When we got to the train station, I realized we should have gone to an airport. Getting from Amsterdam to Norway by train was a multi-day affair, with three change overs. I sighed heavily, looking over the maps and times at the station.

  "Are you just gonna stand there all day sighing?" Verna asked, kicking her foot off the wall, bored.

  "You can go home now." I snapped, a little harsher then intended.

  "You sure are mean for a superhero." She shot back. I rolled my eyes.

  "How many times do I have to tell you, that's not the case?"

  "At least once more, cause from how I see it, you definitely are." She sassed. She was starting to remind me of Kalysta. That thought sent a shock to my heart, and I wondered if I should have at least let her know I was leaving. But what would I have told her?

  The truth was, I didn't know where I was going until I got to Europe. Once I was here, I realized I had to go to the home of my ancestors. I had to be more than my parents, and I wanted to look for that strength in my heritage. I still didn't know what exactly that looked like though. The three train cross over to Oslo was not it though.

  "There has to be a faster way." I grumbled.

  "Duh, its called an airplane." Verna said, throwing herself against the wall dramatically. I glared at her and she just shrugged. "You asked."

  "Why me?"

  She looked up at me, confused.

  "What do you mean?" She tilted her head to the side.

  "Why did you chose me? After what's happened, why have you stuck with me?" I asked, moving to the wall beside her.

  "You seemed lost and I just wanted to help. And then you...saved me from those men, who were actually a monster. I dunno, I guess I just feel safe with you. I don't get to feel that a lot." She shrugged again, this time, sadly.

  "I'm sorry." I said reflexively.

  "I imagine this is what having a big brother feels like." She sniffed. That was when I noticed the tear forming at the corner of her eye, that she was desperately trying to hold back. She was trying to be strong, and I wasn't sure if it was for me, or for her.

  "I never had any siblings. And my parents were...difficult." I told her, sliding down the wall to be on her level. She didn't look at me, but she nodded. "Family isn't all it's cracked up to be."

  "If you've never had it, its all you dream about." She replied quietly. I felt like an asshole. This kid had never had a family, and the people who were supposed to be looking out for her, clearly weren't doing a good job. For all intents and purposes, she had wandered off with a strange man to a train station. She could have been taken or killed and there would never be a second thought about her. My father, for all his faults, would have raised high hell if that had been me.

  "I really am mean for a superhero." I thought out loud. This brought a giggle out of Verna who sniffled away her tears. I was startled when she reached for my hand, recoiling. It had been so long since anyone had bothered that the action seemed foreign. When she looked hurt, I extended my hand for her to take, which she did, squeezing it tightly.

  "So, if you aren't a superhero, what are you?" She asked. It was a valid question; a few hours ago she saw me summon a magic hammer to fight three guys who turned into a monster. But what exactly was I?

  "I'm part of a secret organization called the Order of Vigilance. We collect ancient Artifacts and fight monsters." I told her honestly. Verna stared at me for a moment before bursting out in laughter. I grimaced.

  "That's less believable then the superhero thing!" She cried out between giggles.

  "I'm serious. We're the heroes that fight the monsters from all the myths and legends. All the stories are real." The more I kept talking, the harder she laughed. How did Anders sell the organization when he recruited without sounding like a lunatic?

  "Wait really?" Verna asked after settling down. I nodded. "That's really scary. That means all the monsters are real?"

  "Unfortunately, but that is why we exist; to protect everyone from the monsters." But I didn't have the heart to tell her that it was a losing battle. That for every monster we killed, three more took its place. That every Order agent dead in the field was one less body we had in the fight and couldn't replace. How could I tell her that over time, it was easier to make exceptions, and allow some monsters to integrate into society? Which reminded me of something.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  "The Underground." I muttered, looking around for the nearest utility closet. I had no idea where an entrance to the Old World would be in Amsterdam, but I knew that almost all train and subway stations had access to the powerful railways below this world.

  The monster races had established hyper trains that could jump across the world in a matter of hours, sometimes minutes. There had to be a train below that jumped from here to Norway.

  "I have an idea. Wait here okay?" I told Verna.

  "Don't leave me." Her voice was so small in the moment that I almost didn't hear her. But the emotion behind her words made them a scream. I had just told her monsters exist.

  "Okay, follow me." I motioned for her to join me as I moved around the train station, looking for some indication of where the entrance to the Old World was.

  I walked around, pulling on closets and utility rooms until I found one where the symbol for a plumbing closet looked a little off. Hoping it wasn't just an old worn sign, I pulled the door open and quickly herded Verna inside.

  "What are we doing?" She asked, cleaning her jacket of all the dust. The room was filled with old brass pipes and a layer of dirt and grime so thick, it was like a blanket, covering everything.

