Okay, so I had to rewrite this chapter, so parts of it may not make sense! I had completely forgotten that the doll house had been smashed (and if you've read the author's note on chapter 6, you already know this) so I used it in this chapter! Now I've rewrote it, I hope it still makes sense. Cross your fingers for Chapter 13: House of Shine.

Chapter thirteen: House of Shine

Amber

I knew it was stupid of me to suggest endangering Alfie, but it didn't feel right to have all but one of the Sibunas searching for the Mask. I knew we didn't need to search for the Cup, though. No one had moved it since Nina put it in the tunnel all those years ago, and now we were at that same challenge.

I was the first to find Alfie. He was in his bedroom, playing around with a ping pong paddle and ball. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. All these years and he's still trying to get better at ping pong?

I knocked softly on the side of the doorway, getting his attention. Alfie's eyes lit up as he saw me. I wondered why, I mean we hadn't exactly parted on good terms.

"Hey Alfie," I said, wondering how to continue.

"Hey Amber," he chirped, setting his paddle on the floor. "What's up?"

Before I answered him, I leaned out of the room and shouted for Nina. I ducked back in, seeing Alfie's confused expression.

"What's going on? Is this a prank?" he asked, crossing his arms.

The Sibunas walked in before I could answer.

"Hey guys, what's up?" Alfie asked, repeating the question he had directed at me.

"Remember the challenges in the tunnels?" Patricia asked.

"Of course."

"Do you remember the reflectors for the constellation challenge? You know, the one that made the bird?"

"Some of them. The doll's eye, Victor's pocket watch, the stained-glass setting sun, and the music box's mirror," Alfie replied.

"Of course!" Nina said, clasping her hands together. "The music box! And I brought it with me! Perfect!"

"Will someone please tell me what is going on?" Alfie demanded, grabbing our attention. In response to his question, Nina and Eddie rolled up their right sleeves, revealing matching Marks of Anubis.

Alfie and I both let out a gasp. I had had no idea that Senkarah had marked them! Why hadn't they told me?

"What are we waiting for?" Alfie asked. "Let's go find those reflectors!"

"Sibuna?" Nina asked, holding her hand over her eye.

"Sibuna," we repeated, copying the movement. It was official now.

Sibuna was back together.

An hour later, I was searching for the porcelain doll in the attic. It seemed like the most obvious place to store an old doll, but I was having no luck. I actually found myself wishing for the doll house again, hoping for a clue. But the doll house was no more, having been destroyed by Alfie over a decade ago. Nina, who had been helping me look for the doll, came over and placed a hand on my shoulder.

"I miss the doll house, too. It sucks that it got destroyed, but at least Alfie managed to save you guys, right?"

I sighed. "Yeah, but how do we find the doll now? I mean, where is it?"

"Maybe it's in the common room?" Nina suggested.

It was a good idea as any, so I agreed we should go look. Nina and I went down the stairs and into the common room. Was the porcelain doll even in here? I looked around, wondering if we were just missing it, when I saw the little doll sitting on a shelf. A smile lit up my face. I found it!

I took the doll from the shelf and inspected the eye. In the reflective surface of the glass eye, there was an outline of falcon. Yep, it was one of the reflectors. I handed it to Nina, who rushed upstairs to hide it.

I myself went to the attic to look for a clue to any of the others. Now we had three of the six reflectors. We were still missing Victor's pocket watch and the other two that we couldn't remember. I sighed, looking at the old doll. Maybe it would give us a clue about the other two reflectors.

"Wait, wasn't there a cup?" Alfie asked, coming up the stairs.

"Yeah," Nina said distractedly. "It was a medicine cup with red-and-gray glass, why?" Then she realized what she said. "Oh! Right, let's go get the cup."

We all ran down to the kitchen, thankful that no one was around. I went to the cabinet and started looking for the pretty glass cup that I now somewhat remembered. I spotted a bit of red glass at the back of the cabinet and squealed in delight when I pulled it out.

The glass at the top was a deep red, but it faded to an almost clear color, which then faded to a pretty gray. I traced my finger over the gold-painted scarab and the grayish falcon. I found it!

Now all that was left was the one thing we couldn't remember and Victor's pocket watch. I raced up the stairs to put the cup with the other three reflectors. We were hiding them under Nina's bed, which didn't seem all that smart, but we were desperate.

