Gabrielle’s lungs hurt from holding up her breath, but she felt like she would die if she let go. Every second that passed only made her insides swell, ache and beg for fresh air, as her hands clung tightly to the floorboards. And yet, there was no sign of the man really falling asleep at all: his frame turned from side to side, apparently very busy reading one of his many tomes.

She waited and waited, repeating to herself that there is no way the man kept awake for much longer considering how tired he looked! No dice. The man simply continued reading, humming to himself while enjoying that sticky piece of toffee.

It wasn’t long until Gabrielle had completely lost the notion of time. How long had it been already? How much longer would it be?

Was this the end? No, she couldn’t be discovered now! If the Demiurge trapped her, she would not only get spanked! But she would outright disappear! That’s what happened to Karina a few years ago!

Moments kept passing and there was no end to the Demiurge’s wake. With each turning page Gabrielle grew more and more impatient, the pain on her chest burning and menacing with popping her little lungs like balloons.

Images felt so blurry all of a sudden, darker and abstract; Gabrielle’s eyes lacked focus as the world itself stopped making any sense to her. The man turned on his bed, and those motions were the only thing that remained constant in Gabi’s perception of reality.

There were colorful blotches starting to pop from the floor and floating up to the ceiling, sparkles that remained always just out of Gabrielle’s sight. Shapes and forms twisted into spirals so, so slowly— she could even swear little snails were sliding around her as she contained her breath. Colorful, sparkly, blurry… one of them turned to face her and whispered.

“Breathe with him, Gabi. Your brain doesn’t have enough neurons as it is.”

The little girl wasn’t even sure what a neuron was, but that was a wonderful idea! Waiting for a second, Gabi would pay special attention to how the man took slow, deep breaths— on one of the times he exhaled, Gabi allowed all the burning air on her lungs to escape in a low, soft blow. Then she had to bite down her lips to stop her own body from breathing desperately, waiting for the Demiurge himself to breathe in…

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

That gentle little breath going in did not feel like enough at all to her aching, hungry lungs! Not even slightly! But at least it was enough to make the world a liveable place once more: no dancing snails, no blurry images, just the boring room and a feeling of burning in her chest.

Eventually, a hand would slowly reach under the bed, leaving something right in front of the hidden little girl: a book, one that Gabrielle hadn’t seen before. Did the Demiurge bring this one with him? She waited for that hand to once more disappear before trying to open the book, only to feel a blinding light pushing through the pages and straight into her eyes. She had to bite her lip down to not let out a pained groan when closing the book.

Gabi rubbed her eyes with both hands, begging the Saints to force that old man to sleep so she could properly breathe again! But it would be long before she noticed the man’s slumber.

Finally, after what felt like an entire night and a half, the Demiurge was sleeping deep enough for Gabrielle to let out a sigh of relief. Emboldened by the feeling of oxygen returning to her brain, Gabi opened the lousy book once again— this time with much more care to protect her eyes.

The letters on the page glowed with their light, maybe not as intensely as Gabrielle had thought before but enough to read them without having to focus at all: more words that she couldn’t understand, written with letters she had never seen before! But these looked much curvy and small than the ones in the other books, without any drawings to decorate the sides of the page.

At least, no drawings until she found the Tree.

A giant, beautiful tree adorned two whole pages in the middle of the book, its bark white and sparkly, its leaves hanging purple and beautiful from its spiraling branches… but what interested Gabrielle the most was the trunk itself, covered in strange symbols made out of points and lines, just like the Rune Baraqiel had shown her. Gabi’s eyes widened even more, staring at the tree, seeing how its roots sank deep into the ground and then into drawings of people sleeping placidly under it.

She had no idea what this drawing could mean, but she tried to save the images deep in her memory before closing the book and staring face to face with the head of a Lion devouring a sun, carved in a golden plate right on the back of the book.

Again she had to bite her lip down to not simply jump up out of surprise.

Things kept lining up perfectly with the vision, and for some reason, this didn’t make Gabrielle feel safe in the slightest. With a deep breath, she decided that stealing the book would be way too dangerous, and simply left it there as she slid out from under the bed and stood up once more. Her legs felt cramped and trembling, but she would have to endure that for now.

Her eyes once again grew used to the dark, everything seemed to be right where she left it. The Demiurge slept placidly with its face turned towards the wall… and the box of toffee right beside his head.

Gabrielle gulped, opening that box slowly and watching the man stir as she grabbed two handfuls of the sticky brown candy, and then turned right around to the door. She didn’t even dare to raise her hands, Gabrielle simply used her mouth to bite down the knob, open it, and then quickly push from the other side to close the door.