Hello readers.

Firstly I apologise for the long time it took me to update this. I aware I told one of my reviewers that I'd have the next chapter up real soon weeks ago so I sincerely apologise for that. I didn't foresee how hard this chapter would be for me to write, I had to rewrite it twice because I wrote myself into a corner on both my first attempts and had to nearly completely rewrite the third version of it so that it was up to scratch. Plus with the content of the chapter it was really annoying to get the information out that I wanted to without giving too much away or making it confusing. If some things about the chapter do confuse you your free to write what's confusing you in a review and I'll explain it as much as I can. Also, I had a really hard time getting this chapter beta-ed so that makes up for the last three to fours weeks of not updating. First my sister wouldn't beta it cuz the very first paragraph sent her paranoia insane because it was really good apparently and then my actually beta didn't feel up to beta-ing it at first and than she got really really sick and was practically coughing up her lungs for a week. But I got it beta-ed eventually and that's what counts.

I want to thank Hidden chaser and onimimi for the reviews they sent me, they really made my day.

Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy, Square Enix does.

An end, and a new dawn

Laying on her bed with her rumpled sheets spread out all about her, Claire stared up at the roof, wide awake. All of her efforts to quiet her active mind were to no avail. Night had long since fallen and the going of time ate up hour after hour of twilight. Yet her mind refused to shut off and allow her the rest her body craved.

The relentless mental activity made it impossible for sleep to find her. Her mind, as was the norm of late, kept on retelling the tales of the sad events had taken place in the days past.

The night that the news of the devastating attack on the Yaschas Massif military base reached the attention of the safe house was of them. Hardly the worst of the happenings, but it was a dreadful occurrence nonetheless.

But what was more dreadful was the chain of events that took place afterward. It would have been a week or so after the attack that a group of soldiers from the destroyed base had come to the safe house and delivered to them the news of what had happened during and after the attack. Worse of which easily being that while Hope had survived the attack and had been with them on the journey to the safe house, he had stayed behind with another soldier to distract a group of Valhallans that had appeared before them so that the other soldiers could make it to safety without coming to harm.

Even without waiting for his return, Claire had known from the moment the soldier's spoke of this that neither Hope nor the other soldier would make it to the safe house. She couldn't say how she knew, just that some sixth sense told her so. And being a person who had learned to trust their instincts she knew her sense to be right. It had never failed her before and as much as she may wish for the trust to be otherwise, she knew it wasn't. The truth was painful but it was the truth, and there was nothing anyone could do to change that.

So as everyone else began to become aware of what she already was, the blow they had taken when they had originally thought that Hope may be dead was made more pronounced as what was chance became next to certain.

And that wasn't the worst of the tales her mind had taken to retelling to her each night of late. To her the last of them was the worst, much, much worse. A terrible event that those around her wished was false imagery only to be harshly reminded each day that that ideal was the false imagining.

Only minutes after the soldiers had come to the safe house and told them of Hope's fate that Darla had burst through the doors with utterly more horrible news on her lips.

News that all the sentries that had been sent out with a group of women to collect from the vegetable patches, to the exclusion of Serah, were killed by a Valhallan man. Petrified, she had told of how the black haired man had killed all of them without moving a muscle and proceeded to capture Serah in his grasp. He had allowed the remaining women to run away, but that hadn't stopped all except Darla from being struck down by other Valhallan men who trudged through the area as they fled back to the safe house.

The horrid timing of this news made the devastating effects it had on all of them flare up worse by tenfold.

Her father, a generally lively man, became uncharacteristically withdrawn, very similarly to how Barty had become so after hearing the news of what had befallen the Yaschas Massif base. It unnerved her to no end to see him like that. As childish as it might have sounded, he had always seemed so much to her like an embodiment of strength, someone who could never fall to sorrow.

