Marcy stared at the ceiling as she attempted to sleep. She knew she needed to fall asleep soon. They were leaving early in the morning. She heard the door open up and her mother carefully maneuvering inside the inn room as to not disturb her. Marcy closed her eyes to pretend she was asleep.
"Hey kiddo, I know you are awake."
Marcy sighed in defeat. Her mother was too observant.
"Sorry mom. I couldn't fall asleep."
"Mind racing?"
"Yeah."
"You may not be Liv's blood, but you act so much like her. She use to do that a lot too. Her mind would race with all those bad thoughts and what ifs. Especially when the politics got too much. All I could was just hold her at nights. Then this little kid came along and turned our world upside down. You brought a lot of peace to her, when she found you that night."
Marcy sat up in her bed. She looked at her one of her adopted mothers. She didn't remember much of her life before Olivia found her. She was a toddler wandering around in the forest with blood on her. Marcy didn't know whose blood it was but Marcy suffered nightmares. Yunan reached out and touched her shoulder. She climbed into bed next to Marcy.
"Marcy, are you okay?"
"Yeah I'm fine mom. Why do you call me Master Marcy? I'm sure the Planters aren't dangerous. They seem nice. Even Anne."
"Old habits. It's protect to you and her. Despite my desire to say you are mine and not his."
Yunan gently wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and pulled her close. Marcy leaned into her mother's comfort.
"Think mom is pacing back and forth, worried about us?" Marcy asked.
Yunan let out a small chuckle. It wasn't hard to imagine Olivia pacing back and forth from the lack of letters from them. Marcy could imagine the tongue lashings they would receive when they got home. They had been delayed by a week due to a huge flooding and were already behind their scheduled date to arrive home. Now with Anne and Hop Pop traveling with them, they were going to take a bit longer.
"I bet Liv is. She has always been a worry wart as long as I have known her. I bet she has been making marks on her wall for the number of days we have been gone."
"That's momma for you."
"Get some rest. We leave early tomorrow. Night kiddo. Love you."
"Night mom. I love you too."
Yunan pressed a kiss to her head and then went to her own bed. Marcy attempted to fall asleep but couldn't. After a bit of tossing and turning, she slipped out of bed and walked over to her bag. She grabbed her pouch and slipped back into bed. She opened the pouch up. A green light flashed against her face. She pulled out a small green gem, no bigger then her palm. She cupped her hand around it to dull out some of the light so it wouldn't disturb her mother.
"I see you can't sleep either. Restless uh?" It blinked once. It was her signal that it was saying yes. "Same. You miss your family?" One blink. "I miss my momma too. I miss her bad. I've never been this far from her before. It's a little scary but I've managed so far. At least I have my mom, Yunan, with me."
The gem blinked rapidly in response. "She is so cool. It's a shame that we can't really say we are mother and daughter when we are around others. I felt something nice with Anne though. I feel like I could tell her anything. I probably shouldn't though. What do you think?"
She watched as the gem blinked a few times. She took it as she shouldn't tell Anne too much. Marcy kissed the gem as thanks.
"Have a good night. Sleep well."
The light dimmed a bit. She slide the gem back into it's pouch. She always loved to converse with the gem. It made her feel better when she was feeling down. She soon fell into a comfortable sleep.
Sleep well, my Marcy.
The wagons rocked back and forth as it carried the family to their destination. Anne had taken over for Hop Pop mid way through the day. Marcy had decided join Anne in the drivers seat as Yunan continued to drive.
"Favorite food?" Marcy was firing so many questions at Anne to get to know her as they drove towards their destination.
"Ummm. That's kind of hard. Maybe my mother's casserole. She makes the best food around though. How about you?"
"There are really good little cakes they call cupcakes that they sell in Newtopia. They are red velvet. They are the best."
"They sound delicious."
"I'll have to take you to the shop when we get there."
"My turn. I actually haven't asked a question at all." Anne attempted to figure out a question to ask Marcy. She realized that she had actually never done this before. She really didn't have anyone.
Um. Um. What is your favorite…… color?" She nervously asked.
"Psssfff. That's easy. Mine is green. Yours?"
"I guess blue."
The two fell into a comfortable silence. Anne thought it was nice. Marcy was nice to her. She didn't treat her any different. They heard something rattling in the carriage. Anne turned her head back to see if someone was behind them. She didn't see anyone. Anne and Marcy turned to look at each other.
"Soooooo Anne?" Marcy began, twiddling her thumbs. "Do you have any friends?"
