A Wish Upon a Nightmare

Chapter Two

Juno

I reach for Wish's hand, I can already sense tension in the air. Grace is fuming. Wish takes my hand, its cold, but soft. She's shaking, the movement vibrates in my hand.

"A little birdy told me someone had to step in and save the entire plan from being ruined when another certain someone forgot one little word." says Grace, her voice dangerously soft. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, feeling Wish do the same next to me.

"And then," continues Grace, "these certain two someone's decide that, they should show intimacy, in front of a mortal." she bellows out the few words. A side door unlocks and someone walks in, their disguise immediately changing. Aiden.

He runs a hand through tousled blonde hair, out of breath from what seems like running.

Grace turns to him, her eyebrows raising.
"And what do you need?" she spits, strolling towards him casually.

"Mirror and Red.." He pants, "they.. trying.. find.. crystal... destroy.. ruin.. everything!" he gasps, amber eyes filled with fear.

It takes me a moment to unscramble what he's saying. Mirror and Red, two of the inhabitants in our clan, are trying to find the crystal which allows us to change our identities and disguise the kingdom. If destroyed, our lives will be at risk, the other clans will kill us all, and all the mortals that enter the realm through our clans portal will leave immediately after seeing the realm.

Grace freezes. "Where are they." she hisses.

Aiden - A recount of what happened.

The leaves blow around my feet as I enter the forest to gather creatures I have been tasked to use to scare the mortal. For once I am alone and not surrounded by my fellow clan members, planning another trap. Well, at least I thought I was alone. Until, I heard the voices of Mirror and Red, the twin sisters who had been trapped whilst somehow dreaming the same dream. Imagine, their parents waking up to find both twins dead, without a trace of ill-health or harm.

I had entered the realm a few days before them, been trapped with difficulty and remained here for eternity. The girls were like sisters to me those first few weeks, we trained together, ate together, I would go as far as saying slept together, however - not that way.

Anyway, I heard them talking, decided to get nearer, heard most of their conversation, and somehow ended up upside down in one of the twins signature traps. They went quiet. I could hear their delicate footsteps, treading through the thick layers of leaves towards me.

"Aiden?" says Mirror, her distinct soft voice echoing through the forest.
"You ladies decided it was a good day to go Aiden catching?" I grumble, feeling the blood rushing to my head.

They turn to eachother. "How much did you hear?" asks Red, a sharp tone to her voice.

I pull out my knife slowly. "Enough." I reply, swiftly cutting the rope, gracefully landing and running in the direction of the palace, I can easily outrun the two of them, they'll never catch up. To my surprise, as I look back, they aren't following me, but have looks of panic set into their faces, thinking up something fast. I focus on the palace and continue to run. Blocking them out from my mind.

This was going to be hard. Turning in the girls that supported me all through this whole thing.

Juno - Back to the present

Grace looks at Aiden expectantly. Aiden points a shaking finger towards the forest, he has no time to speak before he collapses on the floor, Grace having pushed him over on making her way out to find the two troublemakers.

Wish runs her fingers through her hair and goes to help him up. Oh sweet god, what do we do now. Wish seems to be thinking the same. We still have a mortal to trap. But what's the point if we are going to die anyway?

I shouldn't be thinking like that, but at this moment in time, I don't know what I should be thinking.
Even if I am not thinking, Wish definitely is, her face has concentration written all over it.

"We have to finish the plan without Grace." She mutters. Aiden nods his head. I smile weakly,
"Yes, but how?"

"You have to win her over."

Red

There's only a short time between Aiden running off and Grace coming to take us away.
Mirror breathes in, "What do we do?!" She whispers, fear rising in her voice.

I take her hand and think. I think hard. There is only one solution I can think of.

"We climb Memory's tower." I reply.
Mirror's eyes widen, her jaw drops, but then she nods.

We start making our way to the edge of the tower, disguised a bubblegum pink.

At the bottom of the tower, we grab hold of the overgrown vines and begin climbing with difficulty.

The reason why Memory lives in a tower?
She went off plan and singlehandedly trapped a mortal in our realm, then she possessed the mortal and broke something in her with some magic that could not have been reversed. But this all happened before our time. We've never actually met Memory.

We were told she wanted power. She was evil, and always wanted more. But that is coming from Grace. Only Grace, Juno and Wish would remember her. Grace tells us the mortal was trapped in a place after they were broken. Something seems odd about that though.

The wind blows dangerously strong has we climb higher and higher, the pressure dropping every metre we climb up. Mirror shivers beside me. How can someone live up here?

We reach the top, holding on for our lives. A silhouetted figure sits by a warm fire. I rattle the bars to get their attention. The figures head turns and spots us. It walks over slowly, stepping into a place where we can see them.

Memory has tangled silver hair, cut into a sort of pixie cut, shading one eye. Her eye is a ghostly purple-grey colour, a scar runs through it. She raises her eyebrows. "What do you want?" She asks sharply, not bothering to ask who we ask.

"We need your help." And we explain our story to her, whilst clinging awkwardly to the vines outside, hundreds and thousands of feet up in the air.

She nods along to our story making noises like 'Mm' as we continue. After we finished she clears her throat and speaks.
Her eyes shine mischievously.

"I will help you if you get me out"

A/N

Chapter 2!! It took me a while took get it out as I wrote it in 2 halves and got writers block after writing the first. I hope you are still enjoying it, now there is actually something leading up to the climax 😂

~Pancake 🥞