Her siblings on the other hand weren't quiet in their grief, they showed emotion, all of it negative. They become inconsolable. Claire had spent many a night staying up to comfort Ereka, holding her in her arms and attempting to still her endless tears. She hadn't seen Joshy shed a tear since the day they had heard the news of their mother's capture but every time she looked his way, she could see them behind his eyes, fighting to be let out. Yet he fought against them so valiantly. She wished that he could see that sometimes there are days when you need to let it all out and cry. To keep sorrow locked up inside you is a tool for your own undoing.

Sazh and Dajh had both been hit hard; father and son had grown close to Serah over the years, especially Dajh. As since before Claire had been born, her mother by profession had been a teacher, and Dajh, like many others, had been one of the students that she had taught throughout the years. So him and those else who had been under her tutorage had become attached to Serah over that time. So the news of what had happened to her was very upsetting.

And herself, how could she describe how she had been affected by it all? She was blank, a white sheet that showed nothing to the outside world other than its sole bare face. Sure on the inside she felt hurt, a lot of it, but for reasons beyond her it never showed. She guessed it must have seemed unsettling, but she was completely unable to do anything about it.

The reason why that was so had, so far, avoided her. But a cause for part of it came clear to her.

The sixth sense. The same instinct that had told her that Hope wouldn't make it to the safe house also told her of her mother's predicament. It spoke to her of danger, danger akin to hell itself, but not death.

Perhaps that had something to do with it; perhaps it was because without a definite of what was happening to her mother she was scared for her. And that subconsciously she herself was scared that if she did show emotion she'd break down and be no less inconsolable than her younger sister.

Blinking her eyes, Claire blew out a sigh and ended that thought there. Her mind's re-envisioning of past events weren't the only things troubling her of late. There were many other small things that sought to bother her lately, but nothing worthy to note. Except one. How lately, every time she had gone up to the sentry posts, against her father's wishes for her to stay away from them, there was always something amiss from the usual. The number of Valhallans in the area had increased from the norm, and not by a small amount.

Though the fears the increased activity instilled in her were a little preposterous there was no reason to completely dismiss them.

Her curiosity on it had been enough to tempt her into bringing up the subject with someone who she knew would be able to get her hands on better answers then she could. Someone from outside, who she had met whilst going against every warning she'd ever been told, and gone outside. She couldn't put into words what had made her do so, but some unexplainable feeling had told her that she had to. The woman she had consequently met had told her that it was fate for them to meet and that her destiny was something much more than to live out her life in the shelter of the safe house.

So there were many more times that followed when she went out to meet with this person, and she had since learned much about what was happening in the world that evaded the eyes of most humans. Like the Valhallans' purpose for the seizure of Pulse.

But that wasn't a part of her train of thought right now, so she turned her attention away from it and back to the answer the woman had given her to the question she asked her about the growing number of Valhallans in Mynscentar. The answer had been vague, but it revealed to Claire that the fears they harboured were one and the same.

Closing her eyes against the thoughts, Claire dragged in a long breathe and held it before letting it out as a protracted sigh. Rolling onto her side she did her best to shut off the repetitive visions that persisted in continuing on constantly in her mind and tried to force herself to going to sleep. Right now she didn't want to think about the bad thing that could happen.

She was tired, both physically and mentally. The strain of past days was getting to be a difficult weight to carry. So she wished herself to go to sleep so she could have some well-deserved rest.

But as soon as she had closed her eyes she opened them again. Jolting into an upright position on her bed, her eyes darted about the room.

She suddenly felt as if an ominous cloud of foreboding had swept throughout the place, enveloping it completely and utterly. Swallowing thickly, Claire got up from her bed.

Jogging to the door, she grabbed hold of the doorknob, swung the door inwards and stepped outside. Closing it quietly behind her so as not to wake her slumbering brother and sister who still slept inside, she let go of the knob and turned her gaze to the left end of the hallway that stretched out further down the way beside her.

No conscious thought moved her steps, but that direction did she begin to walk. A strange curiosity had overtaken her and she needed to fulfil what it told her to do. Without thinking about it she knew where she had to go and without any awareness of her movements her body took her there on autopilot. The lethargy she had felt only seconds before had fallen away, to be replaced by adrenaline that filled her every cell.