"Not really. Most of the girls in the village are either too young or too old for me. I have no one around my age. I spent most of my time with either my brother or One eyed Wally. What about you? I bet you have a ton of friends."
"Not really. I'm…. a weird kid. Most don't want to be around me."
"Miss Planter, pull over at this clearing." Yunan called out. "It's getting pretty dark. We should make camp here for the night."
Yunan ushered her horse over to a small clearing. Anne did the same as well, pushing Bessie to follow Yunan. Once the carriages were pulled off the road, they proceeded to make camp in the middle.
"Miss Planter." Yunan dusted her hands off on her vest.
"It's Anne."
"Miss Anne, can you please gather up some firewood. We have an axe in our carriage you can use."
"Sure thing Miss Yunan."
Anne walked over to the carriage and opened it up. Her mouth gapped open at the seer number of weapons that hung from the walls. Then she noticed one person sitting on the floorboard. A blonde boy, no older then 11, with a green hat and goggles waved to her shyly.
"Hi Anne."
"Sprig?! What the hell dude?"
"It was Polly's idea."
Sprig pointed to a large barrel. When her name was called, a blonde girl popped out of a barrel near Sprig and hit him upside the head with her rolling pin.
"Nice going Sprig. Now our cover is blown."
"What the hell dudes. What are you doing here? You should be with mom. Oh no. Hop Pop is going to freak out."
"Anne, what's wrong? I heard you scream." Hop Pop came up behind Anne. When he saw Sprig and Polly, he got beet red. "Dang it kids. I told you to stay home. It's dangerous out here and you left your mother to fend for the farm by herself."
"Chuck would help her out." Sprig climbed out of the carriage followed by his sister.
"It doesn't matter if Chuck would help her out, it's about integrity boy. Honor. You left your poor ma. For what? A little adventure."
Yunan had come up behind them. She looked at Sprig and Polly with a questioning look.
"Who are the runts?"
"I'm sorry General Yunan. My grandkids decided to slip away in your carriage. I can promptly take them back to Wartwood tomorrow morning."
"No time. We take them with us. We really can't backtrack at this point. We continue on especially since Marcy and I already had promised to be home in three weeks time and we are already far behind. I just hope they can pull their own weight and don't slow us down."
Sprig made a solider salute towards Yunan which got a chuckle out of her. Marcy was laughing as well.
"Yes Ma'am. You will get no slacking from me."
"That's a good solider. Now since you two decided to disobey your parental figures, you get to set up camp. Now chop chop. I want Master Marcy's tent up in fifteen minutes."
"Yes ma'am."
Polly and Sprig both sped off to go help with pitching up the tents. Anne inhaled at the fact that Hop Pop had the future sight to take them out for small excursions in the forest so they could eventually handle themselves out in the wild. Marcy was humming a tune as she gathered water into their water-skins. Anne grabbed the axe and headed to the forest for some firewood. Once she was a bit away from the camp, she pulled the gem out of her pocket and stared at it. It lit up as if reacting to her touch.
"You are an interesting little gem." It flashed blue again. "It's almost as if you are alive with you lighting up."
Anne sat down on a stump of a tree and turned the gem in her hands again. While the gem was only the size of her palm, she swore she felt a humming of something inside it. She was memorized by it.
"Anne, you almost done there? General Yunan says we need to get a fire going."
"Yeah Hop Pop. I'm almost done. Just give me a few more moments."
Anne placed the gem back and was quick to gather some of the large logs to take back. As she walked away, she noticed the large claw marks on the tree trunk along with charred pieces of wood.
"Whoa. That has to be a huge creature."
Anne didn't stray much longer. She quickly made a break back to camp. After dropping the logs off, she sat down next to Marcy who was scratching in her journal. Anne attempted to sneak a peek at what she was working on. She could tell Marcy had a page worth of words and was still working on adding more.
"What are you doing?" Anne broke the silence.
"I'm writing about what I have seen on my trip. I was asked to keep a journal by my mom. She says it's a good way to remember things and my observations. I'm telling her about the new people I met."
"Am I one of them?"
"Yep. I also talked about Wartwood a bit. Surprisingly, Wartwood was only a page. Most of the villages we were at, I filled with several pages."
"I warned you that Wartwood was boring."
"But I met you though. And now we are traveling together. I can't wait till we get to Newtopia. I will show you so much there."
"I'm definitely going to need a tour guide."
Marcy closed her journal up and turned to face Anne. Marcy opened her mouth to speak but they were both interpreted by Sprig and Polly running towards them.
"Hey Anne, we got a tent set up." Sprig was hopping up and down as he pointed towards the misshapen tent that was threatening to fall down.
