Yet Another Dumb Teenager Falls Into Tortall

by an anonymous geek

A/N: I'm so sorry, guys. I meant to make it clear, but I forgot to. I know I said that Lauren was really good at all those things I mentioned, but what I meant was that on earth she was better than most people. But in Tortall, the land of knights, she's actually pretty low in the rankings. That was why she was so surprised and happy when she beat Neal at sword fighting.

I want to apologize for all the fluff in the last chapter. It was all for Sarah. She was screamin' at me, and so I wrote it for her. check out her stories. she now has two Tamora pierce stories. her penname is morfalasiel22.

also, check out the stories of my other friends, bea2688 and Joslyn Sparrow

they also have Tamora pierce stories.

Reviewers- I love you guys so much! You guys just totally make my day. I practically live for reviews.

I FINISHED TRICKSTER'S CHOICE!!! dun worry, I'm not going to talk about it now. i dun wanna give anything away. hey, you guys who've read it, please email me, and then i can email back and we can discuss it, since I dun know anyone who has read it so I can't talk about it to anyone. my email address is lightninggirl21@yahoo.com

On with the story. . .

disclaimer- I may be extremely jealous, but it doesn't change the fact that it was the genius known as Tamora Pierce who made up Tortall and all the wonderful characters (wow, that seems a lot like cytosine's disclaimers on her tamora pierce stories)

Chapter Three

[Lauren's POV]

I walked down the hallways, proud of myself. I had successfully brought together two people who were too frightened to admit that they were in love with each other. Now that they were officially courting, I knew my job was done. But why had I been sent here in the first place? What could I do that someone else could not?

I had a suspicion that the gods were somehow involved, so one day I left the palace and reached an open field. For a few moments I just stood there, then I lost my patience and screamed out, "Come on, you know I'm waiting for you! Talk to me! I know you're behind this!"

Suddenly, there was a flash of an extremely bright light. I covered my eyes to shut it out.

"What is it you desire to know, my daughter?" asked a voice that was far too strong for my ears. I quickly forgot my eyes and instead covered my ears with my hands. As I opened my eyes, I saw a figure in front of me. It was a female, extremely beautiful with green eyes filled with mirth.

"Why did you send me here?" I asked her.

"You have a mission."

"What kind of mission?" This was starting to sound interesting.

"There is one you must save. He is powerful, yet is hateful. You know of whom I speak."

I paused for a moment. "Joren?"

"Yes, my daughter."

"But-" I protested, "but, why me? I'm no better than anyone else."

"Lauren, you are the Chosen One who is spoken of. The one who will help Tortall and bring it to great power, as it is said in the old prophecy:

"One shall come, from a far away land. My Chosen One she shall be; she shall come to help when help is what is needed. She shall restore one that would have been lost. She shall bring power to the land which I have chosen. Her power will be great and all the peoples shall praise her."

It took me a while to comprehend all this. When I looked up, I saw that the goddess had left. I was a Chosen One? I was the reject girl. I was the freak with strange obsessions. I was the. . . The list could go on forever. I was not the one who could be important. Being strange and stupid had always been my specialty, not being the one with responsibility. And then there was Joren. How was I supposed to help him? I would probably never see him again, though this prophecy said otherwise. AND, I didn't even want to see him. I knew that he was a terrible person; he had always been mean to Kel, and Kel was my idol. She was my hero, and I wanted to be exactly like her.

Somewhere in my mind I knew that I had always slightly liked the character of Joren. He was a jerk, that was obvious, but there was also something intriguing about him. Maybe it was the fact that he went so far and tried so hard to get Kel to leave. It was his persistence. Still, how was I supposed to save him? That question kept on bothering me as I walked back to the palace. Once inside my room, I shut the door and laid down on my bed. Then I immediately fell asleep, and dreamed of many people praising a great heroine who stood on a podium and smiled and waved at the people.

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I woke up in the morning, starved. I hadn't had anything to eat since yesterday morning. Quickly, I dressed and ran to the mess hall. After I had collected my food, I walked over to the table where Kel and her friends usually sat. No one was to be seen. They had probably eaten already. After all, it was already about an hour till noon. As I sat down by myself, I thought about what the goddess had told me, and wondered where I would find Joren. As if on cue, a tall, muscular blond man walked into the mess hall and grabbed a tray for his food.

I panicked. What was I to do? He would never want to talk to me. He probably wasn't even aware of my existence. Why me? Why did I have to be the Chosen One? Right then I decided that I had been much better off on earth. To my great surprise, Joren headed towards me. Still, I panicked. What would I say? Should I tell him about the prophecy? How would he react?

As he slid into the chair opposite me, I looked up at him. His face was grim, and he looked very unhappy. Why me? We sat there in silence for a moment, then he smiled, which surprised me greatly, and said, "Hello, Lauren."

"Uh, Joren-"

"If you're going to tell me about the prophecy, you needn't. Let's just say I was visited by a little messenger last night."

"The goddess? What did she say?"

"Oh, she told me that there was some prophecy that you needed to fulfill that somehow connected to me, and you needed to make me into a better person and whatnot."

"Oh." I looked down at my food, not knowing what to say.

After awhile, he said, "Lauren, what would have happened to me?"

"What?"

"How would I have died?"

"Oh, well, in the books all it said was that you were found on the floor of the Chamber, dead. Then your father started swearing at Kel. That was about it."

He chuckled, but not in an exactly happy way, it sounded more evil than good to me. "It sounds like my father."

I nodded. Then I stood up. "I guess I need to go. I'm going to go see what Kel is up to." Joren's eyes darkened when I mentioned Kel. "Joren, why do you hate her so much?"

He looked me in the eye and said, "I still don't believe that women should be fighting. That's not their place."

"Even after you've seen what they can do? I mean, I could understand if you thought that they weren't better at men at fighting, but really, you should be easier on women. Also, they can beat men at times."

He looked at me and scowled. "Once a woman proves to me that she is worthy of holding a sword, then I will give up my hatred. Only then." He left the room and I sighed. There was no changing his mind. I would just have to prove him that women could be warriors. But how? I was no great warrior, compared to these people. The only person I had ever beaten at sword fighting was Neal, and that was after much practice. Practice. That was what I needed. My muscles groaned from my exercises that I had to do all the time to keep in shape, but I would force myself harder and prove to Joren that women could fight, since he was blind to the fact that Alanna and Kel were better fighters than most men. I would start this afternoon; it was the only way. "Thank you, Goddess," I muttered sarcastically under my breath as I walked out of the mess hall and headed toward the practice courts.

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Email me at lightninggirl21@yahoo.com please!!!!