"Julius?" Thurid immediately called out, her voice hesitant, as she held her chin toward the strange clap she heard earlier.
A silence plagued the library, long and drawn.
Thurid immediately stepped past the half-wall, pacing down the red-carpet trail in a thunderous sprint.
The bookshelves seemed to blur past her as she charged down the path.
Her arms pumped blindly ahead, blurring just as quickly as the bookshelves, as she ran ahead at the same impressive speed as an ox.
In the distance ahead she could make out emptied bookshelves, books spilled across the floor like a flood of pages, lanterns attached to the walls with glowbugs fluttering around from inside the glass.
The glowbugs were no size bigger than a pebble, with wings that rapidly flapped to give them flight, their abdomens carrying a transparent sack that gave off a white glow.
Beyond the fallen books, Thurid could make out a sparkling blue light.
Thurid drew closer, speeding over, eventually running close enough to make out how the light flicked in zapping sparks around something metal .
That's when Thurid slowed her place, finally noticing Julius standing beside the light, with a look shrouded in fog..
The light came from a device standing innocently on a bookshelf.
The object was metal, it was similar to a microscope in shape, with a dull chrome colour.
The top piece was like a thick rod, connected to a curved metal beneath the rod, that bent down in almost obtuse angle in an outward upright arch.
The curving metal connected to a gear, spinning around it a spark of blue, the wheel spun and delivered this spark onto another gear as if transferring water.
The spark passed from one gear to the next, completing a full loop around the circle of gears surrounding the object.
"I see your friend has found an artifact." A familiar voiced spoke in the distance in a slimy tutting sound.
Thurid stood frozen, her posture coiled with rigid worry as she ran her gaze over Julius's unscathed creme uniform.
Her narrowing vision then focused on the object, the collection of scattered books over the floor, finally flicking to the librarian slowly slipping closer on her legless main body like a lump of green raw meat.
"Supposedly, this once stole Zeus's lightning. Maybe that's why it ended up here, to collect dust where it can't harm anyone..." The librarian purred in a sickly cough, raising one of her many arms to adjust her glasses.
"Or at least I assumed it would..." She said as her eyes slowly rolled along the sight of the very misplaced books.
Julius turned his chin aside to face the two, his eyelids converged together until they left a small gap for his pupils to focus on them.
His expression was like a blanket of snow, wrapped tightly around ice.
He turned away, his gaze lingering on the artifact from the corner of his eye as he passed it.
Thurid breathed a small and harmless huff.
"This guy's really is crazy." She sighed before strolling forward to follow Julius.
The librarian watched from a distance, her fatty face stretching as her expression conflicted between a smile and something with disdain.
She dropped down, her green body curling like how soft serve dispensed from a machine.
Her many hands reaching out to begin collecting the books to reshelve them.
Up ahead, the two continued walking through the aisle.
"So why were you playing with lightning anyway?" Thurid blurted harmlessly after a momentary blip of awkward silence.
"I thought there was a discharge feature." Julius grumbled with a solemn expression, his voice deep like he was chewing gravel.
A silence.
"I was right..." He mumbled a moment after before reaching the fifty-second aisle.
On the bookshelf on the left stood a plethora of neatly filed books, with only their spines visible to the two.
Beneath each spine, a laminated label sat inside of golden ornate frame nailed to the shelf.
Julius's gaze swept over the row; the bottom started with 'A-1' and ascended in order until Julius found 'A-42' at the sixth shelf in the middle of the bookshelf Infront of him.
The spine facing him was a royal shade of twitch purple, like a brighter colour of lavender.
The texture of the book was rough, with cracks down the skin of the book like an elephant's rough skin.
Julius felt this texture as he deftly slid the book out from the shelf.
He pulled the book out, examining the blank cover, twisting the book around in his hand to examine the empty contents on the back.
"What a book." Thurid snorted, crossing her thick arms with a cheeky grin.
Julius took no notice of the comment, pulling the case open and laying each side in each hand.
The book contained white pages, the texture like a brittle thin sheet of clean bone.
The pages were entirely blank, just as empty as the cover, the surface of the pages a smooth flat like the content's surface of a glass of milk.
Then suddenly black ink leaked onto the page, bleeding onto the milky white surface.
The black curved and twisted into neat cursive.
"Beware the star that travels the thread. You know me, it said."
Julius's eyes studied the page for a long while, as if his heavy stare could will the words to change.
Then with a small huff, that sounded suspiciously like a sigh, he brought his hands together to close the book.
"Waste of time." Julius cursed under his breath, his voice cold with burning frustration.
Thurid tilted her head forward, trying to get a clearer view of Julius's face.
She slowly reached out, her hand raising toward Julius's shoulder in a supportive gesture.
"Hey? What's up? It's just a book-"
Julius pulled away in an instant, twisting his shoulder back sharply as if Thurid had burnt him.
"It's more than just a book." Julius growled in a low voice between grit teeth.
Thurid's hand froze in mid-air, slowly slinking back to her side as her face softened with the bitter taste of rejection.
"When were you going to tell her, you're looking for a prophecy on the apocalypse?" A slimy voice called out from down the hallway again.
