The two continued on down dozens of roads. Some twisting, some winding, some up hill, some down. Throughout their journey they got to know each other a whole lot better. Phoebe opened up more to Neeka, explaining how she ended up on the streets, and Neeka explained to Phoebe about her previous clan experiences. Being together kind of brought out the best of them. "So, do you believe in all that fortune telling stuff?" asked Neeka curiously as they continued on down a rocky road. "Not really, I don't know. I mean sure she knew a lot, but how can we trust her words?" replied Phoebe, watching her footing. "What about the death thing?" asked Neeka again. "Eh. Probably a load of lies just to make us feel on edge when we have to leave." laughed Phoebe. Just as Phoebe finished her sentence, a deadly snake started wrapping around her ankle, tightening it's grip. She could feel the pressure on her ankle, as if someone was wrapping their hands around them. She slowly glanced down and started to freak out quietly. Neeka, on the other hand, had already spotted this and was slowly sliding out a knife that she keeps under her sleeves. "Don't move." she whispered. Phoebe's heart was racing fast, she didn't want to move, or panic incase she messed anything up. Neeka made her way around Phoebe, so she was at the front facing her. "You might wanna close your eyes." said Neeka. Phoebe clasped both her hands over her eyes and started to flinch. Neeka, stared at the snake. She knew it wasn't going to move, and the yellow mark on it's forehead indicated that it was deadly. She crouched lower down, so she was level with the snake. Slowly and quietly she swiped the sharp knife around the back, so it couldn't see, then, in a sudden movement, she pierced it's head. Phoebe flinched, and looked down. The snake was slowly unravelling itself from her ankles. Neeka got back up and continued to walk, whilst Phoebe managed to kick the lifeless snake away from her and catch up. She glanced up at Neeka and found her smiling. "Why are you smiling? That wasn't funny." said Phoebe, confused. "So, you don't believe in that death stuff, huh?" Neeka asked. "Are you referring to the snake? Please. That thing couldn't kill me." she protested. "Phoebe. That thing had a yellow marking on it's head. That yellow means it's one of the deadliest snakes alive. It carries one of the most deadliest poisons. If it had bitten you, you would have been dead in a matter of minutes." said Neeka. Phoebe shut up and looked down at the floor again, as she continued walking. "Well.. Maybe it was just coincidence?" she mumbled. "Maybe." chuckled Neeka. "But you still could of died." she smirked. She liked winding Phoebe up.
The two finally entered the small village of Jera. The streets were less empty than when they were on Haitz Market, and the scenery was completely different. There was grey cobble-stoned streets, brown and grey houses all attached to each other following the streets. Cute little window pots were outside every single house, and there were shutters as windows on every house. "This is cute" smiled Phoebe. They continued on walking down the streets until they found a small little bakery on the corner of the road. They stopped in for something to eat, and asked the waiter if they knew how long it'd take for them to continue making their way to Pesalah. The young waiter was quite tall, and had a very strong Irish accent. "Ahh. Pesalah. I'd say a good 5 hours to get down there." he said. "You're probably best waiting until the morning. It's a bit late to go traveling now." Neeka and Phoebe nodded in agreement. They had been walking for hours and were exhausted. "Do you two have anywhere to stay?" he asked. "No. Are there any inns here?" Phobe asked. He shook his head. "Ah, I'm sorry. Jera's such a small village.." Neeka banged her head against the table. "Where are we gonna go?.." asked Phoebe. The young lad looked at Neeka and then at Phoebe. "I'll tell you what. I have a spare room above this bakery. You can stay there for the night. Don't worry, you can trust me. he said, smiling. He was looking directly into Phoebe's eyes, and she was looking back. A look of innocence and passion was plastered over their face. From her seat, Neeka could spot the little 'moment' going on between them both. It was her time to leave. "Well, I'll just be upstairs. Heh. A girl needs her sleep." she smiled. "It's upstairs, take a left and straight on. You can't miss it." the waiter informed her, still gazing at Phoebe. "Right. Got it, I'll just.." Neeka didn't even finish her sentence, instead she just did a load of hand actions and left them alone.
