SWNOVELS Chapter CHAPTER SEVEN
HALL OF BONES
It was already dawn when they all moved to their room.
Zora paced their bedroom while Fina lay on the bed trying to catch some sleep.
“How can you sleep in this situation?” Zo asked in frustration.
“Because as much as I would love to pace around like you, my head have heard too much and it’s so loud I have to turn it off for a while. Thank you” Fina replied
“You must be lucky then, to be able to sleep easily”
Fina popped one eye open.
“I am not lucky.” She said and went off to sleep.
“I can’t believe Serene Berry is dead”
“Mélanie Crest is dead not Serene Berry. Serene might just be a soul in another human body. It’s possible”
“And Xiana Kang. They said she had a boyfriend. We can ask”
Fina sighed.
“We have to do this secretly, Zo. People will get suspicious if we start asking”
“You are right” She said and resumed her pacing.
Fina drifted off to sleep.
Fina met herself in a strange room with its curtains drawn down.
The room was extremely quiet that a pin drop could be heard.
It was the glass walls that made her realize she was still in Elfina.
Someone touched her on the shoulder and she whirled round but there was no one behind her.
“I did warn you didn’t I? I told you… You know I can hurt you. It’s nothing. I’ve done it several times.”
Fina strained to see whoever it was but all she could see was a shadow. A shadow with no body.
“Even in dreams, I can access you. In reality, I can see you. I can smell you. I can hear you. I’ve looked at you from afar so many times. I’ve studied you. And I’m going to kill you. The same way we killed her!”
Instinct made her moved to the left immediately when a blade suddenly slashed through the air in front of her.
The person laughed.
“So swift.”
“I know you are not a male” Fina said
“Do you? What made you so sure? I am both. I speak like both”
“You don’t fool me”
Something like an iron chain dragged on the floor.
“I will get you”
A sharp long thin spidery leg rotated in front of her.
“Just watch”
Fina jerked awake when something slapped her on the arm.
“You okay?” Zo asked
Fina nodded.
“You want to talk about it? My mum used to say that helps a lot.”
“Just about that person. The spider” Fina said “I heard her when I was with Miss Anne. She threatened to kill me”
Zo eyes widened.
“Like the threat in Mélanie Crest grave?” She asked
Fina nodded.
“You know we still have the ring with us. Xiana Kang’s ring.” Fina said
“Which we haven’t put to use. Except the key. Shelly is with the key”
“I’ll go do my daily routine” Fina said and got out of bed.
“Whoever that is, I think she is closer to us to be able to know our activities” She said
“Could it be Nancy Miller? She really hate us, you know?” Zo asked
Fina took her time with her routines before appearing in the living room in a yellow sleeved gown, her hair in a ponytail with some fake bangs.
“I like what you did with your hair. It’s pretty.” Zo said from the couch.
Fina rolled her eyes at her.
“I’m certain you do have an ulterior motive behind what you keep saying about my hair.”
Someone knocked on the door and they both glanced at each other before Fina moved to the door and opened it.
A yellow fairy, the size of an hand was carrying an envelope in its hands.
The fairy had very big and wide eyes with a small nose and sweet bow lips.
“Fina Clark?”
“Yes?” Fina answered
“I am a labour fairy and this is my house. Each house have labour fairies. I’m called Ashley”
“Nice to meet you”
“You are very pretty.” She said with a giggle.
“Thank you?”
Ashley sobered up at once, gave Fina the envelope and left.
Fina opened the envelope and read…
“Mr Walker “Come to class”
“What’s that? Zo asked
“It’s from Mr Walker. He asked us to resume our classes”
Zo perked up, adjusting her glasses.
“Really? What are we supposed to have now?”
“History” Fina replied
*******
“Past leaders. Past Guardians. They have set so many examples that most of us chose to ignore. Millions of years ago, there were fights. Wars. Amenix fought one another. We were divisible. Spells were tainted. Harmful spells erupted. But now, everything’s peaceful again.” Mr Wright said
Mr Wright have short blue and pink hair with pink eyes. He was tall and thin and walked with a swagger.
They were heading to a hall now, although he didn’t disclose which one.
Students gave Fina, Zo and Shelly different looks.
“Mr Walker released them? They must have begged him when they realize they would starve”
Shelly rolled her eyes at their silly whisperings.
“Some great Guardians died a hero during the war.”
“Mr Wright?” Beau Harrison with the short blonde hair asked
“Yes?”
“Why would Amenix fight each other?”
“A very interesting question” Mr Wright said “Before order, there’s chaos. Before chaos, there’s order. The world moves in black and white. Nothing is permanent. Amenix has scars. Some have been healed. Some hasn’t. Each succeeding Queen have fought their battle. We have evil and bad. Some wanted to rule evilly, they planned to take the Queen’s life. They rebelled. Half supported them and it was bloody. Blood has been shed so many times.”