Her path eventually took her a room that rested close to the front hall where the main doors were situated.

Swinging it open harshly, Claire crossed the threshold and strode purposely up to the woman who slept soundlessly within. Not caring to how the woman would react at being woken up at this ungodly hour, she shook her awake rudely.

"Hey Darla, wake up," she spat nastily.

Grumbling as she was shook, Darla was soon to open her eyes. "Wha?" she mumbled, trying to shake the vestiges of sleep.

"I said wake up, I need to ask you something," Claire reiterated fiercely.

Looking up to the face of the girl standing over her, Darla's eyes widened in shock and partial anger when it hit her just who it was who had woken her. Snapping to wakefulness she hissed, "What do you want?"

"When you fled back here the other day, did you check to see if you were being watched when you entered the safe house?" Claire interrupted her.

"What?" Darla asked in confusion "Why are you asking me that now? Of course I didn't, I was too busy running for my life!"

Eyes locking on to the elderly woman at hearing those word Claire hands tightened into fists, hate evident on her features. Sometimes she had to hate when her sixth sense was right.

"You stupid hag." She breathed in fury. "Did you even stop for a second that maybe they could have been-?"

Her words were cut off abruptly by the sound of crashes coming from the direction of the front hall. Dropping whatever conversation was happing between them, both of Claire and Darla's gazes shot to the open doorway. Ignorance of the situation decorated the elder women's face but Claire's showed the opposite. Whatever was happening, she knew what it was.

Running to the doorway Claire paused at the door-frame and looked up to the main hall which was visible to her from where she was standing. A dust cloud was billowing up in the large chamber and all along the corridor people were coming out from inside their rooms to see what the source of the noise was.

"What was that?" Darla asked frightfully from where she sat behind Claire on her bed. Ignoring the question, Claire paid the old woman little mind, telling no more than the cryptic, "They're here," before running down the passageway and to the front hall.

Many other people had gathered at end of the corridor by the time she got there, all of which were looking into the clouded main hall inquisitively, trying to figure out what was going on. Claire noticed Sazh to be among them.

About to walk towards him, some indescribable instinct told her to stop. Standing stock still she tried to make sense of the feeling. But the probing was brought to an end when she felt the air surrounding her turn still and suddenly it hit her what was going to happen. Dashing forward she grabbed a hold of Sazh's collar and threw herself down by the side of the entrance to the corridor, taking him with her.

Milliseconds later a giant beam of white light shot forward and engulfed the passageway in its entirety. Half ignoring Sazh's pained groans as he recovered from the rough landing Claire bolted up into a sitting position and took in the sight of the aftermath the beam had left in its wake.

No one was there. The people who had been standing there had completely disappeared or rather as Claire soon saw, killed. The beam, whatever it was, had obliterated them.

Shooting up onto her legs, Claire ran to the front of the entryway and let out a ragged gasp of horror. She stared transfixed at the ash remains of the people who had been standing there only a moment ago, the thought creeping unbidden into her mind that if she had chosen to jump out of the way just a second later than she did, her fate would be no different from the people who had just died.

So distracted she was by what the entryway contained, Claire didn't notice Sazh walk up beside her until he drew to her side and placed his hand on her shoulder. "Claire," he spoke up.

Claire jumped and snapped her eyes over to him in shock, but calmed down instantly when she realised it was only him. "Sazh." she breathed out, thinking it stupid to be scared by a person she had known was there.

Looking over the corridor with his own eyes, Sazh adopted an expression similar to that of Claire's horrified one. "How'd you know that was coming?"

"I don't know." Claire answered truthfully, turning her back on the passageway to view the damage done to the main hall. "I just knew I had to get out of there."

