Youngmin and Kwangmin sat by my sides, both sitting close to me in case we were suddenly attacked, they watched in curiosity as those in the camp were moving to and fro tent, speaking in hushed voices and every so often casting a glance towards the three of us who just sat together on the snow covered ground – the dome that had previously surrounded us had faded long ago and it worried me.

I shivered and felt as if someone was staring at me, looking around, I spotted a girl walking our way – her eyes trained to me, “You were sent by JR, weren’t you?”

“Who?” I questioned.

“Jonghyun,” stated the girl, “He goes by JR in the resistance.”

I ignored the last part and nodded, “Yes, he sent us – we were attacked on our way here and he sent us off and promised to meet up with us here.”

“Come inside then, you all are probably freezing out here, it’s bound to get colder – with night fall being just an hour away,” stated the girl, “I’m Mi Young by the way. I’m one of many people trying to help stop the void. I take it that you three were the ones JR was looking for when we first met him yesterday.”

The three of us nodded and she pulled us to our feet, leading us towards a tent where she had us settle in and happily fixed us a cup of warm tea – which was all she had, she then continued to speak after she took off her cloak.

“JR asked me to keep you under my roof until he came around, so I am,” stated the woman, smiling warmly, she placed her hand on my shoulder and I suddenly felt a great amount of trust towards her, “Don’t worry too much about Jonghyun, he knows how to take care of himself and he’ll be here in a little bit.”

“I know he can take care of himself.”

She laughed warmly, moving towards the fire place, throwing in more logs before moving back to the table, where she was in the process of making sandwiches for us. I sat down in a chair opposite of her at the table and the twins were curled up on the rug in front of the fire place.

“How do you know Jonghyun?”

“JR,” corrected the woman, “Call him JR or else people won’t know who you are talking about, JR doesn’t want those he doesn’t trust to know that his name is Jonghyun.”

“Why?” I questioned.

Mi Young shrugged, “Beats me, but I’m going by his wishes, so you should as well,” stated the woman, smiling towards me. Suddenly her gaze met mine and she spoke again, “You are worrying about him still.”

I nodded, pulling my cloak a little closer, trying to get the warmth back into my hands.

 “Why?”

“I can’t help it,” I stated, “Something just feels off.”

The girl nodded in understanding, opening to speak up only to be cut off by the wind blowing the tent’s door open and a bloodied and injured Jonghyun walking through it. As soon as he came into our vision, we all were on our feet – I was the first to his side, leading him towards the bench that Mi Young had cleaned off for the male before pulling out her first aid kit.

“Jonghyun, why haven’t you healed yourself yet?” questioned Mi Young, peering at the male in disapproval.

“Didn’t want to,” stated Jonghyun, “I didn’t have enough energy to, I still don’t.”

“Why?” whispered Mi Young, she them spoke so only the male and I could hear her, “The only thing that makes a mage of your level weak is fear…”

Jonghyun nodded.

“What scared you so much?” questioned Mi Young, “You grew up in the void, you should not be afraid of it and its’ creatures.”

Jonghyun opened his mouth to speak as I removed his cloak; he flinched as the rough fabric scrapped against his torn skin, “Later.”

Mi Young nodded, looking towards me as I eyed the two of them in curiosity, Mi Young smiled towards me obviously catching something else in my eye – that Jonghyun didn’t even notice. Mi Young’s attention then turned back towards my mage, freeing him from his blood soaked, torn shirt – examining the wounds on his torso quickly.

“The wounds on your arm and hand are already healing, so I’m not going to bandage them – as for the wounds on your side, they require stitches from how deep they are – they aren’t showing any signs of healing,” stated Mi Young, pulling out the supplies she needed for her patient, “Minki, can you get me more bandages?”

I nodded, looking towards the twins to see that they both were watching from where they sat – worried about Jonghyun’s wounds. After retrieving the bandages, I moved to Jonghyun and Mi Young’s side, staring at Jonghyun in concern.

As Mi Young began stitching up the mage’s side, I couldn’t help but cringe at the pain filled expression that covered Jonghyun’s face – he really looked like he was in a crap load of pain.

