Try and Catch Me

What’s her deal?
As Lia sat down after answering a question, her professor was nodding his head, content with her answer. “I see that you’ve been studying. That’s good,” he said.

Lia heard the snickers of her classmates around her. Someone even snorted.

“What a show-off.”

“Obviously, she’s been living in the library these days.” The group laughed at that.

The teacher silenced them and continued with the lecture. Lia sat, facing forward with a poker face. ‘Brats. If you want to piss me off, you have to try harder than that.’ She was not going to waste breath on them. It was too tiring to start a worthless fight.

After their class, though, she slowly gathered her books and papers as if making a point, however futile that point was. The last thing she wanted was to be seen afraid, even if that was what she had been feeling these last few months of her life.

Just as she was about to leave, she caught Charlotte looking at her direction with an unreadable expression on her face. Was she angry? Why? Was she also envious like the others, thinking that all the praises should belong to the nobility? But there was something else under that look, something akin to wariness.

Well, whatever’s her deal, that was her problem and not Lia’s. Lia shrugged and went on her way to the library.

She had been reading quite a lot about Sallan, but getting information about this kingdom was tough as though it was not allowed to know more about these things. The more she read the more she felt bad for these people. They only wanted to maintain their peace, something she could very much relate to. They wanted to live their lives away from the greed of the neighboring countries. But leave it to people to grab the first opportunity that comes their way.

In all those readings, she also gathered that Kaeje would not be flourishing now if not for the learned scholars the previous queen brought from her country. If not for them, there probably would not be a Health Ministry where Lia was in.

Reading about the history of the north made Lia want to explore the area especially after learning about these light-haired people. What if Tamara came from this place? What if this was where she learned all those herbal making techniques? Or maybe they knew where Tamara lived now.

Lia wandered around the shelves with these thoughts spiraling inside her head, not thinking about where she was going.

“You shouldn’t be here. This is a restricted area,” the librarian appeared suddenly, glowering at Lia.

Lia almost jumped up from fright then remembered to fix her expression. “I-I wasn’t…”

“Are you looking for something?” the librarian fixed his pointed look at her.

“N-no.” She stammered her response after facing that suspicious look.

The librarian took a step closer, his eyes never left Lia’s. Lia took a step back, her mind was suddenly blank. She had not expected this. She tried to be discreet in her investigations, but apparently she wasn’t. Now she was afraid of what was to come.

“Oh, there you are!” Charlotte popped out from a nearby shelf. “I’ve been looking for you! I thought you got buried under all these papers.” She gave an exaggerated wave of a hand and motioned at the shelves. Then she seemed to have noticed the librarian. “Wait, what did you do?”

“Your friend has been lounging around the restricted area,” the librarian answered, still looking at Lia.

“Ooh,” she drawled, “I’m so sorry about that. You see, my friend here is too much of a bookworm. She wants to read everything and anything. Once she’s absorbed, she no longer cares about the outside world. She probably didn’t notice the restricted sign. Don’t worry, I’ll lecture her about it,” Charlotte said in rapid-fire, not giving the librarian any chance to speak. “We’ll take our leave then.” She then grabbed Lia by the arm and stalked outside of the library.