The librarian rolled slowly back over to the two, her arms crossed as she trapped a finger against her sleeved forearm.
"T-The the apocalypse?" Thurid stammered in confusion at the sound of such a serious word.
Thurid turned over her shoulder, her gaze hesitantly finding Julius's expression.
"Julius. What are is she talking about?" Her voice was soft, slightly confused.
Another long silence warmed the cold hallway.
Only the sound of faint buzzing, coming from the flapping glow bugs inside the lanterns, could be heard.
Julius's head hung forward, obscuring his expression.
His body was still, not like a fixed statue but like metal wire coiled tightly.
He slowly tilted his chin up, as if about to answer.
The sound of sawdust slithering along a chalkboard stopped him, as a sudden black sea of shadow began swirling into the surface of existence.
This void of black, like in ink, looped around endlessly like a music disc on a record player.
A skeletal hand reached out, slowly slinking toward Thurid.
Julius's eyes widened with realisation, his hand shooting out quicker to yank Thurid aside just before the skeletal hand grasped at empty air.
Julius jolted back, pulling Thurid forcefully with him.
"Hey! what the-" Thurid shrieked as she felt Julius pull her aside, only for her dark eyes to widen.
Her eyes then instantly collapsing, to fix seriously onto the black void.
Julius's voice was like a steel blade, ordering without any space for Thurid to argue.
"Get back."
The black circle expanded, like a painter colouring a wider black circle on a canvas.
The figure emerged from the large void of shadow, its bony toes meeting with the red carpet.
The Keeper stood deathly still, never acknowledging the slug lady a few rows behind him.
Its invisible gaze, hidden under its tattered hood, was fixed to Julius.
A visible cloud of cold mist swept past its hood as it exhaled something old and dark.
Infront of Thurid, stood with his back to her, Julius kept himself between the two.
A gap of at least three metres sat between himself and the Keeper.
There was a long silence that filled the endless library, Julius's tense body somehow grew more rigid underneath the tension.
For a long moment, Thurid forgot which of the two was supposed to be the monster.
Julius's body was unmoving, his body a stiff contraption with the same pressure of a loaded gun or a pulled spring.
"I can't rely on my father this time around, sacred spaces like these are often built with seals to prevent it from entering." Julius strategized instantly to himself.
"Not to mention it wasn't with me beforehand, I can't imagine its actively looking for me." Julius theorised, acting cautiously and only acting on the information he was certain of.
Julius's hand twitched once, itching to reach into his blazer jacket for the familiar star-shaped token.
"No." He reprimanded himself internally in an instant.
"I don't need even need that to deal with you." Julius concluded, his gaze sweeping distantly pass the Keeper and toward the lanterns.
The stillness continued within the aisle, everyone caught in a deadlock, trying to anticipate the other's next move.
The silence continued for another moment.
Then the Keeper finally breathed, its bandage wrapped skeletal arms hidden under his cloak.
"I saw the darkness in you."
It had been referring to the earlier morning, when it had previously ensnared Julius's shadow with its own.
Its voice drifted through the air, with the same chill as snow.
"You should not hold the vault." It judged in a voice that resembled cold finality.
Finally the Keeper's shadow from behind it shout out, lunging in a straight line with the width of an arm.
BANG!
Before the arm of darkness met with Julius's shadow, a sudden light burst from one of the lanterns.
Julius, with the purple prophecy book in hand, had thrown the book at one of the lanterns.
The book crushed the glass, squashing the glowbugs inside, rupturing the sacks of the glowbugs.
This caused light inside to spill out in an uncontrollable explosion, burning away the shadow of the Keeper.
"Thurid!" Julius commanded immediately, yet Thurid was already shooting forward.
Thurid was the daughter of Thor, the god of thunder, the same god who wielded one of the heaviest weapons in the world.
Julius had known this, he naturally took the time to plan things, he predicted Thor's godly strength would've been passed down to his daughter.
He was right.
BOOM!
Thurid's fist flew into the figure's torso, sending the figure soaring back in an instant.
It was as if the Keeper had met with the impact of a grenade, or a flying wrecking ball, perhaps even something greater.
The skeletal figure shot down the aisle like a rocket, flying out of view before a loud crash could be heard in the distance.
"Hah! Didn't stand a chance." Thurid boasted in a joyful chuckle, straightening her posture as she retracted her fist where it hovered in the empty air.
Julius stood unbothered, his arms by his side as his narrowed gaze examined the empty hallway in silence.
"We're leaving." He ordered sternly, twisting away as he reached into his blazer to pull the vault from his pocket.
"What? So soon? We just got here." Thurid whined with a dramatic sigh.
"Now." Julius ordered again, his dark tone leaving no room for dispute.
His thumbs brushed the purple glowing vertical eye shape on the cube.
Then twisting it to face the beam of light, emerging from it, toward the empty air.
Thurid groaned with exaggerated angst, swaying her shoulders and pointing her irritated face toward the darkness above that hid the ceiling.
Julius stepped forward, walking through the blue oval frame.