The main hall that stretched out before them had been laid to waste in the short time since the crashing noises had begun. The mental supports that had lined the walls had been torn down and now lay useless on the ground. Everything else in the room had either been destroyed by the same men who had torn down the supports or had been crashed by the heavy structures as they fell.

Taking a handful of cautious steps forward, Claire heard Sazh begin to follow after her, but wishing him not to she turned around to face him abruptly, which caused the man to nearly bump into her, and told him firmly, "Sazh, don't come with me."

Confused by the request, he was quick to argue back, "Why? There is no way that I am leaving you here alone."

Claire shook her head, reasoning to him, "No, I want you to go find Dajh and my siblings, get them out of here from one of the side exits. I don't want to see them get hurt in this. It was the Valhallans who did this Sazh, they've broken into the safe house. Most of them have gone down the halls already; so can you please make sure for me that Joshy and Ereka don't get hurt by them. Please Sazh." Looking straight into his eyes, Claire tried to convey just how much she wanted him to carry out her request.

Luckily for her it didn't take too much to convince him to do as she asked and he soon began backtracking to the hallway they had previously come out of. "What about you then?" he asked her. "What are you going to do?"

Turning her back on him so that the main doors were within her sights, Claire told him, "I don't know why, but something is telling me I have to go out there."

"That all? If the Valhallans are here that would be risking your life. Shouldn't you have some better reason?"

"My instincts saved your ass back there you may as well listen to them now," Claire replied unfalteringly.

Partially silenced, Sazh had to curse how he knew there would be no convincing her to do otherwise when she sounded so adamant on going forward. It was just the way she was, so god-awful stubborn at the worst of times.

"You gonna be ok? Don't want your dad angry with me if this goes south."

Smiling a smile that she was well aware Sazh couldn't see, Claire lifted up her right arm and gave him a thumbs-up. "Don't worry about me, I'll be okay. I'd worry about yourself if I were you."

Not at all assured, Sazh mumbled, "I will," and began backing off to the deserted corridor before turning his back on the main hall. "See ya," he said casually, jogging down the passageway as fast as his old body would take him.

"Goodbye Sazh," Claire said in farewell, all shreds of light-heartedness leaving her to be replaced by a cloak of seriousness. Dragging in deep, long breaths she tried to keep herself calm with no such luck, and began walking towards the main door.

Danger traced her steps, threatening her whole being; existing everywhere she looked; existing everywhere she let her foot touch the earth. Somewhere here, in someplace that avoided her eyes, was someone dangerous. The source of the foreboding that enveloped everything around her.

...:...

Sitting with his back against the wall of one of the sentry posts, the black haired Valhallan man amused himself with his own thoughts of this place's destruction.

It would be imminent and unavoidable. This place would fall at his men's hands, its inhabitants killed, with the exception of a few of course. The Untundra next to never sent them anywhere without a good reason, this place's one being the seizure of people the Untundra wanted captured. As well as the death of an undesirable who took shelter here when she was not disrupting his plans.

Pushing off the wall, the black haired man straightened up. He could hear the sound of someone approaching him. He smiled darkly to himself; at the very least he would go out and greet the person before sending them to their deaths.

...:...

Closing in on the door, Claire stopped in her tracks. Someone was there. Right by the door stood a tall man with his face hidden in shadows, making it impossible for to Claire make out his features in detail. In her hands she tightened her hold on a metal pipe. She had picked it up off the ground earlier for use as a weapon had the need to fight arose.

The defensive action provoked a laugh from the man, a sound that Claire found oddly familiar, but it wasn't until he stepped forward from the shadows and into clear view that she realised why.

She recognised him. She'd seen him before, outside. During the times she snuck out from the side exits without anyone's knowledge.

"Robert," she ventured to say but as she had expected, he didn't blink an eye at the name. Instead he flashed a dark toothy smile, illustrating all the more that he wasn't the Robert she knew. And as long as the brand that ran down his arm shone black he would never be so. The black colour was a sign that he was under that bitch's control and would do all that they directed him to do. He would follow out each and every order she gave him no matter what it was so long as that brand remained black.

