The Grey-eyed Serpent

Chapter 26: The Start of Summer

"Alix!"

Alix was pulled out of her thoughts, flinching away from the window where she was leaning, her eyes darting to where Draco was seated inside the compartment of the train, raising an eyebrow at her almost as if demanding to know why she was so preoccupied.

Still, Alix dares not to answer the questions in his eyes.

"What?" she feigns ignorance.

"What happened with you? You've been like this since the End-of-Tern Feast!"

Alix sighs, leaning to her right where Luna sat. "Nothing happened," she said, her eyes unconsciously travelling to where her soul mark resides, the feeling of cool serpent scales ever-present. She wonders if it were ever going to go away.

Luna silently caresses her hair, humming to herself an odd tune that Alix supposes is a lullaby. The gesture was comforting, something Alix needs most at the moment. No doubt Luna must have already seen what has happened, who Alix met.

She returns her eyes towards the green landscape outside the train's window, the bickering between her friends turning into unintelligible mumbles as Alix once again returns to the silence of her mind.

If someone were to ask her what she feels right now, she wouldn't be able to tell them an answer.

Her mind was up in the clouds even after the sound of the train's horn vibrated throughout each of the compartments, signalling that they have finally arrived at platform 9 ¾. Alix was pulled out of her thoughts once again when she felt someone tap her shoulder. When she looked, it was to see the concern on her friends' faces, all of them already stood up with their trunks in their hands.

"Oh, I apologize," Alix said, absentmindedly reaching up to grab her own trunk, failing to see how her friends shared glances at each other.

Alix doesn't remember much about what happened after. She knew she said her goodbyes to her friends and then met her parents and sister, then they apparated home and everything else was a blur. Still, when she finally comes out from the comfort of her own mind, she gives out a long and heavy sigh, laying her back and spreading her arms on her bed where she was apparently seated after she came home with her parents.

She turns to the side, hurriedly removing the outer robes of her uniform before removing the cuffs of her white sleeve, rolling them to her elbows to see her mark. It was the same, still, the serpent was unmoving, its head resting on her wrist, and the flowers, were the same as well. Nothing had changed.

So why...why did she get the feeling that the lilacs were blooming – no – why did she feel them blooming against her arm? As if they were being blown by the wind while she was running her hands through a field of lilacs? Alix swore she could smell them when she met...well, she smelled the scent of lilacs, as well as the feeling of cool scales slithering around her arm.

Curious.

Alix wanted to ask someone. Though she would never manage to ask anyone without them asking if she had met her soulmate.

Alix was not ready for that question. Not just yet.

"Alix?" the girl in question turns to the entrance of her sleeping area where she saw Althea peeking her head with a worried look on her face.

"Thea, what is it?" she asked, gesturing for her sister to sit beside her.

"Did something happen?" Althea asked.

Alix opens her mouth before closing it again. It was almost an uncontrollable habit of hers to tell her sister everything that was going on with her life. This is not something I want her to know yet, Alix thought.