Spirit Links: The New Order

VIII: Jace: The Forest

They reappeared in a dank back alley. "C'mon!" Azure gestured for them to follow him as he began to make his way toward the larger street that their alley branched off from."You take Alex and Jace" Will said to Azure "I'll take the other two, meet back at the Forge." Will then proceeded to take hold of Alf and Frey causing the three of them, to disappear.

Azure gestured for the other two to follow him onto the larger street,"Act Naturally" He murmured as he stepped onto the pavement.

Just as they were sucked into the flow of the street two figures materialised behind them. Rushing toward the three of them before they merged with the crowd. Azure took the two boys by the wrists leading them through the crowd towards a hoverrail station, and onto a train.The train sped out of the city towards the outer areas of the surrounding forest. Jace looked back to the carriage behind them. Two men were frantically looking around the carriage one of them spotted him told the other and pointed at Jace, "They found us!" He called to the others.

"C'mon" Azure called to the two boys, pulling them off the train and onto the platform, "We need to move!" He shouted back. They began to run, the two men followed, matching their pace, never faster; never slower. Never losing any ground; never gaining any ground. "Get us to the wall" Azure frantically told the driver of a hovercraft that he had hailed. The two men hailed a vehicle which continued to follow the three of them.

*  *  *

"Great," said Alex forcing a smile, "Now were trapped." The forest was growing dark, the trees looming over them.

"At least they can't get us," Azure replied out of breath, "There's no way the guards are letting anyone through ... Why'd I have to choose an older form to make myself look wiser?" He muttered the last part to himself, his form shimmered. Suddenly Jace noticed that Azure was only about as old as himself, he could have sworn that Azure was around thirty a minute ago.

"We need to get well away from here before Five AM," Azure told the boys as he began to travel into the woods,

"But the woods aren't safe at night!" Jace exclaimed to Azure, "They're full of Rouge Wyvicores!"

"We'll be fine," Azure told him, continuing forwards.

"There's a reason those gates are closed you know!" Jace shouted genuinely scared, "This forest is extremely dangerous at night!"

'It's nothing I can't deal with!"

"Sure! Because you're so helpful! All you've done is get us into trouble!"

Azure turned on him, a look of pure disgust on his face, he no longer looked the same age as Jace, he was now towering over Jace, "How dare you!" he screamed enraged, "I'm doing everything I can to keep you two kids alive and all you do is complain!" He brought his hand up about to strike -

Don't do it ...

Azure's hand stopped millimetres from Jace's face, "It's okay," he said, calming down, "It's just that I over react sometimes, I was just like you when I was younger."

"Oh ..." Jace murmured, taken aback.

They continued to walk until they came to the top of a huge hill.

"Whoa ..." Alex exclaimed, "Look at that view ..."

A huge expanse of forest lay below them going further than the horizon, continuing in every direction, in every clearing lay a poachment of Wyvicores preparing for the night Scorpius' burning the ground where they were to sleep, Beta's soaring through the sky, Alpha's hoeing into their dinner, Phantom's hunting for their dinner, the setting sun pulling the whole scene together.

"Yeah, pretty majestic ..." Azure replied to him, "We'll stop here for the night, the city's out of sight and it's a good spot, you two get some rest, I'll keep watch."

* * * 

The next morning Jace awoke to the smell of cooking bacon and eggs, he sat up immediately and looked over to where Azure was cooking the food over an open fire,

"That smells delicious!" Jace exclaimed coming closer to the fire, Alex was already up warming his hands.

"Thank you," Azure said serving Jace and Alex up a plate each.

"What about you?" Alex asked,

"I've already eaten what I need," Azure replied, "I saved the good stuff for you two."

Alex demolished his breakfast as if he'd never eaten in his life, getting seconds and thirds from Azure before being told to calm down, Jace didn't know how he could eat it all so quickly or how he had enough room for it, Alex was as thin as a twig.

The forest was blanketed in a thick fog, not allowing Jace to see more than thirty meters. After they had had their breakfast Azure cleared all signs of them ever having been there, covering the fire, and erasing their tracks as they left, trudging through the wet mud, Jace was lucky, having elected to sleep under a tree he had been saved from the rain that had poured upon them the night before covering their tracks to their current position. They continued through the fog, slowly, making sure that they were alone, the trees rose up on either side of them, sheltering them with branches hiding them away from the sky, they were in virtually in a ditch. It was perfect ambush territory ...

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Wow! I loved that chapter, it really delves into Jace as a character and I think I'm starting to find him more interesting than Bo. Which is saying something seeing as I modelled Bo off of myself. Anyway, I hope you guys are enjoying the story and I hope that this satisfies any hunger for more, as the chapter before was extremely short and it took ages for me to write this one