In the morning, I woke up and stumbled downstairs and ran my fingers through my hair to untangle it. Once I got my hair untangled, I braid it. Then a knock came from my front door and scared me causing me to jump. I quickly answered it, and it was none other than Ruge. "Hey, Ruge, you're up early" I said and Ruge nodded. "Yep, it's better to start as early as possible so I could get done faster" Ruge said as he took out his hammer. "Well by all means come on in, I'll leave you to your work" I said as I let him in.
I then left to collect more of the wild berries that grew around my house. Once I had my small berry breakfast I wandered into town. I quickly turned my attention to Alex who was sitting on the bench that I first saw Neco at. He looked tired and was slumped over and looked as if he was trying hard not to fall asleep. And I guess I was ready to get my face bit off, so I went to check on him.
"Alex? Hey are you ok?" I asked, trying to keep my voice low. "Piss off" He responded, he didn't even bother to look up at me. "I will once you tell me that you're alright" I whispered, and this caused him to look up. "I'm fine, now go away" he said as he gave me a glare, he had dark circles under his eyes and looked as if he could just fall over and pass out any minute. "Ok I will" I said and turned to leave but before I did leave, I took out a small handkerchief that had some berries wrapped up in it. It was tied up in a little knot to keep the berries in. I turned back to Alex and quietly set them next to him, then I left. I only turned my head to see what he would do once I got far enough away from him. And he was sitting there with a small smile eating the berries which I guess made me smile too.
I had wandered around for a while before stumbling upon Lilith. "Oh, hi Lilith" I said waving to her. "Emma Hi, how are you?" She asked, she had her normal guard outfit on, and her hair was slightly messy. "I'm good, how about you?" I asked. Lilith looked down and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "I'm fine, just a little tense. Alex was out all night and wouldn't come back in. gosh he can be annoying at times he wouldn't even tell me why'' Lilith said. I nodded knowing that he was pretty annoying. "So, what are you up to today, Emma?" Lilith asked and I shrugged as I looked around the area. "I might just clean up around the village, some spots seem to need some attention" I said, and Lilith gave me a nod. "That would be nice, this old village has seen some things" Lilith said and then left to probably find Alex.
I then found a nice little corner of the village to work on, no one lived over on this side as far as I was aware. I seemed to have found that I liked cleaning, it was calming to just organize and clean things up and make them neat. A few hours later I had finally finished cleaning everything up, at least from the little corner I was in. As I was examining my work, I had noticed a strange little dot of light in the woods that surrounded this side of the village. It was a light blue color and seemed to just be hiding a few trees in. I rubbed my eyes thinking that I could have just overworked myself and was seeing things in the hot summer sun but no it was there. I stood there for a moment just kinda looking at it before I made my move towards it.
I made it to the first tree when it suddenly dashed further into the woods. I quickly started for it again but when I got close it moved away again this time even further into the woods. I chased after it mostly out of curiosity of what it was. I hopped over fallen logs, and through large patches of moss. But every time I got close to it, it would move away. The moment I broke through the tree line of a small little clearing I finally caught it.
I had trapped whatever it was inside my hand, it felt warm and fuzzy. I carefully opened my hand to see it and it didn't try to fly off but instead it hovered in my hand, it was a faint blue now, not a nice bright light blue that had caught my attention before. I poked at it wondering what it was before I felt a chill run up my spine. I looked up to see a large oak tree which stood tall and sturdy in front of me. I turned back trying to see the village but there were just trees everywhere. I hadn't noticed that I had gone so far. I looked down at the little ball of light and it looked almost transparent now and didn't have the fuzzy texture anymore, it didn't even feel like anything now. Suddenly a large gust of wind steadily blew freezing cold air at me which I responded by moving the ball of light closer to my chest. Then all I saw next was a flash of light.
