The Hidden Crystal

Chapter 44

They traveled until dark, and Iris set up another barrier while Char, Rath, and the fairy set up camp. She sat down on her bedroll and tucked her knees up to her chest, staring into the flames Char breathed into life. He sat beside her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

"You're doing it again."

"Sorry." She took a deep breath and gave him a weak smile.

"So, about getting into that castle," Rath said, passing out the standard dull fare of dried meat and a biscuit.

She shook her head. "I'm not sure how we'll do that. The front gate is heavily guarded, of course, but so are all the side entrances. The guards travel in pairs, and there are archers hidden in all the towers, too. I thought maybe the changing of the guard would be the best time, but they're really well organized, and I couldn't find any blind spots then, either."

"Wow. That's pretty detailed. You sound like you've been watching them," Rath commented.

"I was," she confirmed. "That's what I was doing while we were flying."

"That's a neat trick. Can you do it when you're awake?"

She looked at his smiling blue eyes for a moment. "I haven't tried, but I think so." She turned back to the fire and picked up the amulet, closing her fingers around it and taking a slow, deep breath, closing her eyes on the exhale. The whispers crowded in, and she pushed through them, reaching up and calling them along with her. She opened her eyes and found herself up in the starry sky, looking down in amazement at herself sitting between Char and Rath, the shimmering white barrier clearly visible to her in this state. A smile lit up her face, and she was about to go back down when she felt something tugging at her. Not the whispers. It came from outside herself, from somebody down below and out of sight. She scanned the shadows below and allowed herself to be pulled closer to the inexorable force. It came from a nearby town. The windows were all darkened, as she'd seen before, but the place was not vacant. People cowered in the dark. And on the northern edge of town, beneath the largest tent in a sea of tents, a distinctive snapping and crackling broke the stillness of the air.

She bolted back to camp, back to her body, back to the safety of the two dragons sitting on either side of her. The amulet fell from her trembling fingers; her heart hammered in her chest.

"What did you see?" Char asked.

She swallowed hard and turned to look at him. "Micah isn't far from here."

"What? We need to move," Rath said, standing up. "Which way is he?"

She sucked in a breath, trying to clear her thoughts. "There's a town up ahead. He and the soldiers are camped on the northern edge of it."

"Did he see you?" Char asked insistently.

"I d-don't think so," she stammered.

"Up ahead. The direction we've been traveling?" Rath pressed her, stamping out the fire.

"Y-yes."

"They're going back to the castle," Char muttered.

"Yeah, and they're going to beat us, too. Just what we need."

Rath grabbed a bedroll and rolled it up. The fairy, too, was zipping about with an unusual urgency. Char stood, pulling Iris to her feet so the fairy could get her bedroll, too.

"I wish we could fly," Rath muttered under his breath.

"Well, we can't," Char said sourly.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. We'll be doing some night traveling, Iris," Rath explained, shouldering his pack. "And we're moving fast. Fast and quiet. I'd rather try to break into that castle before Micah and the army returns. Think you can keep up?"