The Dragon Knight; The Secrets of the Desert

The Secrets of the Desert (Chapter 3)

     I followed Sofia down the stairs to the main level. It was really strange because half the time I could see right through her and at others she seemed to be completely solid. Sometimes I was even tempted to reach out and see if my hand would touch anything or would go straight through her but I figured that would be rude so I kept my hands firmly at my side.

     Sofia walked straight to the dining table and I followed her, wondering what exactly a ghost could serve for lunch. To my surprise the table was filled with delicious looking food; bread and fruit and vegetables and all kinds of meat. The most impressive was probably the pig or boar with the apple in the mouth. The room was filled with the different scents coming from the food despite the windows were a gentle breeze still blew through.

     I stopped at the sight of it all but once more Sofia waved me along as she walked to the table as sat down somewhere in the middle of the long bench. I sat down beside her and let my gaze drift over the food before turned it to the Dragon Knight. She smiled, "Go ahead, it's not like I'll eat much."

     "Well if I remember correctly you always ate most of us all." A deep but young voice said with a chuckle.

     "You got that right." Yet another voice, female this time, said.

     My head snapped up and my eyes darted around the table. The seats that had been previously empty were now occupied by a bunch of people all half transparent half solid. All looked different and yet all seemed strangely alike; not in looks but the energy that seemed to hang around them. Or maybe that was just the fright they gave me by appearing like this out of nowhere.

     "People, people! I thought we agreed to meet after she had had something to eat." Sofia spoke up, shutting everyone up.

     Most of the ghosts stayed quiet, one or two grabbed some food, clearly that was possible; the food didn't go right through their fingers. Who would have guessed?! But only one really spoke up. "Well technically we agreed to wait until she rested, which she did. She slept for half a day in our bed."

     I looked at the one who had spoken, a young man sitting next to Sofia. He couldn't possibly be much older than Robin was, probably twenty-four, twenty-five. His light brown hair was longer than Robin's, falling into his dark green eyes. His skin, from the angle where I sat I couldn't see right through, had a golden tint to it; the kind of tan that I had only seen one the royals of the southern kingdoms and Sable Sucré. His eyes went from Sofia to me and a warm smile spread across his face.

     "Hello, young Knight. I'm Priam." He smiled as he looked at me before his eyes went back to Sofia, who had turned to look at him over her shoulder.

     "Nice to meet you." I mumbled feeling unsure about the entire situation. Was everyone at this table see-through, and thus, dead? Looking around, they were all indeed see-through, at least a little. They were the strangest assembly of people I had seen together. It looked like they came from everywhere on the continent; different skin tones, different hair colors, different eye colors, different clothing, different ages. I wondered what they were all doing here before I wondered about what Priam had said. "Wait! This meeting was planned? And what do you mean 'our' bed?"

     Sofia sighed and turned an exasperated look to Priam. He grinned sheepishly as he ran a hand through his light hair, messing it up completely. Sofia turned back to me. "Yes, it was planned to have you meet every single one of us; after you had slept and eaten a little and maybe heard some things about this place. As for 'our' bed; you needed to rest somewhere and because you only knew me it was easiest for me to come to you in a place I had been in my life. It's just so happened that I used to share the bedroom with him." She jerked her thumb over her shoulder to Priam, who looked offended.