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Lukas squeezed my hand and tugged me forward in the darkness while I kept wondering if he was going to suddenly lose his mind and strangle me in a fit of jealous rage. But with each clumsy step I took, my suspicious mind started to relax. Surely if he was going to hurt me he would have done so already.
When something soft and sticky brushed against my face, most likely a cobweb, I shifted closer to Lukas, so close that I could feel his body rise and fall with each breath.
‘Is it much further?’ I asked, even though I knew I wouldn’t get an answer. At least it was better than silence and heavy breathing.
Then it came to me. An idea.
‘Squeeze my hand once for yes and twice for no.’
Lukas paused mid-step.
‘Is it much further, Lukas?’ I asked again.
He squeezed twice.
‘Not much further then.’
One squeeze.
I squeezed him back and thought I heard a low chuckle or at least a noise from his throat. I thought back to what Frano had said about Lukas becoming mute after their parents had died and wondered if Lukas’ voice would ever return and what it would take for it to happen.
How wonderful it would be for Frano to hear his brother speak again. Perhaps then he wouldn’t be so overly protective of him.
Up ahead, a very dull light pierced the darkness. I blinked and concentrated on following Lukas’ every move.
Finally, we stopped and I banged into Lukas, my front pressing into his back.
‘Sorry,’ I whispered.
He let go of my hand and I heard the turn of a squeaky knob. Dull light streamed in, illuminating the entry.
Lukas smiled down at me and held the door open and indicated with a flourish of his hand for me to enter.
‘Thanks,’ I said, smiling up at him. His blue eyes widened slightly as he met my gaze and his lips softened into a gentle smile. He nodded and I broke our gaze and entered.
‘What is this place? Another secret?’ I asked, my eyes blinking at the tiny rows of light crystals embedded into the walls of the wide corridor.
Lukas closed the other door behind him and took my hand, leading me towards the end of the corridor.
He grinned down at me as he placed both hands on the wall in front of him and it shot up as though like magic. Like something I’d seen only in a space comic the village boys sometimes received for Christmas from their parents.
‘What is it? Is it safe?’ As soon as the words left my lips I shook my head. We were no longer holding hands therefor Lukas couldn’t answer me.
Instead I stepped through the open doorway, my mouth hanging open, into a room unlike anything I’d ever seen.
‘It’s beautiful,’ I whispered, moving across the room, pausing to run my fingers over the handle of a large light crystal lever jutting out of the floor, then drifting across to admire the array of multi-coloured light crystals dotting the walls and what appeared to be a control panel spanning across the entire right-hand wall.
‘Does Fran know about this?’ I asked.
Lukas shook his head.
‘It looks like a space ship’s control panel,’ I whispered, wondering if this dome and the city inside it had originally been a space craft belonging to an intergalactic species.
Lukas came to stand beside me and brushed his hand against mine, giving it a quick squeeze.
I stared into his eyes and he nodded, taking my hand and tugging me across the room to a small bed against a wall filled with sketches, drawings of people, hundreds of them, gathered around a moon and dancing beneath it.
‘Who are these people? Are they the original people who lived here before you and Frano came?’
Lukas nodded and gently squeezed my hand. I squeezed it back and he smiled while studying the drawings. I followed his eyes and stared in wonder at the drawings.
‘Were any of these people here when you found the city?’
Lukas shook his head. He let go of my hand and started signing furiously, excitement in his eyes, but then he frowned when he saw the confusion on my face and whipped out his notebook.
‘No. No bodies. No sign of destruction, just gone. All gone. A ghost city.’
‘That’s amazing,’ I whispered, tracing a finger across the drawings to stare at a woman wearing a crown. ‘And sad.’
Lukas turned to stare at me as I continued to study the drawings.
‘Was she their leader?’ I asked, my heart pounding madly while Lukas continued to watch me.
He scribbled another note.
‘There is a statue of her above the fountain in the main square by the castle. Frano named her Kraja.’
Lukas reached for my hand and gave it a long, slow squeeze. Thought he’d done this many times already, this time, something about his touch caused my stomach to flutter.
‘It looks as though she was their queen,’ I said.
Lukas tugged on my hand and when I met his gaze, he pointed to the narrow bed pushed against the wall.
My stomach fluttered. Was he asking me to lie with him? How strange.
He raised the blankets to reveal a bed of glowing green crystals much like the white glowing crystals.
I smiled, realising that Lukas was only showing me the crystals.
‘They’re beautiful,’ I said. ‘Why are they on this bed?’
Lukas let go of my hand to write something. The way he wrote, so fast and so passionately, was fascinating.
He paused when he finished and caught me watching his handsome face, then grinned and showed me the notebook.
He took my hand in his once more while I read the note.
‘Healing crystals. If you ever hurt or cut yourself, come to me and I will bring you here to heal you.’
His fingers stroked the inside of my palm as he stared down into my face. Oh God. My heart shouldn’t be beating like this for the brother of my future husband.
Dropping his hand, I drew away, noting the crestfallen look on Lukas’ face.
He sighed and exited the room and I followed him to the opposite end of the corridor we’d arrived in.
Placing two palms against the wall, Lukas half smiled at me before the wall shot up, leading us into another room.
I laughed in shock as I poked my head through the doorway and recognised the bed I’d been sleeping in since I’d arrived in Marin.
‘It leads to Frano’s room? That’s amazing. So, this was why you were leading me to the wall the first night I saw you? Are these secret passages throughout the entire house?’
He shook his head and indicated that I step into the room, which I did.
Then he took a step back, smiled at me and placed both palms on either side of the opening.
Within seconds I was facing a wall and Lukas was gone.