Chapter Thirty

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Chapter Thirty

The Serrians surrendered before they had time to be completely wiped out. Atanax and the other Elves went from person to person, not caring what side they were from, and healed as those whose injuries were beyond doctors. After an hour of doing so, they had no energy left though, and many people were lost. The doctors didn’t sleep throughout the entire night. There was no time to sleep, every second a life depended on them.

Zeal took Jonathan to the castle, to tell them that the war had been one. When they arrived, they found Nevos and a few soldiers putting tables together in an attempt to make a door.

"That will never hold," Zeal said, looking down at him.

"You’re a lot bloodier than when you left," he went to him feet and looked at her shoulder. "Someone shoot you with an arrow?" He saw the wound, it was barely a scratch.

"I’m fine now," Zeal looked around the courtyard. Once it was been green and beautiful, but now it was covered in blood and dirt. "We need to clean up in here."

"I take it we won. The war’s over?" Nevos was already smiling before Zeal and Jonathan nodded their heads. He instantly ran off. "THE WAR’S OVER!!!" He called to everyone, and everyone in the castle began to cheer.

"I wonder if there will be a part tonight," Jonathan mused aloud.

"It feels nice to walk in here again and no be an enemy... This is my home."

"That’s right, you did live here."

"I do live here," he pointed to a window high up. "That’s my bedroom. On the other side of the castle in the town square. I have a secret passageway that leads right there. In case I ever needed to escape..."

"It’s a lovely place to have as a home... I’ve only ever been here once, but I liked it all the same. "Now that you’re home... what will you do?"

"Leave. I won’t be able to rest until my daughter is here with me."

"I think she’s alive too."

Zeal looked at Jonathan in shock.

"I feel it... She is alive. You will find her."

Zeal nodded. "I know."

"Commander! Commander!!!" Zeal turned her head to see a young soldier coming towards her. She didn’t recognized him, except that he was Serrian.

"What is it soldier?"

"It’s Tiers! He’s gone mad!!!"

"Tiers?" Zeal narrowed her eyes. "... Where is he?"

"Follow me!" The soldier took off again and Zeal ran after him.

"I’ll... I’ll stay here! Help with the cleanup!" Jonathan called after her.

Zeal ran as fast as she could. The words: I knew it. Racing through her head. She had never liked Tiers, he had never liked her either. If this was a way she could get rid of him, all the better. Though she had to ask herself exactly what might be happening with him? Was he sitting in a corner rocking back and forth? Or had he started killing his own men? What did this soldier mean by having gone mad? It was a question that didn’t take long to answer.

They came upon a crowed, it was Tiers platoon. There were bodies of men and women around. Had they attacked them? No, she didn’t think so. Why had these people been killed? She looked around the crowed and spotted Tiers. He stood in the middle of the crowed, he was holding onto the hair of a woman who was on her knees by his feet.

Tiers threw the woman into the mud. "Take a good look men! This is what we have defeated!"

"Please sir! Please stop!"

"She’s one of us! She’s our blood and yet we stormed her home and killed her husband! Some of you may know her, might have been her friend? You threw all that away just for the sake of war!"

He took his sword out, and for a moment they thought he would strike the woman down, but instead he threw his sword into the mud, the fresh blood still shone on it.

"We’ve killed our own people!"

"Tiers," the voice came from the crowed, it was Zeal, stepping forward through the ranks. "That’s enough."

He ignored her. "We’ve spent so long trying to become our own nation only for this to happen! At war with ourselves!?! That’s not a nation! That’s a land of gangs killing each other for sport! You killed those people without a second thought!!!"

"That’s enough!!!" Zeal yelled this time and could not be ignored.

"What’s enough? Enough death!?! Look what we’ve done to this woman!!!"

"Look what you’ve done to her!!!" Zeal yelled, and for a moment Tiers was too stunned to say anything. "We told them why we came, we told them to put their weapons down, we told them of the true purpose of the outsider. He wants to rape our land and our people and make us into his slaves!"

"How have we defeated him by killing our own people!?!"

"We’re not!!! We’re not defeating him! We’re defeating his reach into our world! If they wanted to be loyal to the outsider, then they wanted to die. I will not stand by while he poisons us!"

"There were better ways-"

"What better ways!?! Wait until we attacks us!?! No. I would not wait to die. I would save my people from him, from themselves if need be. We didn’t kill a single soul who loved our people. Those who we killed, were no longer our people, they were the outsider’s people. If you can’t see that, then there is no hope for you TiersNai."

He said nothing, there was nothing he could say before these people. He had lost face, and he knew it, and it filled him with rage.

"Pick her up," Zeal ordered to the nearest man. "Get her help, and the rest of you are dismissed."

Tiers didn’t move.

"Tiers, there something you want to say to me?"

"Yes."

"Then say it."

"I still think it’s wrong... and I know you’re lying. You didn’t fight today to defeat anything to do with the outsider, you fought to get closer to your daughter faster. You could have waited, could have talked to more, won all of them over. You didn’t have to wage this battle."

"I’m not the only person responsible for this."

"Don’t blame Atanax for this! You killed those people for your daughter."

"Tiers, you don’t know what you’re talking about."

"You can’t lie to me, I know you."

"And what do you know about me?"

"I know you’d kill anyone for your daughter."

"I would kill anyone for her."

"Even your sister?"

Zeal was silent, glaring. Tiers smirked in the darkness, enjoying the upper hand he had gained over her. He turned to leave.

"Yes," Zeal said silently, halting Tiers in his steps, he hadn’t won yet. "You’re trying to hurt me, but if given that day over, I’d still kill her."

"Where’s it going to stop Zeal? How many people have to die? Would you kill Nevos?"

"Yes."

"Jonathan?"

"Yes!"

"Atanax!?!"

"YES!!! Anyone!!! Everyone who gets in between me and my daughter!"

"And your own people got in the way!?!"

She moved forwards, grabbing his collar. "They did more than get in the way! They took her away! The outsider didn’t do it! They did! They pulled her out of my arms and they stole her from me! And that’s why they died! I will never forgive them for that! Do you hear me!!? She was right there and they took her away!!!"

Tiers pulled away, it was his turn glare. "I hear you. You’ll kill everyone, even me over this."

"Tiers, you will be lucky if you get an excuse as to why I kill you." She stormed past him, almost pushing him to the ground as she did so.

(This is my favourite chapter, but it's not the last. There's one more chapter after this, and then a prologue. But this is the end of what you shall receive from me. I've done 50, ooo words, so go me!!! *Dances about* Now, I need to stay away from this novel for a few weeks, because I'm slightly losing my mind... *Twitch*)

Chapter Seventeen - What do you mean it's not finished?

Current Word Count: 31382
Words Left To Count: 18618
Days Left: 14?

Chapter Seventeen

They wouldn’t let her leave, and at the same time, neither did she want to leave. The winter soon same. A thin layer of snow soon covered the Elven city and a serene quietness fell over all the Elves. It was a gentle winter, not the sort of weather you’d find on the other side of the mountains, or even in Camsirtch. She missed these winters.

As time crawled along, Atanax did ache to return to Camsirtch, to help get Zix back. She wondered where he was. Maybe they had brought him back to this world, though it was unlikely. He was probably still in the outsider’s world still. A few times she tried to use the mirror, but as she called forth the Orin and had no address other than ‘the outsider’, the mirror wouldn’t work. Some nights she thought she’d never see him again, other than in her dreams.

There was little comfort for her in the cold, though she did find some comfort in the people around her. Galma had stopped arguing with her and they would speak often enough. She said she’d stay with her mother until she returned to Camsirtch. There was also Tiers, whose ability to pick any lock allowed them to see each other almost every night.

She spent a lot of time telling him stories of the war and, more importantly, about what had happened to her in the other dimension. He had to understand that the outsider was his enemy, not the Elves and Camsirtch, and she was sure that the message was getting across in some manner. At the very least, he seemed to enjoy her company.

Toshowex wouldn’t speak to her. Part of the reason why Atanax didn’t leave all the sudden was because she didn’t want to leave like this, with her daughter hating her like this. The other Elves seemed to adore her, even Rotal didn’t seem angry with her, though he barely ever spoke to her as well.

It was through her talks that Atanax decided in the middle of winter that it was time to finally leave the Elven city, but she wasn’t going to go back to Camsirtch just yet. There was one more stop she needed to make before she could go home. She had to go see her son.

The decision to see him was more than personal though, she also needed to go because it was her duty. There was a frightening chance that the outsider might send his entire force against them to get the Crystal. If that were to happen, then they would lose. There was no question to that. However, if they had the help of the Elves then there was a chance of success.

That’s why after the worst of the winter had passed, Atanax went to see her eldest daughter. Toshowex knew why her mother had come, she too could smell the Spring approaching. She too understood the need to go out, though perhaps she didn’t understand the urgency or importance of doing so. Atanax didn’t even have to say a word before Toshowex replied.

"If you go away, you won’t be welcome back. I’ll turn every single Elf here against you, tell them that you betrayed them, gave their position away. You can’t leave."

"No, I can’t stay." She answered in Elven

"Did you hear what I said!?! You won’t be able to come back!" She stood up in anger, slamming her fists into a table. "Aren’t we important enough that you would want to stay!?!"

Atanax smiled, but there was sadness in her eyes. She wanted to reach out to her daughter, hold her in a tight embrace and tell her over and over again how much she loved her, but she had lost the right to do that the second she had decided to leave her daughter when she was still just a child.

"You’re too important for me to stay."

"You are not the only person who can save Camsirtch! They have an army!"

"It’s not just Camsirtch I have to save-"

"Don’t start back on how you’re doing this to save the Elves!"

"I’m doing it to save the Serrians."

Toshowex stopped herself short from what she was about to say. Atanax didn’t know whether or not the look in her daughter’s eyes was shock or hurt.

"We have to get rid of the outsider, and we’re going to need the Serrians help for that."

"I let you keep that Serrian pet of yours, but if you think that I’m going to stand by and let you help our greatest enemy-!!!"

"Our greatest enemy is the outsider, you ignorant little girl!"

"How dare you!"

"I don’t have time for these games Toshowex! I don’t know what you want from me, but I know what I have to do! I have to leave!"

"I hope you die," Toshowex whispered in spite.

"So do I, then maybe you’ll understand how I’m willing to risk everything to save the people I love."

