Fingers briefly skimmed over the hard covers of the books that were neatly lined up along the shelves of Hargeon’s library. The building was awfully quiet, with barely any sounds apart from the shuffling of the chairs and the flipping of pages. Among the room was mostly students and scholars educating themselves and some mages learning about new magics and techniques from the books. Heels clacked along the tiled chessboard floor as Snow tried to make minimal noise as much as possible. At the beginning of each shelf, the genre of the books in the row would be written on a plastic board to assist with easy searching.
 
The Blue Pegasus mage was in a ‘Fantasy’ section, in which the entire row was filled with countless number of books related to kings, dragons and powerful rulers. Those were her favourite, although it was not a big deal to her on which sort of book she was reading as long as they were interesting enough for her to keep flipping the pages. Snow walked along the row slowly, reading the titles that were carved on the spines of each book to search for one that attracted her attention. The girl ceased in her tracks when she reached the middle of the row and plucked out the book from the stack with her index finger. She opened the book, her eyes gliding over the lines written on the pages as she flipped through the book quickly.
 
Closing the book shut, a soft grin rested upon her lips and strode towards the reception where the librarian remains. The woman appeared to be busy with the pile of paperwork that laid beside her until Snow stood in front of the counter. She peered at the girl over her glasses and took the book that Snow had placed in front of her without saying any word. The woman stamped a mark on the last page of the novel to indicate that the book was being borrowed before returning it to her. Snow briefly nodded in gratitude and opened the large oaken doors of the building to exit out of the building. The moment she stepped foot outside of the building, the heat blasted against her face causing her to retreat back in her steps immediately.
 
Cerulean hues scanned around the area and she began to notice that it was a quiet neighbourhood. Right across the library was a small park adorned with gorse bushes, wild flowers and trees for shade. Snow figured that she could relax in the park and chill while she read the book and enjoy the view around her. The girl seated herself underneath a large tree, using the branches and leaves protruding from the truck to shield her from the blaring sunlight. The cool breeze blew through the land, whisking away the dry leaves that collected around her and the strands of silver hair that framed her face. Snow took off the cloth that was wrapped around her eyes before fluttering them open, revealing a pair of gorgeous blue eyes.

Hours passed while she sat underneath the tree, enjoying the cool breeze and the view in front of her. Children ran around the playground inside the park while their families chatted with each other and young couples sat on the benches outside the park, whispering their love for one another. Her eyes were heavy as she struggled to stay away but the frigid wind that blew across the vicinity did not help her to stay awake either. She could feel her head tilting to the side and her eyes were on the verge to close shut before she finally fell into a deep abyss of darkness. In her dreams, she saw her parents once again. The three of them were eating dinner together, her mother and father smiling and laughing like usual while Snow remained silent and ate the meal in front of her. Snow had always been a quiet child, one who does not talk much and barely expresses her emotions and feelings albeit, she was always happy that her parents were with her all the time.

The pleasant dreams she was having did not last long and Snow was finally awoken by the soft touch of something mysterious on her nose. She fluttered her eyes open, only to be surprised by the beautiful sight of cherry blossoms that rained around her. The girl frantically removed strands of silver hair that concealed her face and glanced around. It was the first time she had ever seen the blossoming of cherry flowers and no doubt, it was one of the most beautiful sceneries she had ever seen. The end of her lips was tugged into a huge smile, as infrequent as she does so and her hand reached out for the flowers that fell upon her. Excitement and cheers erupted among the people within the park and they would begin to collect the flowers while some took pictures with them. Snow tucked the flower behind her ear and smiled to herself before placing her visor around her eyes once again. She closed the book shut, which has already been read half way and stood up on her feet as she dusted off the grass that were stuck on her dress.


The crowd exclaimed, raising their arms up in the air. Her eyes glided towards the source of sound, which led her to a young boy and an old man playing chess in the park. There seemed to be a small crowd gathering around the players and the winner appeared to be a young boy who looked to be around his early teens. He seemed to be waiting for his next competitor and Snow was not going to let her chance escape. ”I’ll join.” Eyes began to turn towards her direction and Snow seated herself in front of the boy. With a smirk plastered on his face, the boy muttered, ”Seems to be your unlucky day. I’m sure I’ll win this time again.”
”You have a terrible attitude to talk to your elders in that manner.” She stated the obvious and that seemed to have pissed him off, although she could care less about what he thought of him.

The game began not long after and even though Snow did not have much experience with playing chess, she was decent for her first try. With a lot of thought and precision into each of her movements, Snow tried to counter her opponent but to no avail. The match was over after a long, tense of match between the two and the winner was once again, no other than the young boy. He later introduced himself as Bart Decker and complimented the moves she made during the match.

”I’m very impressed with your skills.”

”So am I. Never knew such a young child would be this good at chess.”

The two finished the match with good terms before she was rewarded with a few pieces of gold for spending her time with him.