"Nice to see you again, pipsqueak," he greeted her in a dark humorous tone.

Claire resisted the urge to shiver at the tone. Robert was always one for humour but when he was under the control of that bitch that love of humour was accompanied by a love of the dark and disturbing. A bad combination in any circumstance.

"I thought I told you before not to call me that Robert; it's hardly a fitting title."

Obviously finding her words funny, Robert let out a small chuckle and shook his head "Well seeing as you've come to me right off the bat instead of making me have to go out and find you, you've done me the great favour of making your death at my hands all the more easier, so I don't think you'll have to be bothered with that much longer."

Hearing those words, Claire gripped the metal pipe in her hands tighter, baring it defensively in front of her. She had suspected as much, seeing as the person who controlled Robert hated her guts like nothing else.

"You're dreaming if you think you could lay a hand on me." Claire shot back at him tauntingly.

As she predicted the taunt provoked a smile from Robert. "We'll see about that."

And then it started; he shot forward at a run, brought forth a sword from his cloak and swung it down at her. Luckily, from past experience Claire knew her speed was superior, so her dodges were faced with no hesitancy from the query of whether or not her speed would be enough to evade him.

On and on they fought, dancing around the hall locked in intense combat. In someone else's control the attacks Robert made at her were not up to scratch with his usual, and his movements were strained. Which was a good sign; it showed that his spirit fought against its imprisonment. If it fought valiantly enough there was chance of him breaking free of the control of the person directing him, but the chance was slim to none, so Claire never let her guard down.

With his strained movements up against those of someone who had total control over theirs, the fight was mostly one sided, but something told Claire that it wouldn't remain that way. So she kept on her toes and did the best she could to remain alert and not let that moment take by surprise.

Unfortunately, for all her vigilance, she still wasn't ready for the turn of the tides.

A odd sort of smile crossed Robert's face, and for a brief moment he ceased all movement. Bringing up the metal pipe to defend herself, Claire was utterly taken aback when the next attack he threw her way wasn't one deflectable by such simple means.

A great wall of energy rammed into her and sent her flying into the air where she eventually landed a couple of metres away on the solid rock floor with a definite thump.

Robert laughed at her, and began walking casually towards her one step at a time.

"Do you seriously think that I would be sent here to kill you without being given any kind of alternative way to end you if by sword become infeasible? Idiot, I am not so dumb as to come unprepared and let you slip through our hands once again. Tonight you will die, and nothing is changing that fact."

Panic rising up in her chest, Claire tried to get up from the ground, only to find, as a pain flared up in her abdomen, that her body wasn't going to allow her to do so.

How smart, she thought. She now saw that it wasn't without reason that Robert had the hall laid to ruin. With debris all about them it had become plenty easy to injure themselves on the bits and pieces that lay strewn about the hall. Like the large spike of shrapnel that had pierced through her stomach.

Absent-mindedly feeling about for the spike, Claire bit down on her lip as her hand came into contact with the metal object. It had easily destroyed all her chances of escape.

Looking up as the noises made from Robert's steps came to an end, Claire saw the man standing over her with a smug smile plastered on his face, giggling joyously, the smile widening. "You have done well to fall right into the trap I set up for you, cretyn."

Leaning down he grabbed a handful of the fabric of Claire's top and pulled her up off the ground, invoking a grunt of pain from the injured girl.

When he spoke next it was much like he was talking to himself and not to Claire. "The Untundra hasn't been happy with me lately, you know, because some bitch has been letting my prisoners escape from under my watch. He wasn't even sure that it was a good idea to let me come here, but we made a deal. That if I could kill you he'd let me back into his confidence."

Slowly, his hands snaked their way up Claire chest and clamped down on her throat, ceasing the girl's ability to take in oxygen. A single though breached Claire mind as Robert's hand held on tighter and tighter to her throat, slowly crushing it.

'Shit, shit, shit.'