Without us even realizing it, it was over and Mi Young spoke up, “Jonghyun, it’s done, I need you to sit up so I can bandage it.”

The mage nodded in response, sitting up and allowing the older female to wrap up the wounds in the bandages I had previous retrieved for her. As soon as he was bandaged, he slipped into a spare sweater and slipped into his cloak. He placed a hand over his side wounds as he forced himself onto his feet.

As soon as I noticed him moving towards the door, I stepped forward, grabbing his wrist, “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to go speak to a few of the camp members who are doing jobs that I asked them to do,” stated Jonghyun, “The jobs are aiding our search for the books. While I’m away, you all are to stay here with Mi Young – you are to not leave this tent, do you understand me?”

The three of us nodded and watched as the mage moved out of the tent. Mi Young them moved around the kitchen area and put her sandwiches in a cooler, turning to face us, “Are you all hungry?”

We all hummed, nodding, Youngmin then spoke up, “It’s been a long day.”

“You’ve all been traveling, so I take it that it has been a long one,” stated Mi Young, the three nodded, “If you’d like, you can move into the other rooms and sleep, I’ll wake you up when dinner is ready.”

The twins automatically stood up, stretching – Youngmin yawned, “I’m going to take that offer.”

Kwangmin nodded, “Me too.”

With that the twins moving into one of the rooms, as Mi Young turned her back to start working on dinner, she then turned to grabbed a utensil and saw me still standing there.

“Minki?” stated Mi Young, “Don’t you want to take a nap? Surely you are tired with all the walking and running you did today, as well as battling the cold.”

I nodded, “I do…I really do want to sleep, but I’m afraid I’m going to have a nightmare.”

“If you do, speak to Jonghyun, he’ll be able to help you.”

“A-alright.,” I stated, moving into the other bedroom – the one in which the other two did not go.

As I entered the room, glancing around to see that the room was filled with someone else’s belongings. I moved around the room examining the foreign objects, only to stop and look through the things on the desk – examining the papers that sat on the desk that spoke of the different temples and had random notes written down in a different language – it was familiar, but I still couldn’t read them.  There was also a map that had random circles drawn around different areas – some circles were red, others green, and some even blue. I eyed it curiously, before turning my gaze to a book that had caught my eyes. It was a blood red and had rubies decorating its spine – it was calling to me and subconsciously, I lifted my hand and just as my fingers were about to brush against one of the rubies, a hand on my shoulder pulled me away.

Spinning to face the person who had grabbed my shoulder, I looked at Jonghyun who was looking at me in concern. He eyed me and my hand, before turning his gaze towards the book.

“I see that you’ve found it,” stated Jonghyun.

“What?”

Jonghyun smiled towards me, “That is the book that belongs to me.”

He looked at me in confusion.

“That is the Book of Fire,” stated Jonghyun, “It’s the last elemental book that you will place back into its temple.”

“Why not let me touch it now?” I questioned, “Also, I thought that you said if we touch any of the books their power would be released and we’d be tracked down and hunted by the darkness.”

Jonghyun nodded, “I’m not going to let you touch it for that reason – plus, you’re not strong enough to control fire yet. Fire is the one element that requires the most control – in order to get control over fire; you must make it trust you.”

“How do you make it trust you?” I asked curiously, looking at the male, who was paler that he usually is.

“You must gain control over the others first,” stated Jonghyun.

“How can you touch it without getting an effect?”

Jonghyun sighed, “I’m the book’s keeper.”

“It’s keeper?”

“I came from a long line of mages,” stated Jonghyun, “My ancestors created the books and made it so only those of their blood are able to touch them without having any affect. Originally, they were hidden in temples that only we knew of – their original temples that were only accessible by my family and the royal family – another line of mages. However, an evil mage within the royal family got into the temples one day and removed them from their temples – destroying their pillars and opening the void for the first time ever. The void was closed quickly because the keepers have a connection to the books and are able to find them easily, however, the people of Miro were terrified that the void would return – so to assure them of their safety the king ordered my ancestors to build their newer temples which have been in use since that time.”

“They weren’t as protected since anyone could enter them, right?” I questioned.

