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I looked back at the two guards at our backs with their gloved hands resting on the hilt of their swords, ready to defend their princess, even though she was in no danger, and never had been.
The lanterns flickered one, two, three times, until they gave out, plunging us into a titanium gray unlike I’d never seen before.
“It’s getting worse,” Emmaline whispered, gripping my hand with a pain-rendering strength. “Eventually, the sky will be pitch-black. I wonder if my father will spring into action then, when it’s too dark and too late to save his realm.”
“I’m sorry, Emmie,” I said, my free hand patting her arm.
My heart constricted as scenes of crops dying and people losing their minds to hunger crossed my mind. Violence borne out of desperation was the most dangerous kind. It corroded and corrupted and consumed people’s souls until death and destruction were all that remained.
It was a not-so-distant future, and yet the king ate his way through it all, while his queen waded in a pool of complacency and hopelessness.
Such bleakness was breathtaking in the most disheartening way.
I was used to our mundane lives. Every day was the same here. I got up each morning and helped the princess with anything she needed throughout the day. It was enjoyable because she was my best friend, and it was nice to get to spend every day with your best friend. After getting her ready, we would go to the community gardens where we would spend our days learning about flowers, herbs, vegetables, and fruits. Everything we needed to feed and take care of our society.
Then, we would go back home where I would tend to her before spending time with my mother, who was teaching me the art of making elixirs—also meant to help our people, especially now that the sun had become unreliable.
Most people believed this was all happening because of the crystals. They said The Aurora had abandoned us. Some believed there was nothing we could do and that the end of the world was near, but I disagreed. I refused to lose hope.
So, each time another crop died from the black sickness spreading through our land, I decided that instead of wallowing, I would focus on figuring out how to save us.
And the only way I knew how to do that was by honing in my skills as an earth witch. Skills I was gaining from my mother.
She was my mother, but to everyone else, she was a savior, as she’d healed many through the years. She was the earth witch revered by all and now I was poised to inherit her status and her knowledge, as long as I didn’t stray from the path laid out for me.
In reality, I wanted more. I wanted better. I didn’t want to just follow in my mother’s footsteps; no, I wanted to forge my own path and leave my own mark.
However, I knew nothing beyond this world. Beyond the castle I’d been born and raised in. The castle where I’d most likely take my last breath.
A brilliant flash of white light stopped us in our tracks. The guards unsheathed their swords as the light grew. A massive circle of energy pulled at my skin.
Beckoning.
I became transfixed by it. Why, I didn’t know. Perhaps, because our world had been blanketed by so much gray I’d forgotten the meaning of light. The joy and the hope that came with it were foreign concepts once held as standard in Frentani.
I squinted as something darker took shape. A shadow in the light.
Ominous and terrifying and intriguing.
The bigger the shadow grew, the more my heart seized with fear.
With squinted eyes, I watched as the shadow got closer and gradually took shape.
Head, shoulders, torso, arms, hips, legs.
A straight back. A confident walk. A swagger I’d never seen before.
I clutched Emmaline’s hand, pulling her away from the shadow.
“Emmie, let’s go.” My tone was urgent; the hairs on my body rising with hypervigilance.
“But what about my guards?” she squeaked, gentle as ever.
If the world ended, Emmaline would be the first to go. She didn’t have a fighting bone in her body.
But she had me.
“They can defend themselves. We need to go. Now!” I yelled, trotting backward, unwilling to take my eyes off the figure emerging from the brilliant light.
