Chapter Seven

New Paths I

The sun was low as Ciella crept back to the Gardens at the end of another day an abject failure. Sunrise to sunset without even a peak of a medallion, during the time of year it was easiest. It was though she was cursed.

Or perhaps something had thrown her off her game.

Those cretins. That Animator with the infuriating smile who clung to her like honey and that Naturalist, quite possibly the most irritating person she had met. Second perhaps, only to Atlas. She still savoured the thought of pummeling them with her staff until…

She slapped her cheeks to regain her focus. The Gardens were no place to amble about distractedly.

She already felt one pair of eyes on her, a man twice her age walking the same direction and staring very intently at her. Now that she was looking at him, he’d slowed his pace.

With a scowl, she morphed her bracelet into a knife. Suddenly, the man had business in the other direction.

That was the Gardens. Looking like an easy target made you one.

Ciella passed defunct streetlamps and buildings that should have been demolished years ago, always keeping an eye. Her building would have been condemned if it were in the Heights, or the Highlands, or Riverside, or anywhere within eyesight of Meridian Academy.

Here it didn’t warrant a second look.

But something did give her a moment of pause: she had never passed through these doors without someone watching her walk through them. She climbed with a light step until reaching her floor.

A floor that was completely deserted.

Years of honing her intuition screamed at her that something was off, even though it was impossible to know what.

She stood still for a long moment, breathing shallow breaths and listening intently for any noise. A cough, a whispered word, someone’s weight shifting.

She clutched her dagger in her hand.

What felt like hours passed and the entire floor remained dead silent. She warped the dagger into a funnel and placed one end on the floor to listen.

Nothing.

It seemed she was truly alone.

Tentatively, she crept towards her door but as she pulled out her key, her intuition was shrieking at her that something was wrong. Her hand froze before she touched the doorknob.

As quietly and as quickly as she could, she turned heel and left the building. Once she was outside, she ran to the fire escape and climbed until she was crouched outside her own window, peeking inside.

Her apartment was empty and just as it had been when she left with the exception of one detail: a bracelet woven out of wooden beads, glowing with Animator vitality had been placed around her doorknob, clearly something put there to alert someone to the door moving.

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Someone was here.

Someone may have still been there.

She warped her dagger into a pick and pried the window open before climbing inside. No reaction. She tiptoed over to her bedroom, listening for noises and heard the sound of someone shuffling around.

She was not alone.

Who was the intruder? Did they have any connection the strange lack of Ioro’s lackies or was this some random, opportunistic neighbour? Ciella mentally prepared herself for what felt like hours before throwing the door open, her heart racing.

Her clothes, her books, her boxes were all strewn about the room like a hurricane had blown through, and at the center of it was a blonde young man, one staring at her with utter shock, holding a maple box.

Her eyes went wide at the sight of that box in his hands.

Instantly the dagger became a staff and crashed onto one of his hands and he dropped the box with a loud yelp and then pressed the point of it deep into his back to pin him to the ground.

“What exactly do you think you’re doing, Atlas?” She hissed.

Atlas craned his neck towards her as much as he could manage and tried to smile charmingly – Ciella anted to wretch at the sight – before speaking, “Heeeey, Ciella. I just thought I would stop by for a visit but since you weren’t home I thought I would let myself in and-agh.”

Ciella stopped pressing the staff into his back, “I could have made a spear.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Atlas said,

“Why are you here?” Ciella asked.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Atlas sounded surprised, “Do you want to play games that badly?”

“No. Why are you here?” Ciella asked. “Every single one of Ioro’s guys is somewhere else. Where are they and why are you here?”

“Let me up and I’ll tell you.” Atlas said.

“You aren’t in a position to make demands.” Ciella said.

“Tell me more about that,” Atlas mumbled.

Ciella decided to lift her staff off his back and the blonde rose, clutching what Ciella hoped was a fractured wrist. She poked her staff around his body experimentally, and just as she suspected found three medallions.

He tried to smile as he handed them back to her; and only after she was certain all her medallions had been returned, pulled her staff away.

“Where is everyone?”

“Apparently Ioro called some sort of meeting,” Atlas said. He stretched a hand out and the wooden bracelet hovered into the room and back onto his wrist.

Suspicion welled up within her, “A meeting without you or me?”

“And any of the other crows. Rats and roaches only.” Atlas said, “As far as I know Heztu and Theora are still out working, and I thought you would be too.

“Rats and roaches only?” Ciella said, to herself.

“Yeah, rats and roaches, like I just said.” Atlas said.

“Where?” Ciella asked.

“Usual place.” Atlas said, “I think you broke my wrist. By the way.” He waved his wrist around, “I don’t think I’m going to be able to lift medallions for at least a few days, maybe you can let me keep one, just to make it right.”

“Or I could tell Ioro that you were trying to sell on the side.” Ciella said.

Atlas paled, “You wouldn’t. I wasn’t trying to do anything that bad, Ciella don’t tell him, you know what he’ll do to me.”

Ciella said nothing.

“He wouldn’t believe you anyway.” Atlas said, scrambling for any leverage, “I’ll deny it.”

“He wouldn’t believe you if you told that story.” Ciella said.

“What do you want?” Atlas said.

“Give me one of your medallions.” Ciella counted her conditions on her fingers, “Never. Ever. Try this again. And put everything back where you found it. Now.”

Atlas gave a sour frown and muttered, “Slave driver.”

He began to put right everything he had torn through (with the exception of her clothes which she refused to let him touch) as Ciella silently watched him.