No Peace For the Weary

Chapter Four-Alex

I opened my eyes to someone knocking softly on my door. I was surprised that I had actually slept well. I hadn't made it through one night without nightmares since elder died, and that happened weeks ago. I sighed, pushing myself up into sitting position. "Who's there?" I called as I stretched, blinking the sleep from my eyes.

"It's me." I jumped at Charlie's voice outside my door. Normally it was Ruthy who came to wake me. Though I should've realized it wasn't when I wasn't awoken by knocks that sounded like she was trying to break the door down. She hated me for reasons that I can't understand, so I stopped trying.

"Oh. Uh, what do you need?" I asked as I grabbed a hairbrush from my nightstand, pulling it through my tangled hair. "The funeral's today. I was coming to see if you were up. Obviously you weren't." Crap. The funeral. That was today. I had to speak in front of every single important person from both kingdoms. This is going to be the worst experience of my life.

"Right. I'll, uh, I'll join you in the breakfast room soon." I called hurriedly before running to my closet and grabbing the custom-made black dress that I had been fitted for last week. At least it was comfortable. I slipped into it, putting my hair in a bun at the base of my neck.

Sighing, I glanced at the door of my own kitchen before stepping out into the hallway. I wish I could just make myself breakfast, but since this was such an important day I kind of had to have breakfast with my adviser. Maybe he could actually calm me down, though I highly doubted that. My heart was beating a mile a minute and I didn't even have to speak for another few hours.

"Amara." I jumped, almost falling over before Charlie grabbed my wrist. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I didn't realize it would startle you that much." He had been waiting outside my door. Who does that? I stepped back, gently pulling my wrist from his grip. "It's fine, I'm okay." I said. "Uh, breakfast now?" I muttered, walking ahead. I could now successfully make it there by myself, after getting lost for weeks.

Charlie sighed before following me. I knew he was wondering what he had done wrong, why I was avoiding him, but I didn't know how to tell him that it wasn't his fault, it was my own. I was avoiding him because I was scared. I was scared of feeling something for him and then being rejected. I knew that I already did feel something, though. I just thought that, if I ignored it, if I ignored him, then I could make it go away. So far it wasn't working.

I pushed the door open to the breakfast room, my eyes drawn yet again to the view out the windows. I still hadn't had a chance to explore out there, but I knew it would happen at some point. I did have one hundred and thirty three years to explore everything.

I dropped into my seat, staring down at the table cloth. I didn't want to be here. I wanted to be home. But what Charlie had told me was right, I was needed here. I had been chosen. I had tried to invite my family to the funeral but Charlie told me not to, he said that it was against the rules for the apprentices to see their families within the first three months, which I found extremely stupid, but he was the adviser. What did I know?

The food had appeared in front of me at some point while I was lost in my thought, and I grabbed my fork, picking at the food. I wasn't hungry. I was nervous. Butterflies filled every part of my stomach and left room for nothing else.

I sighed, dropping the fork and standing up. Charlie looked up. "Something wrong?" He asked, frowning slightly. I shrugged, my eyes meeting his for half a second before moving to the window behind him. "No. I'm fine. I just.. need to focus." I said quietly, giving him an obviously fake smile before turning to leave. "I'll see you later, for the funeral." I called over my shoulder before bolting.

I went to the only room I wanted to be in right now, the glass one. If I had gone to my library I would have been overwhelmed by the words, by the fact that there were so many people that were smarter  than me. But here, in the glass room, I didn't have to worry about that. I could just look at the small yet intricate sculptures and try to forget everything.