~Chapter six~

I glanced up to see Lyria's brows shot up in surprise"Y-your mom?"she asked and I nodded slowly with a sigh.

"I'm confused" Lyria blurted out"But your mom is..." she swallowed and glanced at me cautiously as she said the words"Dead right?" My heart felt like it was being squeezed as there was this dull pain that shot through my chest as my eyes stung with unshed tears while they remained fixated on the paper.

"So why would anyone send a warning with her name scribbled on it"she got up pacing around and i lazily tore my gaze from the piece of paper.

"What do you mean warning?"

"The crow in the circle of blood signifies a warning that is according to the stories i've heard"

"So this means another race is aware that the Amulet is missing?"

"Exactly but what I can't understand is why they would send a warning with your mother's name on it if she's already dead...no offense."she said when i winced at the word 'dead'. Ignoring what she said, i asked...

"So what do we do then?"

"We have to find out which of the races use crows and blood as a warning and hopefully we'll get some answers from there..."she got up and walked over to the left library shelf. She picked up a book, went through the pages and flipped it close."...There's got to be something in this library that can help us"

I ran a hand through my hair with a sigh and said"What exactly are we looking for here?"

"Old books, books on Mythology or Magic...Just grab as many you can find" I nodded and walked over to the opposite shelf to search but all i could see neatly arranged on the shelfs were books on Science, Quantum physics, Biology, Marketing, History, Chemistry, mathematics etc. basically all the subjects being taught in our school. Who even reads such books anyway?

One hour later...

I looked over my shoulder to see Lyria groan in frustration as she shoved yet another book over her shoulder."How can a Library this big not have a single fucking book on mythology or magic?not a single one!" she turned to me and glared. Although I know the glare wasn't directed at me or at least I think it wasn't.

"Did you have any luck?" she asked and I shook my head "No"

"Well there goes our progress"she said in annoyance gripping her hair hard"Now what do we do?" something I've noticed she does when things don't go her way. "...we've searched this entire God damned place and found nothing!"

I ran a hand through my thick brown hair which seemed to have grown longer with every passing minute as i recalled a time when Krugger had ordered all the cleaners to sort out books that were no longer needed by the school into a private sector. "There's a private store room we can search."

"Where?"

"Here"I stated.

"Well why didn't you say so before?" she asked annoyed and I rolled my eyes resisting the urge to glare at her as I wasn't really in the mood for her sass. "Come on, I'll show you"

She nodded and followed after me as we rounded the corner after the hundredth shelf in the library...yeah, this place is stupidly huge. There was a door to the left which had a warning sign with the letter 'X' on it.

"Was this necessary?" Lyria scoffed motioning to the sign on the door and I shrugged"Humans are too fucking dramatic" she rolled her eyes. I tried the door knob and it was locked.

"it's locked" she placed a hand to my chest and lightly shoved me aside. "Allow me to show you how we Gobmen do it." she smirked her eyes now glowing. She wrapped her hands on the door knob and the craziest thing happened.

I watched in total shock as she ripped the door off its hinges and flung it to the side. Off its FUCKING HINGES! I glanced at her then at the broken door now laying on the floor incredulously... Somebody please pinch me because I know for a fact that a girl did not just do that. A small one at that.

"Don't be sexist Brian, come on." she said pulling me along into the store room. It was dark but not too dark to the point of us not being able to see a thing. There was no shelf or whatsoever. There was just a big round table with thick dusty books piled on top.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw Lyria scrunch her nose up in disgust as she said "Right Brian, get searching" she just loves dumping shit on me.

"There is no way that I am getting myself dirty." I stated matter of factly crossing my arms.

"oh come on, you don't expect me to touch it either. I just had my nails done last week!" she cried dramatically shoving her beautifully manicured nails to my face.

"Not my problem"I shrugged unwavering as i moved her hands away from my face and she scoffed" i just got us into this storage room and I'm a girl" she said placing emphasis on the word 'girl' Are you really throwing your 'man card' away?" she smirked wiggling her brows and I glared at her. I knew she was just poking me but I gave in anyway flipping her my middle finger.

I marched over to the table which was filled with an Avalanche of dust. Without thinking too much about it, I threw my hands in and searched...I am never eating a thing with my hands ever again.

I shoved and shoved away moist books, some were even dressed in cobwebs. Ew!

I detest spiders!

I was about giving up when my eyes strayed to one book which was almost falling off the table. If it wasn't for the slightly brown coloured strap peeking out from the side, I would have totally missed it.

I caught it quickly before it could land to the floor and cleared off the table letting it rest alone on it. "Do you have something we can use to clean this off?" Lyria asked and i turned to her with a smirk.

"How about your shirt?"she rolled her eyes and pulled the shirt off her head leaving her only in a tank top. I was not expecting her to actually do it but damn she looked fine as hell. Well there's no denying that she is a hot specimen.

God I sound like a pervert. Get it together Brian!

