Stellarlune - KOTLC Book 8.5 Fanfic

Chapter 43

"Are you guys feeling better? I sure am." Fitz hooked his arms onto his neck, closing his eyes momentarily. They had all woken up, refreshed, and Sophie found everybody sitting in the main hall, stretching. She sat herself down, not knowing what to do. A nagging thought urged her to bring up the topic of Keefe into the conversation, even though she knew that her friends were probably in a state of relaxation. And they didn't get much of those anyways.

"I am," Sophie replied, deciding that the topic would stay closed for the minute. "My head's gotten way better now."

"Told ya!" Biana and Dex exclaimed in unison, grinning.

"I have to admit, I feel way more refreshed," Biana stretched her toes, easily reaching them with her hands.

"Me too," Linh added. Tam nodded reluctantly.

Sophie restlessly found her thoughts going elsewhere while her friends chatted enthusiastically. As much as she wanted to withhold her thoughts about Keefe, his sparkling ice-blue eyes couldn't stop from appearing in her brain. Suddenly, an image washed away the first, Keefe shrieking in pain, sitting down at Sophie's former prison where she had been kidnapped, bleeding and crying for help.

"We need to get him!"Sophie cried out, tears slipping out of her eyes. She couldn't help it! Whether she liked it or not, time was slipping by, and every more second Keefe stayed with Lady Gisela, there was more of a risk of danger for him. She couldn't stand by, waiting on the sidelines. She'd never been good at that, and in this situation, she was terrible.

"Sophie..." Biana soothed, seeming to know who Sophie was talking about. "It's okay."

"How?!" Sophie yelled, voice beaming off the walls, and creating a pained echo. "You don't know that - and none of us do!" It was true. It wasn't like anybody knew what was going on with Keefe. And surely it would be something to do with Stellarlune, as well as Keefe's ability. Sophie knew well enough, that Keefe would resist as much as he could to his 'mother' when Lady Gisela would try to make him train his ability, and expose it, so she had a fear that he would be punished. Lady Gisela was ruthless. All the Nevereseen were. It was what made them scary. Lady Gisela didn't have a love for Keefe for all Sophie knew. It was safe to assume that. She would do anything to make him bow down to her. The past incidents proved this.

"This happened before, we can him back. Remember when you got kidnapped? We all felt the same way," Fitz told her. That was also true. But it wasn't nice knowing that she had been tortured the whole time. For answers. That in the case, Keefe clearly held. Not only that, but Sophie couldn't help knowing that she had been a part of Keefe's kidnapping. Well, she knew it wasn't true, but she also knew that all of this crisis had started happening when she appeared into the Lost Cities. Yet, she didn't feel much guilt. Technically, Lady Gisela would've already used Keefe if Sophie would've been there, or not. Honestly, she didn't know what the Neverseen were planning. But she knew one thing. They had to get Keefe back. If they couldn't stop what was going on with him now, she realized, they had to stop it as soon as possible.

"We. Have. To. Plan," Sophie stated, voice wobbly, crackly, but clear.

"I know. We do," Biana interrupted. "But we also need to be up for it."

"We just slept for a whole night, isn't that enough?!" Sophie regretted her words as she thought about how wrong they sounded.

"We should at least eat breakfast..." Linh suggested. Breakfast was nutritious, but did they really care about how hungry they were at a time like this? In Exillium, all of them had learnt to keep their hunger away. Plus, every second was crucial. They were wasting time right now.

"You guys," Sophie said, trying to keep calm of her emotions. "We need to get to it. Now." She honestly felt out of control at the moment. Was she being unreasonable, or were her friends? Was she overreacting? She couldn't bring herself to care, as she stumbled up from her sitting position, eyes hazy, and dangerous.

"Sophie!" Tam ordered. "You're not in your right mindset right now, get a hold of yourself! Let's think about what has happened over the last few days." Sophie felt her heart lurch reluctantly and caught Tam's intense, somehow angry gaze.

"Fine," Sophie agreed, resisting the urge to take off every one of her eyelashes in frustration.

"First things first. We wanted to learn how to keep Keefe's ability in control, and Councillor Oralie's Forgotten secret had the answer. So we opened it, and her mind broke from guilt," Tam said.

"Stop right there," Dex broke in. "Why did she feel guilty?" Sophie felt her brain searching for possibilities, but she couldn't find a reasonable one. Surely, Oralie couldn't have been involved in this crisis, right? Though she did seem to have many surprises, considering that she was her biological mother.

"I - I don't know," Sophie realized, pausing. Oralie did help the Black Swan, long ago, which was clearly treasonous activity back then, so if she played a part in that, then who knew what other events she had been involved in. She would have to meet with Lady Gisela, or Keefe, or something to do with Stellarlune...

"That's it!" Sophie exclaimed. "We need to figure out if she met Keefe or something."

"'Cause why would she feel guilty about something she hasn't even done?" Dex added.

"But how can we figure it out without proof?" Fitz asked, shoving a hand through his hair frustratingly.

"I don't think we can think of a theory right now. There's too many possibilites. But we do know that this is all connected somehow... So let's start with something we do know. How about trying to get Keefe back? And confronting Lady Gisela at it. I mean, she is sure to have a reason with stellarlune, and if Oralie had something to do with it, Lady Gisela would know."

"Maybe - I don't know." Linh sighed. "This was so much easier with clues..."

Sophie's heart stopped. Clues. That was it. They always had had something to start off with - but what?

"The tracker," she realized. "It's the tracker. Remember?! The tracker was a remnant from the magisdan handcuffs, and because a vanisher, maybe Alvar - made the handcuffs invisible with an enhancer probably, the remnant is also invisible! So that means, the tracker is the clue we've been looking for. And I'm pretty sure, it's not tracking us."

"Wait..." Tam said slowly.

"Yeah. It's tracking Lady Gisela." Sophie finished, and a wave of relief crashed over her. They were finally getting somewhere. One. Step. At. A. Time.

"But that doesn't make sense," Dex argued, screeching a halt to Sophie's racing excitement. "How would the tracker be tracking Lady Gisela? Why was there a tracker in the first place?"

Sophie's mind swirled with confusion. There was something missing, she was sure of it.

"Aha!" Biana answered excitedly. "When Keefe escaped from Lady Gisela, he had the handcuffs on unknowingly - right? Anyways, the handcuffs must've had a tracker on them of some sort, or else how would've Lady Gisela took him the second time? It just makes sense now! And when Lady Gisela leaped back to her place or wherever with Keefe, maybe the tracker backfired? I mean, 'cause now the magisdan handcuffs may still be on Keefe, tracking him down. And the tracker must be connected to the handcuffs somehow maybe -"

"And therefore can still track the handcuffs!" Sophie finished off. That made total sense!

"Though what if Lady Gisela took the handcuffs off Keefe right away when they got to their destination?" Linh wondered.

"I don't think it would matter at this point," Biana told her. "We could still find the destination, and if they left already, there has to be some other clue. Another remnant."

"Okay, I get what you guys are saying..." Fitz said slowly. "But how do we prove this is right?"

Sophie met his eyes carefully. She had one solution to this problem. She was almost too scared to say it out loud, in case the end result of this solution may turn wrong. That it may prove that their whole theory was wrong. "By seeing where the tracker leads us."