Atanax turned and stormed out of the room. She expected Toshowex to come running after her, yelling more insults, but she didn’t. Not this time. She was sick and tired of fighting with her daughter anyway. They had spoken only a handful of times since she had come here, but it had always ended up in a fight. Would things ever change between them? She girl was barely fourteen, maybe there was time for them to fix things... or maybe it was much too late to heal those wounds.

"That sounded as though it went as usual," Tiers greeted her, a smile on his face.

"We’re leaving, right now," Atanax replied, not breaking her stride.

Tiers took off after her, barely keeping up with her. "She’s not going to chase us away with swords, is?"

"No."

"Insults then?"

"If she does, then hopefully we’ll be far away enough not to hear them."

"We can only be so lucky," he rolled his eyes. He hadn’t considered himself lucky ever since he had managed to get captured by Elves and was kept locked up every night.

"Galma!" Atanax called out to her youngest daughter who was waiting for them by Atanax’s house. "We’re leaving."

"I thought we were leaving tomorrow morning."

"No, right now."

Galma sighed. "I’ll go tell Augan. He was going to head out with us, but I guess that plan changed."

"You don’t have to go with us, if you don’t want to. I know you’ve been wanting to get back to your own village."

Galma waved the suggestion off. "Visits from Augan have been enough. I have no clue when I’ll see you next, so I might as well stay with you as long as possible."

Atanax smiled at her. "You’ve been too good to me."

"That’s true..."

"I hate to interrupt, but weren’t we supposed to be leaving right now."

Galma shot a quick glare at Tiers, Atanax had still been the only person to warm up to him.

(It's not finished now, but it will be tonight. My computer's just being a fucking asswipe, so I'm trying to post this before it fucks up again. I just really wanted to put the number count up and let any of you people who might be checking this that I have been writing and here's where I am as of right now. K, bye.)

Chapter Ten

No chapter nine for you...

Current Word Count: 19667
Words Left To Count: 30333
Days Left: 21

Chapter Ten

Jonathan was beginning to get used to waking up and having a splitting headache. However, waking up and finding that he was moving, was a new experience for him. Well, it was him moving, so much as the shaggy mount he was on. More than that, his hands were tightly tied to the saddle, a fact that was emphasized by his hands being completely numb.

It took only a few seconds for all this to process into his mind. Traveling with the Pennies, being attacked by the Traders, falling unconscious... His head shot up to get a look around, and he was met by a searing pain in his head. Clearly fast movements would be something he’d have to avoid from here on in.

There were several men around him, he recognized a few guards, but most of them were strangers. All were tied up and on mounts like he was. There were maybe twenty, he wasn’t sure because it was hard for him to concentrate. He wished that he could feel the back of his head, find out whether or not he was bleeding.

All around him and the Pennies, he saw the Traders, some walking, most riding, all dressed like forest dwellers. There were fewer than he remembered, being attacked in the forest like that must have made it appear as though more men were charging at them, that or at least half of the Traders had gone another way. Either way, there only seemed to be a hundred of them. That was of little consolation to Jonathan though, being that the numbers were still five to one.

"Excuse me," Jonathan looked to one of the Pennies riding nearby. "Is my head bleeding?

The man looked at him confused. "Jung?"

"Does that mean head? Is my head bleeding," he nodded his head. "My head. Ow." Ok, all movement should stop for a while.

"Jul ner elbh abeqvat elbhe uenq?"

Jonathan groaned. He wanted to yell, but he was pretty sure that would hurt as well. He leaned over, letting his head rest of his hands, trying to forget everything that was going on around him and trying to remember something good, something nice. Nothing immediately came to find. All his recent memories didn’t seem to cheer him up. Running from an explosion. Being lost. Being attacked my a mystical creature. Getting a splitting headache from said mystical creature. Getting locked up. Getting kidnaped... Having another splitting headache.

Of course, once he started thinking about that creature in the night, he started to think about what Zeal had said about him being able to use his mind to kill people. It would not be such a bad idea to find out once and for all if it was in fact him who had done that. After all, if he could kill someone with his mind, maybe he could kill a lot of people with his mind. Maybe a hundred.

Suddenly, there was hope in him once more.

He turned to the man beside him without lifting his head. "Do you think I can get us out of here with my mind?"

"Jung?"

"I bet that means ‘what’... My mind," he tried pointing to his head with his numb fingers, they barely responded, but still moved a little. "Mind," he said slowly. "Mind."

"Mind," the man repeated.

Jonathan smiled. "Yes, mind. Do you think I could kill them?"

He looked on blankly.

"How many do you think? One, ten? More you say? One hundred?" Jonathan sighed. "My name is Jonathan. What’s yours?"

"Jung?"

"Jonathan," he again pointed to himself. "Jonathan." He then tried to point to the other man. "What’s your name?"

"Mind?"

"Oh forget it, I don’t need your help anyway."

Zeal slowed her mount down and came to a halt. The Traders were at least an hour or so ahead of them. They could easily catch up, but first she needed to attempt to speak with the men who had followed. She did know a handful of words, though must of them related to currency and sizes. She did, of course, know the word for ‘trader’, and that would most likely come in handy.

The other men stopped and Zeal counted them. There were eight, including herself. This was not going to be easy. She dismounted and the others did the same. Then she sat down, and grabbed a stick. The man came around, some whispering to themselves, wondering what she was up to. She briefly wondered how far they were willing to follow her.

She drew a big circle. "Genqref," she pointed to it. ‘Traders.’ Then she drew a much smaller circle. "Us," she said, pointing to each on in turn.

"Qberf fur ezrna ehf?" One of the men asked another.

Another shrugged. "Eznlor."

She picked up a few words in there. Particularly ‘ehf’, she recognized that as another way of saying ‘hef’. ‘Us’. She pointed to the small circle again. "Lerf, ehf."

The men nodded, they were probably thinking the same thing she was: ‘There are too many of them. There’s no chance.’

Then she drew an arrow from the small circle to the bigger one, and drew a crescent moon beside it. She wanted to attack at night. Take out their sentries, sneak in, release the prisoners and then sneak back out. Hopefully they could comepletely avoid a full on attack, especially seeing they’d most likely lose such a thing. Maybe once they freed the prisoners they’d have a chance... but even then it was unlikely. She knew too much about battle to be optimistic about this.

Much to her surprise, the men nodded. She was pretty sure they understood what she meant. One man, who she assumed was their leader, started to talk to the men. Was he explaining what she had drawn? She caught a few words, one caught her attention. ‘Avtug’.

She pointed to the moon. "Avtug?"

The man shook his head, but in a way that he was almost saying yes. He pointed to the moon. "Ezba," then he poked his finger in the sand a few times around the moon. "Fegnef," he said. Then he drew a circle around the dots and the moon and said, "avtug."

She looked down at the drawing. To her it looked like the moon and stars, and so ‘avtug’ probably meant ‘night’. She nodded, traced over the arrow and pointed to the picture. "Avtug." She wished she knew the word for ‘attack’, but she was pretty sure they understood her. These were seasoned men, had probably fought in quite a few battles, most of them had probably already thought to attack at night, but the important thing was they find a way to communicate, and she was sure that they had.

Zeal stood up, brushing the dirt from her heads. She nodded towards her mount. ‘Let’s go?’ She asked silently. The other men nodded.

"Elrf," he nodded. ‘Yes.’

The Traders came to a halt and Jonathan assumed that they meant they were stopping for the night. The Traders were starting to disperse, probably to set up camp. A few of the Traders then started to come up to the Pennies. They would untie their hands, and then drag them off to a tree where they would then throw a rope over a high branch, tying one end to the Penny’s hands and the other to a lower branch. They were basically hanging them up for the night.

Jonathan suddenly had a very uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t want to spent the night hanging by his hands from a tree. If he was going to try his ‘kill the Traders with his mind’ plan, he was going to have to try it now. A man grabbed him from behind, pulling him off the saddle before they even untied his hands.

"Ow! You’re twisting my hands off!" Jonathan yelled at the man behind him. The other Traders look at Jonathan with surprise, and it wasn’t hard to tell why. He was speaking in a language probably few had heard. Either they realized he wasn’t from around these parts, or they thought him to be absolutely mad.

Another man came around and untied Jonathan’s hands from the saddle, though his hands remained bound together. Immediately his hands shot to the back of his head to see what the damage was. He felt around, ignoring the pain from moving so much. He could feel something wet, and there was also something crusted around it. Jonathan felt sick. His head was bleeding, and as far as he could tell, badly.

The man behind him pushed him to the ground and yelled something at him. Then he kicked Jonathan in the ribs. Jonathan felt as though someone had sucked as the air out of his lungs. He clawed at the dirt, trying to will himself to breath again, panic flooding over him. Finally it passed, he could breath again. He glared up at the man who had kicked up. He had found his test subject.

The man grabbed him roughly and pulled him to his feet, Jonathan tried to kick him, tried to scramble away, but all his efforts did was make the man laugh as he pulled Jonathan away. Jonathan was yelling something less than pleasant at the man when he felt himself hit something hard. For a moment he wasn’t too sure what had happened, but then he realized that he had been thrown against a tree.

He closed his eyes, trying to regain composure, trying to concentrate. He felt someone grab his wrist, they were tying a rope to them. He ignored it. He was trying to focus on something... but what? If he wanted to kill this man with his mind, then he’d probably have to find this man’s mind. What did a mind even feel like? He concentrated as hard as he could, trying to picture the man’s mind. There was something, he could sense it. It was so close... He barely even noticed being hoisted up by his wrists.

He did notice when pain suddenly flashed through his head. His eyes shot up, his concentration was shattered. He could hear the man laughed as he could taste the blood running down the back of his throat.

Jonathan swung his head forward to avoid any more blood running down his throat. He couldn’t believe this! Any of this! How had things turned so bad for him? He looked up at the man, laughing at him, and he felt anger surge through like he had never before. This man, this cocky, ignorant, cold-hearted man laughing at him was more than he could bear.

"Shut up!" Jonathan screamed at him.

The man stopped suddenly, his hand went up to his forehead in pain. There was fear in his eyes. He stumbled, fell to his knees. Other men noticed, started asking him what was wrong. Jonathan could only smile. He had done that, he had actually done that with just his mind. He could feel power and strength running through his mind. Even Atanax wasn’t as powerful as this, she needed a Crystal. He just needed his mind.

He tried not to let the thought go to his head too much. Powerful or not, he was still hanging from a tree and all he had really done was make a man fall to his knees. Then his mind started wandering. What if he could do more than not? Not just kill him... but control him. What if he could send order into this man’s mind? What if he could tell him to let him down?

