The Adventures of Isabel

We are Otta Here

We turned and ran, dashing down the street. None of the bystanders tried to stop us, not after they saw Leo pull down a force field. Quickly the workers and panic from the school was left behind as the market place crowd swallowed us. Weaving through the crowd unnoticed, we kept running until we reached the out skirts of the city where the houses grew less dense and the surroundings faded into green grassy hills.

Sooner than I had expected, we were marching east on the dusty road leading away from Stario. As we walked we spoke little, I realized what we were doing, the bear would be in the Whispering Woods the place of nightmares, the place children are told never, never enter if they want to live. These thoughts in the back of our minds rather killed the mood for talking.

Now that we were out of the city, away from all the people were know and pretty much all we've ever know for our shot lives fear had begun to start building in my gut. I knew that every step I took was leading me to a place that even the mention of its name made me sweat with fear.

The sunlight was comforting, if the journey had to be made in the bear's darkness, the sinking feeling most certainly would have been worse. For the first hour of the walk, I noticed that Isabel was unusually tensed and kept her hand resting on her knife. My heart was thumping so loud it hurt my ears, I realised that I was unconsciously easing my own sword in and out of its scabbard ready to fight if necessary. Slightly irritated with myself I forced myself to stop, but once I stopped concentrating, I started again.

But we met no-one, for a long time I concentrated on only keeping pace with Leo's long strides, determined not to be the one to call for a rest. Thousands of questions whirled through my mind, but I also refused to be the first one to speak. Childish, maybe but I didn't want to seem stupid in front of them. The longer I spent with them, the more I doubted the ease in which I had decided to trust them. This is what Magnus had meant, it's hard to trust people who keep secrets and if we didn't trust each other we would certainly fail. But as it is, I trusted them more than they trusted each other and me.

I stared at my feet and trudged on, I would have to deal with these issues after Isabel ate the bear. I was so caught up in my own world I hadn't realised the others had stopped until I had walked into Leo's back. I stepped back and saw what had stopped my companions.

The woods loomed in front of us. The trees were well spread and there was plenty of light dancing through the pretty emerald green leaves but something was off about this wood, something dark lurked in the very heart. If the stories were true at night this idyllic fairy would turn in to a slaughtering ground for the bear whose hunger can't be quenched.

Shuddering Leo moved away from the woods edge and sat down on a rock on the side of the road and pulled out his map and a blunt pencil, he scowled at his pencil with disdain, "Why is it that whenever I want to use you you're always blunt," he muttered starting to rummage through his bag.

While he was distracted, I grabbed Isabel by her elbow and led her a few meters away out of earshot. "There's something odd about Leo." I whispered.

"Shh, He'll hear our thoughts," she whispered back, slipping her hand into her pocket and pulled out two necklaces with a small blue crystal charm on them. I recognised they were mind stones they helped people keep track of their thoughts. "These will stop him from reading our minds." I looked at her quizzically, "My family is extremely paranoid," she explained. We slipped them on.

"Did you hear what Simon said?" I whispered, "He's worried about something that he's using, and everyone else is worried about some thugs that want something from him. There's something in his past that obviously puts him in danger."

"I agree," she said carefully, "but everyone has secrets and ghosts, I'm sure if something happens out here he'll tell us." I frowned, "Look what I mean is if he sees the thugs or a danger from his past he'll tell us but if nothing happens," she shrugged, "Let the past stay buried, Ella."

She went back to look at the map that Leo had just started to wright on with his now sharp pencil. I sighed, Isabel's careful choice of words and not wanting me to look into the past confirmed she was keeping secrets. But then again she had said if something happened Leo would tell, maybe she was telling me what she'd do. It seemed a fair deal but I was still worried that their secrets would put us in dander.

I tuned into the explanation Leo was giving about what he was doing, "...it can find anything," I assumed he meant the map, "all you do is write it down." He took his pencil and wrote in the ancient magic text along a line that was in the top right corner: o oso famento.

I hadn't been taught it yet but I assumed he'd written about the bear. The words glowed and disappeared then the map began to zoom until we could see a dark cave in the middle of the woods. Leo then wrote on the line: kurzesten pfad. "Shortest path," he elaborated as they too began to glow. The map zoomed out, it stopped when our position was visible and a red line etched itself along the map all the way through the woods to the bears cave.

I smiled, "Great so now we're here, how do we kill it?"

"Hmm," Leo murmured, "curse maybe," he looked up at Isabel, "Ella the bigger question is once we kill it how is it possible for Isabel to eat it all?" I put my head in my hands there were too many things that were impossible about the stupid task.

"What if we shrunk the bear?" Isabel asked, "Then I could eat it and it would be easier to kill." Leo nodded like it could work.

"Leo can you shrink it?" I asked hope returning, he rolled his eyes which translated to: 'of course I can,'

"Hurray!" squealed Isabel, "We have a plan. And if we work together it will work!" happily she jumped around as hugged me.

"Well, you know the plan most likely will work," Leo said. Isabel and I turned to look at him.

"What do you mean 'most likely," I demanded.

"I predict 90% likely," we started at him open mouthed, "What? You need to take into account the fact we might die before then or-"

"Leo, do you always look on the negative side of things" I asked scornfully.

He shrugged, "I'm a Pessimist, expect a lot of it."

I sighed irritably, "We should get moving," I said looking at the sky we'd lost a lot of time this morning, "I'd be happier if we found him before he woke up." There were no arguments there.