I was taken last night, taken to a place I don’t know. I don’t like it here. I hear whispers down the hall, and sometimes I can hear crying. It’s so dark here, I never liked the dark that much. When the soldiers took me, they said they would help me find my mummy. They said Mummy was waiting for me here, but I haven’t seen her yet.
Maybe I did something wrong. Mummy always says when you do something wrong, you get punished, but she’s never locked me in a dark room before. Usually she doesn’t let me have dessert, or she makes me go to bed early.
They said I would meet new friends, that I wasn’t the only one here. But I don’t want new friends, I want my mummy. She always makes me feel better, especially when she braids my hair. She always says I look so pretty with braids.
My hands shake as I hold onto the diary, afraid I’ll drop the book and it will fall. Tears drip down onto the page as I finish reading.
She was so scared.
Closing the diary and forcing myself to sit up, I quickly come up with a plan to hide the diary. Grabbing my knife and kneeling to the side of the bed, I cut a hole in the front end of the mattress since they always check the sides. A horizontal line in the middle hidden by the fitted sheet on top of it, exposing the padding inside.
I don’t know how he managed to get the diary inside The Academy to me, but I have never been more grateful for anything in my life. I still have a piece of Lauren, even after they tried to remove all trace of her, and that means more to me than anything else.
For a moment, I allow myself to sit in this sadness, something I rarely did before today, but finding it oddly fitting I was now doing the exact thing I said would get Lauren killed:
Showing emotion.
I remember when she first arrived at The Academy. Her blonde hair had been cut to her shoulders like everyone’s had when they first arrived. She was crying.
Lauren always cried, but never like she did that first night. I didn’t understand the difference then, but I do now. She was afraid.
Such a simple emotion, yet I have not been trained to understand it. Something I now see almost every day. I should’ve hugged her more, I should’ve comforted her more. I should’ve been a better friend.
A better sister, because that’s what Lauren was.
A knock at the door brings me back to reality, and I slip into the assigned pants and shirt laying on the bed, brushing my hair quickly but leaving it down. My mission is to talk, to be casual. For once I want to leave it down like I see everyone else doing.
Bella and I are followed out by guards to the Commander, who takes us up the lift and up to the car. The sun is almost blinding my eyes as we walk out of the building. It’s not very often we get to see the sun at its full height like this. Usually it’s either late at night or early morning when we are assigned to missions. The quiet hours.
The drive is shorter than normal, too. We don’t go to the elite’s side of the town, instead we stop outside of an old brick building in Zone Three.
“Darlia, Bella, be careful. Watch your surroundings,” Wolvrin warns as we step out of the car and the SUV doors close.
They have stopped making us wear earpieces, since I convinced them it will make Cayden trust me more. Which is one less thing to have to worry about.
Now I just need to worry about everything else.
We walk up to the large wooden double doors, opening them and freezing when we see what’s inside. My heart skips a beat as pure joy flows through me. Inside are walls and walls of bookshelves, all lined up perfectly in rows unlike anything I’ve ever seen before.
The Academy has banned all but three books, and they are books they created for The Academy to help us understand the weapons we use. But this…this is like eating that dish at the gala for the first time. I could get lost here for hours and not even care.
The chair for a day is honestly worth spending the next few hours in a book.
I forget the mission entirely, walking through the lines of shelves looking over titles I’ve never even heard of before. There must be thousands of books in this room, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
“I won’t tell if you don’t,” Bella says, and immediately I’m nodding, running towards the back shelves, picking up the first book I can find and opening it. I don’t even notice as Cayden walks in with Marcus beside him. I’m in a world of castles and dragons and fairies. I don’t even know what they are, but I can read about it here.
“Well hello, darling. This is a surprise.”
I don’t even look up from the pages. I am hooked on every word, as if there is magic woven into the pages that makes me unable to look away. That is until Cayden puts his hand under my chin, forcing me to look up at him and taking the book from my hands.
“There are those perfect eyes, much better. How are you, darling?”
“Give me the book back.”
He smiles, his dimples on display again, and the sinking feeling in my stomach returns. “Is that any way to speak to a friend? Careful darling, you’re forgetting your manners.” Cayden’s voice is mocking, but the jab doesn’t land.
Instead, I wrap my arms around his neck at an unexpectedly fast rate and hug him. I guess I do owe him a thank you, considering he held me while I cried, then made sure I got Lauren’s diary. He hesitates, probably confused why I’m willingly hugging him, before his arms wrap around me, holding me tightly.
