Aura

Chapter One

  On the previously mentioned Tuesday morning, Rowan woke up with the creeping feeling that something would happen today. Nevertheless, he dragged himself up from his bed, got dressed, brushed his teeth, and packed his things with the absence of his grandfather hanging like nostalgic Christmas ornaments. At the last second, Rowan grabbed a bagel on his way out the door, got on the bus, and rode it to school.

  Many stories depict the school bus as a chaotic place. But for Rowan, he would look out the window and see the buildings speed by slowly, all of the noises and movement occurring only in the background.

  There was only one other who would sit alone quietly and watch the windows like Rowan did. She was a small, frail girl with skin the colour of dark chocolate and rough hair in lots of tiny braids, and she had eyes that would focus on only one thing at a time, and when they weren't focusing on anything in particular, they dashed around the room nervously. This girl's name was Piper, and she knew nobody, and nobody knew her.

  It was only on this destined morning that Rowan had turned around and noticed Piper sitting alone, across the aisle and a few rows back. She was accompanied by only a cobalt blue backpack. In her hands, she clutched a map, made of crisp butter-colored paper, wrinkled by Piper's fingers squeezing so tightly.

  Silently, Rowan slung his backpack over his shoulder and plopped down on the seat next to her. Piper didn't look up, but she shook, ever so slightly, and Rowan knew that she knew he was looking at her.

  They didn't say anything.

  At first, Rowan only sat and stared at the faded artificial leather of the back of the seat in front of him. Soon, curiosity got a hold of him and he looked over Piper's shoulder, observing the milk chocolate-coloured lines that snaked and curled around, illustrating a far away land Rowan had never seen or heard of. In elegant calligraphy, the map was titled "Auradelle and the Crystal Islands".

  Something Rowan couldn't quite explain clicked in his head. It was like a quiet whisper reminding him of his past, but he couldn't hear it all. Visions of blurred figures, so foggy he could only make out the shadows. He jolted back awake to find he and Piper were the last one left in the bus, and quickly Rowan stood up and got out.

  As he stepped onto the sidewalk, the bright sunlight illuminated his face. Rowan walked as the other students ran, and yet he was the first to class. This was how his life was every day, but when he had sat down next to Piper, that was different. Rowan thought it was an omen, but maybe that was him reading too many adventure novels.

  When Rowan passed the windows, he glanced at the windows at his reflection. He was an invisible boy, and just like Piper, no one ever talked to him. Ironically, he had olive skin and a pile of dark hair that was so long it scratched at his chin, and Rowan remembered his grandfather used to say he was noticeably handsome.

  Rowan couldn't see it, because the way he slouched in the sweaters he wore torn and oversized made him anything but handsome. He wasn't like the other boys in his class, who could run a mile in so few minutes, and played football at breaktime, throwing perfect passes that arched gracefully through the air.

  Usually Rowan took the bus home, but since his grandfather died, he didn't have any reason to come home in a hurry. Softly, his sneakers pat the sidewalk as his steps grew smaller and shorter. He took his time, just watching the birds fly and the gardeners blow the leaves around the street. It was so quiet. So peaceful. It had been that way for all his life.

  "Rowan?" whispered a quiet voice behind him.

  Rowan turned. It was Piper, shyer than ever.

  "There's people coming to your house," she informed him in a voice that was soaked in newness. It was as if Piper had never used it before. "They look important."

  If Rowan was a normal person in a normal situation, he might have asked Piper why she knew this. After all, she was behind him, and had just come out of the school building. But Rowan was neither a normal person nor a person in a normal situation, so without saying a word to Piper, he booked it out of there and was in front of his house in barely any time.

  From the way Piper had said it, Rowan knew that they were the government people, the cops, the ones he had read about in stories, coming to get him. He passed their car while he sprinted past, and the car doors slammed behind him as he ran through the front door.

  He had only one thing on his mind. I don't want to go.

  Rowan didn't want to go. He didn't want to leave school, or the house where he and his grandfather had lived his whole life. It was the last thing Rowan had left of his grandfather, that and a memory, and a key...

  He froze as the front steps creaked. The key.

  Desperately, Rowan stumbled to the dark wooden desk in the corner, carved with complicated swirls and held down with the weight of many drawers. He was opening them one by one, until he yanked out a particularly loose one, and he found the key, his grandfather's last gift.

  A cloud of dust was swept into the air, and Rowan coughed and coughed. It smelled of old antique wood. He waved his hands, clearing a little of the dust, and looked around for another clue, a hint or something to lead him to what the key opened.

  The steps were getting louder. Rowan was running out of time.

  He found a large drawer, with a fancy knob and many carvings, and a keyhole made out of the same rusty iron as the key. Desperately, Rowan shoved the key into the hole, with an air of an impatient doctor shoving medicine down one's throat. Rowan turned it, and the drawer clicked open. He braced himself, expecting dust.

  There wasn't any. Rowan was looking down at a drawer full of light. So many colours, more than the rainbow contained, danced inside. There seemed to be ambient music gushing from the drawer.

  Rowan stuck his arm in, and to his shock, it sunk into the drawer. He had no time to further inspect it, though, because at that very second, the front door opened. Thinking fast, Rowan leaped into the drawer, and it snapped shut, trembling slightly as it clicked into place.

  He was trapped in a vortex of light, which swallowed him and bound his limbs tightly to his body. Rowan was getting dizzy, and he felt like it should stop soon, but there weren't any signs of it. The light kept getting dimmer, but the force that held him still and flying fast was still there, stronger than ever.

  It was over as quickly as it began, and Rowan was spit out of the light and onto a cold path paved with stones. There was a thick fog everywhere around him. Rowan reached into his pocket. The key was gone.