The next thing I knew I was being shook awake by Alex. He looked like he was talking to me or yelling at me, but I couldn't hear anything. I looked around for a moment before passing back out. I woke up in a bed somewhere I didn't know. Once it connected in my head that I was in some random bed I shot up and quickly looked around only to see Ava sitting next to me. She looked startled to see me.
"Emma sweetheart, are you ok?" Ava asked as she shoved her book down in her seat and rushed over to me. "What happened?" I asked. "Oh, we don't know, we were hoping you knew. Alex said he heard you scream and ran in the direction he heard you from" I looked down remembering that short time I was awake. "He said you were on the ground by a large oak tree, he said it was weird because of how big that tree was and that we can't see it from here" Ava placed her hand on my head and quickly rushed to grab something. "I remember the tree, but I thought I had run out pretty far" I said, and Ava shook her head. "Oh, it's rather close by, Alex is with Nico and Olive right now trying to figure out what it is," Ava said as she handed me a glass of water. I gulped down the water rather quickly.
I looked down at my hand and quickly remembered the little ball of light that I had, I looked around the room wondering where it had gone. "Are you ok sweetie?" Ava asked. "I remember I had a little ball of light or something like that, where did it go?" I looked around the room, it was neat and homie with little nicks and knacks here and there. I pulled the blanket up off my legs and tried to get up, but Ava stopped me. "Hey, you still need some rest ok and as for your little ball of light, I don't know where it is, Alex didn't say that there were any little balls of light around" Ava said, and I looked down in disappointment. "I'm not that tired" I said but Ava gently pushed me down and covered me with the blanket. "Just stay in bed for right now, I don't want Alex seeing you. He'll lose his mind; he seemed pretty worried but then again, he's really tired today" Ava said, and I nodded.
About an hour had passed and I was just sitting in bed looking out the window like a little kid wishing to go outside. Ava had brought me some food a few minutes before and went outside to work on her porch. Everything seemed so calming but something felt off about it. I had begun to drift off into daydream territory before Alex had shown up with Nico.
"Emma you're awake!" Nico said as he ran in. Alex however stayed quiet. "Are you ok? What happened? Did you see anything weird?" Nico asked and I shook my head. "I don't know what happened, I'm fine though" I said. "Fine?! You wouldn't even wake up before! That's definitely not fine" Alex said, he sounded mad but he looked worried. "Look, I'm fine, I feel just fine, in fact I feel really good. I don't know what happened there but whatever it was it didn't hurt me" I said as I placed my hand to my chest.
But something felt off, the skin on my chest felt weird when I touched it, it didn't hurt but it tingled a little and it was freezing. Nico and Alex must have known something was up.
"Emma, are you ok?" Nico asked. "My chest feels a little funny, it doesn't hurt it just feels off" I said and Nico looked at Alex who was looking out the window. "Ok this is going to sound a little weird as I say it but can we see?" Nico asked. Nico looked calm like he didn't at all mind but Alex's face turned as red as a tomato. "What?! you can't just ask her that, she'd have to take her shirt off and such an-" Alex was cut off by Ava grabbing his shoulder and dragging him outside. I watched as he let her drag him off and Nico turned his attention back to me.
"I know it's an uncomfortable question, I just want to see if something happened that we should be worried about" Nico said and I nodded in response. "It's fine, I understand, just give me a moment" I said as I began fiddling with my shirt and it wasn't like I didn't have anything else on, in fact I had a white tank top on. Once it was off we could very clearly see a light glow come from my chest. The mark looked a lot like a snowflake. "You said it doesn't hurt right?" Nico asked after spending a few minutes examining the mark. "No, It doesn't hurt at all, do you know what this is?" I said and Nico shook his head no. "Sorry Emma, I've never seen anything like this, I haven't even read anything like this either, it's quite strange" Nico said. "I guess we'll just have to figure it out one way or another" I said as I grabbed my shirt.
