Silver: The Lost Royal

| 29.5 |

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Grieon ~ grah-ee-uhn
Cathurva ~ kahr-thoor-vahr
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LYING on a stretcher, a young girl, no older than she was, twisted in torment. Her face contorted in pain and her clothes soiled in mud and blood. An unsightly maroon mixture.

Around the girl were the familiar faces of Gema, Jamie, Marcela, Zack, and Lady Minerva. Marcela stood beside the girl, her murmured spells barely audible over the sound of the girl's yowls of pain as her muscles spasmed in jerky motions.

Gema and Jamie stood some distance behind Marcela, while Lady Minerva was on the other side of the girl with a hand on her shoulder, cooing some words to get the girl relaxed. Zack was the farthest from the action, some steps beside her.

She rushed in further. "What happened? Who is she?"

Despite leaning on a crutch and having one arm in a sling, Marcela continued her recitation, her good arm gracefully swirling over the girl.

As Karyn approached, she could see that the girl's left arm was absent, leaving only a flat space where it should have been.

"She turned up like this," Gema started. "She says the portals are closing. Stars only know how she made it this far."

"We..." the girl croaked. "Wlerden is dying. We are all dying. We need the princess, the—"

"Sh. Don't speak, you'll be fine," Karyn urged as Marcela signaled to some men she didn't notice were in the room.

"Let's take her upstairs and get her wounds cleaned. The bleeding has stopped temporarily with some spells, but she would need more herbs," Marcela directed before following the men without sparing a glance at Karyn.

Jamie began pacing around as the men wheeled the girl out. "This is all we need, Lady Minerva. We need to leave now."

"Jamie is right," Gema agreed. "The girl came some moments ago in pain, saying she had just gone through a portal, but it was closing in on itself."

"Did the portal do that to her?" she asked, unable to keep the shock from her voice.

"Unstable portals are very dangerous. Everyone in and from Wlerden knows that."

"She must have been desperate to pass through one," Zack said.

"I'd say foolish," Jamie muttered, unrelenting from his pacing around.

"Not foolish, Jamyen. Desperate," Lady Minerva scolded.

"But why? What would make anyone go through an unstable portal knowing they could die?" Gema asked.

"She said Wlerden was dying," Karyn said.

Jamie finally stopped and stood still. "That's because we have kept the gems in us away from her for too long."

"You all leave tonight." The finality in Lady Minerva's tone couldn't be mistaken for anything else.

"No. Tonight's too far away. Unstable portals are like dominos. Once one becomes unstable, it spreads. She wouldn't have made it far with injuries like those, which means the nearby portals are in line with this instability. We have to leave soon," Jamie insisted.

"We prepared rucksacks with clothes and supplies as soon as you all got here. Salome will get them, and she'll leave with you."

"Sally wants to get back to Wlerden?"

"She's always wanted to. Our Silverein here has simply put away her worries."

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