“How many rebellions were there?” Kylie Davies with the white hair asked
“Rebellions?” Mr Wright asked as he stopped in front of a big door. “Many. That they can’t even be counted. Queen Frida lost her Guardians too. They were her most trusted Guardians”
Everyone was silent as something like cold air breezed through them all.
“But the Queen Guardians are complete” Kylie asked
“Yes. They are more than her Guardians. They are special. Those are whose names must never be spoken. The Queen still mourns. She kept all records of them too. It’s like they never even existed.” Mr Wright said “Her grief is palpable. She cherished them a lot”
Mr Wright blinked so many times as if trying to blink away tears.
“Can you tell us about them?” Nancy asked
“No!” Mr Wright shouted. “It’s not in my place and what the Queen orders, it must never be disobeyed. The Queen is the most powerful Guardian of magic. She feels. She hears. And she sees. She also have a seer. She protects every one.”
“If the Queen can see, how did spells got tainted?” Talon asked
“It all started million of years ago not today. You cannot uproot what has been planted for a million years. It grows everyday and as you rest, it’s still growing”
Mr Wright opened the door and they all gasped in awe.
The hall was big and have different shelves like the library. It looked like a museum. Bones decorated everywhere. Different kinds. It was like an Hall of Bones…
Fina looked around, glancing from the gray chandeliers, the golden glass walls.
The hall might be perfect, but it felt like an holy place.
“It’s different. Why are the bones kept here?” Michelle, an Aries student asked.
“Most graduated from Elfina. It’s like an honor being kept here but these are bones of a million years ago not yesterday.”
Mr Wright moved to four glasses bent like a coffin.
“This is Annabelle and Arabella. They were Guardians. Geminis.” Mr Wright said, pointing to two skeletons. “Keith and Kyle. Both Gemini Guardians too. They were the last Gemini to ever be a Guardian. They died during the fifth Guardian Queen war.”
“Aren’t bones supposed to like, decay?” Zo asked
“Some do. Some don’t. I’ve never seen a Guardian bone decay. It’s impossible. Look around. I’ll be sitting there”
Mr Wright walked to a chair beside the floor to ceiling window.
Fina walked around, looking at different bones. Humans. She could hear chatterings of different scared students but she wasn’t scared. She was amazed, wanting to know more. Her enthusiasm getting the best of her as she fingers different glasses. Zo didn’t even move. It’s very obvious she was scared while Shelly looked bored.
As she skimmed through different glasses moving from shelves to shelves, her eyes stopped at a tiny word scribbled on a bone. It was so tiny anyone wouldn’t even notice but she could see it clearly.
The words wrote…
Carly Brooklyn
Carly Brooklyn.
The bones were broken and put on one another. It was in a very small glass case that no one would ever believe that it was that of a human. It looked like that of a cat.
It was in different pieces that even it’s fingers were missing. No head was there either.
Broken.
Fina’s heart dropped so much the pain was almost tangible.
Carly Brooklyn is dead. She was killed.
Not just killed. Tortured.
No head. Broken bones.
Fina tried to calm herself at the brutality.
She stilled when she felt a presence behind her.
“Oh. That’s Aubrey Mason.” Mr Wright said “She was a lovely cat. A spell went wrong and she broke. Just like that”
Fina turned to him.
“A spell went wrong. And a cat bones broke. And it’s head? Please, do tell. What sort of spell was that?”
Mr Wright looked at her with a weird expression before giving her a fake smile.
“It was a normal spell. Normal spells when gone wrong becomes bad.”
“When did it happen?”
“1900, I think? My teacher told the story every time. It was his cat.”
“Oh. Fina said
“Burying the cat was hard. The Queen laid it bones here”
Fina head told her they were all lies.
“How’s your teacher?”
“Dead” Mr Wright said with so much convincing sadness.
“Oh”
Dead, just like Serene Berry’s Lucius.
“Thank you, Mr Wright.”
“You can ask me anything.. Um…”
“Fina Clark” Fina said brightly.
Mr Wright turned and walked away.
“Class dismissed everyone!”
Students rushed out as if they couldn’t bear to stand a single moment in the hall.
Fina turned back to the bone again.
She shook her head and walked away.
As she got out, a white banshee ran out of the wall, surprising everyone. Students who were still recovering from the bone fear screamed harder than the banshee herself.
“A white banshee” Shelly said with a frown.
“A white banshee means an already dead person. A black banshee means a death warning” Zo said in horror.
“Who could that be? A teacher?”
Fina scolded herself for letting her thought drifts at once to Mr Walker.
“Not a teacher. A student.” Fina said
Shelly and Zo looked at her.
“Serene Berry” Fina said firmly.