Vallen: The Marking (Vallen series #1)

Chapter 39

"I didn't check the paintings last time I was here." He said, swinging the door open. By the looks of it, all the workers did was replace the door. They didn't go inside and clean up the mess. There was still a bunch of melted plastic in the corner. The small door was still hidden behind a stack of boxes filled with building supplies.

"Alaric," I whispered as he opened the small door. "Fuck the paintings. It was just a robbery. Everyone lived. Let's just go." Alaric crawled through the hole.

"You won't die again, Eira." He assured me from the other side. "And if you do you'll just come back."

I took my first few steps into the room. "I don't think you understand how much dying hurts." I crawled after him. "And returning is even worse."

The torches had been casualties of the fire as well, so we had to go down the stairs in the darkness. Both of us had done it before, but I was a little more careful this time, not wanting to fall and take Alaric down with me. Luckily Alaric had left the bottom door open last time he was here, so we got a little bit of light as we went further down.

As always, I could hear the gushing of the river before we even entered the room. I followed Alaric closely. His eyes scanned the room, he looked at all the other paintings and objects until we reached the final end of the room.

There was a pool of blood on the floor. My blood.

Alaric glanced back, probably to stop me from seeing it, but I already had.

"You found me there." I just said. "I didn't even know for sure how I had died."

I didn't want to look up at the empty spot on the wall, fearing that the pain would start again. That the pool of blood on the floor would only become bigger. But I had to, I needed to see.

The spot was empty still. I waited for the shooting pain in my head, but nothing happened. I still felt the same as ever.

"You were right. It's gone." Alaric said, walking over to it and touching the wall as it would magically reappear again. "Do you think it has something to do with you?"

I raised my eyebrows at him. "Why would I have something to do with it?" I would be lying if I said that I hadn't thought about stealing it, but that's all it was. Thoughts. I couldn't make my way into a new world when the first thing I do is steal from the people who were giving me a free education.

"About the heroes I mean." Alaric glanced down at my blood. "You did die once you saw it, you said it yourself."

"The drawing was pretty accurate," I said. "Maybe a little rough around the edges, but they got everything right about Edda, even what she was wearing when she died."

We both looked at the wall in silence for a few minutes. The rock wall had moss growing over it, and looked dirty. But not behind where the painting was. That was fully clean, nothing had touched it since it had been put there.

"He was carrying several scrolls." Alaric remembered, breaking the silence. I glanced around the room. There weren't that many clear empty spots on the walls, like the painting of Edda had left. But there were stacks of paintings against the walls, someone could have easily taken the scrolls out of that one. We wouldn't have noticed. 

I walked over to one and started going through them. There were many paintings made of famous Vallens. I head Alaric mumble their names behind me. That was until we reached an empty frame. It was clearly a rushed job. There were still some edges of the painting left in the frame.

"Do you think we should tell someone?" Alaric said on a quiet tone.

"Woodville wouldn't do anything about it," I said as I brushed my fingers against the solid golden frame. "He'd probably make us take the fall for it. All of the other Professors will tell Woodville." I placed the frame back with the rest. "Look around. The only people that know of this place are you, me and whoever took those paintings. People will think we did it. Especially if we tell them what was originally on that wall."

"So we ignore it?" Alaric asked me hopefully. I smiled back at him.

"Of course not," I said. "But first we must survive our exams."