"Ehm"she cleared her throat holding up the shirt towards me and I swallowed taking it from her whilst avoiding her gaze. I literally just...never mind.

After wiping the book clean (courtesy of Lyria's shirt) I stared in awe as I took in it's appearance. It was a shiny brown hard covered book with weird markings on it...More like claw marks scattered on it with a writing scrawled on it which I hardly read as 'Nasguard'

"Nasguard"Lyria muttered her eyes now widened in shock. Noting this, i furrowed my brows and asked"what's wrong?" she flipped through the pages of the book then her eyes lit up like a child who was just given a die hearted gift.

"We found it"she gasped"Holy shit, I can't believe we found it!"she squealed.

"The book on mythology?"I asked confused.

she smacked her forehead"No Brian, it's a chronicle of Nasguard written by the Neirs which are called story tellers. I don't know how it got here but we sure as hell ain't leaving it here" she said which had me creasing my forehead further.

She seemed to have noticed this because she groaned in frustration"What now?"

"I'm confused...Nasguard?" I raised a brow.

"Home to every mythical creature alive-" The loud creaking sound of the door made her stop abruptly"They're closing the library." Lyria expressed in concern. I grabbed the book from the table and we both exited the storage room. The door to the library was almost an inch closed when I slipped my fingers through it stopping it from jamming shut.

Thankfully, the guard didn't turn around so we snuck away. And by snuck away, I mean out of school"Fuck, what excuse do I give Charlie?"

"Forget Charlie, you'll handle him later." she took the book from me and opened it flipping through the pages when my heart skipped a beat and a feeling of dread filled up my chest. I couldn't resist the persistent needing feeling to turn around. And I did. That was when i noticed this weird looking black SUV packed at one corner of the street which didn't settle well with me.

I turned to Lyria who was still flipping over the pages of the book and said"We gotta get out of here"

"Give me a minute"

"Lyria we gotta go" I said again tugging on her shirt.

"Wait i've got it!" she exclaimed looking up just in time to see two people come out from the black SUV dressed in an all black attire and leather jackets. As if on cue, they both simultaneously pulled out guns from the waist band of their black leathered pants and aimed at us.

"Shit run!" she yelled. Immediately those words left her mouth, bullets went flying everwhere. Didn't have to tell me twice. My legs were already working before my brain. A bullet flew past me barely missing me by an inch"fuck" I cussed. if it wasn't for the fact that I was running on adrenaline, I would have passed out in shock...I kid you not.

Can you blame me though? I only see stuff like this in movies not freaking real life!

We ran towards an old looking deserted school bus whose yellow colour seemed to have been washed away by a continuous downpour of rain and hid in there. My legs were shaking and I struggled to catch my breath"W-who...the hell are...these people?"

"C-ollectors" she managed to get out, breathing heavily. Before I could ask her what she meant, a weird smell infiltrated my nostrils making me sniff the air to get a clearer idea on what it is. I took a longer drag in and my eyes widened on the realisation of what it might be.

"They're gonna blow off the bus, we need to get out now" I said frantically trying to open the doors. "Shit it's been locked"

"Here, lemme try." she took my spot and tried to pull the door open. It felt like deja Vu except this time, the door didn't budge. What happened to all that strength of some hours ago?

"It won't open." she yelled irritably hitting the door with all her might"They're blocking out my powers"

"how?"

"I don't know!" she snapped gripping her hair tightly. I could barely think looking around. My brain doesn't seem to function under stress. The smell of smoke was starting to penetrate the bus and Lyria was already having a coughing fit. I was beginning to feel choked as well.

"Windows. Try the windows." she coughed into her elbows.Taking off my sweatshirt, I wrapped it around my hands and tried breaking through the window.

Thud

Thud

cough

"I can't see" i heard Lyria say in a feeble manner. I turned to see that she was already looking faint barely holding onto the arm of the bus seats. "Hold on!" I yelled over the smoke which had now thickened making it hard for me to see.

"Brian" I heard Lyria's faint voice call followed by a loud thud which propelled me to hit harder at the window.

Thud

Thud

cough

Thud.

I heard a creak and gave it a final hit then it broke. I strained my eyes to see Lyria now fallen to the ground."Lyria come on!" I yelled rushing over to help her up. She stood weakly as I hoisted her up and managed to climb to the roof of the bus. Once she was successfully on the roof, I worked on getting myself out. I placed my foot on one of the chairs and held onto the edge of the roof for support. With the little strength I had left, I pushed myself upward and climbed out the window.

Just as we both took a step to jump from the bus, it exploded with a deafening bang sending us flying in an awkward manner. I landed to the floor with such a force that knocked the air out of my system making my body limp. I felt numb, struggling to keep my eyes open but I was failing miserably.

The world around me appeared to be spinning and I felt this weird gust of wind envelope me in an embrace. Cold, I felt cold then a sudden light shone brightly against my eyes blinding me and I blacked out.