"Don't try to open it," Cecilia said. "Sit down. Mount Layat will show you what you want to know."
"That's where we are now?" Ralph asked, sitting down on the floor beside Cecilia. I might even meet Eve. But... I never knew the weather here is this bad. What might have become of Eve?
"Yes," Cecilia nodded. "Now don't speak. Just feel."
Ralph had attempted to keep even his very breath silent. At first, nothing happened. Then, slowly, as if he hallucinated it, the air around them got mistier as seconds passed on. Until almost everything was blocked out by the milky mist, he tried to call Cecilia, realizing that no sound came out. He tried moving his hand, but it did not move.
The whiteness around him is engulfing him, sending him into a blind void, into nothingness, into...
Pasts.
*
It was winter again. The weather that Layat hated the most.
It wasn't really because of the coldness, she was fine with that, just like any other Garavian. She hated only the ceremony that happened then. The long, boring, toe-freezing ceremony to worship and thank their gods, which made them look like the Flow Jungle natives.
Layat sat sheepishly in the Ice Palace's tea room. She was supposed to be studing the history of the 'Great Raid', which happened around a century ago. But instead, she got to be dragged off by a super annoying brother to worship gods.
"Layat!" Her brother cried. "We're going!"
"Can't I not go?" Layat moaned. She pulled up her thick, furry cape covering her blonde hair, digging her chin into her collar. "Just tell Father I'm sick."
"That is obviously not going to happen, Layat," her brother said sternly. "The Gods' going to curse you if you miss this ceremony on purpose."
"Fine," Layat whined. She pushed herself off the armchair at an extremely slow speed, shooting an eye roll at her brother, Bastian Velinzhag.
His hair was blond, just like hers— but a little darker. His eyes were green, but a little closer to pale blues, like their father. He was basically a smaller version of Emperor Velinzhag II. With that royal cloak flying out behind him majestically, the palace servants sometimes mixed him up with the emperor. Layat, on the other hand, sees him just as boyish and stupid as any other sixteen years olds.
As soon as they stepped into the opening, Layat tipped her chin up, straightened her back, and walked delicately, one foot in front of another on her leather high-heel boots, making sure her princess identity is patent to everyone who laid their eyes on her.
She curtsied in front of Emperor Velinzhag and entered a carriage lined with red velvet cushioned seats. Bastian bowed to their father, talked to him about some protocols of the ceremony, and stepped into the carriage after Layat, huffing a sigh and seated heavily beside her.
Emperor Velinzhag went to sit with the Queen in the carriage's front. But really, Layat detests the fact that the Garavian Queen didn't really get to control anything. The male servants or even some low-status colonels could be disrespectful toward their Queen if they liked. Layat always gave them nightmares with her powers if they started getting out of line.
Layat swore that she would be the best Queen Garavia's ever had. She had the powers— the Shadows that might only happen once a century.
She told Bastian about this, but he just laughed and told her that if she wanted to be the Queen, she had to think of something other than how to steal their cookies all day, which was unfair, since their oat and raisin or chocolate chip cookies, lightly fragranced with ginger, were remarkably mouth-watering.
YOU ARE READING
Alasla: The New Age
Fantasy"What killed him isn't me. It's the world." Ralph had never asked for much. Not even his own identity. But when his best and only friend got murdered by the man he calls father, he was forced to set off on an expedition to unravel the truth of this...
