Aqua Jewel

Chapter 8 - Threat

I awoke to my stomach growling painfully. I groaned softly and wondered what was for breakfast. And why had Oranah taken my blanket and pillow? I rolled stiffly onto my back and opened my eyes to see clear sky above me.

Everything came back at once and hit me like a punch in the chest. I was untalented. King Trub had some kind of seer's mirror. My necklace was magic. The children of Jesburgon were being turned into whisps. I would never see my mother again.

I bit my lip. It took all of my willpower not to cry. I pushed myself up into a sitting position and took a deep breath to calm myself. Looking around the small clearing where we had slept, I noticed that I was one of the last to wake up.

Lae was saying something to the others, which couldn't have been very interesting because Haras was the only one listening. Well, I assumed he was listening by the way he was staring at her contentedly.

Nika looked mildly bored as she watched Tweep run back and forth across the clearing, and Rennoc was greedily feasting on a handful of juicy-looking red berries that he must have got from the bush beside him – which I definitely did not remember from the night before.

Alyk was now the only one still asleep. The quiet boy was curled up in a ball on the other side of the clearing, a good distance from the rest of us.

"Hey, Lexa's awake," Rennoc said, his voice muffled by the berries he had just stuffed into his mouth. He licked the juice off his fingers and my stomach growled ferociously, reminding me again of how hungry I was.

"Tell me that wasn't there last night." I pointed at the berry bush.

"It wasn't." Nika answered.

"Then how ... ?"

"It was Lae," Haras said excitedly. "She was amazing!" Lae blushed, but did not say anything.

"It was pretty cool," admitted Nika. "She put her hand on the ground, and when she took it off, that bush started growing."

I crawled over to the bush and inspected its berries suspiciously. I could not remember ever seeing berries quite like these round, red ones before. I wondered if they were safe to eat and hesitated, but my stomach growled impatiently. I plucked a few and held them in my cupped hand.

"Try them, they're not bad," Rennoc urged. I picked up a large one between my thumb and forefinger, and hesitated once more.

"Oh, come on Lexa, they're not poisonous!" I quickly popped it into my mouth at Lae's surprising outburst. Juice squirted out of the berry as I bit down; sweet and sour at the same time. I was not a big fan of sour foods, but – probably because I was so hungry – it was the best thing I'd ever tasted. I stuffed the rest of my handful into my mouth and reached for more. Lae made a big show of rolling her eyes.

A soft groan drew my attention to where Alyk lay, curled in a ball. I ate another handful of berries as I watched him sit up and rub his eyes sleepily.

"Morning," I said as I picked another bunch. "Have some breakfast."

The walk to Jesburgon definitely seemed more difficult than the walk from Jesburgon. My dress kept getting snagged on stray tree branches and I kept tripping over roots. There were so many more things to worry about as well.

Lae had resumed her very boring conversation. "You see, the leaves on this tree are more of a rich green than the leaves on that tree. That tree's leaves have a slight bluish tint to them, kind of like that patch of moss over there, which indicates ... " I tried to listen, mainly to keep my mind from wandering to other matters, but after a few minutes of her blabbering on about plant life, her voice had become nothing more than background noise to me.