Behind |First book in The Risen Saga|

Chapter Two|Ava - A Maze With No Escape

Emma smiled, nodding. 

It happened in a blur of colors. Of scarlet red and sunlight orange. Of ice blue and evergreen. The colors were like splashes of paint on a blank canvas, something I knew my best friend would automatically think of. 

Then a flash of white, causing me to flinch away, closing my eyes. When I opened them, my mom was standing, leaning against the counter, and Emma was gone. Her hair wasn't knotted with black fluid, and she looked more confused than scared or angry. Everything looked like I had left it. 

"Mom?" I asked, walking over to her. "Are you okay?" I placed my hands on her shoulders, studying her face. 

She gave me a look of confusion before nodding. "Yeah, I'm fine," she said. "Just tired. It was a long day at work, I think I'll lie down."

Before I could say anything else, she walked out of the kitchen and down the hallway, disappearing from view. 

I turned around, laying my hands on the ledge of the sink and letting my body use it as support. My lungs took their first full breath I'd taken all today, allowing myself to revel in the feeling of air filling my lungs, cleansing me. 

There was no reasonable explanation for anything that had happened and I was just wondering why I wasn't completely freaking out. 

It was almost like I was used to this feeling, like nothing I'd experienced today was new. 

A gentle tap—almost unheard—jerked my attention to the window in front of me. Sitting on the ledge of the window was a small sparrow, it's brown wings ruffling as it looked around. 

Written on the window, in the condensation, was the word midnight. That didn't give me much information. It gave me the time, but that didn't matter if I didn't know where I was going. She must think I already knew. 

As I thought about it, I realized the only place that I could think of that I would know would be where I found the necklace. 

It didn't matter if I was right or wrong because I had a feeling she'd find me at midnight either way. 

When it was about thirty minutes until midnight, I slipped on my sweater and boots, and made my way outside. 

As I passed my mom's room, I stopped and back-tracked, peering in. She was laying on her bed, mumbling incoherent words brought on my sleep. Her hands gripped her blanket tightly, her knuckles turning white. 

I pursed my lips before walking in and giving her a light kiss on her forehead. Her hands relaxed some, loosely gripping the blanket. 

I wondered what she was dreaming about. My mom wasn't a very open person. I knew very few things about her past. I didn't even know how she had met my dad. 

But she didn't talk about him and I never brought him up because I knew it hurt her to think about him. 

I sighed and walked out of the room, walking out the backdoor. 

The swing-set was dusted with moonlight, the hole that had been in the yard completely gone—something I assumed had to do with what Emma had done earlier.

I sat on one of the two swings and waited. Even though it was so cold that I could see my breath, I waited because I was afraid of what the consequences would be if I didn't.

It wasn't until almost exactly midnight that she showed up, walking out of the shadows in a white dress, her transparent skin allowing moonlight to trickle through, like a ghost that had been lingering. She walked with amazing grace—grace I'd only seen before in my mother and grandmother.