An Attic filled with Birds [Completed]

35. An attic filled with birds

Felix
I've been tired all day, and when my head hits my pillow in the evening I can't sleep. Riddle me that.

I'm laying on my bed. I'm covered by my blanket, but my arms are resting on top of it. I'm staring at the ceiling. I'm not doing anything but fiddling with the pieces of magic MacGuffin we found.

The curtains are closed, but the holes in them light up the room slightly. The moon is gone however, or covered, and the window is closed. I can see a round, black hole above me from where the chandelier used to be. It's quiet. I can hear myself breathe.

I managed to convince the guard from earlier to leave my room. I told him Damien never stood in my room either and that he would be making me uncomfortable. He believed me, and didn't struggle much with it.

He's not very good at his job.

The pieces in my hands feel cold. I carefully trace the sharp edges with the tips of my fingers. I can feel every little detail.

Out of pure boredom I start throwing them up, then catch them again. It's a little challenging in the dark, but it keeps me busy. It might even make me tired. I keep throwing them higher and higher.

At one point I hear one of the pieces hit the ceiling. In the dark, I don't see whether it made a dent or not. I'm not worried to turn a light on to look at it.

Of course, I was bound to throw crooked. One of the pieces goes in the direction of my feet. I sit straight up and bend forward to retrieve it. While I let myself fall backwards I throw it up again.

It hits the ceiling again, but there's more this time. It emits light. Light? I couldn't have imagined it; it's dark and I saw a light. It appeared and left again. I sit back up, and throw the stone to the ceiling.

Right before it hits it, it glows a faint, blue light. Once it starts falling down again it's gone. I do this some more before the realization hits me.

It glows when it's near another piece. And the other, known, piece is on my bed. Not at the ceiling. It's not near the ceiling. But it glows there.

❖

Felix
I rush out of bed, and leave my room with one piece in hand. When I open the door the guard flinches, but I speed walk away before he could say anything.

I scan the ceiling for anything that could lead me to a floor above. The elevator doesn't go up further than this floor. There aren't any stairs leading up there. I remember people cleaning up the attic before I left with Damien and Nora... but I can't remember where.

And even if I did, I wouldn't get the hatch open; the halls here are too tall. One chair wouldn't be enough, and I have no idea where to get a ladder at this hour.

I keep walking around in my pajamas. A patrolling guard here and there looks at me with a confused face. They don't say a word and keep walking.

It's colder in the hall than in my room. My bare feet on the tiles aren't helping either. I can feel the hair on my neck and arms standing up.

Disappointed, I leave to go back to my room. When I approach the double doors, the guard just nods at me with a shy smile. I hold the piece in my closed hand.

'Your highness,' is the only thing he says.

I go in without saying anything back. I put on a sweater over my pajama shirt and slip on thick socks. I then stand on my bed, and hold the piece in my hand to the ceiling. The other piece is where I left it; on my pillow.

I scrape the stone against the ceiling above me. I quickly find the right area. When I stand on the feet's end of my bed, and hold it right above my head, the piece starts to glow. When I move it around the area, I see it getting less bright. I locate the brightest spot.

Now... how do I get through the ceiling?

❖

Felix
I could jam something up the chandelier-hole. There's a lot of wires there, though. I'm not sure I want to risk that. Then again, I don't have much to lose anyway.

I find my phone on the nightstand. I turn on its flashlight and scan the ceiling. It all white and smooth. Except for that chandelier-hole. Different colored wires cross and connect. There's two wires coming out of the hole, I can see the copper within the plastic shell.

I walk to the back of my room, and into the bathroom. There's a ventilation grid, but nothing else. As soon as I walk out, I remember my closet. More importantly, I remember the hatch in the ceiling there.

I rush over and shine the light onto the ceiling. Bingo.

There's a chair in the room. I throw the jeans on it onto the floor, and move the chair to a position under the hatch. I step on it, and with a tug on the small string, the hatch opens with a creak.

With a little struggle, I enter the space above my closet. The air is thick. It's dark. There's not a single window. I can't see anything, except for the things I shine on with my phone's flashlight.

So this is the attic.

Dusty.

I shine my light around to look at the room.

It's a relatively small room, and by the looks of it it only covers half of my room, which is now beneath me. The attic that was cleaned out must not be connected to this room. If it is, they did a very bad job at cleaning it. My entire life, I have never seen anyone going up here.

The walls are made of wooden planks, and so is the floor. There's piles of boxes covering the entire ground, and some small carpets here and there. There's framed pictures on the walls. There's a globe next to me. Enormous amounts of books in a language I don't understand.

And there are birds.

Birds everywhere.

On the pictures on the walls. On random books that are littered around. Pictures of them knitted into the carpets. There's birds painted on some of the boxes. There are bird statues, both porcelain and glass-made; both hand-sized and human-sized. When I open the nearest box I find dinner set decorated with small birds and feathers. There's a birdcage in the corner.

Just... birds.

It's strange how I've lived under this my entire life, and never even questioned what would be behind the hatch in my own closet. What I do know, is that I never imagined this.

I'm reminded of the stone in my hand, and there's nothing left to do but to trace it over the floor and along boxes. And I do this for a while. A rather long while.

Together with the flashlight at first, but I soon realize I might not be able to see the glowing that way. I don't turn it off, though. That way I wouldn't see anything. I only lay my finger on it. That way, a dim, orange light spreads across the room.

And then finally, the stone emits a faint light. I'm squatting next to a box. I throw down my phone, and open the box. It's filled with small figures of, you guessed it, birds. With the stone in my hand I rummage through it. It glows brighter, then dimmer, then brighter again. I pick my flashlight back up and shine directly into the box.

There, on the bottom, I see a familiar color.That familiar blue color.