"Untie me," Jonathan said calmly, closing his eyes again, trying to concentrate even harder. "Untie me, now." He could feel it, a strong connection between the two of them, pulsing like a vein. He could do this, he was sure of it.

The man staggered to his feet, reaching for his sword.

"Untie me," Jonathan repeated.

"Vy refge ha zebafger!" He screamed, and his sword swung out.

Suddenly Jonathan understood something clearly. He understood that he wasn’t controling this man, more than that though, he probably couldn’t control anyone. This, of course, all became very clear when he felt a searing pain in his right arm, and when he opened his eyes he saw that the man’s sword had lodge itself into his arm.

To anyone else, they’d probably write it off as a scratch, but to Jonathan, who up to now had lived a rather sheltered life, it felt as if someone had cut his entire arm off. He screamed, and then fell to the ground. Finding himself on the ground was enough to calm his nerves and look up. The man’s sword, while still lodged in the tree, had cut the rope along with his arm.

The Traders were already running towards him, swords out, they were yelling at him. He scrambled to his feet, grabbing the sword and trying to pull it out of the tree. That’s when he noticed the man, still standing behind him, but not moving. Jonathan looked at him, terrified that the man would lunge at him, try to kill him, but he didn’t move. He stared at Jonathan with cold blood-shot eyes and then he simply fell to the ground.

He was dead.

Suddenly the sword came free, Jonathan staggered back, almost tripping over the body behind up, but managed to stay on his feet.

"Eha!!!" One of the Pennies tied to a tree yelled.

Jonathan had no idea what the man had yelled, but he took of running. Those who weren’t tied to trees took their cue to fight even harder, Jonathan didn’t have to look back to know that a few of them had managed to break free as well, maybe even grab a sword and fight. Jonathan just ran, his hands still bound and holding onto the sword, and rope trailing behind him.

"Neerg!" A Trader yelled, jumping out from behind a tree, Jonathan didn’t even think, he ram forward, the sword plunged into the man’s gut, spraying Jonathan with blood. He let go of the hilt and kept running as the man fell behind him.
He wasn’t going to make it, there were too many men chasing him, and more there were others coming towards him, who were going to cut him off. He had to concentrate, but he was too frantic to concentrate. His lungs and legs burned too much from the effort of running. He hoped that behind him, what few men had managed to get lose were at least killing as many men as they could.

Suddenly Jonathan saw a mount come out of the trees and cut one of the Traders down. Jonathan came to a halt as the man rode towards him, killing other as he went. It took a moment for Jonathan to understand what was going on. It was a Penny, come to rescue them, and he hadn’t come alone. He turned around as saw more mounts riding out of the forest and cutting men down, just a handful, but it was enough to make Jonathan smile.

He also saw that there were at least ten Pennies who had escaped and had swords. The Traders were just starting to understand that they were under attack, they were just starting to organize themselves, but already at least twenty of them were dead.

Jonathan was then thrown to the ground, he felt a weight on his back, screaming at him, cursing at him, but Jonathan hadn’t a clue what the man was yelling. Jonathan managed to get on his back in an attempt to fight back, he turned around just in time to see a knife coming at his head. He quickly moved to the side, the knife lodge into the ground. Jonathan looked at the man, looked into his eyes.

It suddenly seemed to simple how to kill the man. He could feel the man’s mind as though he was holding it in the palm of his hand. All he had to do was make a fist, squish the life out of his assailant. The man had pulled the knife out of the ground, he was about the bring it back down on Jonathan’s head when he fell backwards, screaming in agony. The knife went flying and Jonathan got back to his feet and kept on running away from the fighting.

Nobody was paying attention to him anymore, they were all running towards the middle of the camp, where the real threat was. He was safe, he was going to get out of there alive, he was going to survive and then he was going to go home and save his people. Everything was going to be alright.

"Fageboch!"

Jonathan tried to stop, but he was going to fast that he fell to his knees. He looked up and saw a line of men holding bows, aimed at him. He looked back for a moment and saw that he hadn’t been forgotten by the Traders after all, there was at least a dozen charging. He looked back and saw the men pulling their bows back.

He almost screamed in fright, trying to convince them that he wasn’t the enemy, that he meant them no harm and he needed help, but he didn’t move. He sat back on his knees, his numb and bleeding hands on his wrists and looked up at them with no expression. He wasn’t worried anymore. He wasn’t afraid anymore. He just kept thinking back to what Zeal had said, about him dying a very old man. He was going to live, he was sure about it.

"Shver!" A man in the line screamed and all at once the arrows fired, and not one of them hit him. They all flew over his head and struck down the men behind him.

Just as quickly as they had fired, there were already bows ready in their hands once more. "Shver!" The man yelled again.

The fight was moving this way now, he could hear men yelling and running this way. Agaian the bows were held ready, and again they fired. Jonathan still didn’t move. He felt oddly safe sitting in front of a line of arrows like that. They weren’t going to fire at him, they weren’t going to kill him, he was sure of it.

Then he hearing galloping behind him. He turned and saw dozens of dead bodies lying behind him, some so close he could touch them, all had arrows stick out of them. He looked at those on the mounts. The last of the Traders, he thought, the last of the threat. He heard the bows getting ready, ready to kill these men.

Then he saw her, he saw Zeal. She had come to rescue him, even though she might have died and never been able to save Serra, she had come to rescue him. He felt tears come to his eyes at the thought of her risking everything for him, and then he remembered the bows ready to shoot her down.

"AB!!!" Jonathan leapt to his feet, facing the archers now. "AB!!!"

The mounts behind him came to a halt. The archers looked at him with confusion.

"FRIENDS!!!" Jonathan yelled, pointing to the mounts behind him with his bound hands. "Friends!" They didn’t understand. "What’s the word for ‘friend’ Zeal?"

"Sevraq." He heard Zeal’s voice behind him and he felt comforted.

"Sevraq," he repeated nodding. "Sevraq."

"Sevrah?" A woman’s voice behind the line of archers asked. Jonathan could see her face, but he saw someone moving behind them.

He nodded. "Sevrah, friends. My friends. Sevrah."

A woman stepped forth from the line of archers, she turned to one and gave an order. The bows were all lowered. She started walking towards Jonathan and he felt his heart stop. She was beautiful. She has long wavy dark brown hair and dark chocolate brown eyes. She had olive skin that seemed to make her face glow in the sun. But it wasn’t her beauty that took his breath away, it was because he recognized her face. This was the face he had seen in the other dimension, the face he had seen right before he lost his visions. She had been his last vision.

He felt week and found himself falling to his knees. She came up to him and knelt down, her soft and gentle hand went for him, undoing the ropes that bound them together.

"Ilbeh cheba na..." She said softly, caressing his cheek.

"I don’t... understand," he said, not caring that she wouldn’t understand him either.

"Zel anzre vef Thravivre."

"Thravivre," he whispered, and then he felt himself collapse in her arms.

(Love is in the wair, la la la la la la la...)

Current Word Count: 14800
Words Left To Count: 35200
Days Left: 23

Chapter Eight

"I hate to sound pushy, but do you have a plan yet?" Jonathan asked, leaning against the wall of their small jail. It was morning now, light seeped in through the cracks in the wood and the two could finally make each other out.
Zeal was silent for a moment, collecting her thoughts. "Make friends with the King, convince him that we mean no harm. Do everything he says."

"Doesn’t sound like a great plan."

"Then you make one, and leave me alone."

Jonathan, of course, couldn’t think to do anything differently than what Zeal had just suggested. "Um... could you maybe ask for some food?"

Zeal sighed, and without moving started banging on the wall. "Sebbeq!"

Jonathan waited, and nothing happened.

"Could you maybe-"

"No, now leave me alone."

"We’re going to starve to death in here."

"They won’t let us starve."

"How do you know?"

Zeal didn’t answer.

Jonathan leaned his head back and sighed. He tried to think of all the bright sides to this, but couldn’t think of any. He was locked up, he was cold, he was thistry and hungry and he was stuck with Zeal.

Before the list could get any longer thw door suddenly opened, a large man stood in the doorway.

"Urer," the man said as he set down a pitcher and a loaf of bread. Here.

Jonathan scrambled towards it, reaching it just as the man slamed the door in his face. He began to tear the loaf apart, scarfing it down hungrily. It was stale, but he was too hungry to care, then he went for the pitcher of water. It was ice cold, but Jonathan didn’t even notice, not even when it dribbled down his chin.

"Jonathan."

"Hm?" Jonathan lowered the pitcher, a mouthful of bread in his mouth.

She raised her eyesbrows. Jonathan looked down at the picther and loaf.

"Oh!" He handed her the pitcher and then ripped the loaf in half - taking into account of what he had already eaten - and handed that to her as well. "It’s a little stale," he said, taking another bite.

"You expected a four course meal?"

"Well... I was hoping for something warm."

"Don’t speak with your mouth full."

He swallowed. "Sorry."

The two sat in silence for a while, eating the stale bread and feeling all the better for it. They didn’t care how stale it was, so long as they kept giving it to them.

"Think we’re gonna get out of here soon?"Jonathan asked after he took the last bite of bread.

"I hope so."

An hour passed before someone opened the door again. Much to Jonathan’s disappointment, he didn’t have food for them this time. Instead he grunted at them and through two furs inside.

"Leaving," he muttered, and moved away from the door.

"Where are we going?" Joanthan asked, as he took the fur off the floor. He wasn’t sure he approuved of the smell, but once he had it around his shoulders, he felt all the warmer.

The man shruged at them, not udnerstanding what he had just asked.

"?" Zeal asked.

"Zenva," the man replied.

"What he say?"

"Where going to their capitol."

"Where’s that?"

"East."

Jonathan groaned. "We’re never going to get home if we kept traveling int he opposite direction."

"It was your idea to stay here for winter, might as well stay in the capitol," Zeal had her fur cloak on and was out the door just as soon as she said that. Jonathan quickly followed.

"Look Zeal, the sun came out. This should be a good sign."

They didn’t bind their hands like Jonathan thought they would, but they were surrounded by larger men with swords.

There must have been at least one hundred men gathered for the march. The King was at the front, riding one of the few wooly mounts, while they were kept in the middle, and a carriage of supplies was taking up the rear.

