Breaking a tale

Luna - Judgement

We all walked into the hall. For some reason, the High Fairies had also requested that Charon should join us so he followed apprehensively behind. The first thing I noticed was that all six seats were now filled, with Theodore taking the final seat, I shuffled from foot to foot uncomfortable at being under his gaze again but held my head high and tightened my grip on my knife. I was prepared to fight him if I needed to. I looked over at the others, they all looked nervous. Even Charon who had seemed very carefree when I had first met him, was paler than usual. As we were standing there in front of the High Fairies the room fell silent and the fairy with the white hair stood up, she was the definition of powerful.

"Well children we have come to a decision." She said, turning to glare at Theodore "And as someone, fought greatly for your side we have decided to help you."

We stood there absolutely shell shocked, so overjoyed that we didn't know how to react. Dawn's mouth fell open. Even though we had asked them to help I don't think any of us had actually thought they were going to help us.

"Charon," the lady continued turning to face the young fairy. "You will be taking the humans to the portal."

The boy turned as pale as a sheet and bowed to the lady before skittering out of the room. Dawn began to stutter out her thanks to the High Fairies when I stopped her. I had a question I wanted to ask, and I didn't want to wait until Dawn had finished grovelling. I walked towards Theodore and stared him straight in the eye.

"Why did you fight for us?" I asked him. "What's the catch?"

Whispers flew around the hall but Theodore silenced them all by raising a hand. He stood up and walked down the steps towards me, close enough that I could feel him breathing. I wanted to turn and run but I stood my ground and kept eye contact. He chuckled.

"I wanted to apologise, it was my fault you got cursed it the first place." He smiled but it was a hollow smile, "human curiosity never fails to amaze me, that bracelet should have been under lock and key, not out in the open like that. Since I put you through so much I thought it was only right for me to give you something back in return."

Theodore stepped back, smoothing down his jacket. "Right," he said briskly. "My work is done, good luck on your travels Luna." With a flick of his cape he strode out of the room.

As the door banged shut behind him, the noise echoed around the otherwise silent hall, the white-haired lady was the first to speak.

"Children, you are dismissed," she said, waving us away.

We left the hall in silence, completely shocked by what just happened.

"Right," Said Charon, rubbing his hands together "Let's go find this portal, you guy got horses?"

We walked through the village chatting excitedly about the prospect of going home. Even though Charon had only ever lived in Sequoia he joined in with our excitement, listening to us describing the wonders of our homeland. We finally reached the horses and were untying them when Squeak barrelled into Biron knocking him to the ground. Charon let out a scream and flew up into a nearby tree. Biron picked himself off the ground and began scratching Squeak behind the ears, the dragon let out a contented purr.

"You can come down Charon," Biron said, talking to the terrified fairy hiding in the tree. "Squeak is with us."

"Why is it called squeak?" Charon whispered, not moving from his spot in the tree "It's a lethal killer!"

"He's not a killer." Dawn yelled up at Charon "Squeak is adorable!"

I stifled a laugh as Dawn continued to shout at Charon, trying to persuade him that Squeak was harmless, by the end of her rant Charon was going to be more scared of Dawn than he was of the dragon. Eventually, Charon flew down from the tree, though he tried to stay as far away from Squeak as possible. After he had calmed down we mounted our horses we set off. Charon had been given the precise location by the High Fairies and had also been instructed on how to open it so he flew ahead leading the way. We found ourselves riding up a hill and as we got closer to the portal, I began to hear sounds of the ocean.