Robert's gleeful smile widened all the more as he thought, that all it'd take to put himself back in the Untundra favour was to crush this girl's throat. Easy, as can be, and with everything going to plan. There was just one factor he didn't write into the equation.

When someone grabbed him from behind, dragged him into their embrace and buried a blade in his abdomen.

"Drop her," A fierce feminine voice spat at him.

And he did drop Claire, but hardly of his own volition. The wound in his abdomen shook his body with pain and his grasp on Claire's neck was released.

And it was with dismay that he noticed as the girl's body hit the ground that she was still breathing. She was undoubtedly unconscious and her intakes of breathe were infrequent and brief, but she was breathing nonetheless. Meaning that for now she was still alive and his promise to the Untundra was yet to be fulfilled.

Dropping to his knees, Robert clutched the bleeding wound with his right hand. "Bitch," he hissed at the unknown woman who had hurt him.

He didn't know who she was, even as she came into his vision in a swish of black fabric, and knelt on the ground by Claire, he failed to recognise her. The chance he was given to examine her features closely when she lifted the girl into her arms and tried to ascertain the degree of her injuries also did nothing to help him ascertain her identity. All he knew was that being someone who had stopped him carrying out the Untundra's orders, she was now a target whose life needed ending.

Knowing that he was now in no state to initiate an attack with successful results, he decided to use his emergency attack that was to be used if all else failed.

Raising a hand into the air, a white light started to form in the palm of his hand.

It was the same attack he had used to kill the people standing in the hallway before. He had used it then with the intention of killing off that cursed girl quickly, but the pest dodged the attack.

But she wouldn't this time. Better yet, she couldn't.

Smiling to himself, the white light exploded from his hand and the world went white.

Perhaps if he had been able to remember who the woman in black was, he would have realised that such a measly attempt at ending her would amount to nothing. And as long as she held Claire in her arms, neither of them would die.

...:...

Hours later, the distant sound of birds chirping roused Claire from her sleep. She opened her eyes to the sight of bright green leaves that filtered out the vision of a dusk sky.

Blinking her eyes in confusion at her surroundings, Claire sat up straight, surprising herself even more when the movement brought on no pain. Eyes darting down to where the wound in her abdomen had been she felt about for it, but it was no longer there. Eyeing the spot curiously, she poked it a couple of times with her finger. It felt tender, but there was no pain or sign that the injury had ever been there in the first place.

As strange an occurrence as it was, her curiosity soon ended. She knew there was only one person who could have healed her wounds. And casting her gaze around her current location, which happened to be a series of tree houses high in the trees that formed a small village, her thoughts were confirmed. The person who had saved her was the woman she had met on her visits to the outside.

All that was left now was to find her saviour. Or her saviour to find her- by walking up from behind and hitting her over the head for no apparent reason.

Falling forward from the force of the blow, Claire clutched her head and rose back up to a sitting position and faced the woman who hit her.

"What the hell was that for, Lye?"

"Well apart from still calling me that, try nearly getting me killed when I had to save your ass. I don't care if Robert's freaky little white light attack is no trouble for my barrier, if I hadn't been prepared for it he would have made mincemeat out of both of us. So I reckon I deserved to give you a good hit."

Wincing at her words Claire mumbled, "Love how your mind works."

Lyella, as was her name, did nothing but shrug off the remark and walk in front of Claire and sit down on a step that led into the wooden tree house closest to them. Fidgeting with the cascading black fabric and lace of her long skirt, she persevered to move it around into a more comfortable position and threw back her lace hood, revealing the face in full. Her eyes were bright, in direct contrast to her otherwise dark colourations.

"Aren't you in the very least curious about what happened after you fell unconscious?" she shot out unexpectedly, making Claire realise just how much she had neglected to ask.

"Oh that's right!" Claire blurted out, shooting forward. "What happened to my family, did they make it out of there?"