"It looks…greaaaaaat." Marcy flinched at the shape of her tent. Yunan was working on fixing it up for her and Marcy. "Thanks you two. I appreciate the help. Well, it's getting late and Mom will want to get up early tomorrow. Night Anne."
Marcy bent forward to bow towards Anne. Anne couldn't help blush at that. As she made her way to her tent, she walked by the fire, which then promptly quick her cape on fire. Marcy swatted at the fire as her mother ran with a bucket to dump water on her.
"Oh gosh dang it. This is the fifth time this week."
Once the fire was out, Marcy slipped into her tent, clearly embarrassed at what happen. Hop Pop wandered over to where Anne was sitting. He groaned as he sat down.
"She seems nice." Hop Pop patted his knees in a rhythm.
"Yeah. She is really nice."
"I'm sure we could spend a little bit of time at Newtopia once we get there. We would need to figure out a way to get an audience with the king to deliver the gem."
"Think he will pay us handsomely?" Sprig settled down in front of them on the ground.
"He has had an reward for the gems for a very long. But I guess there is three gems total."
"What? Seriously. Maybe we have the other two in our farm."
Anne pulled the gem out and stared at it. The gem decided not to make its presence known as it didn't lit up.
"Hey Anne, let me see that. Please." Sprig and Polly were climbing on Anne to sneak a peek at the gem.
"No way dudes. You will lose it."
"Come on Anne. Please?"
"Nope. Not letting you lose this beauty."
Sprig and Polly chased Anne around the fire as they attempted to see the gem. Hop Pop had enough and yelled at them to go to bed. As she laid her head, she held the gem close to her head. She fell asleep to the soft humming from the gem.
Good night Heart.
Five days have passed since they left Wartwood and Anne was missing home already. She had never been this far from home and it was a little scary. The carriages traveled down the dirt road. It was a small road which forced the carriages to travel in a line. Anne had taken over for Hop Pop with Sprig as her passenger. Marcy looked back at Anne and waved. Anne waved back.
"Marcy seems interesting."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean, she is a little strange and I feel like she is hiding something from us."
"You are just paranoid dude. Marcy is harmless. I trust her. I like her."
"As in you have a crush on her?" Sprig wiggled his eyebrows.
Anne blushed like mad. She retaliated against Sprig by punching him in the arm. Sprig feint cried out in pain. They both broke out in laugher. Anne ruffled his head.
"You know you are my best friend right?"
"Yeah."
"Good. I don't know what I would have done with you weren't around. Probably be bored out of my mind."
Yunan and Marcy's carriage soon pulled off to stop. Anne pulled on Bessie's reins to make her stop. The large black Shire horse neighed a bit in response. As they stopped, Anne patted Bessie's neck. The horse leaned down and nuzzled her.
"That a girl. Good girl."
Hop Pop was soon crawling out of the carriage, confused as to why they stopped. Anne watched as Yunan squatted down near the road and was examining something. Marcy and her talked in hush tones. Something was off. Anne could feel it. Even the birds had gone quiet. Bessie must of sensed it too because she was pawing at the dirt under her hoof. Anne felt a shiver run up her spine. She started to walk towards Marcy.
"Hey Marcy. Why did we stop?"
Marcy remained silent as she stared wide eyed at the road. Anne looked down and noticed large animal footprints in the mud along with several smaller human footprints. Blood soaked the grass near the footprints. Anne figured something had been hunted down. That was what she wanted to believe. But something told her otherwise.
"It's a dragon footprint. It must be nearby still." Marcy finally spoke up.
"Then we should move on." Anne said. She wanted out of the woods. There was something unnerving here.
"I agree. We need to leave. It doesn't feel safe."
A large roar echoed through the trees. Anne could feel the pain in the roar. The roar was soon followed by an inhuman shriek. One that sent Anne reeling. She remembered that shriek. It haunted her dreams and reminded her of what she had lost. Marcy had reached over and was gripping her am tightly.
"What was that sound?" Sprig and Polly had come behind Anne. They were just as spooked by the noises.
"A Core solider and a dragon. They must be fighting." Yunan sounded ominous. The noise must have spooked the general as well.
Out of the bushes came several Core soldiers bonding out of the woods. Anne locked up at the sight. She could never get their movements out of her head. It moved so unnatural. It was like a human spider with their movements. One of it's head tilted to the side as it stared at Anne. There was no face or eyes to see. It was covered by a mask with a single large orange eye painted in the middle.
"Girls, run! Now! Get out of here." Hop Pop called out to Anne.
