I Will Find You

* ~ 17 ~ *

Year 1773

Gideon's POV

I'm walking the aisles of the Lodge. The count stayed in the study, saying that "You must have a need to do something on your own. Off you go."  Apparently, when I would have time for it, I don't have anything to do. No secrets of the count to solve, thinking how to get back to my own time...

The book! I totally forgot about the book I 'borrowed' from the library late yesterday evening. I start to walk faster and get to my own little room in less than half a minute.

I walk to the chair near the table and sit. It feels more comfortable than you would expect from a wooden chair. The wood under my elbow feels cool and adaptable, like it would have been made just for me.
I open one of the boxes and take the Mysteries of Time out. It's has a little bit of dust on it, but it will find a new place to cover when I blow it away from the cover.
I  open the book and see an old looking, meandering handwriting. My brain is working hard on understanding it. You never know what time throws on your way, but let me tell you, it can be quite surprising sometimes...

Suddenly someone knocks on the door.

"Diamond!"

I hurry up and put the book back to it's place on the box, close it, and speedwalk to the door. What he said about doing my own things just ten minutes ago?

I open the door and see the count's face, his eyes looking at mine, smiling mischievously, almost like a pirate. He's leaning to the doorframe, arms are crossed. I raise my eyebrows. When he doesn't say anything, I ask:

"So? What do you want?"

"Were going to the laboratory", the count says. Without another word he starts walking forward the in hallway.

"Are you coming?", he shouts over his shoulder. His wig swings in his rhythm of steps. I sigh and follow him to the stairs.

*

When I step in the laboratory door I see the distillation-machine and... a basket of oranges? The count walks near to the basket and stops behind it. He lifts his hands on top of the table and leaves them there.

"What are you exactly doing with those oranges?", I ask.

"I'm not the only person to deal with these", the count says. He points at me. "You are going to help me."

He lifts a syringe behind the basket. It is filled with deep purple liquid.

"What I am supposed to do with that?", I ask.

"You are supposed to inject this -", he lifts the syringe "- to these oranges."

"And what if I don't want to?"

"Then I will inject this to you, and believe me when I say that you would be happy to help me if you knew what happens when it gets into one's system."
The count walks slowly to me, the syringe still in his hand. When he is so near that I have to bend back a little bit, he asks:

"Will you do it, or will you suffer the consequences?"

There's a moment of silence before the words escape through my teeth:

"I'll do it."

"Good", the count says and gives me the syringe. When he walks back to his place and doesn't look at me, I smell the head of the syringe.
I knew it. Same smell as the night a couple days ago. Bitter, oversweet, like putrid apples.

I take the first orange and put the needle in through its peel. I inject some liquid in and put it to the table next to the basket. When I take the next orange, I see it's one of the ones I dropped to the ground just weeks ago.

"For what are you going to use these oranges?", I ask when I'm injecting the third orange. The smell stinks my nose and I know I'm going to have a headache in a bit.

"Nah... I'm going to give them for someone I don't like that much. As a gift", the count says. He's tightening some bolts in his distillation-system.

I take the last orange from the basket, and inject it. I massage my forehead to relieve the tough pain inside my skull.

"Can I go, I have a headache", I ask from the count, who is still admiring his own lab equipment.

"Yeah, off you go, there's nothing anymore", the count says and waves his hand without looking up from his machine.

I walk to the door and almost fall down when my legs do a knot by themselves. When I'm stepping out from the door I hear the count saying;
"I wonder if she is as weak too."

My head is so full of cotton candy that I don't stay to wonder what he means by 'she'. I totter to my own room and to the bathroom, where I splash some cold water on my face. The water makes me feel like I'm on a ship that travels through the mad Pacific ocean. I fall on my bed, and when I close my eyes, I fall to the ocean of dreams.

*

When I wake up the huge ship of headache has shrank to a little boat with oars, and the cotton candy has evaporated into the air. I can remember the count's words a couple of hours ago clearly:
"I wonder if she is as weak too."

Who is going to get the oranges?

Who the count wants to be... poisoned? Ill? Out of the game?

I rush out of the door and to the stairs. A houseplant falls down as I hit it, but I don't turn back. When I'm at the bottom of the stairs I run to the laboratory door and open it.

But the oranges aren't there anymore.

***

Hey, I'm back with a new chapter :3

When the count came to get Gideon from his room, I started to wonder, what if Gideon and the count would be a ship? Gideon+Robert (the count's first name)=Gidbert Omg, the shipname is awful, I wouldn't ship it :"D Would you? (Do you know any better shipnames?)

Ugh, I have to start writing better and not-so-boring chapters. I think the 'action' is about to come after couple chapters. And maybe some Gidolyn ;)

What do You think? How can I improve my chapters? What do you need more/less?

Don't forget to elapse daily,

See you!