Smirking like she found it funny, Lyella mumbled, "Now you get around to it," and nodded, "Yes they did, the old man got your siblings out as well as Dajh. Which is lucky I guess, the Valhallans obliterated that place, by the time I got you out of there it had completely caved in."

An odd look passed over Claire's face for moment, but it was soon gone. If Lyella had read it right it had been one of fear. "And about my father?" she asked. "What happened to him?"

"He's alright, given he didn't make it out with the others. I actually found him in the rubble, but the damn living tank was still breathing fine. Though he must have had a god awful hit to the head. It wouldn't surprise me if he stayed out of it for the next day or so."

Blowing out a sigh of relief, Claire leaned back and brought her knees close to her chest. She lowered her head and held a staring contest with the wooden plates at her feet. She turned serious then, asking out of the blue, "I can't go back can I?" Though a question it had been, she hadn't asked it out of ignorance of the answer, because she already knew what it was.

All sense of light-heartedness left Lyella at the question, and she too turned serious. "No, you can't," she said. "I'm sorry to say but without the protection of the safe house you're no longer safe from the Valhallans. You know as well as I do that their puppet master wants you dead as much as me."

Claire nodded, "I know; I've known that would happen from the moment I started helping you that it would end like that, I just never thought that the safe house could be so easily destroyed by them."

"Underestimating their strength is a dangerous move, Claire; it's a mistake I don't suggest you make again," Lyella informed her.

Claire made a grumpy mumbling sound in response. Then asked "What about my family? They don't know that I escaped."

Pausing as if to contemplate her answer, Lyella bit on her lip. She was in no way going to tell Claire that what she was about to say was something she'd been thinking over for a long time now "Perhaps it's better that way," she told her, "that they think you dead."

Claire reacted much like Lyella thought she would. Her eyes shot up to meet the black haired woman's, appalled by the notion. "How could I do that? It'd be heartless, especially to my own family!"

"Don't think I don't know that," Lyella barked back, "but in your position it is better that way. If they think you're dead then the ones after you are very likely to adopt the same theory. It's no use to chase after a dead person; both of us would be better off for it. If you want to survive from here on out you're gonna have to do some heartless things to get by; you might as well get used to it now."

Silenced, Claire directed her gaze downwards once more, seeing the sense in Lyella words, cruel as they were. Dropping the subject, she chose to pursue a different one. "Lye," she spoke up, ignoring the flash of hate the name sparked in Lyella's eyes. If she was going to be a baby and get annoyed over being called a certain name then that was her problem, she was in no way going to indulge her by calling her something different.

"Is my mother still alive?" she asked earnestly lifting her eyes back up to Lyella's so she could look the woman in the eye.

Blinking at the question, like she had expected Claire to already know the answer, the women answered, "Yes, Hope too."

Claire nodded, somewhere in her mind she had though neither dead. "But they're in danger aren't they?"

Strangely enough, going against everything her sixth sense had told her, Lyella shook her head.

Confused by that , Claire shot back "What!? But every time I try to sense what their situation is, my mind tells me they're in danger."

"And you've not wrong, they are in danger, but then again they're not." Lyella answered cryptically, a small smirk settling itself on her face.

Utterly baffled by what the woman was saying Claire questioned her "What do you mean? How is that possible?"

Her smirk widening, Lyella pointed a finger in the air. "It's simple," she said, "Aaia is with them."

If anyone's wondering but Lyella doesn't hate being called Lye, she hates being called her name. She's a strange one. That and when Claire showed fear on her face before asking Lyella if she knew what happened to Snow, it wasn't entirely out of fear for him if he was hurt, but also fear for how many people would have died in the collapse of the safe house. I just didn't manage to put it into the chapter.

Again if anything in the chapter confused you just write me a review and I'll explain it for you as much as I can.

READ THIS- that was a recommendation from my sister to get the attention of people who skip authors notes. Please review, it helps my sanity. Plus if I don't start getting more reviews than 2 each chapter out of the 50 or so people who read this I'm going to start putting review requests in the scene breaks.