Prison Palace

The Darkness

Ebbie stepped over rocks and crunched on leaves as she journeyed further and further, into the forest. She finally reached her destination. The pond., or as she liked to call it, the pool of secrets. It always murmured quietly, as if it knew thousands of secrets but didn't want to share. She set her ax down and looked around. "Where are you?" She called into the pitch-black surrounded her. It was only 2:00 in the afternoon but the trees were so high and mighty, they tried to block the sun's light. The only brightness of the opening came from the glimmer of the water. It seemed to glow for some unknown reason.

She looked around, a bit frantic, searching for those eyes again. She hated when they messed with her. Those times usually ended with her on her butt or in the pond. Ebbie sat down on a log. "I know you're playing with me. Just come on out," she called out one more time. A dark chuckle could be heard from the depths of the forest. It was deep, with lighter tones to it. It sounded mischievous, as if the god Loki, himself, was the one laughing. A figure stepped from the trees and into the clearing, just a few feet from Ebbie. The person took off a mask of some kind. Hand-made, you could tell. It looked to be made of ebony and crafted to be the of a crow, with bright glow-in-the-dark paint accenting its features. The nose was the only feature painted in a dark color. It had bright gold, cursive lines decorating the sides. 

Underneath was a dark tan face with bright yellow, piercing eyes. They pulled back their hood to reveal jet-black hair. The figure smirked, "Did I scare ya?" they asked in a snarky tone. Ebbie rolled her eyes, "No, Presley. You've done that so many times, it's just annoying now. Don't you think you should just cut it out?" she scowled. "Where's the fun in that?" Presley asked, jokingly, as he sat down next to her. "And careful," he added, reaching into her backpack that was nestled between them, "scowling too much will give you frown lines." he snickered as he bit into the apple. "I don't really care," she noticed him eating her apple but shrugged it off. "And ask next time or I'll take it back." She closed her eyes and sat back, slipping to the mossy ground and leaning into the log. Presley glanced over at her as he chewed the apple. He looked over her relaxed face. He couldn't help but admire her beauty. He watched her face lovingly before she opened an eye and peeked at him. "What are you looking at?" she asked suspiciously. he flushed, "n-nothing!" he stuttered as his ears and nose turned pink. He turned away, grumbling. She closed her eye again and smirked as she went back to relaxing and enjoying the quiet. It stayed like that for a few moments. Comfortably silent. Until...

"EBBIE!!" Cierra's yell shattered the silence. Presley hopped to his feet quickly and placed his mask back on. He hid behind a tree and Ebbie stood up, dusting herself off. "Is something wrong? What happened?" she asked as Cierra made her way into the clearing. Cierra was followed by Sadie. Sadie was hiding behind her toy wand that she had brought along. "Why were you gone for so long? We were worried! and its getting dark, we wanna go home." Cierra pouted and crossed her arms. How long was I gone? Ebbie thought to herself. She looked up at the sky and realized the streams of light that were able to sneak their way through were gone as if snatched by the hand of the night. She sighed and looked to the tree Presley hid behind. She knew he could hear and see them so she nodded at the tree and walked out the clearing with her siblings.

As they were going back home, Ebbie looked to her left and saw a grand castle in the distance. It wasn't too far from where they were but far enough for her to see its entirety and see it was abandoned. She stopped for a few seconds and gazed at it. She felt a small tug to go towards it. To run through its grand doors and be its queen. To sit on the grand throne in the center and rule over all that came to her. She'd help them with their woes and punish the evil ones that came. And she'd go to war. Vanquishing her enemies with a mighty sword, splattering their blood on the stone walls.....Wait, what? She realized what she was thinking about and shuddered at the fact she went that far with her imagination. She felt a poke on her leg and jumped. "Gah!" she exclaimed, as she looked to see it was only Sadie. She looked up at her innocently and worriedly. "Are you ok?" the small girl asked her. Ebbie looked at the castle and looked back to Sadie. "Yeah, I'm good." she patted Sadie's shoulder and smiled at her. "Come on we gotta catch up," she pointed to Teran and Cierra, who were a about 9 yards away. Sadie smiled back and nodded as she grabbed Ebbie's hand and they raced to catch up to the others. 

At home, their mother was reading and watching a tv show that Ebbie didn't care enough to get the name of. Cierra immediately ran to her room to stash Camper away before the mother saw it, Sadie went to show their mother the stick dolls she had made, and Teran went to post some of the nature pics on her blog. Ebbie sighed and walked to her room exhausted. She flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling before looking out her window and into the woods. She wondered what Presley was doing and what else was in those woods. She didn't dwell on it long, since her mother called her for dinner. She sighed and went to join her family. At bedtime, she imagined her life in those woods. Just her, Presley, a nice pet she adopted,

and her dreams...