Sleep with the Lights On ✔️

11. Cassie, Peros and Essylt

Fion sat at a wrought iron patio set in the greenhouse, sipping tea from a floral tea set. Cassie stood awkwardly, there was only one chair and Fion was in it.

"Now, I can tell by the look of you that you've been here a while." Fion said between graceful sips of tea. Cassie nodded, her eyes were wandering around the greenhouse. Nothing seemed to grow quite properly in the underworld, although this didn't surprise her. Odd plants grew, stunted and gnarled. Not quite a lush setting but an attempt at a healthy garden. The glass ceiling towered high above the tallest tree - which was not saying much. "So what have you learned? Anything?" Fion asked.

"I've learned open, tidy and shield spells." Cassie said, she wasn't sure if they were spells, charms or incantations. She almost blushed at her own ignorance but these were lessons, she tried to ignore her pride.

"I assume you've been using the Greek." Fion asked, talking through her thick eyelashes as she had so many times before.

"The Latin actually." Cassie said. She wasn't sure what the translations meant, she assumed they had to do with race, or maybe magical ability.

Fion put her cup down and leaned foreward, smiling broadly. "Of course." She purred.

Cassie rocked back on her heels, the chill of the underworld seemed to have lifted a bit, she was warmer than she had been in days. The wonderful fire that had magically appeared seemed to have helped, she wondered why they hadn't set a fire before.

"So I'm going to teach you things differently, easier." Fion said as she pulled out a huge volume and dropped it on the table, making the iron scrape against the stone floor of the greenhouse. She opened the book and began flipping through. "So you know the shield spell, I imagine you've memorized the Latin." She spoke curtly. Cassie nodded. "make the spell, but instead of saying the word, think of what you want to happen." Cassie looked confused. Fion rolled her eyes and stood closer to Cassie. "Imagine the shield spell, without saying the incantation." Fion peered into Cassie's eyes, searching for something. Fion's delicate features seemed to shift at such close range, she was beginning to look predatory. Cassie remembered the feeling of the shield bubble encasing her.

Fion flew backwards, obviously buffeted by the shield that Cassie had conjured. Fion huffed, fixing her red hair. She stomped over to the table and continued flipping through the pages. "Good job." She snapped.

Peros watched Cassie leave for the greenhouse, he was unsure about leaving her alone with Fion, but he didn't want to raise suspicion and possibly put Cassie in more harm. She was safe for now, somehow he was sure of this. The mansion seemed to hold an unsettling serenity, this was just the beginning of something bigger, and all he could to do was prepare and hope that Cassie would be prepared as well.

The urge to search for a clue stirred in him again, his search the night before hadn't uncovered anything. He sat on his bed, looking around the room. He tried to remember how he'd lived before Cassie showed up - eat, sleep, talk to Essylt. Despite the feeling of doom and uncertainty he got whenever he thought about Cassie and her situation, it felt more like living - better than just surviving as he had before.

There was no where he had to be, no one had offered him lessons to survive in the underworld, even when he was left alone at fourteen. Peros went out to the main hall, he vaguely remembered Fion pointing out a library and he figured it was the best place to start looking for clues, to prove what? To prove that the awful feeling in his stomach that hadn't gone away since meeting Fion was founded on something.

He found the library was close to the suite, with tall ceilings and shelves of old leather books. The room wasn't particularly large but he could hear someone else was in the library, behind a tall bookshelf maybe.