Jonghyun nodded, smiling towards the boy, “That is right.”

I fell silent for a little bit, absorbing all the information the mage had given me, before asking another question, “What does it mean to be a book’s keeper?”

“To be a book’s keeper it means that you were born from that element – that it is your strongest element because it is your origin,” stated Jonghyun, “It means that you have the job of protecting the book, that you are tied to the book. If it just so happened that this book was destroyed – I would die as well. If I was killed – the book would live.”

I nodded in slight understanding, “So you were born from fire?”

Jonghyun nodded, “It’s more like light – rather than fire.”  I nodded again in understanding and Jonghyun carried on, “You see if someone took this book, I’d be able to locate it with ease – which is why I have it.”

“Aren’t you the last survivor of your family?”

Jonghyun nodded, “As far as I know I am.”

“Then, who is the keeper of the other books?” I questioned.

“I’m the keeper of another book,” stated Jonghyun, “I can feel it within me. I’m pretty sure I am the keeper of both Air and Fire, but I’m not too sure.”

“How can you tell? Is it even possible to be born of two elements?”

Jonghyun nodded, “It has happened before in the past, but that was when there were only two mages in a generation of my family. The reason I can tell is that I gained control over air first and I’ve always been able to control light – which is a weaker form of fire.”

I looked at me in shock, “How does that prove that you’re the keeper of two books?”

“The element that you learn to control first is your element; it is what decides what books you’re tied to. It’s the thing to show you what element you come from,” stated Jonghyun, “I could control Air and light as soon as I was born – it was the reason the darkness hated me. The darkness fears the light as the light fears the dark.”

I nodded in understanding, “So, you know you’re the keeper of not only the book of fire but the book of air as well because they were the first elements you learned to control?”

Jonghyun nodded, “That is it exactly.”

“How can you control two elements? I thought mages could only control one.”

Jonghyun shook his head, “No, that is not true. All mages can control all four elements with some training; it’s just that their origin element will be their strongest power – most choose to just learn their own element and leave it at that.”

I nodded in understanding, “I think I understand it now.”

Jonghyun smiled, his face clearly showing his exhaustion as he did so, “I’m glad that you do.”

“One last thing,” I stated.

“What is it?” questioned Jonghyun.

“Who is the keeper of the other two books?”

Jonghyun looked at me, clearly swallowing back his fear as he looked towards me, “I don’t know. My teacher told me that I was the only person remaining in my family – they never mentioned anyone else.”

I looked at him in shock, sighing and sitting on the edge of his bed, “So, we’ll have to look for them as well.”

Jonghyun nodded, “I honestly thought that I was the final person left in my family, but if that was the case, I’d be connected to all four of the books, but I’m not – so, there has to be someone else out there.”

I hummed.

“However, let’s leave that for another time,” stated Jonghyun, “You need to sleep Minki, you’ve been running around all day - plus it’s only your first day, so, it has to have been hard on your body.”

I nodded, watching him as he took off my cloak – I looked at his face that was just inches away from mine. Something stirred up within me and I could feel my face heating up and nervousness bubbling up within my veins.  Upon getting my cloak off, Jonghyun had me lay down and covered me in the thick white blankets.

“I heard you have nightmares,” stated Jonghyun.

I nodded.

“Would you like for me to stay with you?” questioned Jonghyun, a bit hesitant.

I nodded, my cheeks turning even hotter as I did so.

Jonghyun smiled warmly, snapping and putting out the candle that was lit – plunging the room into a safe darkness. I squirmed slightly as I felt Jonghyun climb into bed beside me, slipping under the cover to come lay beside me. As the random, creepy voices appeared in my mind again I curled up against his side, leading him to wrap his arms securely around my waist. As I began to tremble, Jonghyun started to hum a really familiar tune that silenced all the voices in my head – his warmth lulling me into the most peaceful sleep I’ve had in years. 

I'm back from the dead and I've brought an update with me. I apologize for not updating in so long - I was busy the past month with school. However, seeing as how I am now on summer vacation, I no longer have to worry about it. ^^ 

If the chapters confuse you in any way, please let me know and I'll explain it to you.