The Night's Curse #3 (Waverly Stump and The 7 Realms)

Chapter 28

Aveon led Waverly through a funny looking threshold of snow covered leaves that sprouted bright blue flowers as soon they crossed over it.

"What are those?" She asked pointing at the flowers.

"Silent alarms." Aveon replied. "They sprout blue flowers when a stranger crosses the threshold." He watched Waverly's face for a reaction but she gave none.

The sky suddenly became darker as if a huge covering had blocked out all the sky light. Waverly glanced up and saw nothing but a drab, hazy curtain above. She was about to ask what the haze was when Aveon suddenly stopped walking.

"Welcome to the Darkle." He said, folding his arms behind him.

Waverly peered around awaiting to see anything different but everything remained dark and undetectable.

Aveon turned to her. "Apologies. Your eyes will need to take a while to adjust."

"Adjust to what exactly? There is nothing here." Waverly said and took a step forward then bumped nose first into something. It smelled strongly of citrus.

"Watch where you're going." An irritated voice said.

Waverly blinked about a hundred times before she began to discern.

The environment unfolded before her eyes like a parchment that was slowly being rolled open. The first thing she saw were houses.  Lanterns hung from wooden signs in front every house and a charcoal stained panel blocked the flames halfway so that the lights were awfully dim and slightly vignette. Elves moved about in twos, threes and sixes; carrying with them short logs for firewood, tables, chairs, bronze boxes, old flags and banners, pieces of armor and several huge parts of what Waverly assumed were the ruins of a ship. Snow covered pine trees littered the place and a good number of leafy thresholds and stonebrash thoroughfares led to different areas. A water fountain laid some feet away and behind it grew a tall shrub with several flowers that shone blue.

No one seemed to have noticed the blaring flower alarm but Waverly doubted it. She looked around, expecting the Elves to spring on her with bows and arrows or swords ready but nobody paid her any attention.

Her eyes took in the surroundings within a second and darted back to what she had bumped into, or who rather. An Elven boy was glaring at her with a half empty glass in his hand, his white robes stained around the chest area by the faint yellow of the cup's contents.

Waverly covered her mouth in realization. "I am so sorry."

"Yeah, right" The boy said, rolling his eyes. He sounded frustrated. "Try to say you're sorry to Elizar when she discovers her orange juice was spilled. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to get any oranges nowadays?"

"I. . . I'm. . . I truly apologize." Waverly stuttered but the boy was far from listening.

"It's been two whole bloody weeks and she won't let me sleep because of her constant craving for oranges. I had to watch the citrus grove six hours everyday under the damn blizzard just to make sure nobody gets to them before i do when they ripen."

"Crest." Aveon called calmly.

"And now Elizar's gonna kill me with those whiny screams. I got only six oranges and could not even fill more than half of the glass." Crest gazed fearfully at the cup as if suddenly realizing that it was indeed near empty and his face contorted into a pained one.

"What in the name of Gayl am i gonna do now?" He complained placing his fist against his face.

"You can start by calming down, Crest." Aveon said.

Crest turned to him. "Oh, i didn't see you there Aveon. Good day."

"Good day, Crest. I am sorry about your spilled drink but our guest had not yet adjusted to the Inks before she bumped into you." He explained.