Friends Unite

Chapter 13- Back to the Light

The russet orange of the sunset slowly faded away into dark blue, and the first stars began to appear. Gradually, the blue darkened into black, more stars appeared and the moon rose, sickly and pale in the Land of Darkness, but still the moon. The night grew old and clouds began to cover the moon. More and more clouds appeared, blotting out the moon and stars until all was dark. Then the rain began to fall, softy at first but growing heavier by the second. Soon lightning flashed across the sky and the deafening sound of thunder sounded in their ears, but still the friends trudged on.

"I think we should stop and rest for the night," Isaac finally broke the long silence. "It is still very far from here. If we continue we will not reach it by morning."

A lone tree stood nearby. "Let's go rest under this tree," Edwin suggested. "It will shelter us from the rain."

"Good idea," agreed Rose. Isaac opened his mouth to say something, but then he shut it again and lead his friends over to the tree.

As the rest of them lay down with their backs to the tree and began to settle in for the night, Siluetta sat up, wide awake, staring into the distance.

"I'll take first watch," she offered. She wouldn't have been able to sleep anyway.

For hours into the night, Siluetta sat there, tired but not able to sleep, staring into the distance, and all was quiet and still. Then there came a huge crack above her. She looked up to see white light leaving the tree, which had split in two. Siluetta bent over and shook each of her friends in turn.

"The tree has been struck by lightning," she whispered over and over again. "We must move on."

"I should have known," sighed Isaac. "It's common knowledge that lightning is more likely to strike a tree than the ground."

"We must move on then," said Daniel. Rose, who was rubbing her eyes and yawning, nodded in agreement.

"We should be safe now," said Isaac. "Lightning never strikes in the same place tw-"

Just then another crack sounded, this time even louder than the first one. And this time, when the lightening left the tree, Siluetta felt herself being carried away with it. She did not know how she knew, but she was beyond doubt... that old superstition, which the Land of Darkness still believed, had been proven wrong, and she and her friends were being carried away from the Land of Darkness, and back to the light.