Missing

Chapter 20

7 hours later

The pod had taken all afternoon and all night to finally get to the other station. Kestrel was awake first and had been for a long time. She stared absent-mindedly at the glass roof of the pod, at least she thought it was glass. Every moment she spent at this 'Fabled World', the weirder it got. And wonderful, she decided.

Moon shifted.

Before the night had set in, Henrik had 'face-timed' Allie and Delilah to see how they were getting on. Apparently, Atti had spent hours going through all the Elites and taking off their power-inhibitors. He and Sara were settling in well but planned to return to the Jeger soon. They weren't quite sure about that though. Sara said that the Jeger had school only in the holidays, so she thought School Moondoor was very good. Atti agreed. Seraphina and Melanie had come to say hello as well.

Interestingly, Melanie was taken from her Lacker school. Her family had wanted her to stay in the Lacker World. She also had decided to stay at Moondoor.

Kestrel was genuinely pleased about this.

She felt Mia stir beside her.

"Hey." she whispered.

Mia groaned and stretched. "Hey." she replied, though her eyes were still shut.

"Look outside." Kestrel said.

Mia's eyes squinted open.

They had arrived at the mainland and were now passing into an underground tunnel.

The cavern billowed out in front of them and it was stunning, stretching out as far as the eye could see. A city made of skyscrapers reached up to the glowing crystals that lined the rock. Every building had circles on them. Circular windows, circular doors and circular towers with glass domes filled the city and the cavern opened to the sky where large scots pine trees

bowed over the gleaming city. Trees with white bark hugged the grassy levels of rock, bathed in light. Giant ferns leapt up around the buildings and waterfalls flowed from the edges of the cavern into rivers that separated the buildings and flowed into a glass tube which pumped it upwards.

Henrik and Cora had both woken up by this point and stared in awe at the view as the pod travelled on.

Small, pure white dragons flew around the spires and glinted under the light. Fields of tall grass were bathed in golden light and parrot griffins perched in the canopies of the colourful trees, chirping quietly against the rush of water. What appeared to be young Centaurs played about in the tall grass and multiple other pods shot past the four.

The pod moved on to the next cavern, which was lower down and filled with sparkling pools, connected to multiple dazzling waterfalls. Cabins shot out of the water and Merpeople and Sirens lay on the rocks. Hippocampi and Kelpies were in underwater stables that were visible beneath the crystal-clear waters.

The pod moved on to another cavern, this time even higher up and completely covered by forest. Small wooden cabins stood in the clearings and large treehouses that stretched over multiple trees were adorned with human-sized elves with pointed ears and green suits, with leaf-like patterning.

The pod flew to the far end of this cavern where a temple stood proudly. The four picked up their backpacks as the pod slowed.

They stepped out of the pod and into the temple. Henrik pressed another button, and it went down into the 'docks' where the other pods lay.

"Wow." was all he could say.

The four stepped out of the temple.

"Where now?" Henrik said.