I was sitting on a fallen log in the center of the meadow, when I heard the scream.
After Aurelia had left, the pixies' song had softened to a more melancholy melody, as if they could sense my bad mood. Why did Ethan have to be such a jerk? Why did he have to walk up right then? Part of me, the greedy, selfish, part of me, hoped he was mean enough to Aurelia to make her break up with him, but the rest of me hated that I thought like that. I didn't want her to be sad.
Any thoughts that Aurelia only liked me as a friend had kind of vanished tonight, when she had held my hand. When we had danced on the clouds. Watching her almost childlike glee, and hearing her carefree laughter as we danced precariously close to the edge of the cloud had given me hope that one day, we could be more than friends. We had almost kissed...
And then Ethan showed up. I had been torn, watching Aurelia's large blue eyes dart from me to Ethan's slowly disappearing silhouette. I knew she wanted to go after him...but I wanted her to stay with me. I shouldn't have told her to go.
I wondered if she was going to come back for me, or if she was going to just leave me sitting here, and go off with her boyfriend. I wondered if he was being a jerk, or if he was accepting her apology. I shifted anxiously on the log, and looked off in the direction she had walked in. “What's taking her so long?” I muttered. Maybe she really did leave me here.
One of the pixies landed on my shoulder. It had glowing white orbs for eyes, and bright green skin. For hair, a gigantic pink Lilly bloomed from its head. It chirped something in its strange language, and then took off flying again. “Wow, thanks for the help,” I muttered, rolling my eyes.
I watched the pixie fly off, and resume chattering to its buddies, and that's when I heard the scream. “Alex!”
The sound tore through the air, and chilled me to my very core. “Aurelia,” I said, not even realizing I had said it out loud, and then I took off running in the general direction of her scream, not even stopping to think about what I could be running into.
After running aimlessly for what felt like forever, I stopped and looked around. Great, now I'm lost.
I looked down, and thought I saw some tracks, but couldn't be sure. I pulled my phone from my pocket, and turned it on, letting the light of the screen illuminate the prints. There was tons of them overlapping each other. From what I could make out, whatever creatures had made these prints had been in a large group, and had only three toes. Goblins.
I followed the prints into the forest a little further, and stopped when I saw some sort of metal glinting in the moonlight. I hesitantly made my way towards it, but stopped in my tracks when I saw what it was. An ornate sword, with an intricate golden vine growing from the hilt. Aurelia's sword.
. . .
Jane
“Did you guys hear that?” Sasha asked, her brown eyes gone as wide as a scared owl's.
“Hear what?” Rae-Lynn grumbled. Sasha, Rae-Lynn, Tina, Belle and I were crammed in the largest of the three tents, packed in as tight as sardines. Sasha was the closest to the door, Rae-Lynn in between Sasha and Belle, Tina beside Belle, and me on the other end.
“Hear that scream,” Sasha whispered. I immediately sat up straight, and Rae-Lynn's eyes widened. Tina continued snoring softly. I heard Belle grumble something about beauty sleep, and then she yanked the blanket over her head and started snoring again.
“Scream?” Rae-Lynn asked.
“Yeah. It sounded like 'Relia,” Sasha said. “She was screaming for Alex.”
