Twisted Towers

Chapter 2

   "What's wrong?" Prince Aryc asks. 

   "You don't need to know, Prince Aryc." I say, while wiping my arm across my eyes. 

   "Please, just call me Aryc. I would much prefer that."

   "Ok, Aryc." I say slightly angrily. 

   "What did I do?" He noticed the slight anger in my voice. 

   "Something you shouldn't have done in a thousand years."

   "And that is...?"

   "Making me live through the memory of their deaths."

   "Who's?"

   "You don't need or want to know."

   I hear a knock at the door, then a voice. "Erys, are you in there?"

   "Yes, Mother."

   "Are you alright?"

   "Yes." I reply. 

   "Who was at the door?"

   I think about if I should tell her, or if I should keep one more secret from her. Eventually, I decide to tell her. "It was someone I never would have thought would come here."

   "Who?"

   Aryc is shaking his head no at me, like he doesn't want me to tell her. I don't tell her. 

   "Would you like to see who it is? You can come in if you would like."

   "Now you've done it." Aryc says. He grabs me around the waist and pulls me to the window. 

   Mother walks in, and the only thing she sees is my terrified face as I fall out of the window with the Prince of Jenhien. 

*~~~*   *~~~*   *~~~*

   We ride on a white stallion, towards what I assume in Jenhien. 

   "Aryc, why did you not want Mother to know?"

   "She was your jailer, she was keeping you from your real family."

   "My real family?"

   "Yes, the royal family of Askon."

   "Will I meet them?" I ask more to know if he is lying, rather than to know if I would meet the royal family.

   "Of course. They are your family, after all."

   I fake being excited. He seems to take it. 

   We ride for what feels like hours before I ask, "How long until we get wherever we're going? And where are we going?"

   "We are going to my kingdom, Jenhien, where you will be prepared, and where you will be reunited with your family."

   Yeah, right. I think. "Prepared?"

   "I see no clearer way to say it than this; you will be made into a princess. And as for how long until we get there, we are arriving tomorrow."

   "Tomorrow?!"

   "Yes, it will take more than just a few hours to get there."

   I slump down in the saddle, seated in front of Aryc. 

   He sees me slump, and he says, "If you would like, we could go a little faster."

   "I would very much like that."