TEN
ROOK
The room wasdark when I snuck back inside.
Mom once told us that she’d lived in this place, and all these years later, there were still a few things of hers here. It made me wonder if my dad knew about it, or if maybe he came to visit this place with her, or maybe it was for her and my aunts. She liked to have time with them and it wasn’t very often they came out to the Orchard.
“What were you doing out there, Rook?” my mom whispered from her place on the bed.
I stood close to the edge of where she was sleeping, but her eyes were open. Sometimes my mom reminded me of an angel. Her hair was fair and wispy, and pieces always curled against her face. She was always happy. Even when she was mad, she only stayed that way for a few minutes before she was smiling again.
“I went looking for cookies.”
She patted the space next to her, and I crawled in beside her. She pulled me closer, hugging me while pressing a kiss to the back of my head.
“Cookies?”
“Didn’t find any though.” I smiled in the dark, listening to Ryle breathe on the couch across the room.
“What did you find, Little Bird?”
I wasn’t sure if I should tell her, but Mom never got mad at us for being curious. “We went into the cellar and found a secret hatch in the floor.”
Mom froze behind me, which made me even more nervous about what was under there.
“Did you open it?”
I shook my head. “No.”
Mom’s fingers slowly slid in my hair as she let out a heavy sigh. Things were quiet for a minute until I finally asked the thing that had been on my mind since this morning.
“How come Dad isn’t here yet?”
She continued to stroke my hair until finally she softly replied, “Daddy had to go help Uncle Lance with something this morning.”
“Mom, I’m not a baby…you can tell me what’s going on.”
She was quiet again, but this time, she moved until I was sitting up and she was sitting next to me.
“Honestly, I don’t know. But I know your dad would be here if he could, but the fact that he’s not means we’re safe. You know that.”
I did know that. Dad would never leave us if he thought we might be in trouble.
“But why can’t we just leave and go home?”
Her fingers found mine and she gently squeezed.
“Tenebrae iterum nos invenit. Non solum opus est ut omnem lucem protegat.”Darkness has found us again. We just need to protect all the light.
I pulled my hand away, frustrated that she wasn’t just telling me. She always got cryptic when she spoke in Latin. Maybe I was just tired, but I felt tears burn the backs of my eyes. I wanted to go home. And I wanted my dad.
My mom probably sensed my mood, and where it was taking me, because right as I moved to leave her bed, she lightly gripped my wrist.
“If I were you, I’d check the cabin. Make sure the grounds are safe first, and the blizzard has to have died down, but there might be a clue about that secret hatch you found out there.”
“It’s snowing again,” Royce said from off to the left. Her nose was pressed against the glass, just like mine.
I was watching the members of the club blow hot air into their palms, while walking along the perimeter of the property, when Royce Quinn randomly sat next to me. I was just waiting for the right moment to ask them to go to the cabin with me.