“Joseph,” Liana murmured under her breath.
“Who goes there!” an armed man shouted over to the two.
“We are but mere travelers passing through,” Joseph said, pretending to have a funny accent, they agreed he’d better do the talking, in case somebody might recognize the princess.
“Go ahead and make sure you do not cause any trouble,” the man said commandingly but not roughly as another burly man escorted them or rather guarded them.
“Why is this village being sieged?” Joseph asked the man accompanying them.
“You got it all wrong, we are not bandits or rebels here to siege this poor town, we are one of the groups sent by the king to protect all the small villages unable to withstand the rebels in case they might attack,” the man said. At hearing the word “king” Liana’s heart seemed to skip a beat and she pulled the hood over her head closer.
“Where are you headed,” the man asked
“We just headin’ to the Central city, eh” Joseph answered. They continued to ride along the streets of the village and finally they reached the rear gate.
“Here is where we part,” the man said.
“Thank’ee much, nice meetin’ you,” Joseph waved goodbye as they were out of the city. Once they were out of earshot, “Are you okay, princess?”
“Yes, let’s just continue riding, we are a bit late as it is,” and they rode off into the sunset unto the Central city,”
They slept for the night and rode again that morning, by noon they were entering the city.
Liana led Joseph into an inn and they waited until late in the afternoon
“We are nearing the city,” Illysia said exhaustedly.
“Good, first thing we’ll do is find an inn to rest and put our things down,” Jaren said speaking up from the rear of the group.
“It’s been taken care of,” Illysia explained, “King Midas took care of your lodging while you are here,” she added.
“Thank you,” I said, she humbly bowed her head.
We arrived at the gates at about 5 of the clock; we were waved in by the guards at the gate. The city was magnificent! We trotted upon the cobbled stone way, following Illysia closely. High lamp posts lined the streets, by the time we got there, they were already lit and spilling light throughout the streets, creating shadows of different lengths all around us.. The people were warm and welcoming but there was an air of fear around the place. We stopped in front of the inn and entered. We already had a room checked in for us so we were led to our rooms, to our surprise there were two people inside. Illysia looked as if no one was there she stepped in and curtsied to the girl inside. She waved us in and we slowly inched closer, my heart was beating fast, I felt a hand take mine and saw it was Jaren. I finally saw who was inside, there was a beautiful girl and with her was… IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE… Jaren’s jaw dropped in shock, Heather blurted out loud, “IT CAN’T BE!!!” and Mikey’s eyes seemed like it was going to pop out of its sockets.
“JOSEPH?!” I asked and the boy just nodded.
“You are Joseph from school, right?” Mikey asked
“You are correct,” he replied
“How… it’s impossible… How’d you get here…”I stammered disbelievingly.
“We can talk about that later, right now, someone wants to talk to you,” he simply said, looking at the hooded figure with him.
“Joseph, you did not tell me you’ve met them,” the girl told him.
“I wasn’t sure before,”
The girl shook off her hood and curly, auburn brown hair fell down to her face, she looked up and deep blue eyes stared out at us. She was beautiful beyond compare and on her brow sat a golden circlet.
“I am Liana, princess of the Northern Kingdom, it is my pleasure to finally meet you,” the girl said, we bowed and curtsied and everything
“Pleased to meet you, princess Liana,” I said
“No, please just call me Liana,” the princess warmly smiled at us.
“I am here to see to it that you meet Yalina and complete your training,” she looked at us, “why are you incomplete, there is one missing,” she asked.
“Viola got separated from us on our way here,” Heather explained.
“That is extremely awful news,” said the princess, sitting down on the bed, “but it can be resolved, I’ll send word to the kingdoms to be alert for your friend,” just then, someone knocked on the door saying, “There’s a runner out there for a someone named Joseph,”
“Excuse me,” Joseph said, leaving us alone with the princess.
“I will be overseeing your training until you are ready to face your destinies,” Liana said oh-so-Princessy. Then I’ve found a brand-new respect for her; she was totally young to be accepting responsibilities like this. I think she was about seventeen or eighteen, just about the same age as Joseph is.
“Thank you, did your father sent for you to see us here?” I asked curiously.
She paled and fell silent, then, “Actually, my father doesn’t know I am here,”
“Oh, but, Princess,” Heather interrupted,
“But let it not trouble you, I did this out of my own fee will, I won’t let you trouble yourselves of my problems when so much depend on you,” she replied.
Joseph came through the door and said abruptly, “Your Father knows of your presence here, and actually, he wants you to accompany the heroes to Yalina, he said he couldn’t think of anyone better suited for the task,” he finished and smiled.
“I…” was the princess’ entire response. She got a hold of herself and, “Now, for the task at hand, we go to Yalina,”
“Uh… is it too much to ask for a quick stay to rest and sight-see?” Mikey asked
“Well, I guess we could spare a day or two for you all,” amazingly, she agreed to the plan.