"Well this is goodbye!" She shouted to the slug lady behind her, who stood with crossed arms whilst tutting in disappointment to herself.
"Thanks for having us!" Thurid pumped her arm, turning forward again before jumping through the portal as it closed behind her.
When Thurid stepped through the portal, she found herself in the same luminous aquatic room where they acquired the vault.
Thurid looked around, twisting over as if examining the room to double check her surroundings.
Julius stood with his hand reaching into his blazer, pocketing the vault, standing by the entrance of the steps.
"Didn't that dude have portals too? Can't he chase us here?" Thurid wondered aloud as she turned to face Julius.
Julius's eyes were as steeled as always, the rest of his expression was as calm as wind in spring.
"No. This space belongs to me, everyone has one, this lake has one for each and every one. the Keeper doesn't have the so-called key to enter mine." Julius worded particularly.
He turned toward the exit, ascending the steps, as he expected Thurid to follow without turning back to check.
Ahead of him, the sound of rumbling water could be heard even from the bottom of the glowing steps.
Thurid stepped forward to follow behind Julius, she looked up and could make out a growing light from the tops of the steps.
Now that she was on the stairs, she could hear gurgling water from above slowly echo down the steps.
The two continued until they reached the opening they came from earlier.
They stepped out of the hole and onto the riverbed, where the sea was parted into two.
Either side of the two were tall walls of sea water, impossibly held into place.
The ground underneath them felt freshly wet, it hadn't dried at all, as if the water had closed and opened up for them again when they returned.
Thurid shook her head, absorbing the days events with a mix of delight and confusion, she was mainly overstimulated by it all.
The two climbed out from the shore, Julius using his agile body to swiftly pull himself up the roots protruding from the exposed wet dirt where the water level would've previously encompassed it.
Thurid leapt up with ease, her hefty legs propelling her easily to the edge of the shore as she scrambled up it.
The sky was now a navy-blue blanket, with dots of white sprinkled stars.
"For a mortal, you're pretty nifty." Thurid bantered with an undercurrent of praise, following Julius over to the Pegasus in the corner of the shore.
Julius remained silent, though the way his eyes scraped Thurid's figure behind him from the corner of his vision made it feet like he thought about replying.
Julius pulled himself onto the transparent beast, the creature's pressured wind-body feeling impossibly smooth under their hands.
Thurid yanked herself behind Julius, catching him in a gentle hold, although still quite a death grip to Julius's mortal form.
The beast leapt up, speeding off into the air and toward the veil of billowing grey fog.
Thirty-three seconds later, the two burst through the other side of the fog, sweeping over the horizon beneath them.
"Today was fun..." Thurid breathed quietly, her voice small compared to the whisking winds they jet through.
Julius's ears twitched, his gaze narrowed into very rare slits of confusion as he digested her words.
"It's not like how Falson's ever said it." Julius mentally took note, soon discarding the thought as the beast lowered itself toward a neighbourhood district a while beyond the outskirts of a lonely forest.
From where they were in the air, they could just about make out the clean white building dotted deep into the lonely forest surrounded by brick buildings.
The Pegasus continued to lower, stopping to a hover at the roof of a home, Thurid took this moment to slide off and onto the tiled roof.
"Hehe, let's do this again sometime, Sparrow." She giggled, turning over her shoulder toward Julius as she stood. Then she turned again, heading forward to slide a window open and climb inside.
By the time she settled into her bedroom and looked out, the Pegasus had vanished.
The Pegasus ascend into the sky again, flying at a much gentler glide as the creature neared a tiny home another few minutes away.
The Pegasus lowered carefully toward the home, the home was small with a white picket fence and tidy greenery in the front garden.
The house itself was the shape of a rectangle, with a tiled roof in the shape of a triangle and a circular window in the middle of this triangle.
The Pegasus grew lower, and lower, carefully slipping down at an angle to hide itself from anyone still awake at this late hour.
Then the Pegasus froze, yanking it's weight back as it sensed danger in the shape of a dome around the house, as if sensing a charge coming from the house.
Julius jolted forward, plastering his weight against the Pegasus's back to stop himself from falling off.
"Shh, calm boy." Julius whispered, his grip tight around the wind creature as he soothed it with a hush.
Soon the beast calmed, slowly dropping to land behind some trees beside the house.
Julius dropped off from the creature, waving his hand with a flair to signal the creature to leave.
Julius turned, recognising the shape of the new home he moved into to attend the academy.
He huffed a sigh, it was actually inconvenient for Julius, though it would've aroused suspicion if he were able to travel to and from the academy with ease whilst not being anywhere remotely near it.
He stepped along the concrete path outside the white picket fence, approaching the gate.
He paused for just a moment, his observant gaze turning toward a window from a house next to his.
Julius could see a young boy, perhaps no older than five, with what looked to be their mother holding them tightly.
The sound of laughter muffled through the glass, though that wasn't why Julius had trouble identifying it at first.
He turned away silently, opening the gate and stepping toward the front door.
His expression was as unchanging as ever, his posture still entirely graceful, but if he closed that gate a little harder than necessary?
Well...No one knew.
end of chapter 10