I met the rest of Sibuna upstairs. I could tell they were bored to tears, having been waiting there for a while, but they were keeping an interested look on their face. I smiled, pleased with the work we had done in just a few hours. I had only been aware of the Sibuna return for one day, and already we had gotten through the music challenge and most of the way through the falcon challenge.

Someone suggested we go look in Victor's office. I groaned. We all knew his pocket watch was in his office because he was in his office. Alfie volunteered to distract Victor so we could snatch the watch, and since we didn't have a better plan, we let him go ahead.

Five minutes later, Alfie was in the hall way in front of Victor's office, balancing a ping pong paddle on his nose. He was singing very poorly in his loudest voice, trying to get Victor to come out.

The door to Victor's office opened, revealing a very pissed Victor. He marched over to Alfie, who dodged him, teasing Victor into following him down the stairs. I had to bite my lip to hold back a laugh. Alfie was such a goof sometimes.

I stood watch with Fabian and Nina as Patricia and Eddie snuck into the office and looked around for the watch. Three minutes later, just as Victor was coming up the stairs, they ran out, Patricia's hands closed around something with a chain.

We all dashed back to the room I shared with Nina, adrenalin and energy rushing through us. I laughed, sweeping my blonde locks over my shoulder, fixing my hair. I had forgotten how much fun running and sneaking was!

We all sat around the room, looking at each other. Suddenly, we all let out a laugh. None of us knew why we were laughing, but it got so bad that tears were streaming down our faces. I had no idea if anyone could hear us, but I found that I didn't really care.

A few minutes later, the door opened, revealing Jerome standing there, a stunned look on his face. He looked at me, a silent question in his gaze. I just kept laughing. Jerome walked over to me, wrapping an arm around my shoulder.

"What's going on?" he asked, ignoring the others in the room.

"N-nothing," I laughed. "I'm not act-actually sure."

"Jerome, maybe you should take Amber and go out," Nina suggested. "You haven't really spent any time together since you got here."

Everyone took the idea instead of just Jerome, and somehow we were all going out dancing that night. Now we had until tonight to finish the task. I made Jerome leave, telling him I had to work on my hair –it had once taken me three hours to perfect my look, so he wasn't all that surprised –and turned to my fellow Sibunas. Fabian suggested a memory game to help us remember the missing reflector, which we all reluctantly agreed to.

"First up, Patricia," he said cheerfully while Patricia groaned. "Cat."

"Dog."

"Moo."

"Sheep." She got a quizzical glare for that one.

"Reflector."

"Doll's eye. Shoot, I knew this wouldn't work."

Fabian rolled his eyes, but played the game with each of us in turn. Alfie's guess for the reflector was the cup, and Nina's was for the pocket watch. Then it was my turn.

"Okay, Amber. Ready?"

"Of course."

"Mouse."

"Squeak."

"Dog."

"Bark."

"Muppet."

"Kermit."

"Reflector."

"Mosaic. Oh my gosh! The mosaic piece!" I cheered. "I think I saw it in the library a few days ago. Come on, let's go get it!"

A few minutes later, all of the Sibunas were looking in the library for the very ugly mosaic. I heard a snide comment or two from Alfie, but we had no luck. Finally, Patricia called out something useful.

"Found something!"

We all ran over to her, joyful when we saw the really ugly glass-and-clay mosaic. Nina pulled out the large piece of glass, emerald in color, and branded with the falcon. I smiled at the group.

"Do you know what this means?" I asked them. Judging by their clueless looks, I guessed not. "We can complete the challenge!"

Nina used her locket to open the library entrance to the tunnels, leading us right past the Cup of Ankh. Nina promised we'd come back for it when we needed it. When we got to the challenge, we giddily placed the reflectors on the staffs.

The glowing blue light shot from each reflector to the next, creating a huge falcon out of light. I had to hold back a happy-cheer as the door to the Mask chamber opened, revealing the scary sennet game. We still had three days to get through this challenge, so we were going to go dancing.

I would have to literally drag Nina up to our room to get ready, but I knew it would be worth it.

Can't wait for some cute Fabina fluff! Anyway, the next two chapters are fillers, so sorry in advance. Oh, and school ends soon, so if I don't update but once a week over the summer, I apologize. So, um, OH! I have something to announce! There is a good story by Everysingleword, a friend of mine, that you should read. It's called The Beginning of Destiny, and the chapters might be a little short, but it's totally worth checking out. Anyway, thanks for reading!

~C