Chapter 9

Childhood was lost by now. They were eighteen now, the war long past. It didn't matter. Their innocence was taken from them, stained with blood.

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Miach stood among the soldiers. They all smiled at her, enchanted by her full-grown beauty. It was as though she grew into a woman through the war alone. Nothing else could create the gorgeous Lilty before them. Her father presented them all to the king. "This is my army. We have trained and grown stronger."

"I cannot let you go." The king shook his head resolutely. "It is too dangerous. We did not succeed two years ago, and we will not succeed today. The Yukes are strong. Their magic knows no limit in power. We must let them be."

"But, sire!"

"No! Our empire still rules. The Clavats are under our command. The Selkies are enslaved. The Yukes cooperate but are separate. Our people have conquered!"

The soldiers cheered, Miach among them.

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Frederick looked across the kingdom. "It would have been mine." He whispered, as he had everyday since he turned eighteen. "Yes, this place would have belonged to me."

Chessa put a hand on his shoulder. "But we are at peace. And the Lilty empire is not flawed. We are safe."

Frederick put his hand on the crystal, which seemed to be fading. "It's as if it knows," he said to himself. "Everything is lost."

"Not everything. I am still with you, and we made this place a refuge, remember?"

"Yes." He looked across the place where the crystal's light shone. Tents and lean-tos lay about. He smiled, it may be empty, but one tent was filled with what really mattered.

"I'll check on the refugee," Chessa spoke casually. "Come along?"

"Of course."

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The wall was finished. It had taken two years of intense labor, bringing the stones and bricks from the capitol to the old Selkie land. "Did you take that from within?" a Selkie asked Uday in his tongue. "Are you a fool? You'll get whipped or killed if they find out!"

"They won't find out." Uday clutched the tambourine, the only thing left of his home and his sister. He looked up at the wall, so high. He couldn't even see the crystal. "How tall it once was…" he mumbled in his friends' tongue. He felt secluded. The wall had definitely fulfilled its purpose. "Let's go, before the Lilties come hunting."

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Dhiren filed through a large atlas. His younger sister was beside him. "Did you find it?" she inquired.

"Not yet. I don't believe it is recorded here."

"I think it is. It's unnamed, but it's there."

He kept paging through.

"Remember when you used to go off somewhere, and I would ask you where you were?"

"Yeah. I never told you, though."

"You always told me some random place. I always knew it didn't exist. Well, I always pictured you sailed away to that island. So I labeled it."

"You labeled it? What did you call it?"

"Dhiren! Don't you remember where you always told me you went? The land of magic!"

"Land of—wait a minute!"

"And you needed a special ticket of sorts to get there, and that's why I couldn't go."

"Yeah, what was it that I called it?"

The page had a picture of an island, surrounded by the blue illustration of ocean, right off the coast of the Yuke's kingdom. There, labeled in black ink in his sister's writing, was the place she had imagined him to be while he was with his friends. The place he named…

"Shella."

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Miach followed her father obediently. He had spoke of meeting the king's son, prince of this new empire. She couldn't help but think of Frederick. This prince had taken his title from her dear friend, Frederick. She didn't know how to proceed, so she was silent as they walked down the red-carpeted halls of the castle.

"Perhaps Lilties were more worthy," she determined. She waited at the throne as her father spoke to the king.

"Hail, for the prince enters!" a guard shouted.

Miach turned, and her eyes fell upon the royal-clad boy that stood, tall and proud. Yes, tall was the correct word, for he was taller than she. She bowed as he approached. "So you are the nurse girl that helped the army?" the prince looked down at her, both figuratively and literally.

"Yes, sir." Miach stood firm.

"I suppose you couldn't very well have been an actual part of the battle."

"Excuse me, Your Highness, but I was a valuable part of the army."

The prince shrugged. "As valuable as one can be without fighting."

"Perhaps my will was not to fight! Perhaps it was to heal, to help!" She couldn't stand this boy. He was snobbish, conceited. His pride had stretched too far. "What gives you the right to have such contempt towards me?"

"I am heir to the throne." Was it that simple? Frederick was never like that. He was open to the thoughts of not only his people but also her and his other friends. He was interested in their identity, their selves. It was obvious by the way he spoke with them, questioning them about their races' ways. The Selkie script, the Yuke lore, the Lilty pride. The Lilty pride… the very thing that had gotten them into this mess, this war that had taken a toll on each friend.

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Was friendship really that fragile…?