Marked: Part 2; The Wronged

Chapter 68

The morning was a spooky one. The fog all around Amilia seemed to seep in without a sense or feeling of letting go. Amilia couldn't see very well, or hardly at all, should I say. She squinted her eyes to try to see the path in front of her. Yet, walking through the forest at dusk was not 'safe' as many people liked to consider. She tried to find her way around, yet nothing seemed familiar to her, luckily no one was around. She could hear something of a whisper in the distance, as if it were a dream. But she scraped herself earlier, and it was quite painful, she seemed to recall. Amilia continued to walk, even though she was anxious. And almost suddenly, that little voice became louder. She shrugged it off, refused to hear it. Amilia needed to get to the Market or else she might be late. The voice became periodical this morning, it came every few steps.

"Get off my back you mangy witch, I know!" She said aloud to herself.

Amilia squinted her eyes again. She couldn't believe the amount of fog this morning. It was probably that Unora taunting her. That was something Unora did like, she liked to toy with Amilia. Amilia often felt like a new toy being dragged around everywhere. Most of the time it got old and annoying, but other times it would become dangerous or out of hand. Yet most of the time she felt odd when Unora uses certain... phrases. Calling Amilia things only a mother might say to their own. Things that more than often made Amilia uncomfortable. My darling, sweetie, sweet heart, my child... she would tend to say to Amilia. And yet, there were things she would not dare tell anyone. Secrets from her childhood that were extremely sensitive and should have been hard to talk about. But, of course, she would ramble on, and on, where Amilia could barely understand or hear. Amilia tended to hate Unora's 'outbursts' that she had. Unora would suddenly bring things up, it reminded Amilia of some sort of hypochondriac. But, Amilia kept walking, or at least tired to. Once again there was still all this fog all around, it was kind of getting cold too. And suddenly, it disappeared, as if it were magic. But then Amilia realized that the terrain around her had lost most of its color. The grass was a blunt gray, the sky a light grey, the moon was white and the trees, they were nothing but pitch black. Only a few moments in the monochrome world, Amilia missed the green color of the grass and the fun filled colors of the trees. She hadn't the fondest idea of what was going on, or where she was, but she wanted to find out. She had been somewhere like this before, but it didn't look quite as aerie as the grave sight. Especially not since that night she had stumbled upon it with Akxfo. Wasn't that fun? She never heard the end of that from Akxfo, he still mentioned it from time to time. He just couldn't stop, and after all, that was three years ago. She hadn't seen the place since. She couldn't even go back there if she'd wanted to, she truthfully didn't remember how to even get there. Now that she could see better, Amilia continued to walk. It was still hard to tell where exactly she was, but she made do. After just a few minutes the color began to flow back into the forest. This of course made Amilia happy, therefore she smiled. It was a lot easier to tell the different parts of the forest apart now that everything was clear and colorful. As she continued on she began to hear rustling, as if something was following her. She stopped a moment to look around her. She didn't see anything in all the two minutes she stopped to look, but then, something appeared in the distance. Someone she saw at school from time to time, her substitute teacher, Mr. Barrenlord. It was peculiar to see him in the woods. He usually insulted nature on a daily basis. To see him walking around and about in the forest would be off, since he hated it 'oh' so much. Yet, she had been fooled before. He started to walk away and Amilia decided to follow him. She was very close to his coattails, it wasn't hard to keep his trail. And yet he wasn't sloppy at all, you could barely see his footprints on the wet ground. Amilia had learned the ability of stealth, so she was good at keeping quiet. Then again, she was used to creeping around by now. She peeked over a shrubbery that was in her line of view. Moving just a tad, Amilia managed to break a twig. Mr. Barrenlord seemed to look up and back, proceeded to grab something from his pocket and began to run. And so, Amilia did the same. She ran behind him, and surprisingly, she could keep up with him. Yes, she was still behind him quite a ways, but she was not dramatically behind him. She had been keeping up with not only Unora's training, but Akxfo's as well. Both of which were aggravating and incredibly time consuming. She didn't mind what Akxfo was teaching, but Unora on the other hand, she disliked. Mr. Barrenlord put his hand on a fallen tree to jump over it. He landed on the other side with near perfection. Amilia repeated his technique, perfectly mimicking it. She began to run again, but paused when she saw a new being clearly. She turned her head side to side looking for the now disappeared Mr. Barrenlord. The new figure stood in front of her for a moment. Amilia finally focused on them and realized the impossible, he was a Sok Arc. She turned her body completely to him, so that she faced him. Then he began to frantically look to the sides of his head, left and then right, before skidding off in one direction. Amilia, not wanting to lose him, ran his direction. She stopped almost immediately because he must have been too fast for her, he was gone. She stood back up, out of her stance. She looked around herself and realized that she was clearly lost. Amilia scratched her head like all confused people do. She was so focused on the man that she had forgotten where exactly she was going. Next she pressed her fingers together. She pointed with her thumb behind her and then pointed left and then right.