"This is very strange, say how did you find that tree?" Nico asked. "Oh I saw a little ball of light, I didn't know what it was so I went to investigate it but it kept flying away from me and once I got to the tree it finally let me catch it" I said and Nico nodded. "It could have been leading you to the tree," Nico muttered. "While if you say you're fine then I'll leave this for later, but for now don't go following any more balls of light please" Nico said in a much more clear voice and I nodded. "Good, I'll tell Ava to let you go, if anything weird happens tell me ok?" Nico said. "Of course I will, you're like the smartest person here at least that I know of, if there was anything wrong you'd be the first to know" I said and Nico smiled brightly.
After a few minutes of trying to piece together everything that had just happened I got up. I had just made it to the door when I noticed Alex sitting on the finance looking out on the village. I slowly tried to tiptoe around him hoping he wouldn't see me but the second I was out the door he was looking at me with an uncomfortable glare. "Hey, I'm just gonna go" I said awkwardly as I tried to scare away. "What were you doing out there?" Alex asked in an oddly calming voice. "I uh saw something and I may have chased it and found myself there" I said as I rubbed the back of my neck. Alex gave me a grumpy look before turning back away from me. "Don't do that, you don't know what's in the woods" Alex said. "Yeah understood, sorry for making you worry" I said but Alex didn't reply so I just left.
After a few minutes I found Lilith looking out at the woods. "Lilith! Hi, are you ok?" I asked and Lilith looked at me with a relieved look. "The better question is, are you ok? We were worried sick" Lilith said as she placed her hands on my shoulders. "I'm fine, just a little confused, that's all" I said and Lilith just couldn't help but to smile. "I'm never going to hear the end of this from Alex, he's going to talk my head off and then some" Lilith said and I could help but laugh. "You can always hide out at my house, Neco has done so before and it worked like a charm" I said and Lilith started giggling. "Oh you're gonna be the death of me" Lilith said as she hugged me. "I'll try not to" I said and she gave me a warm smile as she pulled away. "Good now you should do something that won't get you hurt" She said and she turned away leaving me to wonder what I should do.
I later found myself by the pond pulling weeds and such. The little stone bridge was quite strong for its old age and didn't look like it was coming down any time soon so I just cleaned up around it. However when I touched the water I found myself quickly having to stop to warm my hands which is strange because just the day before the water was warm. Now it is ice cold. But I pushed through and finished up before Ruge made his way to me.
"Well your house is almost done, just give me about a day or two and it'll be good as new" Ruge said as he whipped dust off his hands. "Oh that's great, thank you again for doing this for me" I said and Ruge nodded. "I know you'd probably been asked this a bunch already but are you alright? You gave everyone quite the scare earlier" Ruge said. "Oh I'm fine, just a little confused about the whole thing" I said. "Whatever it is, I'm sure you'll figure it out," Ruge said.
Ruge then left for work and I continued fiddling with the weeds and the oddly cold water. Once night had begun to set I had headed back to Ava's who let me stay the night there. She treated it as if we were having a little sleep over.
Sleeping, however, was difficult. I was restless, cold, and everytime I tried to sleep I was woken up by a voice. The voice was quiet but loud at the same time. It was of a woman or even a little girl. But it only giggled and said one thing. "Find us, help us" The voice rang in my ears and at some point I had to get out for some fresh air.
I quietly got up off the floor and away from all the blankets and tiptoed out the door to the porch. Once I made my way out the door I noticed Alex sitting on the steps of the porch. He looked as if he was falling asleep but he was trying to fight it off.
"Alex? Hey are you ok?" I asked. Alex quickly jumped up and turned to me with a startled expression. "You should be asleep" Alex said once he calmed down. "I can't sleep, but you on the other hand need to sleep before you pass out in the middle of the street" I hissed, and Alex rolled his eyes. "Don't tell me what I need to do, now go to bed" Alex said as he turned away and headed down the steps from the porch. "I will, but please go to sleep yourself" I said, and he just waved me off. I then turned back in and layed down.