Chapter 2

            Melody rolled over and threw her alarm clock off of the bed stand, then she rolled over and tried to go back to sleep. The alarm kept on blaring out the morning news, but she just tried to ignore it. Finally she could no longer stand it so she rolled over and got out of bed.

            That’s weird she thought. The clock was unplugged, but it was still working. She shrugged, guessed that it had finally started working on battery power again and pressed the button to turn the alarm off. She had guessed wrong. The voice on the radio kept on talking, so she just turned the volume off. The voice didn’t even get quiet.

            This was really starting to creep Melody out. She looked down and noticed the batteries lying on the floor. The voice continued blaring from the radio. It wasn’t telling the news either.

            “Melody, you need to listen to us!” came the voice, “Melody, you can’t shut us out forever. Someday you are going to have to face the truth, and I fear that day is coming fast. Melody, you must be prepared!”

            The voice was talking to her! Melody took a fast breath, then another, then another. This was only a dream, it couldn’t be anything else. But if it were her dream, why wasn’t she able to make it stop? She screamed and threw the alarm clock at the wall with all of her might. It fell apart on impact, but the voice kept speaking to her. She screamed again and covered her ears.

            The voice stopped. Silence filled the room.

            It was just a dream, and Melody was waking up from it. She slumped back into her bed and pulled the covers up over her, curling up into a tight ball of protection. She slowed her breathing down and gradually fell back to sleep.

            Her dream was quiet, but strange. Melody was dreaming of her parents for the first time in many years. They just stood there, tall and sad, looking at her with eyes full of love. Somehow their eyes communicated more than just love, they told her everything. Their eyes carried whole worlds of information. The black irises inside the bright blue eyes of her father told about his work and why he was killed, while the intense hazel eyes of her mother communicated the love they had held for her even after they had been killed, and why they were still there.

            When she awoke, Melody was a new person. She thought of her dream as just that, a dream. But though she did not yet know it, that dream had changed her in more ways than one. And it would continue to change her until the end of her life.

***

            As she thumped down the steps, Melody heard her mother talking to someone in the kitchen. She sleepily wondered who it was, then turned to return to her room. If someone was visiting she wanted to at least look respectable.

            Dressing quickly, Melody looked into a mirror and paused for a moment. Perhaps she noticed something different when she looked at the girl staring at her in the glass. Nothing seemed different. Her hair was still the same golden brown with blond highlights that made her the envy of all the girls in her school, and her face was just as plain. Perhaps she had grown taller recently? Yes, that had to be the difference. She was already considered rather tall, but she hardly noticed anymore, which would explain her surprise.

            She turned and walked downstairs, taking the steps two at a time now that she was awake. Turning toward the kitchen, Melody again heard her mother’s voice as well as another. This time she recognized the voice and walked eagerly into the kitchen.

            “Sam!” she exclaimed “I haven’t seen you in so long! When did you get here?”

            Her cousin turned towards her and they hugged. “I got here a few hours ago. You didn’t think I’d miss your birthday, did you?” Samantha smiled and hugged her again.

            Melody turned toward her mother “Thanks for inviting her mom!” Then she turned back to Sam “How are you? Did you bring Knight with you?”

            Sam laughed. “So you aren’t excited to see me, huh? Just want to see my dog?” She gave Melody a playful punch on the shoulder “She’s in the other room, watching over your present.”

            They turned the corner, and Melody let out an excited gasp! “Oh Sam, it’s adorable!” She said running over to pick up the tiny German shepherd puppy which had been playing with the older dog’s tail. “Is it really mine? Is it a boy or a girl?”

            Samantha laughed and knelt down beside Melody on the carpeted floor. “It’s a boy, and yes he’s yours. Do you like him?”

            “Like him? I love him!” She scratched behind the puppies ears as her mom called from the other room.

            “Remember, he’s your responsibility. I will not have him leaving messes all over my house and you will be buying his food with your own money. Now come and have your breakfast before it gets cold.”

            Melody put the puppy down reluctantly and she and Sam went back into the kitchen. Sitting down at the table, she found her a stack of pancakes on her plate with “Happy 16th birthday!” spelled out in syrup on the top. She smiled and immediately started eating.

            As Sam poured syrup over her stack she talked about her parents and how they had been reluctant to let her drive all the way from Florida to Indiana on her own, so they had come with her and then turned back. Then Sam talked about school and her friends and her siblings and dogs and many other things.

When they had finished both their breakfasts and their chat they had already decided to name the puppy Sir Valiant in keeping with the theme of Knights that was started with his mother’s name. Then Sam went to finish unpacking her belongings (she informed Melody that she would be staying the whole weekend).

            While Sam was in her room, Melody decided to try and sketch the puppy. It was not easy since Valiant would not hold still for more than a moment, and before she knew it the sketch looked nothing like a puppy. In fact, it looked very much like a room. Very much like the room she had been standing in last night in her dream.

            The room was full of books and other odd artifacts. They seemed to have been artifacts from another time, but they all looked like they had just been made. Like they had been ripped out of their original time and placed in ours.

            Something was different in Melody’s sketch though. Something was wrong. She couldn’t figure out what it was. Then she noticed something strange, something very wrong. There was a dark man hidden behind some books in the room, and he was looking right at her.