Stone Wing: The Steinur Trilogy

Chapter 2

"Alice, It's time to wake up I have to get to work!" 

The familiar voice of her older sister blasted through the closed door of her small room like it was the same decibel count as a jet engine firing up. She let loose a soft groan as she shifted in bed, her mess of fire blessed hair splaying out on all sides of her head as she did so. It was summer break, she deserved this. She needed this precious few extra hours of sleep to catch up on all the late nights and early mornings she spent at school, why could no adult ever understand that huh? Of course her small action of defiance did not last very long. Her elder sibling soon knocked obnoxiously loud on the wood of her door and then swung it wide with a sarcastically cheery entrance and a dangerously sweet tone of voice. 

"Alice, up please." 

This earned yet another loud groan of exasperation from between her lips as she rolled back over and opened her eyes to look at her sister already primed and ready for the day. Her long dark hair was neatly done back in a pony tail that kept it out of her way for work. Her features were pretty, heart shaped almost, and her stature somewhat short. However despite her attractive looks and smaller stature than most people she felt rather sorry for anyone who dared to get in her way. Nothing was Scarier than her sister when she was angry, Alice had learned that many times over. So with a loud sigh she just sat up in bed and moved her hands to push away the frizzing strands of hair that dangled over her eyes so she could see the world clearly without any filter as she spoke tiredly. 

"Kenzie..what time is it?"

"It's seven, now up. I made breakfast its waiting for you, I cant wait up so ill be heading out ok?" Kenzie stepped across the open space of the room and leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of Alice's messy bed head. "Love you, be productive please." and with that she was gone. Off to work. Alice just sighed loudly one more time and let her arms stretch wide, working all the kinks and soreness out of her muscles inch by inch. If she was getting up at seven in the cursed morning she was gonna take her sweet time doing it. Even through the curtains that draped themselves over the small windows on either side of her bed the golden sunlight began to seep into the room. She knew even if she tried to lay back down and sleep she wouldn't be able to at this point. She was never a morning person but if she found herself awake it became unnaturally difficult to fall back asleep. So instead of wasting time she just slid herself out of bed, leaving the sheets a rumpled mess, and stood up tall. Well..as tall as she could manage with her small build. She stood there for a few moments inspecting her visage in the standing mirror settled nicely beside her bed. Her lions mane of fiery red hair fell down on each shoulder like wildfire burning through a forest. Her freckled features looking unflattering messy and devoid of make up at this early hour. Even her usually sparkling emerald eyes lacked the energy that commonly danced behind them. Typically this was how most people looked in the mornings but Alice was always someone who held herself to a higher standard of appearance. What was the point of having looks if you didn't use them? That's what her mother used to tell her. However lately she found herself not following much advice. Maybe it was because she was trying to come up with her own advice to share, or maybe she just simply didn't care. Whatever the reason it stopped her from going about her usual morning ritual and cleaning herself up. Instead she just let a soft sigh fall from her lips and snagged a loose blanket and wrapped herself up in it like it was a cape. 

Her bare feet made their way across her messy floor all the way to the door that still stood ajar that led out to the very small space of the studio apartment she and her sister shared together. It was obviously not very big, tiny in fact. But they had lived there for years, so every facet of it had become filled with memories of them together, both old and new. From the way the front door frame was marked with little lines to show how Alice was growing, to the dents on the bottoms of the pots and pans when her and Kenzie used to play on them like they were drums together. Even the smell that lingered in the air just made it feel safe and warm to her. This was home, even if it was just paid in rent. Her feet moved her across the cool tiled floor of the kitchen to the small creaking table that sat in the center of it, on its surface was a bowl of cereal and a glass of OJ, this brought a small smile to her lips. It was the same breakfast Kenzie always made her since they were much younger. It wasn't that she couldn't afford anything better, or even that they didn't have the ingredients to make an omelet or something, it was just that Kenzie was downright awful at cooking anything that required more than tossing itself in a bowl and adding some liquid to make it taste ok. Sometimes Alice couldn't really tell who took care of who. However she never complained, instead she just sat herself down and settled in, she of course slid her phone from her pocket and opened it up to scroll through current events and news, texting the occasional friend to see if anyone else was actually awake at this god awful hour during the summer while she munched away at her food. With little surprise she received not a single response. This just made her sigh and slowly slouch back into her seat dramatically. She wasn't ready to actually make herself presentable for the real world, which meant she was confined to the apartment for now. She had planned on going out and taking some pictures for her summer project but her plan was to do that not long after she woke up past noon with several hours of cushion sleep to help her lack of motivation. 

