ONE (Book 1 in the Amnesia Archives)

Chapter 7

I had to admit that I was disappointed when there was no loud bang or sudden puffs of smoke as we unwrapped the mysterious package. Instead, there was just a simple black box underneath the brown paper.

"Ominous," I remarked as I reached down and looked the box over. It was a simple box with a clasp of the same colour holding the top part shut. "I'm sure that they know that though."

"If they're edgy enough to abandon a package at the door of a wandering inn, then I think that's covered." Sarphi joined me on the floor before quickly grabbing the box and undoing the clasp.

"Sarphi!" Aknon scolded with wide eyes, reaching forward to take the box back. "There could've been something inside it, or someone for that matter."

Sarphi shrugged and turned the box upside down, revealing items which I recognised, but it took me a few minutes to remember where from.

"Is that your rattle?" I asked with a snicker as I pointed to the black cylinder which lay at her feet. "Because it looks pretty identical."

"I can't be," Sarphi denied as she reached down and picked it up.

"Okay, stop picking them up," Aknon interrupted, putting his hand over Sarphi's and making her put the rattle down. The rattle fell to the floor with a familiar noise. "These can't be our baby toys."

"Our?" I questioned as I looked at the other three items and snorted with laughter. Alongside Sarphi's cylinder baby rattle, were two other objects which were also familiar and full of memories for me. It was like I had stored them at the back of the cupboard and forgotten about them until I was cleaning and was flooded with my childhood. "Senka," I said with a grin as I reached down and picked up my old doll.

Her name was Senka, and I think it suited her very well. She was a ragdoll, with beautiful wool hair and button eyes, but all of her features were made from black material. It meant that she would be able to sit in the corner of the room and not be noticed, blending in with the shadows.

"Acer, I literally just told Sarphi not to pick them up," Aknon said with a grunt before his eyes moved to the last object. To me, it was a freaky book with blank pages full of black paper. But he was obsessed with it as a baby. I remember him just lying on his stomach and staring at it. "We know who these are from, don't we?"

We were silent for a few moments. We all knew who had sent the package now, but it wasn't clear whether or not this was good news. I assumed that my siblings had the same thought as me, that it was our old babysitter who had sent us these objects from our past. But I didn't know if they were still alive. Their entire being was fuzzy in my memory, like charcoal had been smudged.

"It doesn't matter." I shook my head, holding Senka to my chest. "We're keeping them. There must be a reason why they were sent here."

"Maybe it was someone threatening us?" Sarphi suggested, always finding a reason to go against what I said. "If they knew where we came from and where we grew up, that stuff could be used against us."

"Really? I'm not sure." Aknon sighed and reached down, picking up his small baby book, flipping through what was seemingly blank black pages. "I'd say that the only person who could be threatened with something like that is our mother."

I nodded. "And do we really care if she suffers?"

"Nope," Sarphi replied enthusiastically. "Right, I'm going to continue getting ready. Then we can get breakfast and head out."

Aknon and I mumbled our agreement, and I left the room, ordering breakfast so that we could get out of here quicker.

The village might've been small, but it was loud. It was also in a completely different area to what it had been the night before. We should've expected that, but what was a surprise was where we were.