As soon as Zeal and Jonathan joined the group they started walking, a slow and easy pace and every once in a while some crackers and bread were passed around. Sometimes the guards took enough pity on their prisoners to actually share with them, but there were a few guards who seemed to enjoy the hungry look of Jonathan’s face as he watched them eat.

Occasionaly Jonathan tried starting up a conversion with someone, but that was always futile and got him shoved away from the man in question more often than he was comfortable with. If he complained to Zeal, she would just smile at him. It seemed as though everyone in the world was against him.

"I wish that translator were here, maybe he could tell us how far it Zenny is." They were in a forest now, though not the thick brush they were used to. Here all the trees were far apart and the light was no different.

"Zenva, not Zenny."

"You really think I care Zeal?"

"No," she wasn’t paying attention to him anymore, something was happening. The guards were talking to each other nervously, the pace was quickening. Jonathan even noticed that something was wrong.

"You understand anything they’re saying?"

She shook her head. "A few words, but I still have no clue what they’re talking about."

"Something’s up," he looked around nervously. "Are there any... predators here?"

"How should I know?"

"I don’t know! But I do know that you know more about these people than I do."

"You know nothing about these people."

"I know they don’t like strangers."

One of the guards turn back to Zeal with a stern look on his face. He said something to Zeal.

"What’d he say?"

"Something about traders..."

"What’s that supposed to mean?"

He was beginning to her on her nerves. "Please stop talking for just a few minutes."

Suddenly the ground came to a halt. Everyone was quiet and tense. Jonathan looked towards the front and saw that the King and over twenty guards on mounts had taken off at a gallop.

"Zeal, we’ve been abandoned," Jonathan whispered.

"My sword’s probably in the carriage," Zeal whispered back.

"So?"

"So, something’s going to happen, and that’s the direction I’m going."

"Oh, thanks for telling me."

A guard hissed something at them, and Jonathan was pretty sure that it was ‘shut up.’ He quickly nodded and did so. Zeal stood tense at his side, she was ready to take off at any second. Everything around them was quiet. He could hear everyone’s breathing, everyone’s heartbeat. At the drop of a pin chaos could break loose, and it did.

Suddenly yelling went up all around them. It was everywhere, all around them, and close - too close. It was almost like someone was standing right beside him and shouting into his ear. All the guards looked scared. Jonathan used all his will-power not to cower into a ball and clutch onto Zeal. Zeal was already inches towards the carriage.

He saw the men in the woods now, coming towards them on mounts at full charge, their yelling never pausing for a second, swords and ropes swinging in the air. All the men around Jonathan had their swords reading and were yelling back at them. They were going to fight, they were goin to fight and not only did he not have a weapon, he didn’t know how to fight.

Zeal was going to leave him to get her sword. He’d be alone.

It was then that he thought back to the inn for the first time since the actually conversation. Zeal had said it plainly enough, he could kill someone with his mind. Hope came to him for a brief second, maybe he could protect himself. Maybe he couldn’t exactly control it, and maybe he didn’t even know hot to use this power, but he was sure that if anyone attacked him he’d be able to use it.

Then all the men around him started charging, leaving him in their wake. He turned to find Zeal, but she was no where to be seen, and he lost all hope. He couldn’t kill people with his mind, that was just stupid fanciful talk. He was going to die. He was going to die. He was going to die. The words wouldn’t leave his mind, and all he could do was stand there as the men came towards and the killing began.

"ZEAL!!!" He called out into the battle, but of course no one herd him. He looked towards the carriage, that’s where she had gone, and he quickly took off running in that direction.

At first the battle had some distance from him, but now the men were starting to close in one him, he was starting to lose sight of the carriage even. He kept on running, trying to push himself faster and faster, but he knew that he wasn’t running fast enough.

"ZEAL!!!" He yeleld out again and suddenly he felt something ram against him and he was thrown to the ground. He looked up and saw that he was right in the middle of the battle. He tried to get when suddenly a body felt on him, the blood spraying onto his face and he screamed.

He pushed the body away and started to crawl, tried to crawl away. "ZEAL!!!" Someone grabbed the back of his collar and pulled him back. He yelled something at Jonathan, but he couldn't understand.

"ZEAL!!!" He could see her now. Her blonde hair shinning in the sun. She was making her way towards him, killing any man who got in her way. He felt himself smiling. She’d come and save him, and then everything went black.

"Where’d they take him!?!" Zeal yelled at the young man as she nearly throttled him. Those men, the Traders she imagined, had left moments after attacking. Leaving many dead on both sides. Still, there were only about fourty of them left. They had taken some people, and Zeal quickly found out that one of the people they had taken had been Jonathan.

"The... the port... to boat," the young man stuttered, it was the translator from the other night. "They go s-south..."

"Why!?!"

"Traders... trade men for money. Slaves..."

"You just let them do this!?! I thought your King was powerful!!!"

"Traders many... don’t come always... We go to Zenva, no hope for others."

"I won’t leave him to be traided off like that!"

"W-why?"

"Because I won’t be held responsible for changing the future."

She let the man go and walked over to a mount, his rider no doubt dead or missing. She was wuickly on him, she turned back to the man for a second.

"Tell your King that I’ll be back! We both will!"

"You can’t go alone!"

"Are you going to come?"

He shook his head. "Ab..." he mumbled, still shaken over the whole experience.

"Then what choice do I have!?!" She gave a swift kick to the side of the mount and it took off in a gallop.

She didn’t go alone though, behind her a few other men had grabbed loose mounts and were following. She didn’t care, the more men who came, the better chances she had or rescuing him. There had been hundreds of Traders, and there were less than ten people coming after them. Maybe if they came at night, freed those who had been taken, they might have a chance at fighting off the Traders to be able to make an escape.

She didn’t care about the other thought, she just had to get Jonathan back. How could the future be the way it was if Jonathan died or went missing? He had told her once that the future could be changed, and she knew if she just abandoned him, she might destroy their entire futures. She might destroy Serra’s future.

She would get him back.

(Feel the excitement. I feel a cold... as in I'm sick... I want soup... Maybe some love.)

Chapter Six/Chapter Seven (excerpt)

Current Word Count: 12916
Words Left To Count: 37084
Days Left: 24

Chapter Six

Jonathan had expected a short walk to another building in the village where they would find their King, but he wasn't so lucky. Once he left the inn they had been staying at, the left the small village and began to head east, the rising sun guiding them. He wanted to ask them where they were going and how long it would take, but the language barrier prevented that and Zeal didn't know enough words to ask herself.

Whenever Jonathan asked her where they were going, she'd simply reply, "to see their King." It was unsettling to say the least. He felt like their prisoner. Even though they wren't bound, he knew that they couldn't leave them.

The afternoon came and went, and they didn't stop. Nobody tried telling them where they were going, nobody really noticed they were there, but Jonathan did notice that they kept their hands on their weapons, just in case they had to notice them.

Once the sun started to set behind them, Jonathan was sure that they'd rest and then continue on the next day. He wondered how long they could go on walking for. Wasn't there supposed to be an ocean eventually? These people, long ago they were at war with Camsirtch, and they lived here near the ocean, that's all he really knew about them.

When it was almost dark, Jonathan finally saw something in the distance. Small stone houses, and a few wooden ones like he had seen before in the village. They were going there, they were going to rest for the night it seemed, and that made Jonathan feel a little better. He was tired, and very hungry. When was the last time he had eaten? Sometime in the other dimension, two days ago. Suddenly he felt like passing out if he didn't eat soon.

"Negare," a man said to him and Zeal suddenly, pointing towards the settlement.

"What does that mean?" Jonathan asked.

Zeal shook her head. "I think it's a name."

"Name of the village?"

"I don't know."

They kept walking, ushering the two along, some people were trying to speak with them now, but most of it was all in vain. Then they came to one of the stone houses, it was round like the others, but much larger. There were guards on either side of the wooden door. Either this was a jail for them, or someone important was in there. Maybe a King.

A soldier nodded towards the door and the two went inside, a handful of the men came in after them. Inside the house it was warm. There was a fire in the middle of the room, and skins lined the floor and the walls. There were men and women inside, the men seemed to all be guards, and some of the women were cooking, while the others stared on in interest.

At the far side of the room was a great chair, raised of the ground on a dais and on it sat a large man, with long hair and a shaggy beard. He wore furs lined with gold and leather and held a polished wooden scepter in his hands. He stared down at them with a weathered face, his age impossible to tell, and suddenly spoke with a loud booming voice.

"Venz Negare FbesHegare, Ehyre naq Ybeq bes Penzrybog naq ny Ynaqf febhgu. Jub nre lebh?"

They didn't have to know what he was saying to know that he was the King.

"He says," a young man stood to the King's right, he had no bearded and kept his head bowed. "'I am Negare son of Hegare, Ruler and Lord of Penzrybog as well as all the lands south of here.' And he asks your names." He spoke with a thick accent, but they could still understand him. Zeal was sure that this man worked with the traders of Serrsircth and that's why he knew their language.

"What a stupid name for a country," Jonathan muttered quietly to Zeal.

"My name is Zeal, this is Jonathan. We are lost travelers."

The man turned to Negare and translated it for them.

The King looked at them with disdain, he didn't believe them. He said something else and the man quickly translated it.

"King Negare knows that you are spies."

"Spies? Ab." No, Zeal said.

"You are spies from Camsitrch, he says."

"I am from Serrsirtch. Serrsirtch!" Zeal said to the King, not wanting to speak towards the translator.

"King Negare says Serrsirtch is the children of Camsirtch, you are maybe working together."

"You've traded with Serrsircth many times, you know that we have no love for Camsirtch."

"There is war in your land, things might have changed."

"They have not!"

Haven't they? Jonathan asked himself. Weren't they in fact going off to help Camsirtch now? Was she just saying this to get them to trust her?

"They why have you come here?"

"We are lost."

"No one accidentally crosses the mountains and finds themselves here."

"We have no way of explaining ourselves," Jonathan whispered to Zeal.

"You think I don't know that?" Zeal hissed back.

"Jung frpegf ner lebh juvfcrevat?" The King yelled.

"Stop your whispering," the man warned them.

"I promise you we mean no harm, we simply want to return to Sersirtch."

The man translated and the King looked at them calmly. Jonathan felt that at any moment he would order them to be executed. Although he knew very little of these people, he had heard many stories of them being... Violent. Finally the King answered, much more quietly.

"King Negare says that you will stay here, until he knows of your true plans."

"We have to get back home!"

The King yelled at them now.

