A/N: Thanks again to my friends Lily and Jordyn, I wouldn't have started it without you! Love you guys! Chapter three should be up soon, and please review people!

CH.2

After allowing only ten minutes of mourning she uncurled herself with effort but could not stop the steady flow of tears. She reached for the saddlebags but then caught sight of the gruesome mass of bodies just as the wind blew a gust of wind carrying the scent of burnt flesh in her direction. Aris couldn't help it she leaned over and retched all over the ground. Five minutes later she got up from her knees shakily and wiped her mouth. She took a sip from the wineskin to settle her stomach then continued with the task before her. She emptied the bags of everything then but the necessary supplies, making the bag as light as possible.

Then with trembling fingers she unlaced her mothers diamond embedded sword belt, then removed the bow and quiver from her back. She picked up her mothers identical long swords from the ground and trying to ignore the fact that there was a dead person beneath it, wiped them on a tunic. She slid them into their sheaths then retrieved her daggers from the dead mans throat, wiping those off as well.

With everything she needed at hand Aris reached down to slowly stroke her mothers cheek, then she kissed her forehead one last time, then sprinted east, deeper into the Beors, looking back only once to whisper good-bye.

"A cave," Aris thought, "I need a cave to hide in." But, her careful scanning came up fruitless. "These useless mountains are filled with divots," she muttered trying to overpower her grief with frustration, "why can't one be a cave!"

She finally found a boulder leaning against the mountain surrounded by thick brush and trees. She crawled through the brush and squirmed through the gap between the boulder and its support. Once in the boulder rounded in upon itself allowing for enough room for a girl just her size to sleep comfortably.

"Yes this will do, it has to, I will collapse if I go any further."

And, so she did. As soon as her bag was set down, belt and boots off and blankets laid she fell into an exhausted slumber, thankfully void of dreams.

"I'm beginning to worry Oormis…; they should have arrived in Ceris by now." Izlanzadi frowned, chewed on her lip, and clasped her hands in worry.

"Normally I would say that they possibly left slightly later than planned…but…" Oormis brow creased searching with his mind for Forsythia but coming up blank, "six hours is a bit much, especially for Forsythia."

"Faolin and I, and maybe even Vinakyn, could go look for them." Arya, Izlanzadi's daughter, offered just as worried as the others.

"Yes, I dearly hope you have no need for our best tracker but…," Izlanzadi turned to a young elf in the hall, "fetch me Vinakyn from the training grounds." The young elf bowed and sprinted off in a flash. Only minutes later the elf returned with a dark-haired older male in tow.

The second elf approached Izlanzadi and twisted his hand over his chest, making the comman sign of respect among the elves, "Atra esterni ono-" He began the respectful greeting all elves made to each other, but was cut off by Izlanzadi.

"No time for that Vinakyn." she said shortly

"Very well my queen." his baritone voice rumbled. "You needed my assistance?"

"Yes," She nodded, the queenly demeanor she had adopted when the two elves had returned flickered some worry showing through. "Forsythia and Aris were supposed to arrive in Ceris six hours ago, and then communicate that they had arrived there safely through the two way mirrors we use during celebrations." She bit her lip again, "we have heard nothing."

"Hmmm, highly unusual to be late from our other queen." Vinakyn noted.

"Yes," Arya interrupted her worry getting the best of her; she dearly loved her cousin and aunt. "So I proposed that Faolin, you, and I go and search for them."

"That would be wise, I think." Vinakyn acknowledged her opinion

"Very well," Izlanzadi gave a short nod and a sigh, "leave at once."

As Arya and the others left the room, Izlanzadi paced to the window, while Oormis merely stood in thought not wanting to contemplate what might have happened.

With a start Aris woke, momentarily disoriented. Then in a wave of memory, grief washed over her and for almost an hour she fought against drowning in it. Finally she broke through the surface, gasping for air and relief. Withdrawing her head from her hands she stuck her head outside of her makeshift shelter and glanced at the sky.

"It's midday," she concentrated through her headache and heavy heart trying to remember when she had fallen asleep. "It was dusk when I found this cave," she thought, pulling her head back in and leaned it against the cool façade of the mountain. "That can't be right though." Something about that didn't make sense; there was no way that her energy could have been this revived from one day. Her brow creased as she slid all the way outside this time to check for old footsteps.

She looked down upon one of her footsteps then closed her eyes and thought for a moment, "I turned ten two days past the turning from hot season to brown season," she almost scoffed aloud, at the moment she felt around two hundred, anything but ten, "anyways, getting her mind back on her train of thought, that was a month ago which means that the pine should be shedding a layer of needles per day." She crouched near the footstep and counted the layers of needles in multiple stages of deterioration, then she reached the layer that had been crushed by her feet.

