Our second world- Book two: War is coming

Chapter 20

~Silver~

After their short test, Silver made his way through the halls on the third floor in search of his room. The others following close behind. He found it in the middle of a crossroads between two hallways. Two doors were right next to each other, but only one had his number on it. By some chance, Radelia had the room right next to his, and the triplets had rooms opposite each other a door down the hall from them.

"W-wow. Looks like we're room neighbors," Radelia said, double checking the number on her scroll.

"Yeah. I'm gonna unpack my things. Get me in ten minutes if you're ready to explore," Silver said, stepping into his room before the others could say anything else.

His room was larger than he was expecting. There was a single bed shoved up against the wall opposite the door and a wardrobe was stuck next to it.

Silver made his way over to the bed and emptied the contents of his bag onto it. There were two outfits; Night clothes and the plainclothes he'd worn on the first day. He put those in the wardrobe and found an extra blanket folded up on the bottom shelf. Making a note of it, he went back to the pile on the bed. There was a small, pocket size box of hygiene things that he put on the small table and shoved his notebooks and pencils in the drawer of the table.

"Hey, Silver? We're all ready to go!" Asashi called through the door," Are you coming with or not?"

"Calm down. I'm coming," He sighed, moving to the door.

When he opened it, he found the other four members of his team waiting for him. The girls were wearing cloaks over the clothing they had on and Aien and Aimar had on T-shirts over their uniform pants.

"So?" He asked," Where are we going?"

While he spoke, he heard a stomach growl and looked over at Asashi who was blushing.

"I vote lunch. I didn't eat breakfast this morning," She admitted sheepishly.

"Then let's eat first," Radelia suggested.

The triplets eagerly agreed and Silver slowly followed them down to the second floor where the mess hall was located.

Unlike the rest of his team, Silver already had breakfast so he wasn't hungry, and instead, stood outside the double door to wait. After about 20 minutes, they retrieved him and started dragging him down the halls again to the first floor.

It was at the far east corner of the building that they found the bath. It was two medium-sized rooms separated by gender. Each side had multiple showers that relied on magic circles to pull up groundwater to use. There was a small front section where both walls were lined with shelves of holders for clothing or other things people didn't want to get wet, and taking up the majority of the room was a large pool of water permanently heated by a fire magic circle.

On the boys' side, Silver chose a spot a few feet from the pool of water and sat down.

"Hey Silver, Aren't you going to join us?" Aien called from the other side of the pool.

"I am joining you," Silver replied," Just not in the water."

"Why? can't swim?" Aimar teased.

"I can swim fine. It's-- I'm going back to my room."

When he stood up to leave, something slammed into him. Before he could do anything, his head went under the water. A sudden surge of water filled his lungs and he found himself struggling to break the surface again to breathe. It felt like someone was holding him down. His mind froze.

Before he knew what had happened, strong hands pulled him from the water coughing and gasping for a much-needed breath. He tried to push away when he felt someone touch him again.

"Hey, Silver, calm down." A steady voice pulled him from his mind and plopped him back in reality. Haren was kneeling in front of him.

"I'm fine." He blurted, pushing his hand away.

"Dry off and head back to your room to get changed," Haren tossed a towel over his head," Think you can make it?"

"I'm fine." Silver answered. He stood slowly and made the long walk back to his room alone.

Once in the safety of the walls, he shut the door before sliding down to the floor leaning against it. He pulled his knees up to his chest in an attempt to control his trembling body and let out a shaky breath.

His room was dark the next time he looked up. Behind him, the door opened just enough to let a small figure slip into the room before it was closed again.

"Silver?" the shy voice moved over to him. He was just barely able to make out the shadowed figure of Radelia from the dim light of the half shaded window on the wall behind her. He looked up at her and saw worry swimming in her crystal blue eyes," Silver... Your clothes are still wet." She took the towel from him and started drying his hair while she continued," It's ok to be scared of it, Silver. It's natural for everyone to have a fear of something. Just remember that I'm here to support you any way I can. Always have been and always will be."

"Thanks, Eli."

"No problem," She smiled," Now get changed and try to get some sleep. I'll be right next door if you need me."

As she left, he pushed himself to his feet and moved over to the wardrobe. Changing into the plainclothes before flopping down onto the bed.

That night, like many nights before, his sleep was plagued by nightmares.

He was his six-year-old self again.

"Found you, little brat!" The menacing voice of his father followed him as he hurriedly wormed his way out from behind the firewood. Sprinting away as fast as his legs would carry him.

By the time he made the short distance to the river, his father had caught up to him and tackled him to the ground. Silver tried to squirm away from the iron grip as the face of his father, mere inches from his own, shouted every curse he could think of.

He was screaming when the drunken man threw him into the deep water and held him down.

"Silver! Wake up!" he was jolted from his nightmare to find Radelias face inches from his own.

When she saw he was awake, she stopped shaking him and threw her arms around him. Crying into his shoulder until his own tears stopped.

"I-I'm ok now." He whispered after a few minutes.

"Good. If you want to sleep again, I'll stay with you, or we can talk." Radelia replied, wiping tears from her eyes.

"I think I just need you to be with me for a while," Silver answered.

She nodded and grabbed the blanket from the wardrobe before coming back over to him. Crawling into the bed, she lay with her back to him and draped the two blankets over both of them. Silver slid closer to her and turned so that he was facing her back. Curling into her warmth as close as he could manage while she hummed a quiet song.