"He says you should not have left now. He says it will be impossible for you to go home now that Jvagre is so close."

"Jvagre?" Jonathan asked. "What's Jvagre?"

"Winter."

"You can't just keep us here."

"Bu?" The King said mockingly. 'Oh?'

"King Negare says that he can."

Zeal wanted to her sword in her hand, she wanted to strike this man now. She couldn't stay here a moment longer, already they had cost her a day. She needed tog et home, needed to get back to her daughter. This was unfair! Why did things have to happen this way.

"I beg of you! Let us leave!"

"Genxer gurz nijnil." Negare ordered with a wave of his hand, and the handful of guards behind them reached forward and grabbed Zeal and Jonathan's arms, beginning to drag them away.

"Let go of me!" Zeal yelled, pulling away from them. "I'll go myself!" She left the house, the guards hot on her heals. They didn't let go of Jonathan though, and he didn't try to escape. There was no real point now.

They were taken to the edge of the village to one of the small wooden houses and while Zeal walked in, Jonathan was no so gently pushed in. The door closed behind them and as Jonathan fell to the ground - because there was no floor - he heard them put a bar across the door.

"They mean us no harm, let's go with them," Jonathan mumbled angrily as he stood up, peering into the darkness. "Last time I listen to you."

Zeal yelled in frustration, and he heard her hit the wall. "There's no way out of here!"

"Well what's the use of them locking us in a jail with a back door!?! They're not stupid, we are!"

"We need to leave now! We need to get back!"

"I hate to say, but there's no way we'd make it to Camsirtch now."

Zeal sat down on the ground, her hands on her knees, she had to calm down. "We need to get back."

"I know! But even if we ignore the fact that the Penny-Ratty people will probably chase us down and kill us if we escape, our chances of not dying in the mountains are getting slimmer by the second."

"If we left now, we could make it."

"We could. We could make it. We could possibly make it. And then what? We stumble into Camsirtch, half dead from the mountains. Serrian Royalty and her Oracle? They'd kill me at first glance, and then keep you for ransom, and the second they found out that you've been ostracized from you own people-"

"We don't know that for sure-"

"-they'd kill you too!"

"I can't wait until Spring."

"You're no good to Serra dead."

Her grip tightened on her knees, her knuckles almost turning white.

Jonathan sighed, going down on his knees to look Zeal in the eye, he could just make her out in the darkness. "Look, I know how badly you want to get back. We both have people we need to save, and neither of us are doing them any good by being so far away, but we also know how the outsider works. He'll keep Serra there until you show up. He'll lure you in, and try to kill you. But he'll fail. We wait until the end of Winter and then leave this place. I'm sure they'll trust us by then. We'll reach Serrsirtch by the end of Autumn at the latest, but the important thing is that we pass over the mountains during Summer."

Every part of her, every sense of her being screamed at her to leave now, to take her chances against the Penzrybog, to take her chances during winter, but she knew in her heart that she couldn't. "... I'll wait, but not a moment longer than I have to," her gaze pierced into Jonathan's and he knew she'd be gone even before the end of winter, with or without him and the trust of King Negare.

"Hey, don't worry so much. You're forgetting whom you're talking to. I am an oracle after all."

"An Oracle who lost his visions."

"Just because I don't get visions now, doesn't mean I didn't get visions before."

"You had visions about this future?"

"Hundreds," that was the truth, but in all honesty trying to remember them was like trying to remember a dream. Sometimes he'd see something and think, 'was that in a vision?', but the meaning would be lost to him. "Everything will work out... At the very least I'll live. After all, you did see me die in the future."

"... Do you know what your last words to me were?" Zeal asked, but she was no longer looking at him, her eyes were looking far off elsewhere.

"No... What were they?"

'Thank you for your sacrifice.'

My sacrifice... she thought to herself. Was she going to fail Serra?

Zeal smiled. "I'm not going to tell you."

"Why not?"

"Because the future's not for me or anyone else to write."

Chapter Seven

That night they went back to the forest floor. There were at least five landings at different parts in the city that had access to the ground. Once there they started a few fires going and began making a meal for themselves. Galma explained that they often came down, but could also very quickly get back up if they thought someone coming. She also said that barely anyone came this way, being that they were at least a weeks walk from the road between Camsirtch and Serrsirtch.

It was Atanax's turn then to ask everyone questions. She wanted to know how all of theirs parents were, and how life had been for them since she had left. She also wanted to find out more of their ring of spies, but she quickly found that that she'd have to ask the adults about that one because they seemed to know very little of it.

It would seem that Toshowex didn't share secrets with children either.

After their meals were finished, and no one could think of anymore questions to ask and sleep weighed heavily on all of them, they hid all evidence of a fire and climbed back up into the city. In the night time they had only a few candles in each house to light the way, just in case someone came by and while they had no guard posted, they wouldn't be seen.

"You can stay in my house with me, it's small, but it was built to fit an adult."

"What will you do when two of you want to live together?"

"Why would two of us want to live together?"

Atanax smiled. Her daughter may be leader of her small group of Elves, but she was still an 11 year old child in the end. "Because, when a boy and a girl love each other, they want to spend as much time with each other as possible."

Galma made a face of disgust. "I don't love any of the boys here, they're all too little."

"What about Augan?"

"Augan?" Her look of disgust only got worse.

Atanax laughed. "Maybe it's not the right time for this discussion."

"No, because it's bedtime."

"GALMA!!!" Someone who was still cleaning up of the forest floor yelled up frantically.

Galma ran to the edge. "Kehres? What's wrong!?!"

It was too dark to see anything clearly, but they could hear shuffling about, panting, someone calling out. There was fighting down there. Galma got a look in fear as she turned back to her mother.

"They've found us." She wasted no time running into her house and grabbing a bow and a handful of arrows. Atanax expected her to then head for the ladder and climb down, but instead she went back to the edge of the landing, grabbed onto a vine and jumped. "THEY'VE FOUND US!!!" She yelled, and other Elves began to grab their own weapons and torches and headed for the forest floor.
Atanax found herself reaches for the Crystal with some relief and she followed her daughter down the vine. It felt as thought it had been ages since she had last used the Crystal and every part of her was yearning to feel the magic pulse through her veins once more.

They reached the forest floor and gathered around in a circle. Kehres, a boy who was maybe 10 years old stood over the dead body of a man. Kehres had no weapons, and Atanax knew that he has used his magic to lay waste to him. The man wasn't alone though, two others were beside Kehres, holding swords up, reading to kill the boy.

At least five Elves had bows, and all held them ready to strike. Would they shoot with Kehres still standing there? They were just children, they shouldn't be killing. The two men - though once Atanax got a good look at them she realized that they couldn't have been older than twenty - had fear in their eyes. They understood what they had just found.

"Drop your swords," Atanax said calmly.

"Get out of the Kehres!" Galma yelled, worry on her face.

"Elves..." one of the men said in awe. He had shaggy brown hair and it was clear from his stubble that he had been traveling for a while, they both had. He dropped his sword, not because of Atanax though, because he was in shock.
The other man had a look of fear in his eyes. He held his sword higher, looking right at Kehres.

"You killed Jeda," he said, gritting his teeth.

Kehres looked up at the man calmly, he could still feel the magic at his finger tips, like electricity.

"No..." Atanax whispered, and before she could do anything the man lunged at the young boy. The Elves reacted, letting their arrows fly. The other man fell to the ground, just missing the arrows.

"NOOO!!!!" Galma yelled, running forward as blue light surrounded both the man and Kehres, the arrows flew towards them.

The light just disappeared then, and everyone was silent as they watched the two standing figures slowly fall towards the ground.

Galma was holding Kehres almost as soon as he fell, shaking him, tears in her eyes. "Wake up! WAKE UP!!!" He didn't move.

The Crystal flared in Atanax's palm, she could heal him. She was at her daughter's side instantly, almost pushing her aside because she was in such a hurry. With one hand she started pulling out arrows, and with the other she put the Crystal close to his heart. Blue light exploded around them, Atanax could hear some of the children screaming, but she didn't care. She had to save this boy, she couldn't let him die, he was just a child.

Slowly the light seeped back into the Crystal and although Atanax tried with all her might to make the magic work, she understood that it wouldn't. He was dead. She had infitnit power in her hand to heal and destroy, but she couldn't bring back the dead, even of one so little.

"He's dead," Atanax whispered.

"No, no, no, no," Galma kept repeating the word as though it could bring him back. She reached out for her daughter, wanting to hold her, but she just pushed her mother away and grabbed Kehres in a tight embrace. "KEHRES DON'T DIE!!!" She screamed, her tears falling onto his lifeless face. "DON'T DIE!!!"

"We didn't.... we didn't attack him..."

Atanax turned her head to the man who was still lying on the ground, his sword a few feet away from him. He looked absolutely terrified, he was even shaking.

"We just saw him in the woods, we thought we heard something and we went to see what..." He looked up at the other Elves arroud him. "I just got here, I can't die now..." he whispered softly to himself.

"Kill him."

The whisper was so quiet that Atanax wasn't too sure what Galma had said at first, and when none of the Elves reacted, Galma understood that nobody was sure of what she had said. "KILL HIM!!!"

The Elves, shaken, help up their bows once more. Those who had no bows suddenly had sparks of blue electricity on their fingers.

"No," Atanax said and stood up. "Everyone calm down. We're not killing this boy." She looked down at him, cowering behind her legs. What was he? 18?

"He has to die!!!" Galma yelled up at her mother.

"He didn't do anything!"

"THEY ALL HAVE TO DIE!!! HE'S SEEN US!!! HE'LL BRING HIS ARMY HERE AND KILL EVERY ONE OF US!!!"

"I won't let you kill him."

"Why not!?!"

"It's wrong."

"He'd have no mercy for us! So we have none for him!"

"Says who!?!"

"Toshowex!"

"Well she isn't't the Queen! I am! And I say that we do not kill a man who cowers on the ground! I say we kill when necessary! Not for sport!!!"

Galma was speechless. No one move, no one breathed. Most of them were looking at Atanax's palm, glowing blue with magic. They knew that she could kill all of them easily. They knew what whatever the decision, it was hers to make.

"He can't live." Galma finally said, her eyes set in a glare.

"No, he can live, he just can't leave." Atanax turned around to the young man, he looked up at her with both awe and fear. "What's your name?"

"T-Tiers... Nai. TiersNai."

"My name's Atanax, and you have found the Elves."

