The next day, Ravenna rushed towards the Crystal Palace, eager to meet Neptune again. But he was nowhere in sight, so she decided to clean up the art studio next to the library. It was full of drawings, sketches and unfinished maps that she simply couldn’t leave anywhere. The place seemed long unvisited, with dust everywhere and things scattered around, but she worked busily, moving across the oak floor, putting paint bottles, tubes and brushes into chests near the shelves where she had placed all the papers. The girl always loved to draw. Looking at the sketches, she tried to imagine what they would look like if they were finished, but the easels stood untouched for years. The only thing that disturbed her about this place was the stuffed animals. She loved animals and disliked the figures that had been frozen for centuries.
Ravenna spent several hours in the studio, and Neptune didn’t come back. It was unusual for him, and the girl began to worry, pressing the pencil between her fingers and trying to draw a composition of busts in the corner, but when nothing came out, she finally gave up and went out into the corridor. Too preoccupied to concentrate, she decided to arrange the books that Neptune had scattered yesterday in an attempt to find something. The girl had no idea what exactly he was up to, but she noticed he was hiding something. There was probably a good reason he didn’t say a word about the fourth tunnel connecting the Crystal Palace to her home. It was impossible that he didn’t know or simply forgot because he even knew her name, which meant he had to know where she lived as well. She was aware that something was wrong and needed to find out, but decided not to force him because Neptune was her friend and she couldn’t forget the time they spent together.
Thinking about this, Ravenna placed the last books on the shelf, but soon her attention focused on something she had never seen before. Only when she got closer did she realise that on the table lay a mirror. It was round, all black, with a diamond-shaped crystal above the glass, which also shone like onyx black. The girl picked it up by the handle, unable to resist such a strange find, and slowly brushed the glass, but something electricity-like emanated from the mirror, causing her fingers to tingle. Ravenna dropped it on the table and backed away. At that moment, the door creaked open.
“Where have you been for so long?” she asked as Neptune appeared in the doorway.
The boy smiled innocently, holding an old thick book in his hands. “At the public library. I tried to find out about the man who built these dungeons. Maybe he can tell me what’s at the end of the third tunnel.”
“But you said only special people know about those tunnels,” the girl arched her eyebrows. “How can something you need be written in some ordinary books?”
“You’re right, but I was with someone who’s also special. Remember the one I mentioned yesterday from the Shadow Kingdom? His name’s Gordon. He knows almost everything about the special worlds, but also can’t tell what’s in the tunnel, because there is some negative energy building up there that he can’t get through. It’s like a barrier, Gordon tried to break through, but it’s too strong.”
“You said exactly the same thing about energy,” she gasped. “Could that person tell us more about those special worlds?”
“He could, but it’s not useful to us right now. He just said there are many more worlds, but the gates aren’t on Earth, but in other dimensions. We could only get there using special abilities such as teleportation.”
Ravenna laughed. “Other dimensions? Teleportation? Now that you mention that, it sounds even crazier!”
“But you believe it’s not a dream, right?”
YOU ARE READING
Demon Daughter (Book I)
FantasyOn the night of the Blood Moon, a girl was born, destined for a dark future. She is the daughter of a demon, created from a false love, but she knows nothing about her origins because during the war she was sent to live on Earth with Lynn and Roger...
