Losing All Hope

Part 1 - Chapter 1 - Mystery

Today. Today I will escape this horrid palace. I will escape my uncle Macras, this palace and find my mother! I don't care how i do it! I don't care what happens, as long as I find my mother I will be happy.

There is a secret passage, in the middle of the maze, a secret exit to the Human world. I know that sounds cliche, but it's the only thing that keeps Human people from seeing my world. The passage creates a sheild around the maze, meaning that people can walk through but can not see us, hear us or touch us. Well they can but they don't know when they do.

I will wait untill night falls and the stars begin to shine in the pitch black sky ight night lights, floating around the castle turrets, and then I will run. Of course I will have to escape the maze first. I have done this many times before but I have never made it all the way to the middle.

I hear a knock on my chamber door, "Yes, come in."

" Alswyre, your dinner is almost ready. It's Star-Lion steak tonight, your favourite." my uncle says in the least enthusiastic voice I have ever heard.

"I told you, i'm vegetarian." I say calmly. I'm sure that he doesn't even know what the word means,

"Oh well, food will be ready in an hour. Make sure you are dressed appropriately, we have guests tonight.". Oh yes I had forgotten, my uncle had invited his girlfriend for dinner. He is preparing to propose to her so that she can become queen.  I hear the door creak closed and a small latch locks it from the outside.

As you may have guessed, she doesn't really love him, she just wants to be queen. Then- again, Macras doean't really love her, he just doesn't want me to become queen. 

You see if she becomes queen and then they have a child then they will be next on the thrown rather than me. I take the oppertunity to pack my bags grab my most important treasure and summon a tree branch over to my window from a big oak tree in the maze.

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

The night is warm for the beginning of spring, and you can see the stars through the dispersed clouds.  I look up at the sky and find the biggest, the brightest. It's far over to the left, right above my head. And I can't help but wish on the star that I will find my mother, and that everything will turn out right.

I used to do that with father. We used to look up at the stars and make pictures, and then we would find the biggest and wish for mother to come home. I always knew deep down that she would never come home, but the feeling I got when I placed all my faith in the stars was enough to keep my hopes up, even a little.

I walk through the maze's stone walls, and reach out my hand to touch the damp blocks, covered in moss and dew drops. Suddenly the bricks begin to shift and a metal gate unfolds from within the walls themselves. Knowing that the maze changes at-will anyway, there is no reason why I should avoid this gate.

I reach out my hands to push the gate open, slipping in the wet mud as I struggle with its weight. It opens just wide enough for me to squeeze through, closing by themselves again, and then disappear bask into the stone walls that they once were.

I continue walking down another stretch of stone walls until i see a dead-end ahead of me. I look around, this is unusual, there are normally no dead ends in the maze. I see a hole in the ground just infront of my feet. It looks dark, damp, like a well. I trust the maze, a little too much. I jump.

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

The walls of the hole turn from mud to dirt to stone as I fall futher and futher. The unusual thing anout this hole is that I am continuing down at a constant, steady speed. I am not speeding up, i'm not even falling that fast at all. I can see some sort of ground aproaching and my feet gently place themselves as I get closer.

A warm carpet of beautiful apple-green grass welcomes my bare feet. I wiggle my feet around in the unfamiliar feeling, the individual blades coming up between my toes. I search the field like cave, there is a light source shining on the grass, it looks beautifully natural like the sun itself.

I can see a door in one of the cave walls, it has ivy and other plants that I can not name climbing up around its cracks. There is a shining brass door knocker in the shape of a water dragon. They are almost like a huge seahorse, but with wings and legs, they are extremely rare.The knocker itself is its tale, curled around with delicate detailing of the scales and eyes. Its eyes are made of glass balls, with a bright blue centre shining, reflecting the light which i still can not seem to understand. 

I can't help but find myself reaching out my hand towards the knocker, gently lifting it up and then bringing it back down with only just enough force to create a sound. The noise bounces off of the door itself and echos down the entire cavern.

The door creaks open and an overwhelming smell of newly baked chocolate cake and honey fills the air around me. I can feel my feet beginning to move, but I have no control over where they are going. I have no choice, I enter the room.