Ever After

☾Chapter Twenty Four☽

The sky had darkened like it knew what was coming.

They had reached the island and pulled the boat up against the shore.

"Is this it?" Ever asked gazing up at the thick line of trees.

"Yes." Haven sighed stepping out of the boat.
Her green dress swept against the sand.

The group of them traversed through the forest before reaching a tall iron gate.

"The barrier starts here." Haven said forcefully.
She then took the bag that she had swung over her shoulder and laid it on the dirt floor. She pulled out the three artifacts. Ever took a deep breath in. It seemed like so long ago that she had gathered them, but in truth it wasn't.

"When we destroy them," Haven paused, "we will only have a few hours before the barrier comes back. So we will need to hurry."

"Do you think this will work?" Wyll questioned.

"It better." Ever snapped. "I didn't do all this for nothing."

Ever grabbed the pure white conch. "So how are we going about this?" Ever asked.

Haven handed Wyll the amulet, and kept the ring in the palm of her hand.

"If we destroy them at the same time it should release a powerful enough surge."

"And if it doesn't?" Ever argued looking over at Wyll who shrugged in return. "How do we even destroy them? The only one that would actually break is the conch." Ever lifted the conch up in her hands.

Haven sighed. "Switch with Wyll then and use magic to break the amulet."
Ever groaned in argue as her and Wyll traded artifacts.

"Alright, are we good now? On the count of three."

Ever drew in a deep breath.

Here's to hoping that this works.

"One. Two."

Ever stared down at the amulet in her hand. It had taken quite a bit of work to get.

Ever glanced around at everyone else. All the artifacts had been difficult to get. Ever never could have dreamed that she would have to do something like this, let alone that she would be standing on the island of Ione. She never thought they'd get this far.

"Three." With a quick flash of purple light, the amulet in Ever's hand broke into several tiny pieces. She looked up at everyone else. Wyll had thrown the conch against a stone, and the ring sat broken in Haven's hand.

There was a slight flicker in the barrier before the whole thing broke into shards.

"Come on." Haven commanded. Ever let the pieces of the amulet fall into the grass as she stepped towards the arch in the wall.

Wyll reached for Ever's hand, giving it a quick squeeze with a reassuring smile as they passed under the arch.

They found themselves on a path through some more trees. They took a right, and all three of them stopped dead in their tracks.

Ever had grown up hearing stories of the beautiful island. It once had tall, spiraling towers of stone and marble, but now... everything was in crumbles.

"Where do we start looking?" Ever asked glancing up and down at the rubble as they passed.
"I'd suggest we start with the castle." Haven stated.
Ever glared down the path towards the castle. Half of it was destroyed, but half of it seemed partially in tact.

As Ever got closer, she noticed the tower connected to the remaining castle. It was tall and made of stone, with a small slit window that led to a view of the forest surrounding the island.