  "Looking for a secret door." I told her, dragging my hand through the filth, stirring up clouds of dust. When I looked over at her, she had her hands on her hips, watching me skeptically. Eventually, my hand found a small latch hidden under probably a century of dust and I pulled on it.

  It didn't budge.

  "You probably turned all the water off in the train station." Verna scoffed, shaking her head.

  Frustrated, I wedged my hand behind the latch and pulled my forearm, yanking hard on the door. There was resistance and then, the sound of a seal popping as the door hissed open. I had to put my shoulder into it, and when we got to the other side, I realized I was pushing crates stacked up in an old alleyway, trying to block the door. I motioned for Verna to wait while I scoped out the place, but she pushed passed me and into the alleyway.

  "Whoa!" She exclaimed, peering down the grimy path of stone floor and walls. Behind a dumpster, a dog headed man sat, drinking out of a brown paper bag. I grabbed her wrist and pulled her away, peering down the alley.

  "Listen, I have to make something very clear. We are not welcome here. Nothing is safe. This world is filled with monsters, so I need you to stay close to me. Do you understand?" I told her, trying to keep her eye contact. But she kept looking around, enthralled by the world beyond the alley.

  "Is that a McDonalds?" She exclaimed, pulling away from my hold and dashing out of the alleyway.

  "Verna wait!" I called out, chasing after her. "Oh, there is a McDonalds."

  Stepping out into the main area, the Old World station wasn't much different from one of the larger subway stations back home in Toronto. Sure, the roof and walls were made of stone, but there were stores everywhere, most of which were franchising of stuff from our world. The menus were slightly altered, I assumed, to accommodate monster diets.

  There were dry cleaners and tailor shops run by giant spider women, using their silk threads to mend clothes with too many arm holes. I watched as a centaur wearing a dress shirt and blazer on his human half and nothing on his lower half, rush off with a briefcase.

  "What the hell?" I spun around, questioning everything I knew about monsters and how they lived. When we're young, Order trainees study all the ancient stories; Grimm fairytales, myths and legends from all cultures, that sort of thing. We are warned against the creatures in the stories so we do not befall the lessons and traumas of the heroes in those stories. We are trained to hunt and kill them. To identify them by their habits and breeding places.

  "They have nuggets!" Verna bellowed with excitement. She stood in line behind a woman whose lower body was two serpentine tails; a Dracaenae.

  " Be careful!" I yelled at her, quickly moving to protect her from the creature as she turned around from the noise.

  "Oh, she's no bother. Your daughter is adorable." The Dracaenae said, her voice soft and her yellow slitted eyes staring almost affectionately. I put myself between the creature and Verna, but something felt wrong. She simply turned back around, waiting in line to order from a cashier with two heads, wearing two McDonald's visors.

  "Can you buy me nuggets?" Verna asked, seemingly unbothered. I wanted to scream at her. To tell her all the stories about monsters stealing and eating children. How could she be so calm in the nest of the enemy?

  "Sure." I sighed, still on guard, but resigning to the fact that apparently, I knew nothing about monster society.

  After Verna was fed, we waited on the platform for a train that would take us from Amsterdam, stopping briefly in Sweden and then Norway. Apparently that trip took forty minutes, and that was because of rush hour traffic. I stood, exasperated, as Verna went around looking at all the monsters, being polite and friendly. With the exception of language barriers, she was doing quite well.

  No one had admonished us for being humans in a monster space. If a centaur tried to board the TTC, it would have been a disaster all over the evening news. Here, it was just Thursday.

  "Are you certain you want to make this trip with me? I don't know if you'll be safe. And you'll be far away from home. I don't know if or when I'll be able to bring you back here." I said, staring down at Verna.

  "I'm sure. I want to go on an adventure with a superhero. I want to see the world and meet lots of cool people. Not like anyone will miss me here." She nodded resolutely. I couldn't help but be surprised by how worldly and old this child seemed. She was smart and witty. She knew what she wanted and what she didn't. At her age, or what I assumed was her age, I wouldn't have dreamed of wandering out from my father's shadow.

  It occurred to me then that she would have made an excellent candidate for the Order. But that would kill the light in her; chain her and take away the freedom that was so important to her. I was never given the option of anything different. There was never any future dreams of a life other than this. And what had it gotten me?

  "Okay. Adventure it is. When we get to Norway, we'll stop for supplies and some warmer clothes. I have a feeling we'll need it." I told her, smiling through my painful epiphany.

  "Do you know where we're going yet, like, once we get there?" She asked, her tiny hand settling into mine as the train pulled in at break-neck speeds.

  "I don't know what it's called, but I feel it calling to my soul. Like my ancestors are pulling me somewhere." I told her. She squeezed my hand tightly.

  "That's called home."