Spirit Animals: The Stolen Crown

Chapter 9

Nazeer woke up a few minutes before sunrise. He was barely able to sleep for an hour at times and kept waking up during the night. His nightmares hadn't gotten any better making even harder to stay asleep. 

The same scenes played throughout his dreams. Their house catching fire, his father screaming from the pain of the fire and at Nazeer to run, and him obeying and not looking back. At this point the only reason he did fall asleep was because of his exhaustion. The small snippets of rest he was able to get were only for about half  an hour at most. Needless to say, he was exhausted. 

He rolled his sleeve up and looked at the tattoo of his animal that resided over his wrist. He felt a pang of guilt for not talking or showing any kind of affection for his spirit animal. He assumed that Maki would be fine and his energy wouldn't deplete if he was in passive state. 

Guess I should let him out he thought. He held out his hand with his palms facing the ceiling, and in a flash Maki appeared on his palm. Nazeer brought out some roots he had in his pack and gave it to him. He immediately started gnawing at it with his teeth devouring it causing Nazeer to feel guilty again.

He looked at the bed next to him and saw Kai was still snoring away. Suddenly a thought struck his head. He could go explore the castle and see if he could find the crown he saw in his dream. He had feeling that he was supposed to find it for some reason and that it was here in Greenhaven. 

The only problem was that he didn't know anything about the layout of the castle and he didn't even have a map. He also had to remember why he was here in the first place. Finding his brother and his mom was his top priority. He couldn't risk getting caught sneaking around the castle looking suspicious. 

Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that if he found the crown then it would help lead him to his brother. It was important for sure but he had no idea where to start. 

"Arghh, this would be so much easier if Dad or Nazfir were here" he growled to himself. He felt tears forming in his eyes and immediately wiped them away. The last thing he needed was to start crying and wake up Kai. Nazeer decided to stay in the room for now and see what there was. He saw that the nightstand had drawers and went to it as quietly as possible and opened them.

The first drawer on the nightstand had books inside. Three books to be exact. 

Maybe I can find something about the crown, Nazeer thought. However, he quickly found out that they wouldn't be of any use. The first book he picked up had a green cover with a picture of a castle. The title was in yellow and read The History of Greenhaven.

The cover of the second book had various animals drawn over it with the title in red saying The Great Beasts. Nazeer assumed that it talked about the Great Beasts, how they came to be and what happened to them over the years.

The third book had a blue cover with the title in red saying Heroes of Erdas. Nazeer decided that it would be decent book to read even if it didn't have anything about the crown. He remembered his dad saying that they were descended from a famous hero in Nilo. Maybe the book had something about that person. He decided to keep reading the book until Kai woke up.

"Oh, you're awake. Didn't know you were an early riser," Kai said yawning. Nazeer ignored what he said and asked a question that had been nagging him since yesterday.

"What exactly are we going to do? You said something about combat training yesterday. What's that about that?" Nazeer said. 

"Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that. So basically since I have combat training today you'll be coming with me since I'm showing you around the castle and everything. Everyone has schedules they stick to in a way and all the new recruits have training in the castle for various things until they get sent out on a mission." Kai explained. 

Nazeer cringed when he heard the explanation. It sounded so much like school. He did not want to remember the school he went to back at home. Horrible was the least of it. 

"Uh, is that your spirit animal?" Kai asked shaking Nazeer out of his horrendous thoughts of school.

Nazeer mentally slapped himself for keeping Maki out. He hadn't wanted anyone to know about Maki but he knew he couldn't keep him a secret forever. "Yes. He is my spirit animal. What about it?" 

Kai turned away and shuddered. "Nothing. Lets go to the dining hall." Nazeer went to the bathroom to wash himself. He changed into the spare clothes he had in his pack and went with Kai to the dining hall. They went to the dining hall and they got their breakfast which was some fruit and bacon. They ate quickly and went to the training room. On the way there Nazeer attempted to ask a few questions.

"Uh, hey Kai, does Greenhaven have any kind of like, uh treasure?" 

"Yeah, I suppose it does. Why are you asking?" Kai asked looked at him questioningly.

"Nothing! Its just that my dad told me a lot about Greenhaven and how he used to work with the Greencloaks. He never really talked about treasure or anything like that no matter how many times I asked him. So it was just a question on my mind." 

Nazeer could feel how awful of a lie it was the moment it left his mouth. Kai looked like he was running scenarios in his head. Nazeer wondered if Kai was going to accuse him of trying to steal from the Greencloaks and sound some kind of alarm.

"Yeah I guess so. I wouldn't really say treasure though, they're more like artifacts. Stuff handed down from generations to generations, like the amulet that is passed down to every leader. Olvan, the previous leader had it until he retired and had Conor take over the position, so now he has it."

Nazeer realized he was holding his breath and let it out. He frowned since it wasn't what he wanted to hear. If Greenhaven only had artifacts, then there was no way a crown would be part of it. The crown in his dream was polished and shiny, something like that would surely be considered treasure and well kept, not a dusty old artifact that would be kept locked up in some kind of storage room.

"Well we're here. You ready?" Nazeer nodded and opened the door just wanting the day to end.