PENDANT THAT SAVES?

They chased after it till they lost sight of it but Lia wouldn't stop at all. she let them run on according to her instincts and before they knew it, they'd reached a place where the road forked into two.

"This isn't going to work, Lia. we've been chasing after it pointlessly and look where it's gotten us to. It'll come back home so we don't have to follow after it."

"This is why I hate having you around. You don't help in the slightest, you only think of the negative part of everything. Okay, this is what we're going to do. Since the road parts into two, we'll split up. You will go left and Mozrael and I will go right. Any questions? Good, let's go." And with that, she was gone off to find the cat. Ara and Mozrael exchanged confused looks but before they could do anything, Lia ran back and dragged Mozrael off, leaving Ara alone. Ara watched them disappear and after standing in her spot for some minutes, decided to take off. Too many people were looking at her and wondering why she was standing alone there. She stormed off on a pointless journey to find a cat, or to put it more clearly, to roam about aimlessly and then return home with nothing.

She searched for quite a while and even after motivating herself thoroughly, finally gave up. She decided to return but that kid Lia wouldn't take it so easy, she would be as pestering as ever. Ara stood at a spot, thinking of a suitable excuse to give Lia when they met. After a while of thinking, when she'd decided she had one, she started to move out pleased but jumped up in terror.

"Whaaat?'

She quickly shuffled back and looked down at what she'd just felt brush against her legs.

"Meow," the cat looked at her with its green eyes then started to lick its paw. It sat staring at her for some time then started to walk off.

"Hey wait," Ara followed after it, understanding that it wanted to lead her somewhere. It would walk ahead and when it's gotten some distance between them, it'd stop and look at her, waiting for her to get close enough then take off once again. It was a while before they reached a dark alley. She instantly got goosebumps all over her skin, feeling something oddly familiar about being in that alley. The cat still moved forward into the alley, but Ara stopped halfway through, refusing to go into the shadows. She stood at the tip of the shadow and looked down at it before her feet. The cat still moved deeper into the darkness and when it turned around, she could only make out its green eyes.

"Come here, cat. I'm not going any deeper into there. What if something's there?" Ara said and stood her ground, refusing to go any further. That was when she noticed some movement in the darkness. The thing moved again and she moved back some steps in fear. the figure moved forward a little more and she could now make out the figure of a person. The person moved forward still till the sunlight fell on the head of the person. It was a cloaked person, and instantly Ara felt some fear within as she remembered the odd person she'd noticed earlier when they were riding the carriage. He raised his head to look at Ara and she saw the cat perched on his shoulder which confused her. She knew if he wanted to do something terrible, he would only be pushed to do so if she tried to run away, so she stood still and looked into his eyes while frowning.

He moved closer till he was an arm's length away from her, and with that, she had second thoughts about staying there, but her body was stiff and stubborn, refusing to give her control for her to run away.

"Aramith," the man said in a scratchy voice. Ara just stared blankly at the man.

"In two days, there will be an attack by a secret group, the same day that you people would be enjoying yourselves. You can't stop them from causing harm, but you can stop them from causing too much harm. They won't stop till they have what they're looking for."

"What are you talking about? You're being very unclear with your words and I don't even know what organization you're talking about." Ara said as she did not get what this weird man was referring to.

"What they're looking for is inside of you, but they won't get it if you don't let them. They don't plan on harming you, the only harm they can cause won't be to hurt you directly but the pain will be great. It would greatly affect you, take this," he pulled out a pendant from his cloak and stretched out his arm to Ara. It had an hourglass-shaped glass vial with a clear blue liquid within. Strangely enough, even when the vial was held still, the liquid would still be sloshing about within like it was disturbed or being constantly shaken, and if her eyes weren't playing tricks on her, she was sure she could see some white mist within as well. It didn't have a top where it could be unscrewed open, the silver necklace just connected to it at the top, where it twisted around the vial like vines to the middle with one silver vine piercing through and running back up to form a circle that only reached the upper half.

Ara was mesmerized indeed and stared at the object for a good minute before the man shook it and snapped his fingers to draw her attention back to reality.

"Take it," he said, bringing it even closer to her. She hesitated a little but took it at last.

"I almost forgot about this", he said again then took out Lia's purse and gave it to her ", and if you're wondering, everything's intact, but I advise you to keep that pendant safe. Even though you don't trust me, you can still trust your cat's instincts to know that thing's not dangerous, you'll be needing it to save her life.

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!!" Lia shouted at Ara from behind. She quickly turned, almost breaking her neck in the process.

"I'm so going to kill you! I spent the last two hours searching for you and look at you. what were you doing?!" She shouted again at Ara, but Ara ignored her and turned around only to find the spot where the empty spot where the man was standing

Lia gasped, "You're ignoring me. Look at me when I'm talking to you. Don't you remember mom taught us that? What a disappointment," she said as she walked closer and snatched the bag from Ara's hand.

"You're so lucky you found it or else I would have sold you" "Lia?! You should be thanking me. See how long I spent searching for it and all you do is talk rubbish in my face." Ara said annoyed at that ungrateful kid. Mozrael understood where she was coming from "You know, you should understand all this, Lia. You could at least say thank you for doing all this for you," Mozrael said from behind Lia.

"Yeah...You're right Mozrael. I Shouldn't have said that, how daft of me. I take my words back, I should have just gone on and sold you right away, but where....?" She said thoughtfully

"Lia!"

"Lia!"

They said in unison.

"What?" Lia jumped back in shock, "What's wrong with what I said? You don't tell a slave when you're going to sell it, do you? Besides, I'm still thinking of where I could go sell you ah! Why did you hit me?" Lia grabbed her head which had just been smacked hard by Ara who was still waving a fist before Lia to threaten her, but Lia just ignored her and started off. "Come on, Let's go."

The three ambled back to the carriage Lia and Mozrael had ridden to get to Ara to go home.

They were three hours past noon when they reached home. Ara let the two go off and chose to wait at the gate for the stuff Lia bought so she would send them to the appropriate place. Well, that's what she told them as she stood at the gates but when they had gone off, she called one of the soldiers. "Call me Ren," she told him and the soldier was off. Not long after Ren, the same young man who'd almost cried that he might lose his job was running his way towards Ara but when he got there, he stared at Ara for a long time and then scratched his head.

"Who are you?" he asked

Ara's eyes turned dark and ominous "Say that again and that would be the last non-funny joke you'll ever know for your life. I'll even make sure you don't get reincarnated," Ara said. Ren's eyes now widened and he covered his mouth and looked away to hide his laughter as coughs.

"Are you laughing?"

"No, it's my cough cough, my throat cough. I think something's in my throat cough."

Ara was about to rage but calmed down "Ren, I want you to do something for me," Ara said

"Okay, cough. Just say it whatever it is, master A-"

"Take this, I've written everything in it," Ara told him and gave him a parchment before he could finish his sentence. He looked at it once and left to do his duties.

Sure enough, four carriages came in, one after the other, filled with things Lia had bought on her shopping spree.