Pretending To Be Gilead's Prince and Master Wizard

My diary is like my most precious thing to me right now, so I made sure to take it with me always and hid it in the safest way than I could ever imagine. Letting it be seen by other people, lest if it was Alex, is the last thing that I wanted to happen right now.

Monday came without a trace. As I was feeling a bit heavy inside my heart, I cannot let it all out and tell anyone what I am going through… and not to my friends either.

I was walking down the hallways, my bag strapped behind a certain number of textbooks that I am now carrying for today's lessons, when I happened to walk across my childhood friend Dexter who just came out from the male's washroom on the second floor of this building-- looking just as surprised as I am upon seeing me here.

"Hello there Dex!" I greeted him enthusiastically to hide his heavy burden that I am going through right now. I already figured out that I need to stay this way to somehow forget all my worries even just for a while until I came back to the castle.

"Krisella, hi!' he greeted back with the same enthusiasm as I have. I don't know if it's just me, but… it also feels fake to me.

"I seldom see you in the hallways so it was quite a surprise to see you here. Where are you headed right now?" 

"Back to our classroom. I just took a quick break before our first-period teacher comes in," 

In just a short while, we both heard the bells of the school started ringing, indicating the start of the classes. 

"Oh, we better hurry to our classes or we will end up getting late, especially you." Dexter starts to scan my look. "You look like you haven't gotten in your classroom yet. You sure do like to come in late just like the old times."

"I am certainly not!" I tried to deny it, but he was right though. I tend to be lazy during my younger years back in our home village. "I am also now on my way to my classroom."

Dexter smiles before saying, "Well then, see you later." 

"Yeah, see you."

The lad has already turned his back on me and started walking away from here when I noticed something on his hand immediately after I realized that he didn't wave a hand at me like what he usually does. It was currently wrapped in a bandage, like he just got himself injured recently. And that's what made my eyebrows snap together, forming a crease in between.

"Hey Dex!" I called out once again. Yet the boy didn't hear me and just kept on walking… or maybe he was really avoiding me. I don't know, it just suddenly occurred to me that my childhood friend has been distant to me these past few days.

As I pushed the door of our classroom, there were more or less ten students that were already inside. I immediately spotted my friends occupying the seats near to mine and walked towards them. They all appear to be talking about something, and I was silently praying to the heavens that it better not be about me being involved in the fight scene that occurred last Friday.

"Good morning guys," I greeted, smiling. Act casual, I said to myself. 

"Hey, good morning Krisella," It was Ariella who greeted me first, the rest of them followed.

"So, have you already heard what happened last Friday? I'm sure you did, since it is currently the talk of the town these past few days."

I silently gulped inside my head. Here we go again, talking about the rumors that are now circulating around the city. After the dating issue of Alex died, this was soon replaced with yet another rumor about him.

"I've heard plenty of rumors from residents on the way here. Which rumor are you pertaining about?" I asked Ariella who said those lines earlier. 

That made her pause for a moment, like she was searching my face if I am being serious now or what, but then it did not take that long before she responded. "There was an epic battle that happened last Friday at the marketplace." 

I really fought the urge to scoff at her words just now, a battle that is sure hard to win over. As one of the actual spectators of that fight, I wouldn't exactly call it an 'epic' one like what they claim it to be. Sometimes, people can be a little overly dramatic with word descriptions.

"That, I didn't hear about." I lied as I now placed my bad towards my seat and settled down right after. "So tell me about this 'epic' battle rumor that you've heard." I've been dying to know how they would describe the details this time.

Ariella gladly told the details for me without even suspecting anything. "So what happened was that captain Alex happens to see an enemy, that was believed to be a spy from another enemy nation of Gilead, lurking at the roof of one of the store establishments in the marketplace. "

"Does that really happen most of the time? That the magic army senses spies from the enemy nation here in Citadel?" I asked, my head is now resting on top of my right fist.

"Not really. But we know their existence here is real," Ariella says. "For all we know, these spies could be everywhere, trying to blend in with the crowd."

"Agree," Maggie chimes in. "We'll never know. Those persons that we least expected could turn out to be a spy in reality."

I gulped for the second time around inside my head. Surely, I don't want any of the persons closest to me to be an enemy of the nation.

"But wait, here is the catch to that story," Ariella continues, making me suddenly nervous for some odd reason. "Captain Alex was seen with a girl beside him for like a split second only before disappearing out of the blue." 

Upon hearing it, I tried to go back to that day and evaluated my actions. I am one hundred sure that I had my cap on during that instance. How come someone still suspected the captain to be with a girl during those times? Is it because someone is using a revealing spell to identify me? Good heavens, that's the last thing that I wanted to happen right now.

"Is that even the same girl who was on the dating rumors of the captain the other day?" I tried to dig in the details, silently praying that no one has still seen my face in that instance.

Ariella shrugs and says, "I think so, though no one has really seen her face. It's just her back facing them. She is a petite girl, they say."

Whew… that saved me from worrying, thank goodness.

"Ah, I see, Though the captain is truly with a girl or not, it doesn't immediately imply that he is dating her or something like that. For all we know, they could be friends." I smiled. In reality, I am just trying to come out clean in front of my friends without really them knowing that it was me all along.

"As if the captain is the amiable type of guy," Cailin scoffs. "For me, he looks like someone who barely socializes with anyone. But if he does have a friend who happens to be a girl, which I doubt that would ever happen, then that girl must be really special for him to let him inside his life."

I tried not to fluster with her words. The thought of Alex letting me hang out with him sometimes causes my heart to do a backflip.

Before we could even discuss Alex's life, Mr. Pumpkin suddenly enters the classroom, and our conversation has put to an immediate stop.

---

"We'll never know. Those persons that we least expected could turn out to be a spy in reality."

Three subjects have passed, and I still can't get over what Maggie has said earlier this morning. Up until the very last subject in Mr. Wimbshaw's class, I am still thinking about it.

So for that reason alone, it led me to do something that I wasn't expecting to do all along. After the last-period class, I made some excuse to my friends that I will be in the library, but in reality, I went straight ahead and looked for the person whom, I felt, is being distant from me in the past few weeks.

I went to their classroom and checked him there, but their class was longer than ours and his classmates said that he was already on his way home. I thanked them afterward and ran like a wind to somewhat catch up with him.

Luckily, I was able to spot him a few feet away in the hallways while he was walking along with the multitude. Painting, I tried to run towards him as fast as I could.

"Krisella?" was the first thing he says once I was able to catch up and hold on to his right sleeve. His eyes are now filled with confusion.

"Dexter…" I called out, trying to catch my breath first before proceeding. 

"Can I… talk to you for a moment, please?"