed her arms over her chest.

"We don't even know where the basement is." Mapi rolled her eyes at our best friend.

"I don't care. I'm not going." She shook her head.

"Bibi, listen close and listen carefully. There's a certain brunette on the other team that would love to kick my butt and I don't want that to happen so get yourself together." I took a hold of Leila's shoulders and made her listen. The dark haired girl only stared at me but I seemed to get my point across because at the end of my speech she simply nodded.