GRAVICTA

CHAPTER 2.

"Do you have a minute?" I ask, not sure if I should leave or stay but she smiles and drops the papers unto the desk in front of her.

"Sure. Have a seat." She sits up and rests her back to feel a little more comfortable.

I just walk in and sit down, keeping my bag on the floor beside the chair.

"Thanks. I actually wanted to ask, since you didn't want to talk about it in class," I say with caution and she tilts her head sideways in confusion.

"You mean the question you asked? About the death of the late King and his Queen?" A small smile is beginning to play on her lips.

"Yes, that." I nod with hopes that she wouldn't send me out of her office immediately.

She just laughs really hard causing me to widen my eyes. Uncomfortably, I look around the room to avoid her stare. The bookshelf close to the window behind her helps as I just focus on counting the number of books in it.

The sound of her chair scratching the floor grabs my attention again. I watch as she stands up, taking a moment to steady her breath before going towards the door and locking it so I'm guessing she's cool with us talking about it. Just in private.

"You know; I was expecting you to do just this," she says as she walks back to her seat.

"Really?" I raise a brow in confusion and she smiles.

"Yes. I knew you would come see me out of curiosity," she explains and I offer a small smile even if I am actually dying to know what really happened.

"Well, after the late King Lucifer was crowned, he married the late Queen Annie and they had a son a year later. They were truly the definition of love." She smiles as she looks up.

I follow her gaze only to see nothing but an exhausted ceiling. I fear this building will fall apart someday.

"King Lucifer also ruled as king in Hell. He would leave once in a while to check up on stuff going on in Hell and would tell the angel council to keep him updated when he returned so he wouldn't miss anything that happened in Gravicta while he was gone."

"When he had time, he would tell the young children stories of his experience in heaven. He always said that he regretted ever rebelling against God and making his friends fall with him. Everyone loved him." Her expression begins to change and I can see her smile fading.

"Well not everyone. Some of the Freestars didn't like the fact that we let the Fallens in our lives not to talk of even making one the king. About eleven years ago, there was another great rebellion," she says sadly and my eyes widen in surprise.

Oh no we didn't!

"Oh yes we did," she says and I realize I spoke my thoughts out loud.

"Some Freestars broke into the Royal Castle and started setting everything on fire. They made their way to the bedroom where the king and queen were asleep and..." She breaks down as she trails off, not completing what she intended to say.

Tears begin strolling down her cheeks. It starts looking to me as though she was close to the late royals.

"Did you know them? Like on a personal level," I ask and she wipes tears off her face.

"The late Queen Annie was my best friend," she says, looking down at the floor to hide her already red face.

I immediately get up and walk over to her, patting her back in an attempt to ease her up. It must have been really hard to take in the news that your best friend was murdered. I haven't lost a close one before but I can at least understand that.

A sudden thought pops into my mind.

"What about their son? Did they?" I say almost too loudly.

"I don't know. Nobody has heard anything about him. It's said that he just vanished," she says and a wave of relief washes over me. She gets up and takes a deep breath slowly but then exhales sharply.

"Thank you. I haven't spoken to anyone about this before." Her smile returns and I mirror it.

"Welcome. Thanks for talking to me."

I turn, picking my bag up and cleaning the bottom.

"I really need to get going then. I'm excited to finally get wings soon." I grin almost too hard that my cheeks start feeling the pressure.

"I'm happy for you dear. After 5 years of school, you're graduating in two days."

She quickly arranges a few things on her desk and starts heading for the door so I follow her out of the office.

"Get going then. I need to check up on something at the principal's office before heading home. I wouldn't want to keep you waiting." She smiles and places a kiss on my forehead.

It's kind of weird but I guess it's okay.

"Okay. Bye ma'am," I say and start heading out of the school.

Memories of what Mrs Purplestorm told me begins to flood my mind. It's just overwhelming to think that even after we killed a lot of Fallens, we still killed the first and best King and Queen anybody could ask for. I mean, we killed even the Queen.

"She was a Freestar for God's sake," I mutter.

My mood quickly turns bad as I walk back home. Everything around me seems to disappear and all I can do is try to imagine what the King's son would look like. I bet he's gone through a lot over the years. I also bet the Fallens must really hate us. Now we don't have a King. We just have a council or government or whatever it's called. This city isn't what it used to be from what my mom tells me. "What was the point in the first place? We ruined everything."

After walking a good distance, distracted by my thoughts, I finally see my house. It's not an overly big house but it's quite big enough. I hurriedly walk home, remembering I've spent more time in school than usual, which is not my fault though. My mom is in the sitting room working on the same sweater that she's been working on for the past three weeks. She's really obsessed.

"Hey Mom. Good evening," I say as I place a kiss on her cheek before sitting beside her.

"Good evening baby. How was school?" She doesn't look at me but she smiles.

"Ah, it was alright." I shrug and she looks up at me suspiciously, a playful smile on her lips.

"Okay. Why don't you go upstairs and freshen up? Tomorrow's going to be a long day, don't you think?" She smirks and I playfully push her shoulders. This makes her laugh a bit but she then continues making the sweater.

Mocking me and showing off her white wings so I'd see had become a hobby to her. Well I'm getting mine in two days. "Ha! Take that mom."

"I'll get you for that," she says and I realize that I said my thoughts out loud again.

With widened eyes and pouted lips, she tries so hard to show me her angry face but that only makes me laugh.

"I've got to rest mom," I say as I start heading upstairs.

"Not yet dear. Make sure you brush your teeth!" I hear mom yell and I roll my eyes.

"I know Mom. I'm sixteen not five," I yell back and her laughter sounds out loud through the building.

It takes me over fifteen minutes to freshen up and about thirty minutesto have dinner with Mom before going to bed. Sleeping isn't easy though. I justkeep thinking about getting my wings soon. At least that's what I was thinkingabout before I slowly start losing the so little grip, I had on myself and sooneverything goes blank.