So now she found herself in a dilemma, one that many people around the world surely have. To suck it up and have a productive day..or to lounge it away on a couch watching TV and eating some crappy food while she stayed put in her pajamas. All of these thoughts were going through her head, the pros and cons being weighted with strong consideration as she took her dishes to the sink and began to wash them out and clean them as she always did when it started. The sound was just a small rumble at first, nothing new seeing as their Apartment rested right beside a elevated train track that ran around the city. But soon the rumbling grew into a violent vibration, that that caused the dishes to clink in the cupboards and the water at the bottom of the sink to jolt around violently. Alice furrowed her eyebrows together and moved her attentions far from the cleaning of dishes in the sink at this point. Her hand raised and pulled aside the small curtain that covered the sink window to peer outside, there was no train. Her eyes widened just barely for a mere second before she quickly dropped the curtain and moved back to the table, sliding herself under it and ducking her head. She had read somewhere that was a safe way to wait out earthquakes. But in Boston? an Earthquake? Since when did that ever happen here? Suddenly a loud ringing noise began to fill the air, soft and hardly noticeable at first but quickly rising in volume and density. It got so loud Alice let out a scared scream and moved her hands to cover her ears as it pierced the air. It continued to rise and rise, cracking the glass on all the windows and shattering a few cups and dishes inside the cupboards until suddenly all of it stopped. Just all at once the cacophony of chaos ceased to exist and there was just silence. Alice remained hidden away under the table in fear, her small body shaking slight from adrenaline and a healthy mix of terror. slowly she opened her eyes and peered around the room, it was normal. Nothing out of the ordinary besides the few shards of glass the littered the floor in the kitchen space. She let her hands fall away from their places guarding her ears and she tentatively crawled out from underneath the dining space to look around in utter confusion. What in the actual hell was that? Any of it? She reached for her phone and quickly unlocked it, going to her contacts until she found her sisters number, however just before she pressed the button to call she stopped herself. Even though she was scared, even though she had no idea what was happening, what good would it do to call her? She probably wasn't even at work yet. Besides what would she say? 'Hi sis, yeah so some poltergeist crap just happened at the apartment and have the dishes and all the windows are totally trashed. Just thought I would let you know'. She grimaced at the conversation that would be had after such a phone call. No, she would just have to handle this on her own. Alright so first things first, she had to clean up. But then what? where did she go from there? She just sighed loudly, something she found herself doing all too often lately and just set her phone down before rubbing her face and letting herself think. It was an isolated incident, maybe she just didn't see the train outside, maybe that ringing noise was its breaks being faulty or not oiled properly or something explainable, she would just tell her sister that when she got home. Maybe she was just going crazy because of her lack of sleep. Either way she just needed to do damage control. So instead of going to her sister, researching anything, or even checking outside, she grabbed a broom and a pan and began to clean up the apartment. After all, poltergeists and demons didn't exist so it had to be explainable right? 

Alice simply shook her head and took another slow calming breath before going about her business. After she finished cleaning the glass and tossing out the broken pieces she cleaned herself up. Shower, brushed her hair, flossed her teeth, the works. She tossed on her favorite outfit, one that ironically portrayed fall colors, meaning a dark green shirt, a pair of nice bleached blue jeans with a few stylish holes planted along the legs and her usual leather jacket that always seemed just a tad too big. She snagged her camera and her phone and set out for the day. She didn't put much thought into what had happened, as a normal human would she simply chose to ignore the terrifying experience and write it off as her own lack of attention to detail. This was only bolstered by the fact that after she had taken the gated lift down from their floor to the lobby, walked through and waved hello to Walter, the friendly old desk attendant, and stepped outside to take a look at the pristine and untouched brick wall of the outside of their apartment she saw nothing out of the usual. She found that anxious knot tied up in her stomach soon relaxed and melted away into a relieved sense of understanding. Now instead of dreaming about horrors attacking her home she could just focus on taking pictures. So she did, but never did she consider that just because she could not see anything, did not mean it wasn't there.