Nuala and Abe cautiously approached the now-closed book. Nuada rose from his chair.
"Where is she?" Nuada asked. This was the first time he showed concern the entire incident.
"In the book?" Abe suggested.
He carefully picked it up and flipped through the pages. They were still blank.
"Whatever it was, it was meant for Lily." Nuala said. "It only reacted when she held it. And only she could read it."
"A spell? A trap?" Abe asked.
"Treason, no doubt." Nuada said, walking around the table. "We need to trace the magic and find out who's doing this was."
"Right, brother." Nuala agreed, taking the book from Abraham. "To the enchanters'."
HBHBHBHBHB
Lily walked down a hallway of the castle. The air around her seemed thick and foggy. Her vision blurred on the edges and she felt slow-moving. It almost felt like a dream, but slightly more clearer. She noticed the doors to her and Nuada's room and opened them. Inside she found an elf near the window, holding something.
"Who are you?" Lily asked.
The elf turned around and Lily knew that she saw her somewhere before. Lily saw that she was holding a baby draped in long silk blankets.
"My name is Arwen. Queen Arwen." The elf spoke.
Flashbacks of her wedding went through Lily's head. Arwen was the one who had sneered at her for being human at the reception. Lily looked her over and saw that she looked the same. She instantly became angry.
"What are you doing here? This is my room. I am the queen!" Lily questioned Arwen fiercely.
"Not anymore. After your little disappearance, he had to take a new wife." Arwen explained calmly. The baby in her arms cooed.
"Is that my baby?" Lily asked hesitantly.
"Ha! Like I would ever hold such a mutt. No, this is Nuada and I's child." Arwen spoke.
"No, Nuada and I are having a baby! I'm pregnant right now!" Lily put her hand on her stomach.
"Really?" Arwen turned her attention to Lily's stomach. "That makes everything so much better."
"Better?" Lily took a step back. She didn't like Arwen's tone. "Wait, my disappearance? What disappearance?"
"When you touched that book and got sucked in. Did you really not know where you were? I didn't know humans were that daft." Arwen sneered.
Lily ignored the insult for more pressing matters. "You . . . you did that? That book? Why? So you could be queen?"
"Oh, look who's finally figured it out. I figured I'd waited long enough. King Nuada deserves someone better than a lowly human as his bride." Arwen sneered.
"You're insane. Even if I was taken out of the equation, he still has to marry a human. The treaty and all, remember?" Lily pointed out.
"Oh, I remember, but he won't have to marry a human if the treaty no longer exists." Arwen said.
"What? You can't be serious. War? War with the humans after everything that was done to prevent it?"
"Deep down Nuada doesn't want peace with the humans. He wants them DEAD. And if his queen goes missing and a certain someone convinces him that this whole treaty idea was stupid and foolish, he'll break the treaty and kill them all. Oh won't it just be wonderful?" Arwen blinked dreamily.
"No. You can't do this. I won't let you! My friends, my family, I won't let you touch them!" Lily lunged at Arwen, but passed right through her. She landed hard on the floor. Arwen laughed behind her and she turned.
"You can't do anything about it now. Face it, my dear, you're stuck here while I'm out there wooing Nuada." Arwen then laughed and slowly vanished from the room, her laughter fading with her.
Lily looked around the room, hopeless.
HBHBHBHBHB
"Can you figure out what it is? What kind of spell sucked her in?" Nuala asked the head enchanter.
He hovered his hands over the book in question, his eyes closed as he concentrated.
"I cannot tell. I can hardly tell that there is a spell placed on it. It must have a time limit on it for such a powerful spell to have almost no trace at this point." The enchanter said.
"Time limit? We must get Lily out before it is over!" Abe exclaimed.
"What has happened with Queen Lillian?" Meldiron asked as he entered the enchanters' rooms. He and Nuada shared a look, then he stared at the floor.
"She has been sucked into this book and we must get her out before it is too late." Nuala explained, ignoring the tension between the two males.
HBHBHBHBHB
Lily stood from her place on the floor and began wandering around the room, trying to find some way out. She approached the window and found everything appear to be the same as it was supposed to be, besides her vision still being blurry around the edges. She looked out at the kingdom, desperately wishing she was back in the real world.
"I'm so sorry for everything I've done. Please someone, anyone, help me." She wished softly.
