Perhaps this was a deposit of what they considered worthless material. Was Griffin playing tricks on her? Well, not really, this room did have information about the Royal Games, it was just that it was disorganized.
And there was no clock in it. Perhaps she’d better come back later, with time to really dig through the records, without worrying about being late. She should also ask Prince Larzen for everything he knew, writing down dates. That would be a better starting point. She sighed and went to the door. Weird. Zora could swear it had been left open. Or maybe she was confused.
No wonder, for some reason meeting Griffin stressed her. Perhaps it was still the fear that he would sentence her to death or prison for having attacked him, or the very real possibility that he would come up with a convoluted rule to keep her out of the competition. It was even hard to focus.
Zora turned the handle, but the door didn’t move. Then she tried turning the handle differently, pushed the door really hard, and it still didn’t budge. She tried a few times and got no result. Horror struck her as she realized she’d been locked in. She banged on the door.
“Hello! Someone! Open up!”
On the back of a huge library on a remote corner in the castle, she’d have to yell a lot. Zora wanted to strangle herself. How stupid she’d been following Griffin, thinking he was being helpful. No wonder he’d been calm and even polite. His plan was to sabotage her odds at getting the cup. Zora hated him.
After struggling against the handle some more, she kicked the door and only managed to hurt her foot. No. She had to think. Think what? It wasn’t as if breaking down a door was among her skills. Being stupid, on the other hand, was right there on top. There wasn’t a lock for a key, which meant that there was something outside keeping the door locked, probably some kind of bar. Groaning in frustration wasn’t going to help.
Then, from bad, her situation suddenly turned to worse, as the lamp went out. This wasn’t like when she walked at night and the moon and stars changed the landscape to tones of grey. This was complete blackness. No difference between eyes open or closed. She pulled her sword from her back. It had a subtle pink glow, not enough to allow her to see anything other than her sword.
She felt that at any moment something would jump on her, and having her sword ready eased some of her fear. Still, her heart beat very fast and she turned around to cover every direction, but nothing came towards her. Zora sheathed her sword, sat on the floor, and took slow, deep breaths. Yes, everything was dark, but she was safe, nothing was going to attack her. She was safe, she was safe, there was nothing in that room.
After a few minutes, she got up. This was not the time to be scared or to berate herself. It was time to act. Yelling was pointless. Her voice didn’t have that much reach, and had a limit, too. What she had to do was one of two things: either force the door open or make enough noise to alert someone.
Stepping carefully, she reached out her hands in front of her until she touched the table, then pushed it towards the door, pulled it a bit, then kicked it with all her might. Bam. That was more noise than yelling. She didn’t even need to pull the table much, as the impact pushed it back from the door. All she needed to do was push it or kick it with all her might, and let its weight hit the door, a strong thud reverberating through the room, hopefully through the library, and perhaps reaching the hallways outside. Perhaps it would even force the door open.
Again and again, she pushed it at about every thirty seconds, to the point her body hurt and sweat dripped from her forehead. It was strange to be in this completely dark place, but at least her fear and apprehension were gone, replaced by anger. All she had to do to keep going was imagine she was kicking or pushing Griffin. It turned out that she’d been right to push him to the ground on their first meeting. And now she was pushing a table. And all the noise she was making had no effect whatsoever. What kind of people were these who left such a majestic library empty, abandoned?
She lost track of time and had to fight back tears, when she finally heard someone outside asking, “Zora?”
“Here! I’m locked! Open the door.”
After a loud screech from the door, Tania was outside, breathless, holding a candle that looked bright as sunlight. “I was looking for you everywhere. You have to run or you’ll be out.”
“Which direction?”
“Right at the hallway to the front gate, then down the hill.”
Zora was out the door not even a second later, running as if ten shadow wolves were after her and her life depended on her speed. She’d practiced running a lot in the Shadow Valley, and taught it, too. It was the easiest way to survive a human shadow or even a ball, sometimes even shadow wolves depending on their distance. Even experienced rangers sometimes had to run when outnumbered. And with that thought, she dashed to the back of the arena. Breathless and confused, she stared at three different doors, until someone pulled her hand. It was Stavos.
“Silly girl, what were you thinking? You missed the rehearsal.”
Zora was so out of breath she couldn’t even respond, and plus she was actually glad he was pulling her somewhere. It meant it wasn’t all lost. He led her to a small door, then said, “Follow them.”
In front of her, a line of men were walking into the arena. Zora ran and stood at the end. They walked to a place that had a semi-circle drawn on the ground, around a pyre. Zora was at one end of the semi-circle, and Griffin at the other. He frowned when he saw her. She stared at him as if saying, “I know what you did and you’ll regret it.”
It didn’t seem to bother him, as he moved his eyes away from her and looked at the stands, as if searching for someone. The stands. Holly light. So many people that it was impossible to count them, impossible even to find anyone. Zora wondered if Larzen was there. On the lower part of the stands there was a section with glass windows and a golden roof, probably made for special guests and even the royal family, but she couldn’t see across the glass.
A loud thud scared her, then she looked at the sky and realized there were fireworks forming figures as if the stars had been brought close to them. Then they formed flowers and circles, and her jaw dropped when she saw a line of interconnected forms at the same time. A brilliant painting in the sky.
Then some people ran onto the stage, men and women wearing tight-fitting clothes, some of them juggling, some doing acrobatics. At a corner, there was an orchestra playing, with string instruments and drums. The only music they had in the valley was singing and some wind-up music boxes, the internal gears packed tightly not to form big, empty spaces. They also had harps and flutes, but the knowledge of how to play them had been lost generations ago. Other instruments required hollow dark parts that were not allowed in the valley.
Listening to these for the first time, seeing the musicians turn movements into harmonious sound, brought tears to her eyes. This was so much more than the music boxes. Then there were the acrobats and dancers. They were now standing on each other, and then others standing on their shoulders. The top ones jumped and came down as if rolling in the air. She had no idea people could do that. Technically, she had read about acrobats, but still, it was different to see them in real life, right in front of her.
The crowd erupted in applause, and she applauded, too. One of the acrobats knelt in front of her and extended a hand with a yellow flower. She took it and put it behind her ear. It was just a flower, but she was emotional with the gesture.