(Ok, so I couldn't get chapter six up yesterday, so here it is today. Chapter seven was really long, and mostly exposition, so I just posted the last part of it, which is the only really important part in it, and has the appearance of one of my fav. characters: TiersNai. You know, I feel like I'm talking to myself... but that's ok.)

Chapter Five

Current Word Count: 8740
Words Left To Count: 41260
Days Left: 26

Chapter Five

Atanax stared down at the silver mirror, carefully brushing aside the dirt from her shallow grave. She hadn’t told the other Elves about the mirror, and had even less intension of telling them about the Crystal. She had left their camp so that she could check on her items. These Elves, these children, they didn’t understand the important of these things. If something happened, if they let someone wrong know...

She missed Zix.

She quickly pushed him out of her mind. She couldn’t just sit there and think about Zix over and over again. She had to think of a way to get him back. Not only that, she also had to figure out what had happened to Zeal and Jonathan. The Orin had sent her back to her body, but she didn’t know where those two had asked to go and where they had ended up.

Could she use the mirror to find them? How did it even work? She could use it to go from one dimension to another, and from one time to another, so could she use it to go from one place to another while staying in her own dimension? She looked around the woods, the sun was setting and she couldn’t be sure, but she couldn’t see any of the Elves around her. She could use the mirror without them knowing.

"I’ve got to try it sooner or later," she bit her lip, prayed nobody had gone into the woods to fetch her and called on the Orin with her mind.

It was just like before, white light surrounded her, blinding her almost. Unlike before though, this time she began to feel pain. Her emotions rose to the surface, rage, depression, pity, guilt... all tore at her mind until she had to scream out in pain. This was wrong, something wasn’t right. Had she done something wrong? Had she broken the mirror.

The pain seemed to subside slowly, or maybe her body was simply going numb. She became aware of her surroundings. She was not in the nothingness she had found herself last time, but the same darkness surrounded her. She could see buildings, and animals, people even, all in the distance. It was all unmoving, the buildings all broken and crumbling... She soon realized that everyone was dead as well.

"You should go back now."

It was the Orin’s voice, she recognized it immediately.

"Where am I!?!" She was frantic, all her emotions still at their peak.

"This is the end, Atanax, Queen of the Elves."

The Orin was different too, rusted, chipped. As thought it had aged millions of years in the few hours since she had seen it.

"I don’t understand, what’s happened to you!?! What is all this!?!"

"This is the nothingness at the end."

"Of what!?!"

"My time."

"I don’t understand! How did this place change so fast!"

"It has not. It changed slowly. Once all travel ended through my gateway, I found this nothingness. This was a long time ago."

"But... I just saw you."

"We have met many times before, all of them eons ago."

"That’s impossible."

"Is it? You take for granted that our lives are linear with each other."

"You said travel stopped between worlds. Why?"

"I shall never know. Perhaps they found another way to do so, or perhaps they no longer were curious of other worlds."

"Is this... is this where those buildings went from the other day?"

"All things with no destination, will end up nowhere."

"So why am I here?"

The Orin didn’t answer, there was no need to. Atanax understood clearly why she was there, because she couldn’t travel to a dimension she was already in. She couldn’t find Zeal and Jonathan this way, she’d simply have to make her way to Camsirtch and either they would go there as well, or she’d have to send out soldiers to find them. It was going to be harder than she had originally anticipated.

"You should go back now. Something tells me you have yet to live out the life I have seen you live."

"No wait! Where are Zeal and Jonathan!"

"From what time?"

"ORIN!!!" Atanax sat up and stared into the darkness, but this was a different darkness. She was back in the forest, she could see a fire in the distance, the other Elves. Her only plan hadn’t worked and no she didn’t know what to do. She had expected the three of them to come here to together and then go to Camsircth, free their worlds of the outsider... and then... Would she find Zix in Serrsirtch? Was that going to be easy? Or just as hard as this was?

"Mehrehn?"

Atanax peered into the darkness and saw a small figure emerge from the trees. It was Galma.

"How long..."

"I heard you yell, I came to see what was wrong."

"Nothing’s wrong, I’m fine, really..."

"... What does ‘Orin’ mean?"

"Orin? Oh, well, it’s a name..." She could tell her daughter, couldn’t she? Couldn’t she trust her own flesh and blood not to accidentally tell their enemies? An enemy who until recently owned this mirror. "Actually... I’m not too sure if it is a name."

"Then what is it?" Galma was standing by her mother, and Atanax stood up as well, the mirror still in her hand.

"It’s a way to get to the outsider."

"The outsider?" Atanax couldn’t tell if Galma sounded annoyed or nervous, but she could tell that she recognized the name. The Elves had clearly heard of the outsider as well.

"Do you know of him?"

"From what I’ve heard, the outsider’s not what one would call a ‘him’." There was a hint of awe in her voice.

"What have you heard?"

"I suppose rumours only... That he’s a monster who’s lived for hundreds of years and goes from world to world looking for power to keep himself alive forever. That’s why Showex wanted us to split up."

"What do you mean?"

Galma smiled. "Well, you probably don’t know this, but we’ve had spies in Serrsirtch for a few years."

"Spies? Who?"

"Well... Rotal for one."

"Rotal?" The mention of him hit Atanax with waves of guilt. Rotal, her children’s father, her first lover... but not the person she loved. Did he know about Zix if he was a spy? Had he told her children? What did they think of her?

"A lot of Serrians don’t like the outsider, but a lot of people really like him because he promises them a lot of power as well. When Showex heard about the outsider she knew it only meant more trouble for us. She figured, if they knew about one Elf, then they’d probably figure out that there were more."

One Elf. Her of course, Atanax. She had given away their secret existence, but she had to.

"So we decided it’d be easier for the Elves to hide if we separated."

"Is that why you’re out here with these other children?"

Galma huffed at the word ‘children’. "We’re more than children mehrehn, we’re the future!"

"How many of you are there?"

"I have 14 Elves with me, the youngest of the Elves. Showex kept the older Elves, the Elves you were raised with and also..."

"Also?"

"Well, when you left there were only 16 Elves... but while you were gone we found more Elves. Along with the Elves who’ve been born over the last eight years-"

All of whom seem to be here.

"-there are 50 of us now. 14 of the eldest stayed with Showex, and the rest went with Geriha. We are the trinity of the Elves. Showex is the spirit, Geriha the body and we are the mind. Divided we stay a secret to those who would harm us, but if ever we are discovered, then united we shall come together and no force will be able to quail us."

"Sounds like a good idea."

Galma shrugged. "Showex is smart, she knows what she’s doing. We couldn’t have a better leader." Galma’s eyes widened at what she had just said. "Oh! Well what I meant was, we couldn’t have a better leader with you gone is what I meant, because of course you’re a great leader! You’re off fighting a war for us!"

"Galma, it’s alright. The only reason anyone ever considered me to be a leader is because after Nagaem died, I was the oldest. We were so young then that age mattered. When I left, I left the Elves to Rotal."

"If you came back... Showex would stand down."

"If?"

"Well... aren’t you going back to war?"

"...Yes."

Silence. Atanax wanted to say something, wanted to tell her daughter that of course she would come back after the war, but even that she wasn’t sure of. She might very well die, and if she didn’t, if they won the war and she lived through it and she found Zix... would she be able to leave him a second time?

"We should get back to camp."

"Yes, we should get some sleep."

Galma nodded and the two slowly went back towards the fire.

(Exposition, exposition, exposition. I really need to stop explaining things, though then nobody would have any idea what was going on. Still, I write a lot of exposition. The next chapter won't have much, if any, so that'll be nice.)

Chapter Four

Current Word Count: 7158
Words Left To Count: 41842
Days Left: 27

Chapter Four

"Wake up."

He didn’t want to.

"Jonathan, wake up," Zeal shook him now as she whispered into is ear.

Jonathan moaned and tried to push her away. He felt so tired, why was she trying to wake him up?

"Well I guess you’re not dead."

Dead. Why would he be dead? He could recognize Zeal’s voice, a low voice, very stern and yet... a sadness. There was always a sadness to Zeal. Was it because of Reya? Of Maida? Maybe it was because of Serra... or maybe it was all three of them. Her family, dead or lost. But he wasn’t dead or lost.

He could remember a bright light, and Zeal walking towards it, her eyes blank... lifeless. She was going to die, he could knew it. They had been in a field, they had been cold and wet... His head, his head felt as though someone were pouding on his skull from the inside and squeezing his brain. Now he felt warm and dry, he didn’t feel any pain at all. He opened his eyes.

"What did you do?"

Jonathan looked at Zeal confused for a second. They were in a small wooden room, the place looked old and unclean, but there was a fire in the corner and the bed he was lying on seemed to have clean sheets. Zeal was sitting on his bed, she was wearing a plain brown dress, he could see her clothes hanging on a chair by the fire, his as well. She looked down at him, blue eyes piercing into his, her face was very serious, her hair down... For the first time Jonathan couldn’t help but think to himself that she was beautiful. But there were more important things on his mind.

"I’m naked."

"Your clothes were wet," Zeal stated plainly. "What did you do?"

Jonathan rubbed his eyes. "Where are we?"

"A village. What did you do?"

"What are you talking about?" Jonathan looked at her with nothing but confussion on his face.

"That light... that... creature." Zeal could think of no other word to call it by. "You killed it."

"I did?"

"Yes, and you nearly killed me." She was becoming angry.

"I... I don’t know... I remember trying to stop you, and then my head," he winced as the meer memory of it gave him a headache. "Then I woke up here."

"You killed it, and enarly killed me... Apparently with your mind."

"That’s ludicriss, I have neither the power nor the means to do that."

"Oh? So it just killed itself did it?"

"Maybe you did it! You do have magic you know."

"Had it been me, the creature, you and me would have all been engulphed like... that building!" Zeal was of course talking about the Serrian base that had been engulphed by the portal in the other dimension. "We’d no longer be in existence... But you," she stood up and began to pace back and forth. "You did something with your mind."

"No Oracle has the power to kill with their minds."

Zeal stopped pacing. "What about the Oracle we fought in the other dimension?"

"That's different. Something happened to him-"

"Something happened to you."

"I don't think-"

"Oh shut up."

Jonathan shut his mouth.

She sat back down on his bed. "Listen. You did that, I know you did. You were in my mind Jonathan. And you were in that thing’s mind as well, only you killed it, and just gave me a bit of a headache."

"Sorry."