Nothing changed after the words left her mouth. She sighed and turned to exit her room. She stood in the doorway and peered down both ends of the hallway.
"Help! Somebody! Anybody! Hello!" She screamed. There was no answer. No sound at all.
The ends of the hallway began to turn black. It was after a minute that Lily realized that the blackness was getting bigger and appeared to be swallowing everything in its path. Lily looked down both ends and saw the same thing happening on either side. She closed the doors and walked backwards into her room, away from the blackness. Her heart was beating. What was happening? She ran back to the window to look for a way out, but saw the same blackness closing in on the window. She screamed and ran back into the room. She stood in the center and spun around, trying to figure some way out. The blackness was absorbing the door until she saw no more of it and was entering through the window. She even saw it come through the walls. It looked like vast, black, empty mist. Lily grabbed some things off of her vanity and threw them into the mist. It was immediately absorbed. She screamed again.
"Help! Oh please HELP! Anybody! Somebody! Please!" Lily screamed at the top of her lungs. Nothing stopped and nothing spoke. The mist kept coming, closing in on her from all sides. She knew she was trapped. It was five feet away from her now.
"Please! Help me!" She was sobbing now. Three feet away. "It can't end like this! Oh PLEEEEASE!" Little more than a foot. "SOMEBODY!" It was at the edge of her toes. She saw it begin to climb over her shoes.
HBHBHBHBHB
The head enchanter suddenly put his hands down.
"The magic has stopped. If Queen Lillian was in here, she is no more." He spoke ominously.
Mostly everyone in the room paled. Nuada remained emotionless and calmly left the room, walking past everyone else's frozen bodies.
"She is dead? Lily is dead?" Nuala repeated, the words feeling foreign on her tongue.
"She can't be. There has to be a way! Get her back!" Meldiron strode over to the head enchanter and lifted him up by his collar.
"I cannot. There is no more magic in this book. If she was in that book, she is no more or she is trapped there forever." The head enchanter struggled to explain.
"Then put more magic in. We need our queen!" Meldiron spat in his face.
"I cannot!"
"Meldiron! Stop!" Nuala shouted. "If she is gone, she is gone. We must accept it and begin our search for a new queen." There were tears in her eyes.
Meldiron put the head enchanter down. The enchanter gasped for air as he hit the ground. Meldiron stared at the ground, his eyes lifeless.
"She cannot." He argued weakly. "She is our queen."
Nuala put her arm around Meldiron's shoulders.
"I know how much you care for Lily. It must be hard, but we must accept this small fact." Nuala comforted him. He nodded his head slowly.
HBHBHBHBHB
Nuada walked fiercely down the hallway to his room. Approaching him from down the other end of the hallway was a familiar face he hadn't seen in months.
"Arwen?" Nuada asked puzzled as she came closer. "I have not seen you-"
"Since you got married, my king." Arwen said as she curtsied. "How have you been?"
"My physical being is fine." Nuada told her.
Arwen laughed. "You are so funny, my king. Where is Queen Lillian?"
Nuada's face darkened. "She is unwell."
"Unwell? I certainly hope she feels better." Arwen said. She placed her hands on Nuada's upper arms.
"I am still married, Arwen." Nuada told her, his eyes becoming slits.
"To a lowly human." She picked imaginary dust off of his armor. "I heard she is pregnant. Will you keep the mutt?"
"Sadly we will have to keep the child for appearances with the humans." Nuada told her.
"So sad." Arwen twirled a strand of his hair. "If only there was a way to have a pureblood elf for an heir."
Arwen batted her eyelashes at Nuada. He lightly pushed her away.
"I am sorry, but I must retire to bed." Nuada said to her.
He continued down the hallway until he reached his room. He stared at Lily's things. He walked to the vanity and picked up her hairbrush, twirling it in his fingers. He placed it back down and looked at his reflection in the vanity mirror. His blank stare turned into a glare and he clenched his hand into a fist. He punched the glass, shards flying everywhere and cutting his cheeks and hand. He stood with his fist in the wooden back of the mirror, calming himself. He removed his fist and stared at the blood on his knuckles and the back of his hand. He knew in the back of his mind that Nuala had the same injuries, but he couldn't bring himself to care much at the moment. He looked back at the vanity and saw only the indented wood.
"What have you done to me?" Nuada asked the air.
Felt like this was a good place to end the chapter. Like it? No?