Marella grabbed Biana's and Tam's hands gently, their gloves brushing against hers, a weird sensation. The huge sleeves of their cloaks fell on each other and added some weight to their arms. Dex sat on the floor, holding a device that looked about the size of an eye. Hacking it. Keefe grabbed Tam's hand, and Marella heard a small sound, somewhere in between a squeak, grunt, and a laugh. Marella didn't have to lift Tam's hood to see he was blushing a deep shade of red.
"Ready? Now!" Marella said. Vanishing was different than how she'd imagined. Instead of a sudden zap of electricity, she felt light. Warm, comforting light passing through her as if she weren't there in the first place. She looked down at her covered hands and realised she couldn't see them anymore. She turned to the side to check for Biana, but neither was she.
"I'm here!" Biana said, as if reading her mind. Her voice was wobbly, and her breathing, which Marella just noticed, was shallow.
"You okay?" She whispered.
"Just fine. But let's not talk too much." Biana panted.
Marella nodded, seen by no one, and pulled the group along into the corridor. The wooden boards creaked slightly at their weight, and Marella cringed at the sound. She thought about levitation, but came to the conclusion that with all the energy Biana was using, she would've been able to levitate, and the rest of them lifting her would just drain all their energy,
Soon the steps stopped creaking, and Marella felt the carpeted floor underneath her. She was in the ogre common room. She kept a keen ear out, and a quick eye, and saw no one there. The light from the window lit the room perfectly, showing off the crumbling walls, dirty, carpeted floor and six beds, with a small drawer next to each one of them, and weapons she'd only heard of scattered across the floor. Daggers long as forearms, dark as the shadows she'd seen Tam hide himself in, and scrolls. So many scrolls. She noted to herself to ask her father what was in those.
"Keefe, now, I want you to let go and walk beside us. Anybody asks why you're here, you've lost your way, got it?" Marella murmured.
"Yeah, yeah, just like you said, Blondie," Keefe said. Tam let out a small sigh as soon as Keefe let go, which he poorly disguised as a cough. Marella felt Biana's grip loosen.
"You, okay?"
"Yeah, now I'm using less energy, so it'll be easier." She replied.
Marella and the group trudged on, Keefe humming a tune she'd only heard once before: when she was a child, and her father sang to her, when she had hurt herself with a sword much to big for her child self.
Marella was about to mention it when she heard a thundering footstep.
"Oi! What are you doing here?" A voice said, low and booming, but had a melodious note in every syllable.
"I got lost, don't know where my lesson is. Care to help?" Keefe said, and Marella could almost feel his smirk. Why, oh, why did you have to be so . . . Keefe?
The ogre seemed to pause for a second, examining him. Marella risked a glimpse of them and saw only ashen hair seemingly dipped in hot pink dye, and glowering grey eyes, scanning Keefe.
"All right, you're good." They said suspiciously. "What room are you in."
Keefe rattled off the room his telekinesis lesson was in, and the ogre grabbed his arm, and dragged him along. Keefe mouthed something that looked an awful like help me, but Marella only flashed him an invisible smile, before slowly turning to the next corridor.
They soon reached a stairwell, and the group descended, slowly and carefully. Marella could see the balefire-lit torches hung every couple meters. The stoney stairs soon turned to tiled floors. Marella grunted. One more building.
Marella led the group through another hallway, this time, the wooden floorboards creaked from the ogres' heavy feet pacing up and down, blissfully unaware of the group of rebels padding their feet along the very same floor, mere centimetres apart.
No alarms went off, and Marella thanked Dex in her head for his incredible hacking. Marella turned to her side glancing at the doors, and nearly gasped out loud when she realised where they were. Member headquarters. Each door had a chip taken out of it by a sword of every mistake a member had made, to remind them there were consequences every morning and night. That when they stepped into their so-called sanctuary, the burden of their mistakes would harden them into better performing people. She had only seen this place once before, as a child, when her father would tour the campus with her. Even he had a chip in his door. But she then remembered . . .
She tiptoed slowly toward a certain door, her friends stumbling to follow her. It was just as she remembered. The glossy, rectangular door wore a dull wood colour, but, even if you searched the tops or the bottom of it, you wouldn't find a chip. It was perfect. She longed to know who was behind the door, who wore the cloak, but she knew full well her father wouldn't tell her, even if she begged.
"Nearly there," Marella said to the group after checking for guards. She stopped in front of a door, wooden finish glossy, and it's colouring dull and dim, opposite to the girl behind it. Marella heard a small sigh from behind the door and pressed her face against the crack in the door. Linh. Marella took a deep breath.
"Three," Marella murmured, courage flowing through her.
"Two," Biana said, her grip tightening.
"One," Tam's voice was full of determination, but there was a lingering note of fear. Biana let go and the three of them pushed the door, stumbling through and crashing into the carpeted floor.
YOU ARE READING
Every Ice Blue Cloud Has a Silver Lining
ФанфикKeefe Sencen was running. He didn't know for how long, he didn't know when he'd stop - he hardly knew why. Suddenly, his world is turned upside down when a black-cloaked villain grabs and drags him to a building, where he meets someone special - Tam...
