Forever and Ever After (book1)

Epilogue

Epilogue

Jasper rode through the forest as fast as lightning calling out for Robert, almost chanting the other man's name like a mantra until he came to stop in the middle of the road to look around him.

"What does the King want with me?" Robert asked as he appeared in a V of a tree above Jasper's head.

"Isobel and Owen weren't in their chamber this morning, and they have been gone since first light," he explained as he turned his horse to face Robert.

"Okay, for a start this is my Isobel we are talking about; she disappears all the time and when you were their age didn't you ever disappear for hours on end?" Robert sniggered and swung down to road level.

"Well yes, but I don't think that's what they are doing. I felt something earlier on and I've had reports throughout the kingdom about people being pulled away."

"I don't think they would have done something that stupid, maybe they just went for a walk," Robert suggested but in his gut he knew it was a lie.

"They wouldn't leave Julian."

The two men fell silent when they heard the sounds of sobbing coming up from behind them.

Katrina was crying into Dylan's chest as he half carried her down the road towards them, he too had tears streaming down his face but he kept rubbing his sleeve across his cheeks before they became too obvious for anyone to see.

"What happened?" Robert asked while dread chilled him to the bone, he suddenly didn't want to know what had happened.

Katrina quickly looked up at Robert and ran for him. "I'm sorry," she whispered as he wrapped his arms around her and let her cry on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry Robert."

"Where is she?" he asked quietly and seemed to freeze to the spot.

"Nowhere, she is missing with Prince Owen," Katrina sobbed.

"At the bridge to nowhere, the Prince was pulled over the edge and Isobel jumped with him."

Robert knew where he was going and wasn't going to believe that Isobel had simply disappeared into thin air until he had searched for her thoroughly. He gently handed the still crying Katrina back to Dylan and set out on a run towards the old bridge. Maybe it was only him who knew where the bridge really went to.

Jasper was hot on Robert's heels and he trotted up along side of him and held him up behind him. They would find their children together or not at all and at least Robert knew where he was going.

It was around midday when they reached the old bridge. Robert was as nimble and as quick to get down from the horse as he once did when he was younger. "Isobel?" he shouted hoping for her voice cry out that she was only somewhere out of sight not in another world.

"Owen?" Jasper called out as he jumped down from the horse.

But neither Isobel nor Owen answered back; only the echoes of their voices answered their cries.

Jasper nudged Robert in the ribs and nodded over at the small gap in the stone wall where a sword was planted in the ground. "Whose is that?" he asked as they marched over to it.

"It's Isobel's," Robert muttered and had to choke back the tears as he rubbed his fingers around the hilt and felt the dragon's head carved on the melt just above the guard but left the sword left stuck in the ground. He quickly turned to where the small part of the bridge should have been but kept looking down the cliff to try to see if by a miracle Isobel had clung to the rocks on the face of the rocks or by a sad chance she lay at the bottom of the gorge. But she wasn't and he could only see the start of a river forming at the bottom. "Dylan was telling the truth," he whispered and backed away.

"What are you talking about?" Jasper demanded and nudged Robert out the way so he could see for himself, but he almost knocked Robert down instead.

"The magic world has gone, this is the where the magic world joins with ours but I can't feel or hear anything from the other world," Robert explained in a whisper.

"How is that possible?"

"Isobel and Owen must have done it. That might be..." he couldn't finish as he felt the tears sting at the corners of his eyes.

Jasper placed a hand on Robert's shoulder; he could see the pain overcoming the other man for her too felt the same pain. "Let us keep their memory alive and keep the magic out shall we?" he whispered and turned his back on Robert and the bridge. He had a kingdom to inform and a son to mourn in private and he knew that Robert would want to mourn Isobel in private.

Robert too his time returning home, his heart too heavy and for a change he didn't want to return to an empty house where the life had left the walls of his home for the last time.

But when he pushed the door open and expected the gloom of the house to weigh heavy on him but he heard the most peculiar sound coming from Isobel's room; a baby crying. He slowly climbed the stairs one step at a time all the time listening to the unusual sound coming from the upstairs room.

When he nudged the door open, he found that it really wasn't his imagination playing tricks on him; it really was a baby crying. "Oh good grief," he sighed and he went to wrap the baby boy in a sheet and held him in his arms.

At once the baby stopped crying and gurgled just as Isobel had done all those years ago when Robert held her for the first home. "Well, well, welcome home little prince," he muttered and let the boy grab his finger with his tiny fingers. Again his heart strings were plucked and he knew exactly who this was and what he was going to call him. "I better name you seeing as your Father isn't here to do it, right Owen?"

But the babe had fallen asleep as Robert spoke. In his arms he held a part of Owen but more importantly he held a part of Isobel. He was the small part of Isobel Robert would keep safe, that little bit further than his heart.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N

Just to let all you know that most of book 2 is now uploaded, please follow this link https://www.wattpad.com/story/58795735-a-land-far-away-book-2 and you will find the first chapter, and please, don't forget to comment on what you thought of this story. :D thanks :D