World Walkers: Unknown World: Clio’s Story – Part 1

[k_a_webb]

Silence followed the sounds of battle. For a moment Clio stopped, thinking of those who had lost their lives, but she didn’t have time to grieve for the people she’d become close to. She had to keep moving. That was what she had always been told to do if something happened. It was possible they would kill her, because of who she was, or they might keep her, and she couldn’t work out which was worse. Both were… she shook her head, her hand pressed against the wall as she tried to figure out where she would be safest. Nowhere was the first answer she thought of, but that was pessimism talking.

There were several doors leading out of the building. Clio knew where all of them were, but she didn’t know who else knew where they were. One came to mind as being the most likely door to lead her to some form of safety. Unfortunately it was the furthest away from her and getting to it was going to be the hard part, even though there were shortcuts. Biting hard on her lip she looked up. If no one else looked up then the pathways up there would be much safer than attempting to make her way using the normal route. She didn’t think about what might happen if someone did look up.

Ladders had been created within the walls and the closest one was a corridor away. It seemed a long way, because Clio didn’t have any idea where anyone was. They might even have already left the building. Her shoes made little noise on the floor, but even that seemed too loud compared to the silence everywhere else. Silently she prayed to deities she had never believed in before. All she needed to do was get to the ladder and then she’d be safer. She wouldn’t be truly safe until she got to the door she planned to leave through. The door that very few people knew about. She just had to hope that one of those few people wasn’t a traitor.

Clio’s hand brushed the ladder. If she hadn’t been using her hand to guide her she probably would never have found it. The corridors she was walking through were dark and seeing the world around her was almost impossible. She could just about see the walls, but the details were lost to her. In normal circumstances she would have been able to see every brick that made it. Her teeth bit into her lip again as she felt tears well up in her eyes. Crying wasn’t going to help them, because they were already dead and the building she had started to love would never be the same again. They would want her to get out of the building, so that was what she was going to do. It was the only thing she could do.

Climbing the ladder was easy. Had the invasion happened a couple of months earlier Clio probably wouldn’t even have thought about using one, because she simply hadn’t been able to. Until he’d spent hours with her, helping her learn how to use her hands and feet correctly. She swallowed around the lump in her throat, which was filled with the knowledge that she would never see him again. One stray tear tickled down her cheek as she forced herself to focus once more on what needed to be done. He would want her to get to safety, because that was why he’d spent all that time with her, when he had plenty of other things to be doing.

When Clio reached the top she crawled along the path. Most of them she could walk along but a few were too short for her, even though she was the smallest person in the building. There was a time she would have worried about dirtying her skirt and she was glad that part of her had faded away to nothing. She couldn’t imagine what she would have done if she had still been that person. Skirts didn’t matter when she knew that one of two things would happen if they found her.

The first room Clio passed through was empty. She’d looked down in an attempt to see where the invaders were, because they would be much easier to a avoid if she knew. It was harder to go through the second room. No invaders, but there were dead bodies and she recognised them all. One of the men had helped her when she got lost during her first month. Gritting her teeth she kept going. Thoughts of revenge were entertained as she made her way through the third and fourth rooms to find more bodies of people she knew. A couple of them she had even cared about.

“I want her found and I want her brought to me,” a male voice boomed as Clio got closer to the fifth room. “She has to be here somewhere.”

A shiver of pure fear went down Clio’s spine. The voice was one she recognised and knowing that he was leading the invasion force… breathing shallowly in order to keep the sounds she made to a minimum she crawled into the room, keeping to the shadows as much as she could. When she saw him, and the determination on his face, she knew that she had to get to that door.

“We will find her, sire,” another voice answered, again male. “I have a group searching through the building, checking every room, every corridor, and anywhere else she might have hidden.”

Clio kept crawling, hoping the whisper of her skirt and the sound of her breathing were too quiet for either of them to hear. Part of her wanted to wait for them to leave the room, so she could look at the faces of the dead in the room before moving on, but that was a bad idea. She could hear his voice in her head, telling her that she needed to get to the door. There was a reason he wanted her found and it wasn’t a good one. ‘Death or capture,’ he said. ‘We’re the first line of defence and if something happens to us you need to get out.’ Something had happened to them. They were all dead, because of her. Another tear trickled down her cheek.

“There are people watching all the doors,” the second voice continued, “because her first thought will be to get to safety.”

All Clio could do was tell herself it was unlikely they knew about the door she was aiming for. It was kept hidden from the outside and the inside, so they wouldn’t be able to find it during their search of the building, but she couldn’t stop thinking that someone could have told them about it. Although, she bit her lip thoughtfully and tried to ignore his voice telling her to stop, if they had of been told about the door they would also have been told about the hidden pathways through the building. Feeling more sure of her plan she crawled faster, keeping her body pressed tightly against the wall.

Getting through the next two rooms was easy. Both the paths were against the wall, so Clio didn’t need to worry about someone noticing her skirt hanging over the edge. It was the room following those two that was harder. Crawling would draw attention to her, because the path was so thin her skirt would hang over both sides, so she had to stand and walk. There was every possibility that someone would see her and it was something they had planned for. However the room was empty, so she took her chance.

It was one of the hardest things Clio had done. All she could do was walk, hoping that no one would enter the room, and try not to look down at the bodies below her. They were going to be people she knew, people she cared about, who had given their lives to keep her safe. One unstoppable tear trickled down her cheek. When she’d first arrived she’d hated everyone, feeling as though they were stopping her from living her life because she had to be kept safe, but slowly certain people had made a place for themselves in her heart. Eventually she had come to understand their point of view and did everything she could to make sure she could stay safe if something bad happened.

Of course Clio had never expected that bad thing to happen. She had understood their point of view, but hadn’t realised exactly how much people wanted to own her. An invasion force had entered her home, destroying everyone who had lived there, simply because she had magic. Being the first person with magic in three hundred years was more special to other people that it was to her. She didn’t even know how to use her power properly and she wasn’t sure she would ever be able to. There was no one to teach her, so everything she got right was purely down to luck.

If she’d been able to use her magic Clio might have been useful during the invasion. Instead all she’d been able to do was run for her life, knowing that people were giving their lives for her safety, and it had made her feel utterly useless. Without looking down she kept walking. If she fell, or someone saw her, she would be in even more danger from the invasion force, and that was the last thing she wanted. Getting out of the building was the only thing she could do that would have made him proud of her, so that was what she was going to do.

Mirrored from K. A. Jones Writing.

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[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

>>easier to a avoid if she knew. <<

Delete "a" above.

>>The voice was one she recognised and knowing that he was leading the invasion force… breathing shallowly in order to keep the sounds she made to a minimum <<

Capitalize "Breathing" above.

>>if they had of been told about the door<<

Delete "of" above.

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[(Anonymous)]

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