"Three days!" she exclaimed this time aloud. Her voice sounded hoarse and strange in the silence of the forest. It was then that she noticed things were far to quiet, not even a bird was chirping.

"I should have noticed that before," she thought frustrated at herself though she knew she had more than enough reason to be off on her observations. She opened her mind for a moment and felt only the bugs in the grounds and the plant life around her, nothing around her that could fly away or had reason leave to was there. She hurried back into her shelter, gathering her things quickly.

"You have to get your head right again Aris!" she told herself, then took a deep breath and shouldered her bag. Then slipped out one last time demolishing her tracks and staying to the shadows as she began to move stealthily across the mountains. She was headed toward the Az Ragni River, there she could follow it to DuWeldenvarden. Danger was coming and she knew it.

Three days later, around midday, Arya arrived in Ceris, an elfin city on the eastern fringe of DuWeldenvarden. As she, Vinakyn and Faolin entered the city and gained audience with the lord of the city. They asked for news of the pair, but none had come. A guard from the city, named Lifaen, who adored Aris and would constantly teach her about the trees and nature, joined their party and together they set off down the Az Ragni.

"May I ask Arya svit-kona?," Lifaen suddenly said.

"I'd be pleased to answer your question if I can." Arya replied.

"My inquiry is as to when Forsythia Drottning and little Aris were supposed to arrive?"

Arya smiled at Lifaen's affectionate obedience of Aris' past wishes. Aris despised the formality of the titles elves used such as svit-kona, elda, vor, Drottning, or vodhr. Arya remembered the day when she finally told Lifaen to stop. Earlier that week Oormis had felt weak so he asked Aris who she wanted to learn from that week. Either Vanir with swordplay, Vinakyn for tracking, Glaedr for history, Lifaen for nature or how it relates to life, and then Oormis for everything else and more. She had chosen Lifaen, he was so far away that Aris always jumped at the chance to see him. Aris had chosen Arya to escort her there, it was always fun to spend time with her away from the pressures of being a princess and politically correct, she truly was a fascinating little thing. When they arrived Lifaen had greeted her as usual Aristianna svit-kona, it was then that Aris gave him a frown and said "no". He had looked very confused then Aris continued "I know that you have to be respectful and honor royalty, but we are friends Lifaen. I understand being that polite and formal to a stranger or an acquaintance, but we are good friends. Vanir and Vinakyn both call me Aris, just Aris." He had smiled back and said, "very well then just Aris, I will save the titles for only the most special occasion."

"Arya…Arya?" Faolin was gently rubbing her shoulder.

"oh! I'm sorry, your question reminded me of something." Her smile was replaced by a frown when the worry embedded itself in the pit of her belly stronger than ever. She regained herself and answered his question.

"Three days ago Aris and Forsythia were supposed to arrive in Ceris and let us know from there that they were safe. They were to stay in Ceris for the night then travel to Ellesmera."

"I see," Arya could see that Lifaen was trying to not shown his stress, "may I inquire as to how the egg is doing?"

Arya smiled ruefully, "The same as always, not a single twitch for anyone. I leave to take it to the Varden in a week."

"oh-"

They had come upon the horrific battle scene that Aris and Forsythia had left behind.

"Oh my…" Faolin spoke for the first time, "…do you think…"

"Lets search," Vinakyn said watching Arya's face crumble as Faolin implied the worst. "perhaps they ran fearing more soldiers."

"or, they died," Faolin added, his shock still making him oblivious to his loves obvious pain.

"no…no…they must have…they must have survived." Arya stammered out in a panic. Lifaen regained his composure and looked at his life mate, "yes! They are probably hiding, Vinakyn's right lets search." he took her by the hand and they made there way into the burned ring of bodies and grass. They searched from the outside in , flipping over charred remains hoping that one of these now unrecognizable forms wasn't either the princess or the queen.

"None of these corpses are small enough to be Aris," Vinakyn mentioned, "and somehow I doubt Forsythia would have strayed far from her. Let's look in the middle then bodies are still whole there."

They made their way from burnt ground to blood soaked, as they began flipping bodies over again Lifaen made his way to the middle of the bloody scene, and looked at the two dead horses, one was Aris' and the other Forsythia's. He moved the black elfin horse but there was no Aris. Just as he was about to lift Forsythia's much larger horse with magic when he saw an elfin made leather traveling boot that both Aris and Forsythia wore. He walked around the horse then gasped instant tears springing into his eyes.

"My, lady Arya come here if you will." he called out

The rest of the group mad their way over to Lifaen and Arya fell to her knees taken over by instant grief. They had found Forsythia's body.