Chapter 18

Se-le-ni

“This is where you took us?”

I stared around.

“We had to go somewhere”, Hamid grinned.

I took a step. We were in a small room, barely wide enough for us all.

“We’ll follow Hamid”, Ka-ma-la interjected. “He knows how we’ll get to Bo-lo-to.”

I rolled my eyes and went to sit in a corner.

“How long will we be here for?”, the younger man asked.

I’d almost forgotten about him, even though he’d come with Ka-ma-la, and had followed us all the way from the forest to here. Albin.

“You never know”, Hamid grinned.

Albin paced the room. I’d met him before, of course. He’d even been part of the war. Not that I’d ever liked him, but Ka-ma-la was fond of him, and so he had his place.

“I don’t like it”, he grumbled.

Who cares?, I thought. Ka-ma-la walked over to him, whispering something, and he sat down.

“We’ll need to take it slow”, Na-sh-dara said. “If we make too much activity in the thread, Bo-lo-to might understand we’re tracing him.”

Albin glared at her but stayed quiet. Joshua stared out into the room.

“Do we even know how to defeat them once we meet them?”

“Not yet”, Hamid grinned. “One step at a time.”

I don’t think anyone was happy to be confined in such a small room, but there was nothing we could do about it.

“He’s moving…”

Hamid went still, listening into the space.

“He’s changing place. No one makes a move.”

He froze on the spot, even though it was magic, rather than movement, that he meant. He held his breath, seemingly listening for a sound.

“Not good…”, he said as he relaxed and went to stand by the wall. “He’s changed place. The thread will need to find him again, and until then, we cannot move.”

“So we’re stuck here?”, I asked.

He looked at me sheepishly.

“Unfortunately, yes.”