Neeka entered the small room above the bakery. It was a quaint little room, with only a bedroom, a bathroom and the smallest kitchen ever seen. The waiter was obviously too busy to keep the place tidy though as their was clothes all over the floor, bed, doors and chairs. She managed to enter the room by bashing the door hard, only to realise the clothes were everywhere. She shook her head at the mess and went over to the bunk bed that was in the corner of the room. She chose top and laid down, waiting for Phoebe to come back upstairs. She closed her eyes and imagined that she was back home with Kai and Thyra. Her imagination was so vivid it could have been classed as reality. A small ringing sound drowned out her ears with words in the background. It kept saying, 'Test'. Like it was spelling the word out. Kai would say the T, Thyra would say the E, then back to Kai, then to Thyra. It was nice having the reassuring tone of their voices in Neeka's head, but she couldn't understand why they were spelling out 'Test.' It was like each letter had a whole different meaning. Neeka was deep in her thoughts when suddenly the door banged open, making her shoot upright in her bed. "It's only me!" called Phoebe. She looked at Neeka, her hair messed up from the pillow, bags under her eyes. "You ok? You look.. ill." Neeka remained silent for a few minutes. Although Kai and Thyra's voices had now disappeared, the ringing was still lingering in her ears. "Can you hear that?" she mumbled. Phoebe paused what she was doing and listened. "I hear nothing." she laughed. "You should probably get some sleep, you're hearing things." As soon as Phoebe said them words the ringing stopped. Neeka looked skeptically around the room. "Yeah.. I guess you're right. Goodnight Phoebe." Phoebe climbed into her bed and babbled away to Neeka about how nice the waiter downstairs was. She had found out his name; Lance. She kept talking about his facial features, and his scent. Neeka stared up at the ceiling and continued half listening, half trying to figure things out.
As Phoebe continued on talking about Lance, Neeka was starting to get the impression he was now her 'lover'. After hours of talking, Phoebe finally drifted off to sleep, leaving Neeka on her own. She was still wide awake. She was stuck with her thoughts. She closed her eyes again and thought long and hard about what TEST meant. What the words stood for. All Neeka could hear was the same thing she heard earlier. The ringing noises, Kai and Thyra's voices. The next morning Neeka woke Phoebe up before Dawn, a lot earlier than expected, confusing Phoebe. "Come on, I've packed your things.. We've gotta go back to the fortune teller." said Neeka, urgency in her voice. "What? But.." said Phoebe, still confused. "I'll explain on the way. Listen we have to go." "No. Explain to me now. It's friggen 5:00am in the morning, so it better be a good reason." insisted Phoebe. Neeka sighed. She could tell Phoebe wasn't going to go anywhere until she said something. "Fine.. I'm having these dreams.." "DREAMS?" shrieked Phoebe. "You woke me up.. BECAUSE OF A DREAM." "No.. Kai and Thyra are in them. They're spelling out TEST over and over again. That's why we need to go back to the fortune teller so I can find out what TEST means." said Neeka, desperately. Phoebe shook her head instantly. "No. Neeka it's a dream for crying out loud. Hell we all have weird dreams sometimes." argued Phoebe. "Phoebe. We have to go.." replied Neeka. She shook her head. "I'm not going back. Not now. We have to continue on to Pesalah." "Phoebe.. But we've got to stick together. Remember?" said Neeka, starting to get impatient. "Of course I remember. But I'm not going back. You can, I'll continue on. We have a task to do." said Phoebe stubbornly. The two continued arguing for 15 minutes. Phoebe wanted to continue on making their way down to Pesalah, the sooner they found the boy, the sooner they could return to Ceadda. Whereas Neeka had the urge to go back and re-visit the fortune teller because of the voices from Kai and Thyra. Sure she had had dreams before, but never anything like this. It was as if Kai and Thyra were giving her instructions to follow through her dreams. This was serious, but how serious? Eventually it was only Neeka who left the bakery at Dawn. Phoebe watched from the window watching Neeka walk back the same direction they had come from. Neeka was on her way to the fortune teller, and Phoebe was soon going to be making her way down to Pesalah. They both knew that they were doing the opposite of what the fortune teller had told them previously; to stick together. Neeka and Phoebe knew that they just had to trust one another on this, and hope nothing screws up.