Joined (The Secret World Of Atlantis 4)

Chapter 2 - A Solution In Sight

“I’m sorry to break it to you, but this literally makes no sense,” Emilia declares as she looks up from my notes about the prophecy. I can barely prevent myself from rolling my eyes.

“Gee, thanks. Like I didn’t already know that,” I remark in response, hearing Eros sigh beside me. I suddenly feel a little embarrassed as I hear his thoughts. Right. I should show a bit more patience and gratitude to her. To all of them actually. “I’m sorry, it’s just frustrating, not knowing what it’s about,” I continue in a much friendlier tone, making my cousin offer me a half-smile.

“No worries. I get that. I truly wish I could be of more help,” she says, letting out a long breath. “Perhaps Elena will be able to figure something out, she’s the brainy one,” she then adds, glancing at my best friend hopefully. But she doesn’t seem so sure.

The moment she takes the scroll into her hands, she frowns. I don’t know how many times she reads the notes through, but the silence is longer than it was with Emilia. We all watch her carefully and I am surprised at how collected she seems. Our stares must be getting on her nerves. I mean, they would surely get on mine, if I was in her skin.

After a few minutes, she finally looks up, the frown seeming even deeper on her face. “There is a big problem with this. All of these meanings are too broad. They need to be more specified for the prophecy to make sense. Just like the second verse is,” she voices her opinion.

This time, I’m the one frowning. “I tried to do that, but I don’t have any ideas left. That’s why I asked you guys for help,” I say slowly, trying my best not to panic. If we don’t come up with something soon, then Korinna truly is our last chance. And I don’t even want to think about what might happen if she won’t be able to help either.

Elena stares at me like I’m stupid. “Well, then why aren’t you making this personal? It’s clear that this whole prophecy is meant for you. That’s why the general meaning you’ve found don’t make any sense. The second verse is about your bond, so the rest of them must clearly be about other aspects of your life, don’t you agree?” she suggests, making my face fall.

Now she must have realized that I truly am stupid. At least that’s how I feel. Don’t say things like that. You were exhausted, both mentally and physically after we came back from Earth. That doesn’t make you stupid, Eros scolds me. I let out a long breath, before responding to Elena’s words.

“That actually makes a lot of sense,” I admit, still feeling a little embarrassed that I didn’t come up with the answer on my own. Isn’t it odd, how it can sometimes be so simple? Lying right in front of your nose, but you still don’t see it? “What would I ever do without you?” I then add, shaking my head at myself. Elena waves her hand dismissively, turning her attention back to the scroll.

“You can thank me, once we solve this,” she remarks, her eyes narrowing at the words. “Alright, let’s try to input something from your life to each verse and we’ll see how it’s going to work out,” she continues, making a feather float into her hand with the help of magic.

Her suggestion makes ideas pop into my head and without her even asking, I already know how to begin. “I know what the first verse means. At least the first half of it. The rising darkness must be Teivel,” I blurt out, making the air temperature suddenly drop for a few degrees. Everyone is staring at me with uneasy looks on their faces.

In the end, it’s Eros who responds to my statement first. “Alright, might as well write that down, sister. We might come up with multiple versions of the prophecy after all,” he says, directing his words at Elena. She shakes her head, like she’s trying to wake up from a daze.

She then quickly writes down the first half of the verse, then looks up at me. “Any suggestions about ‘the red is near’?” she asks curiously. Elena and Demitri turn their gazes from the scroll towards me. But before I’m even able to start thinking, Eros already has an answer in store.

“It’s talking about a war,” he says quietly. His words make a deadly silence fall upon the library. We all stiffen, but Emilia is the one who looks absolutely terrified. I clench my jaw. I don’t want to believe it, but it seems like I was right the first time I was guessing about the meaning of the first verse of the prophecy. Back when we were in the Gray Woods, brewing that concoction for making my wings regrow.

I don’t like it either. But I wasn’t able to get your speculation out of my mind ever since that day. And I hate to say this even more, but put together with Teivel’s name, it makes the most sense out of everything else we came up with, Eros speaks inside my mind, making goosebumps stand up at the back of my neck. I don’t think I’ve ever said this before, but I hate to agree with him on this.

We need to go to my father with this, sooner or later. After we come up with some possibilities of what the whole prophecy might mean, we can’t hesitate any longer. We need to be prepared, if Teivel truly is raising an army, I respond, my hands suddenly growing cold with anxiety and another familiar sensation. Fear.

I can still feel each broken bone, ruptured muscle, and torn skin from every time that Teivel was torturing me. But what scares me the most, is the memory of the look on his face when he was hurting me. It was like he was enjoying himself. I shiver, hoping that my best friend and cousins are thinking that I’m cold. I already know I can’t fool Eros. He is literally inside my mind.

I’ve been practicing my mind powers with him and Silver every day, but never once have I closed my mind from them when we weren’t training. That’s not why I learned how to shield my thoughts. I want them both to be able to access me at all times and know what I’m feeling. It might save my life some day.

Elena’s gaze jumps between the two of us. She must know we’re communicating, but she seems frustrated, because she doesn’t know what we’re talking about. “Do I write this down, or …?” she trails off, sending us a questioning look.

We both nod at the same time, our faces solemn as if someone just died. But someone might. Not just someone. Many people might die, but what I’m scared of most, is someone from my family or one of my friends losing their life. I bite my lower lip aggressively, to prevent myself from tearing up.

No. I can’t think like that. If what we just came up with is possible … If it’s the version that will come true in the end, I must pull myself together. Do my best to prepare them all, teach them how to properly defend themselves and hope that everything works out well.

The atmosphere turns even more grim, as we move on to the third verse. Now that we’re making this about me, I don’t have any problems with guessing what it’s talking about. And the fourth verse just seems to complement the whole prophecy. In fact, it makes so much sense, that I don’t even find it necessary for us to come up with anything else.

“Are you sure you don’t want to try coming up with something else as well? Just to make sure. It’s better to have a few options to choose from, even if they don’t all make sense,” Demitri tries to be the voice of reason.

I think about his words for a long moment. I truly consider them, before giving my answer. I don’t want to do this halfway. I can sense Eros silently agreeing with both aspects, mine and my cousin’s. Brilliant. It’s all on me, then.

I take a deep breath, all eyes on me as I prepare myself to speak up. “Alright. Let’s try to come up with some more possibilities, before I carry this forward,” I finally agree, earning myself a few encouraging smiles in return.

We then truly put our brains to it, all of us trying our best to come up with something different, but that it still makes sense. It takes us a while, but we finally gather two more solved versions, then combine them between each other to get a few more.

As we’re all surrounding the scroll, staring at the product of our work, we seem to be feeling contented and anxious at the same time. No matter which one of these versions is going to come true in the end, it won’t mean anything good for us. The best thing we can do now is try to figure out which one it is and prepare ourselves. Because no matter how badly you want to, you can never prevent a prophecy from happening.