"Don’t appologize, you did save my life... though you probably could just have easily killed me."

"I doubt I would have-"

"It’s reasonable to argue that you can’t even control this power."

"I don’t even have this power. I’d know."

Zeal looked at him long and hard. "You have this power, or had it for those few moments back there."

"You’re not going to admit that you might be wrong... are you?"

"Of course not."

"Right, figured as much."

"If you can’t already tell, this has unerved me a bit. Not even with the Crystal could someone just look at you and you’d die."

Jonathan wanted to point out that with the Crystal the person would still die, and the user would not then experience a teerible migrain resulting in them passing out... but he figured that it would be fruitless to do so. After all, if one could kill with just their mind, and had complete control over those powers... It was a frightening prospect.

"So... what if I do have these powers?" He wasn’t conviced yet.

"I don’t know... but I rather you didn’t use them... or try to use them."

"Right, right."

"Good. Now get out of the bed, I’m tired and it’s almost morning."

"... Could I have my clothes first?"

Zeal smiled, only adding to her hidden beauty. "Don’t worry Jonathan, you’re much too young for my taste."

She could just hear him mumbling something under his breath about not being young at all as she fetched his clothing. His outfit was simple enough. To her it looked like two grey jackets, one with sleeves and one without. The sleevless one was thiner, made of finner fabric and looked like a lot of care had been put into making it. It was worn under the jacket with sleeves, which had some white on it as well. She knew Oracles, had dealt with them far too many times, and she knew that all Oracles wore the same thing.

"You should get new clothing," she threw the mostly dry clothes at him.

Jonathan grabbed the clothes and quickly put on the sleeveless tunic, doing the buttons up with as much grace as he could muster while still being under the covers. "I happen to like my clothing very much."

"Yes, you Oracles can make lovely dresses. Don’t you think you might want to dress like a Camrien if we’re going to be travelling through Camsirtch? Might be less suspiscious."

"Might be," Jonathan stood up and put on his jacket, leaving it undone in the warm room though.

"I think-"

The door was thrown open with a loud bang. Zeal had her sword in hand before Jonathan even noticed that someone had entered the room. Not just someone though, five mean swarmed into the room with bows held up. Scragly looking men, most had beards, all had weathered faces. They didn’t wear armour, but instead fur.

"Fignal javre elbhner! Qbabg zbir!" One of the men yelled in a husky voice.

"What?!" Jonathan yelled, more confused than anything else.

"They’re speaking Ratyvfu."

"That’s not a word Zeal."

"No, it’s a language you idiot."

"Fuhg hec!" The man yelled once more.

"I don’t know what you’re saying!!" Jonathan yelled at the man.

Zeal was almost sure that she could kill them, but she wasn’t sure if they’d manage to kill Jonathan before she could kill them. She was also a little worried that Jonathan might panic and do... whatever he had done the night before."Junt elbh jnag?" She whispered softly. ‘What you want?’

"You can speak Ratawhatever?"

"No, but I’ve learned a couple of words trading."

"King wants words," the man said with some difficulty.

"Well we’re busy!"

"Calm down Jonathan. We’re in no danger."

"Do you not see the pointy sticks of death!?!"

"I said, calm down," her voice was quiet, and Jonathan could tell that she wanted to yell at him. He could tell that she was angry, and the thought of her showing this anger made him stop talking. "We’re in no danger. They’re scared of us." She slowly got down on one knee and put her sword down, and then stood back up, her arms harmlessly in the air.

"Do they give inn rooms to everyone they plan on attacking?" Jonathan asked, but mostly to himself.

"Ab unez," Zeal said motioning to her sword. ‘No harm.’

"Ab unez," the man repeated carefully. "You come."

Jonathan looked towards Zeal, pleading with his eyes for her to just attack them. She didn’t knew if they were in danger or not, these people could be very paranoid and very willing to kill them once they stepped outside. Maybe they just wanted to avoid a mess in their room... even though the room wasn’t what he’d call slean.

"Laref," Zeal nodded.

"Laref means yes?"

"Yes. Button up you’re coat, we’re going for a walk."

(Ah yes, me and my obssesion with languages. It just makes sense people! Different country, different language. Fear not, I don't use it often, just often enough you don't forget it. Also, it's not jiberish, I spent quite some time figuring it out! Sorry about the lack of editing.)

Chapter Three

Current Word Count: 5714
Words Left To Count: 44286
Days Left: 28

Chapter Three

"It’s a nice place..."

"What?" Galma asked, looking over at her mother. The two were sitting together by a log, Atanax was laying back on it, looking up at the sky through the trees. The leaves were all red and yellow, a few of them slowly falling away from their branches and gently gliding towards the earth.

"It’s a nice place to be buried in."

"Oh... You know, we really are sorry... but you were dead. You had been turned back into a Crystal."

Just like the Druids, Atanax thought to herself. Just as they turned into what looked like Diamonds, the Elves turned into what looked like Rubies, when they died. Of course, once Atanax had her memories back, she understood why the Ruby on Zeal’s sword interested her so much. That Ruby, had once been an Elf. Probably an Elf killed in the massacre, picked up as a souvenir. Zeal was too young to have taken part in that, so the sword must have belonged to a parent.

"I know... And I was dead," she turned to look at her daughter, and she felt pain in her heart. Pain for having left her daughter to go fight, pain for letting her daughter think she was dead. "But I came back..."

"Why would you want to come back here?"

Atanax’s hand went up to softly caress Galma’s cheek, like she once did when Galma had been but a child. Did she hate her mother for leaving her? Was it all the greatest mistake of her life? Fighting their war, falling in love with Zix? The war would have spread, and before long it would have engulfed her people. Would they be able to survive through that without an ally? Maybe she had saved her children, and by coming back she would make sure of that.

She smiled. "Why wouldn’t I want to come back?"

"You never wanted to come back before..." Galma’s head dropped as tears came to her eyes. "Showex said you didn’t love us anymore."

"Toshowex said that?" Atanax sat up as her daughter began to cry. "You didn’t believe it, did you?"

"It doesn’t matter what I believe, you never came back!" Galma was crying now, her head buried in her hands.
Atanax wrapped her arms around her youngest child. "You’re right, I didn’t come back, but not because I didn’t love you."

"Then why!?!"

"I was scared..."

"Scared of what?" Galma looked at her mother, her eyes were red from the tears.

"I was scared... that you’d hate me for leaving in the first place. And the longer I put it off, the more scared I became. One day it just wasn’t an option anymore. But I never stopped loving you, or thinking about you and imagining how wonderful it would be to be together again when the war was over."

Galma pulled away and wiped the tears from her eyes. "Does that mean the war’s over, and you won’t have to fight anymore?"

"No... there’s still a war to be fought..."

"So why come back? The Serrians killed you. They sent messengers to every village, spreading the news. Even we heard. I went to Toshowex, and she wouldn’t talk to me. So I took my Elves and we stole you back from the Serrians... But you came back."

"I came back because the war’s not over... I can’t sleep until I know you’ll all be safe. You know I’m fighting this war for you. You know that right?"

"But why’d you take so long to come home!?!" Tears were trickling down her cheek once more.

"Because I was stupid, and there’s no reason for you to forgive me... I know that-"

"Mehren, just promise you won’t disappear again and I’ll forgive you."

Atanax felt a smile of relief come to her face. "I promise, even though I have to fight, I’ll come back as often as I can."

"Alright..." Galma smiled through her tears.

"We have to go see Toshowex... and Geriha," she had to go see her eldest daughter and her son.

"You should know... Toshowex won’t forgive you."

Atanax felt like someone was hitting her, felt as though her heart were going cold, but she hid that from her daughter. Toshowex? Her little baby girl? Her first child? Did she hate her mother? Could she blame her daughter? Shouldn’t she have understood better than her other children? Before every battle she repeated the names of her children to herself. For Toshowex, for Geriha, for Galma. She fought for them...

Yes, of course there were other reasons she found herself in the battlefield, but her mind always found its way back to her children. If ever she pushed them out of her mind, it was simply so she wouldn’t feel the pain of having left them behind. Even that was for them. If her enemies didn’t know she had a child, then how could they hurt them?

She smiled, to hide her pain. "I never imagined you’d look so much like me."

Galma smiled back. She had always loved it when people said she looked like her mother, and hearing it from her mother’s own mouth warmed her heart.

"We should spend the night here, and tomorrow we’ll set out for Toshowex’s Elves."

"How far are we?"

"It should only take us one night after tonight."

"Ok, that’s good."

(Today's chapter is pretty short. I have chapter four written, but I figured if I actually want people to read this that maybe it's best not to overwhelm you with more than one chapter a day. Not too much longer until that romance I promised you! Or if you're a guy: the fighting I promised you.)

Chapter Two

Current Word Count: 4780
Words Left To Count: 45220
Days Left: 29?


Chapter Two

Zeal let her settings sink in. She had walked through the mirror with both Atanax and Jonathan, but once she had been with the Orin, she had been alone. All she asked the Orin was to be taken back to her world... and she was there now, she was sure of it, but this place was unfamiliar. She was used to great forests surrounding her, and all she could see before her were hilly plains, and all she could feel was the cold rain hitting her face.

"Where in the world are we?" Zeal looked over to Jonathan who was looking around wildly.

"I think I know this place," he said almost excitedly. "I think I might have seen it in a vision.

"How delightful... Where is it?" She looked around. "And where is Atanax?"

"Somewhere else?"

Zeal looked at him with annoyance. "I’m so happy I got stuck with you."

"Be nice. I know I can be of help."

She wanted to ask how he could possibly be any help if he’d lost his powers as an Oracle, but she knew it would be too cruel to say that. He wanted to help, she could tell by his eyes. There was pain in his eyes, the pain of someone who’d lost part of himself, but there was also hope that despite this he could still help her... He wanted to help so badly.

"Well... do you see anything that’s familiar?" She asked, trying to be nice.

He looked around more, and for a while was silent. "There," he said, pointing to her left.

"Mountains," she could see their shadow in the distance, and then she too recognized them. "Of course! Camsirtch is by those mountains! And Serrsirtch is to the southwest... Wait," she looked behind herself and then back to the mountains. "The sun."

"What about the sun? It’s just behind the mountains, I can see the light. Guess it’s not raining there," he wrapped his arms around him for warmth.

"It’s on the wrong side of the mountain!" She yelled at him.

"What?"

"The sun is setting on the wrong side of the mountain! It should be setting on our side!"

