The Last Princess

Chapter 43

It was dark.

We'd been walking the whole day. Aiden was maintaining his stony manner, and I'd given up trying to figure out what was wrong. I had let him walk in front, and was following him silently. The sky was colored orange and dark blue, and I was wondering when we were going to stop.

I didn't think Aiden even planned on stopping.

The ground was sloping upwards, and I felt the extra strain on my calves worsen. I was covered with a light sheen of sweat, and the heavy dress didn't help much. So, on the way, we had passed a small pond. To pass the time, and for practice, I'd raised a small ball of water and was carrying it in front of me.

Currently, I was keeping it floating in front of me, molding it into various shapes: a star, a leaf, a flower, Aiden's angry face...

It wasn't very taxing, much easier than when I had tried to move a leaf in that glade so far away. Obviously,since that hadn't ever worked.

The ground was sloping very steeply, and I was leaning forward, trying not to collapse (and therefore endure Aiden's wrath). Aiden didn't look like he was suffering very much, and that gave me enough determination to keep going.

He stopped abruptly ahead, without looking at me. I furrowed my brows and walked faster, catching up to him.

The hill sloped back down to reveal a large village right on the other side. Aiden slowly turned around to face me. His cheeks were pink, and he looked like a deer in headlights. "Uh, Princess, I kinda forgot to tell you something."

I glared at him.

"What?" "We have to go through that village."

I dropped the ball of water.

"What?" "And it's filled with soldiers." He mumbled. "Are you crazy?" "I am most certainly not crazy!" He cried, offended, forgetting to look guilty. I glowered at him, cowing him back into hanging his head.

"How can you even tell it's filled with soldiers? And if it is, we're never going to make it through." He huffed. "I can tell it's filled with soldiers because I can see their armor from here. See." He pointed past me, directing my eyes to a silver gleam in the village. The gleam looked like the sun glancing off of silver armor.

"Your mom must have sent them here."

"How could she know we're here?" I cried. "Maybe she didn't. Maybe she sent them the first time she caught us, before you trapped them in the water. She saw which direction we were going in. She was following us. She might've known we were coming here. And, even if she didn't send them, there would be soldiers in every village and town, now that you've escaped."

"So, what now?" I asked, suddenly nauseous. "Can we go around the village?" He shook his head solemnly in reply. "There's a passage in the village. We have to go through there."

"Why can't we just go above ground? I know we might be seen, but we'll be careful. What's so important about that passage?"

"Queen's territory guard. We can't get past them."

I sighed. Our Forest was huge. So, it was divided into territories. We'd been lucky. We hadn't gone through a territory guard yet. They were ruthless and sometimes killed on sight. Many a peasant had died after coming across a territory guard.

"So, how will we get through?"

Aiden grinned for the first time all day.

He raised his hand up, pointing his index finger at the sky. I watched curiously as the sky seemed to condense on his finger, and a blue wisp settled at his index.

When he pulled his hand back down, the blue wisp trailed behind it, hanging from his finger. In one swift, fluid motion, he whisked his hand towards his eyes, and the blue wisp split and flew into both of them.

Slowly, he lifted his face and looked at me.

I gasped.

His eyes had turned blue.