The Forsaken Prophecy

Chapter Sixteen

The group chatted and laughed for hours. Ayren took multiple bathroom breaks and rests. He felt horrible for it.

Just stick it out a little longer, he encouraged himself. Then, you can forget they ever existed.

The thought didn't comfort him like it once would have.

He finally broke in as Rowen and Jason were heatedly arguing about a bully named Kenneth. "We're within a few miles of the prison," he said, brandishing the map Polly had nonchalantly "lost" in the boys' bedroom (she had walked in, dropped it, and said in an expressionless voice, "Oops, I dropped the map to the troll prison. Well, guess it's yours now.").

*

Rowen fell silent. Jason pushed his flighter to go faster.

"You'll break it if you do that," Ayren warned him.

"Maria is within a few miles of us and you're concerned about a crappy flighter?" His voice was strained and bordering on hysteria.

"Jason, Maria isn't going to die until..." Rowen thought for a second. "Tomorrow. And she's definitely not going anywhere. If we're rash, we could blow it. No one should know we're coming. Let's hold on to the element of secrecy."

Jason nodded his head in defeat and slowed down. Ayren also slowed down. He looked like someone was stabbing him in the heart.

"What's wrong?" asked Rowen concernedly.

"Nothing." Ayren's face was suddenly smooth and composed. "I'm fine."

*

It was dangerous to waste his energy like this. An illusion over an illusion?

But if he took down the illusion of calm composure, Rowen would press harder for answers. She was not one to let a friend suffer in silence.

If she knew I wasn't a friend...

The realization finally hit him that he was literally walking the only people who had ever called him "friend" to their deaths.

He's actually going to kill them.

He's actually going to kill her.

Something began to change inside of Ayren, then.

*

The prison looked virtually unguarded.

The trio parked their flighters a ways away and snuck carefully through the forest. The air here had a crisp, autumn feel, the familiar scent out of place with their racing hearts and adrenaline-filled veins.

"We're approaching the Frost Territories," realized Rowen, remembering the maps from the history books Ayren had shown her and guesstimating how far they had flown from the castle.

"That's right," said Ayren, looking surprised.

"What, I can't know things?" teased Rowen.

Ayren began to object when Jason interjected irritably, "Shut up!"

Rowen frowned. She felt bad about having fun before rescuing her kidnapped best friend, but Jason was getting unhealthily worked into this. Did he doubt her magic or Ayren's strength? Then again, who knew what he had seen in his multitude of visions?

Rowen caught a glimpse of the prison through the trees. The silence of the forest, punctuated only by birdsong and the teenagers' footsteps, worried Rowen. Where were the guards?

A bullet blasted through the air directly next to Rowen's head.

Ayren and Jason started toward her when a cold voice cut through the air.