"But that would mean that we’re on the wrong side of the mountain."

"Yes!"

"That would mean that Serrsitch and the shadow lands are..." he looked far off into the distance, and impossible distance to cross. The mountains themselves were small in the distance, and then to have to cross them... cross them into Camsirtch. An Oracle and Serrian Royalty would have to cross Camsirtch and then go on southwest through the forest... through the Elves. They could go around, but that could take them a year.

"ORIN!!!" Zeal screamed to the sky, only lightning answered back. "You lying, sneaky, traitorous beast!!!" Zeal grabbed stones and threw them at the sky.

"Don’t worry, no need to panic," Jonathan reassured her. "We just use the mirror and ask the Orin to take us to Serrsirtch."

Zeal said nothing.

"Well... can’t we?"

She looked at him with solemn eyes. "Atanax has the mirror."

Jonathan felt his legs go weak and he sat down before he could fall down. "You know it’s almost winter right? By the time we reach the mountains it will be snowfall. We’ll freeze to death there, and if we manage to live the Camriens will kill us the second we’re in their territory."

"Let’s say we do get as far as Camsirtch, I’m sure Atanax would be there to give us safe passage."

"When did you become the optimist!?! This is hopeless! This is even more hopeless than trying to escape that building unscathed."

"But we did."

"I didn’t!?! I lost the very thing that makes me who I am!!!"

"Oh, right..." Zeal sat down beside him. She didn’t know if she was supposed to comfort him, she didn’t even know how to comfort him. She had spent her life training to be a warrior, not a caretaker. "Look, we need to find a village or some sort of shelter. If we don’t get out of this rain, we’ll just freeze to death right now. Especially seeing night’s falling."

"I should have just left with the troops. What was I thinking joining you? I’ve lost my powers, lost my way... Very soon I’ll lose my life."

Zeal could barely believe that this was the same person as the older Jonathan she had met in the other dimension. He seemed so wise and calm. This person was aggravating and needed all the help he could get. Maybe losing his eye was going to calm him down in the future. "So what were you thinking, joining us?" Zeal finally asked.

"I was thinking that I could make a difference..." He put his hands over his face and laid back.

"Keep that thought in mind," she got to her feet. "You’ll need a warm thought while we look for shelter."

The rain had stopped, and in many ways that just made it worse. Now they really felt the cold as the strong wind blew at them. They were dressed for the cold, Jonathan may have had robes on, but they were soaked through, and Zeal was wearing light armour. The two of them walked on, following the setting sun, hoping beyond hope that they’d find a village, or at least some trees so that they could make a fire.

"I think this teaches us something," Jonathan said between chattering teeth.

"And what might that be?"

"One must be very clear with the Orin. Next time I’ll ask her to take me to a nice warm bed."

"If there is a next time..."

"See, that’s more of what I’d expect you to say."

Zeal said nothing, she just continued to stare on into the twilight.

"What? Nothing to say?"

"I think I trust you enough to have a proper conversation with you."

"You don’t trust me? Why not? I trust you... well, I mean, the Oracles said you could be trusted anyway."

"There, that’s why I don’t trust you."

Jonathan looked confused. "Try to remember that I can’t see the future anymore and have no idea where you’re going with this."

She sighed in annoyance. "Your people can see the future, so why would they let you live if they knew you were going to betray them?"

"Betray them? Betray the Oracles? Are you insane? I’m here for them."

"For them?" Zeal looked at him skeptically.

"Yes, for them," he shook his head at her. "When the Oracles joined the Serrians everyone figured immediately that that meant the Serrians were clearly going to win."

"Doesn’t bother me, you said so yourself, the future can change."

"Well, listen. We never had a vision about who would win the war. The only vision we received, was that if we did not join the Serrians the Oracles and well as the Elves would be a near extinct people right now. Or in our case, completely extinct because we have no powers to fight back with."

"So you joined the wrong side to save your own skin."

"It’s not like we’re giving the Serrians everything they need. We tell them what we want them to hear, and they never use our army. We basically have managed to stay out of this war. Of course there were a few of us who went off to live in Serrsirtch as... councillors if you will."

"I know that. I can’t even remember how many Oracles I’ve spoken to in the past. They never told me anything useful. ‘Your child will be a healthy girl.’ Things like that."

"They knew more, they knew you’d kill your sister, and that you’d join Atanax. I hardly think you would have liked to hear these things, especially seeing you were in love with Reya."

Jonathan waited for her to say something, but she remained silent.

"When an oracle was asked to accompany Reya to the other dimension, I was sent by my people. They had always known that I was to go and one day be given a choice. I could not join you and return to my people and live the rest of my days in comfort, and die very, very old. Or, I could join you, help to end this war, and forever lose my place with my people... I think I made the wrong choice."

"Warm thoughts, remember?"

"You are trying to tell me that you have no second thoughts?"

"You mean, would I rather be living peacefully with Reya and Serra in our castle, my sister at my side? A warm fire roaring before me, my entire future secured?"

"That’s what I mean."

"I’d rather be here, dying of cold, than living in a world I knew was wrong. If you’d gone home, you would regret it for the rest of your life. Don’t forget that I’ve met you Jonathan, I know how your life turns out. You die knowing you made the right choice, and you die very, very old."

The sun was gone. They were still cold, only now they couldn’t see.

"No moon... Is that a good omen, or a bad omen?"

"If either of us walks into a tree, then it’s bad."

Whether or not Zeal was at his joke, he couldn’t tell. He could barely make out her shape walking beside him. The only thing he could see was when he looked up, and then he could see the great sky filled with tiny specks of light. There were always thousands of more stars visible when the moon was gone. It was almost overwhelming to look up, but Jonathan kept doing so, kept on looking up at the sky every few minutes, remembering when he’d stare up at the stars and receive vision after vision. He could barely remember those visions now. In losing his power, he was losing his memory of it as well.

Jonathan looked back down, trying to push the sadness out of his mind. If he thought of all the good he was going to achieve, then it helped. Would he ever be able to shake away the feeling that he had lost part of himself? Would he ever be whole again? Ever walk with his people once more and be happy? He turned to Zeal, looked at her sad eyes and her neutral face. Would she ever be happy for what she had done?

"Wait," Zeal stopped walking at looked at him.

"What?"

"I can see you better."

Zeal looked down at herself and then back at Jonathan in confusion.

"What?"

"It’s getting brighter."

They looked back forward, and sure enough, it did seem to be brighter in the distance. There seemed to be a sort of glow in front of them so subtle that they had barely noticed.

"A village," Zeal said, and this time Jonathan could make out her smile.

Their pace quickened, their minds were already forgetting the cold they felt in their bones. All they could think of was warmth. A nice fire, warm food, a soft dry bed. When was the last time either had been able to feel any sort of comfort? Jonathan wanted to run he was so excited, but the closer to the light Zeal got, the more unsure she felt.

It wasn’t a warm light they were running towards, it wasn’t the light one say in a village. This light was cold, a soft blue, it almost had a dreamlike quality to it. It reminded her of something... It reminded her of Atanax. At first she couldn’t tell why, but the thought made her slow down. She looked down at her hand, looked at the way the blue light made her skin glow. She knew why it reminded her of Atanax, it was the same soft glow that came off of the Crystal whenever Atanax touched it.

"Jonathan..." Zeal whispered. "I don’t think we should go this way."

"Why not?" He looked back to see Zeal trailing behind. "I need to get out of these wet clothing."

"I just don’t... think..." She felt drowsy, walking for so long... battling with her sister... It all seemed to be catching up with her, and she just felt tired. It was the light, she knew it was the light. She kept on walking forward, wanting to see what was causing this. What was making her feel so tired?

"Zeal?" Jonathan watched as Zeal walked on past him, her eyes seemed so distant... so sad. "Zeal? You don’t think what?" He started walking beside her, he passed his hand in front of her face, but she made no reaction. "SerraZeal! What’s wrong?"

Jonathan turned his head to the front, to see what they were both walking towards and saw where the light was coming from. It wasn’t what he was expecting, he was expecting to see a Druid standing before them, but instead he saw a rotting log, laying on its side. Fungus growing on it and flowers. He had never seen flowers like those before, they were all bright colours. Nothing they had seen in this place had been bright. This thing was unnatural, this thing wasn’t right... and it was doing something to Zeal’s mind.

"You’re right, we should go another way." He grabbed her arm, trying to turn her around, but she didn’t respond. He grabbed onto her hand with both hands and started to pull at her in desperation, panic starting to hit him. What was going to happen when Zeal reached those flowers? "Let’s go Zeal, you need to snap out of this."

Jonathan stood in front of Zeal, pushing against her, but all he was doing was slowing her down. She was stronger than him.

"Zeal! Wake up! Snap out of it!" Jonathan turned to look at the log and felt his stomach turn, it was moving, the flowers all started pointing towards them, and vines seemed to be coming alive, slowly reach out like vines to grab them. "ZEAL!!! WAKE UP!!!" He was frantic now, any second now that thing was going to grab them and he knew beyond a doubt that it would could them... that it would kill her.

"ZEAL!!!!!!" The light seemed to intensify around them. Jonathan felt like the world was pulled out from underneath him. He could see the vines on the log, twisting around, pulling at each other as if they were in pain, and he wasn’t even looking at them. He was looking at Zeal, looked at her as she fell to her knees, grabbing at her head, screaming in pain. Then the light seemed to explode and Jonathan felt as though someone had thrown his to the ground.

He opened his eyes. He expected there to be darkness, he was sure they had been killed, but he saw the stars instead, millions of brilliant twinkling stars. He felt pain all over his body, but nothing hurt as pound as his head. His mind was pounding, as if it were trying to break free of his skull.

The stars were suddenly blotted out.

"What in the world did you just do?"

"Zeal?" He winced as she pulled him to his feet. He felt weak, and almost fell down as soon as he was up, but Zeal held onto him tightly. "My head..." The pain was unbearable from moving. He opened his eyes, and he could see the log, just a lifeless shadow, the growth on it now wilted.

"A village," Zeal said, and he didn’t need to turn. The light from the village was why he could see the dead log now. "Let’s go Jonathan, we’ll get that meal yet."

(I am not willing to explain anything from the first book in order to make this chapter make more sense, that'd take too long. Not that you need any more explanation after reading a chapter comprised mostly of exposition... I gets better, honest. I'm gonna have battles and romance, and... fighting... And stuff...)
-LS