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Meet me in the mountain caves.
The west wing parapet would have too many spies hovering. She inhaled and whistled. The iciest of wind swept through the corridors, and if anyone had been spying she should have felt the flash of surprise through their chakra.
Saieke could waste no time debating impossible options or pleading with her parents. King Ajali’s arrival tomorrow would herald the end of her free movements in the castle. She would be guarded until she was forced to bend to his will. Her path, though uncertain, was clear.
She would leave her kingdom tonight and be branded as the betrayer.
***
Saieke gasped for breath in the thin mountain air as she raced through valleys, harnessing the wind to move at maximum speed. She’d escaped the castle with her two most trusted Queen’s Blades, Kamu and Thyon, her protectors from birth. They moved through the night without a whisper of sound to betray their passage through the mountain paths of Boreas. The mountains were intricate—death traps to those who did not know them and her Queen’s Blades maneuvered through the maze-like passes as shadows.
They raced against time and discovery. Thyon loped ahead to scout, using whistles and patterns of the wind to notify them if warriors or civilians lay ahead.
Melodious notes travelled on the wind, and she listened to their keen fluttering, seeking if danger awaited them. She ran along the mountain side’s crumbling stones, which clattered down to the earth.
“Princess!”
She flashed behind a boulder. Kamu moved with stealth to the mountain’s edge, and after a brief moment, he signaled clear. “It is not too late to alter our course, Princess,” he murmured.
She flinched; her feet shuffled crackling and crunching the leaves on the mountain path. The trees swayed, parting to reveal the sun, bringing the warmth she needed to thaw the cold knot of doubt that constricted her. “We will forge ahead. We must make it to the border before the rising of the second sun and before my father discovers we are missing,” she ordered with only a slight waver in her conviction.
“As you wish, Princess.”
In a quick motion, they launched, flashing with speed, covering hundreds of miles. The second sun took much longer to rise as winter approached, giving the breaking dawn a bleak cast. Yet, the bleakness could not overshadow the enchantment of Boreas. She flashed pass waters as blue as the ice lakes of the northern mountains, lush valleys with rare flowers and plants of vibrant beauty. Their exotic scents calmed her racing heart and filled it with poignant sweetness. Unending minutes passed in silence before he pumped a fist in the air, and they jerked to a stop.
The flat lands seemed to stretch endlessly before mountains rose behind them, dark and intimidating. Taryllion—thousands of miles of land separating the borders of the seven kingdoms. Its mountains stood eerily silent, and the grey, stark, foggy landscape echoed her feelings. Gritting her teeth, she tried to ignore the hovering sense of dread.
“Are we prepared, Kamu?” Saieke asked, her gaze penetrating into wide eyes set in a granite hewn face.
“As best as we can be, Princess.”
They scanned the horizon, probing for danger. Taryllion was vicious and harsh to maneuver, with hardly a position to hide and defend from attacks. Until they reached the mountains or ravines, they were exposed.
Kamu rolled a scroll borrowed from the great archives of Boreas onto a boulder.
“We will travel northwest through the ravines of Taryllion, Princess. We will meet with Thyon at the fifth mountain path. We must then move like shadows past the Darkage to the dimension gateway,” he said pointing to spots on the map.
Her stomach knotted. She hated they had to move so close to the Darkage—the kingdom of shadows and darkness—to access the closest gateway to Earth. The other gateway was located east of Nuria, and during their quick conference in the mountain cave, they had deemed it more perilous to travel anywhere near the king from whom they were fleeing.
But the Darkans were bestial. It seemed inconceivable that anything else could be considered more perilous.
“Princess.”
At the gravity of his tone, she faced him.
“I fear for your safety. I will not pretend I do not wish for another solution.”
Saieke hardened her resolve. “King Ajali’s hands will not crush my kingdom through me.” The rush of rage burned the grief away, and she welcomed its bite.
“At this moment, I am not apprehensive about the King of Nuria.” Kamu gauged her reaction. “The gateway only rests a few miles from the northern Darkage border. We must never forget the implications of moving so close to the dark ones’ domain.”
The Darkage inspired terror in all of the kingdoms. She had been avoiding thinking of them, not wanting the fear of their kind to prevent her from acting. She glanced toward their lands in the far distance, forcing her heart to beat in a steady rhythm. “Before we charted our journey we knew the dangers. We must not waver now. Our people lives depend on us.”
“Darkans are also rumored to also live on Earth, devouring humans and our kind.”
She winced. “We are faster, stronger, and more enhanced in every way than humans. I will defend our lives until we can return to our kingdom.”
Anger flashed across his face. “Do not be foolish, Princess. I do not worry if you can defend us. We are your blades and our lives are yours. My fear is that Thyon and I are not adequate protection for you in this unknown world to which we are heading.”