Yunan had pulled her sword out and had engaged with the soldiers. Anne stood still as she stared at the things. She couldn't move. She was stuck there, fear gripping her heart. She finally snapped out of her trance when she looked down at Sprig and Polly pulling on her arms.
"Anne. We need to move. Now." Sprig begged. Anne wasn't going to lose another family again. She was ready to pull her sword out of the sheathe. Hop Pop grabbed her hand to stop her.
"Anne, move now. Go. Run. We will handle it from there." Hop Pop pushed her away.
"I'm not losing you."
"Anne, this isn't up for argument. Go with Marcy. Protect Polly and Sprig and run. Yunan and I got this. You get yourself safe. We will meet up later."
Anne couldn't focus through the tears. She was pulled away by someone as they dragged her. Her feet automatically began to run but the rest of her shut down. She noticed Marcy had grabbed her and was running. Sprig was grasping her hand and was running with Polly. Their feet carried them away from the fighting. Anne shut her eyes from the loud clashing of the swords against the swords.
"Marcy, we need to stop. We need to help them." Anne begged. Pleaded with Marcy. Marcy just turned to her with a sad look on her face.
"It's safer this way. My mom and I had a plan for this situation. We aren't to far from the nearest village. We will go there."
"But… but. Hop Pop. I can't lose him."
Anne stopped with Marcy. Marcy just squeezed her hands for comfort. Anne wanted to run back and fight with her grandfather. Sprig squeezed her hand. She reached down and hugged her siblings.
"Anne, what are we going to do?" Polly sounded so small. Anne brought her close. She knew she needed to be brave for them.
"I don't know. I don't know."
The group was interpreted by something breaking through the forest. Several more Core Soldiers appeared in front of them. Anne gulped in fear. She glanced at Marcy. Almost as if Marcy read her thoughts, the other girl scooped up Polly and was off. Anne grabbed Sprig's hand and started to run.
"Anne, they are getting closer."
"I know buddy, I know. Shit!"
Anne screamed as both Planters stumbled down a hill. Anne automatically used her body to cover Sprig's from harm. Her back hit a large log. She looked up to see one of the soldiers ran down the hill towards them, stumbling down the bank. Anne pulled Sprig up to his feet. She pushed him towards the forest line.
"Run! I'll hold him off."
"No Anne. I ain't leaving you either."
"Sprig! This isn't the time. Go."
Sprig looked at Anne then at the solider. Anne grabbed her sword and pulled it out of the sheathe. She got up from the ground. She winced at the pain in her right ankle. She held the sword out towards the strange being. She roared in anger as it rushed forward. She went to slash the approaching head. It ducked and swept it's arms at her feet, hooking her ankle and pulling her feet from right under her. Anne tumbled to the ground as it stood over her. It's arms spouted long, curved blades. It was a walking weapon. Anne looked up in horror.
Suddenly, something bounced off the head. The head twisted, similar to an owl, and stared at Sprig. He had his slingshot out and was aiming another rock at it's head. The thing moved at an unprecedented speed towards the boy. Anne screamed. She scrambled to get up. She needed to save Sprig. She needed to save her family. She tried to get up, ignoring the pain in her ankle.
Anne felt a surge of power hit her as she swung her blade. She roared as the blade made contact, running her glowing sword through the being's chest. She stood there in shock as she stared at it. Blood splattered against her cheek. She pulled her blade out. It collapsed onto the ground. Anne collapsed next to it, breathing heavy.
"Anne! Anne, please speak to me."
"I'm fine. I'm fine. Just have no idea what happen. I don't think this thing is human."
"Yeah. No kidding. Come on Anne. Let's get going."
Anne tried to get up but cried out in pain. She fell back onto the ground. She grabbed her right leg and pulled it close to her chest. Her ankle was a fireball of pain. Sprig was panicking. She didn't blame him. They were far from home and were being chased by several in-humans. It was scary. Sprig tapped her shoulders a few times.
Anne looked up to see more soldiers standing on the top of the hill. Anne grumbled in rage. They could not catch a break. As if the gods had heard her plea, a large red beast broke the forest line. It was a large dragon. It roared, the vibration rattling Anne's bones. Anne pulled Sprig close to her. The dragon used it's arms and head swat some of the creatures away. Anne watched as it made short work of the soldiers. Once the coast was clear , the dragon made it's way to the two Planters.
Anne couldn't keep her eyes open any longer. A wave of exhaustion hit her body. Her head fell. As it did, she saw the dragon then suddenly a blonde girl staring back at her.
