The Necklace: The Trial Realm

Chapter Four: Realm of Impossibilities

My mind and body keep telling me to run, but my heart...My heart apparently is the one really in control, because my feet move beneath me, carrying me behind Oliver's slow walking form, right back to the others.

I'd laughed in his face, called him insane, and even punched him in the nose (as is evident by the little smear of blood still visible there) but in the end, I followed. Call me crazy, which clearly I am, but when someone tells you that you belong to a whole other world and that this new world is full of wonders like I've never seen before, it'd be hard for any girl from the Ring to turn down I think.

Not that I really believe in all this mumbo-jumbo, but I am willing to at least entertain the idea that this could be...true? Clearly it can't be, but still I'd like to hear them try to change my mind.

"Well would you look what the cat dragged in." A male voice says when we make it back down to the mud pits. I'd been keeping myself directly behind Oliver, ready to use him as collateral or something if the need came up.

My mind though had been distracted by the other's low murmuring voices, my heart pounding too loudly in my ears to think straight and when Oliver moved a step to the left, I didn't follow.

Their eyes all fell on me, and one by one a look of surprise crossed their ever ranging features. "Well, well." The big brawny guy from earlier with the red ring nodded his head, eyes scanning between Oliver and me. "You could have told us we just weren't pretty enough for you." He chuckles to himself, winking at Oliver.

"Maxum, hold your tongue." Tonyedda scolds him with a sharp look that quiets him right up. "That's no way to welcome our guest."

"Neither is the whole ambush thing." I point out, trying to seem braver than I currently feel. "I mean, no offense, but when trying to get someone to listen to you, the whole ganging up on one person with a group of glowing weirdos probably isn't the best strategy."

A hush of laughs moves through them, some of them losing the rigid stance if only for a moment. It made them seem a little more normal, and less like a group of crazies hanging out together. "She's come back to hear us out, but if you all keep that up she may just run again." Oliver's deep voice mumbles disinterestedly.

I try not to be too obvious about keeping track of him as he walks over to join the group. Maybe join isn't the right word though, because even though he stands with them, there is something about the placement of his body, the way he plants himself within the group's line, but still manages to seem separate from it, that makes him still seem disconnected.

"Thank you for returning." Tonyedda nods to me after a moment of awkward standing.

"Uh huh." I mumble, barely audible as I make sure that my own positioning is strategic. I don't want to get caught with my back to the mud ponds again, so I angle so that my back is facing the open space, giving me the opening to run backward if need be while also keeping the road to the left and right as an option.

I swallow back hard as I scan over them again.

For the most part they look pretty normal, aside from the weird clothing and the random colors glowing from various spots on their bodies, but each one is so different it takes my breath away. It's not a diversity that you see around here, or even in Utopia if I remember correctly, though Tawny was right in that I don't have as much knowledge of my home as some others do.

I'm used to seeing people of varying heights and weights, but for the most part, we all have narrow faces, pointed chins, thin straight noses, prominent eye brows, bowed lips and large wide eyes in colors varying from a bright gold, down to a rich brown, or in rarer cases like Tawny, a bright aqua blue. Our skin is a dark golden brown, some lighter if they are new to the Ring, and some a little deeper like mine if you've been here a long time.