Isadora burst out of the woods into a clearing, laughing that she had escaped. She held the crystal in her hand; it was too bright to look at for long. With this and the marked location she no longer needed him. One step closer! She used the compass to determine the correct way and began to walk forward.

  Humphrey drew his legs to his chest, and exhaled heavily. He knew this was going to happen, his kidnapper never screamed ‘joyous’ or ‘kindness’. She was evil… He hated her for her villainy of leaving him to die. His stomach ached as his side burnt like fire as his head felt like it was in a metal press, from the events of the last few days he felt dreadfully sick. He was suddenly sick again. He had prayed to the God for forgiveness for using their magic without any sort of worship, but the __ Lesser God wasn’t forgiving him… She was the reason he couldn’t defend his home, why it’s now destroyed. While these people around him where the reason it got destroyed. He didn’t know people could have such… bottomless cruelty. She cursed him to a life, now much shorter, of nothing but pain. He despised her. He… he was better than her. She lived in squalor her entire life, while he got everything he wanted! That gave him some relief he did have a good life before all this, while she never would no matter how long she could live…

  He sat up in the cage, getting pulled along by a hase with the Red King soldiers all around him. He only counted four five must have fallen prey to wild animal attacks. His arms and mouth were bound, not that he had the energy to fight back. His feet where shackled to the ground. He overheard some of their conversation, about bragging of their kills, how they did it, how quickly, which only made him feel worse. Blocking out the soldiers stared blankly out of the bars, hearing bird chirps and the wind rustle the leaves and without realizing it he fell asleep.

  But she walked only a few steps. She told herself.again she couldn’t finish that thought. She tried to walk forward but each step made her feel dreadful.

  ‘Even if I wanted to…’ She said sternly.

  He knows magic, he can save himself. She walked to the trees with purpose. ‘Damn it!’ She yelled and turned on her heels, back the other way.

  The jostle of the cart stopping woke him up- it was night. The soldiers made a fire, he could hear it crackle and the wood pop.

  Rexford sat amongst the group of soldiers all hungrily eating. A sneeze from inside the cart took their attention. One asked what they were going to do with the mage and Rexford answered ‘once the other comes back to get him we’ll kill him and travel back to the kingdom with the ‘optic.’

  Humphrey wiped his nose, eye lids tired but unable to sleep. Had the Lesser God cursed him?

  ‘Do you hear that?’ Kero asked before spotting an animal bound off. Humphrey heard at least two automatically run off after it cheerfully. He pulled against the chains but nothing. The door winging open made him jump. The black haired knight, Rexford held food in a bowl and removed the gag. ‘Tell me where your friend went.’

  ‘Why do you want to know? How important is she to you? Why are you trying to find her? Why-?’

  He only narrowed his eyes, with a hand on his wounded side.

  ‘If I knew I’d tell you,’ then mumbled ‘I hate her just as much as I hate you.’ His eyes shone with grief.

  ‘Then tell me her weaknesses.’

  He looked at the bowl of food, it wasn’t pretty but he was so hungry. ‘She can only use ingredient magic and worships the Battle Goddess. She has a slight limp in her left leg, probably a past injury. She a geoptic, about sixteen, can’t fight physically, but growing up rough probably knows a few things. Happy?’ It tossed him the food he hesitated against it- it looked vile- before slowing beginning to drink it. Then the gag was put back on and left alone.

  The next day Humphrey managed to hang between sleep and wakefulness through the morning, Rexford took charge as the others trailed behind the peaceful day sunlight cut through the trees. A bird chirped in the distance. Suddenly the cart exploded and the boy hobbled into the trees!

  Running through nature his side was agony, already gasping for air. Moments after escaping he heard footsteps gaining on him. ‘Ah!’ Humphrey yelled as his collar was grabbed and thrown to the floor as Rexford lowered a sword to his throat. ‘Why are you doing this?! You’ve killed so many people, what’s one more?!’ His voice cracked from fear. ‘doraki’ Humphrey yelled and rock around him vibrated but he didn’t the energy or skill to complete the spell and was gagged before he could attempt again and picked up by Rexford he was carried back.

  They managed to repair the hole he made and threw him in while some only half-joked about cutting his tongue out, making him feel even more vulnerable than his weakening magic was. So he sat in the cart, bullet wound worse than ever, hearing the squeak of the wheel as the sun set and stars illuminated everything.

  ‘The training half killed me,’ Big Nose reminisced to a few around him. There was an agreement of mumbles, ‘sword training was the best.’ One said and they all agreed. Rexford randomly said, ‘let’s kill him.’ Humphrey’s eyes widened. His heart tried to leap from his throat when he heard the latch squeak open. Suddenly a deafening scream was heard. A few seconds later the door swung open to see Isadora run and unchain him. ‘You wouldn’t believe how long it takes to gather ingredients.’

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  ‘… Isadora?’ He thought his eyes were lying.

  ‘DORAKI!’ She suddenly turned and threw a mixture at a soldier at the door. Suddenly, it hardened around Big Nose and turned to inescapable rock. But it was a spell she crafted, so the rock was already crumbling into dust. They’d better hurry!

  She took out a potion and swallowed it quickly. With his restraints off she grabbed his hand and pulled him out. She spotted the Walking Shadow unhook his gun and aim at her head, bringing her back to reality. She breathed deeply in ‘fosla’ and fire exploded from her palm and blasted out, the impact interrupting everyone else but the flames weren’t hot. She hated her inadequacy! Suddenly a net encased her and pinned her down. Humphrey blasted fire from his hand which encased his own net- only to be hit hard into the back of his head. He crashed to the floor discombobulated. A sword sliced down, his brain too damaged to properly fight back- Isadora swung his staff crystal into the back of the knight’s head like a mace! Isadora threw the net off him and pulled him up, ‘run!’

  Rexford suddenly came out of the trees, slicing down. Humphrey barely avoided it as his blade merely cut his cheek. It was levelled a blade to Humphrey’s neck. The other soldiers froze. Isadora’s hand tightened around the staff… but she couldn’t do anything quick enough. She raised her hands in surrender. Humphrey didn’t. He whispered, ‘draki, foral.’ A sharp spike shot from the ground under Rexfords feet, forcing him to dodge and allowed Humphrey to run, weakly, but his legs buckled. ‘Why is this happening?!’ Humphrey asked no one through gritted teeth. Instantly, Isadora smashed the crystal into the jaw of another knight, although the knight tried to spin his blade to deflect the shards it was still a heavy impact which knocked him back. She gripped the staff and aimed ‘fosla!’ then sent a fireball at Kero. Due to the staff the flames were larger but a summer breeze warm. Those flames should’ve melted the flesh from his bones!

  Humphrey had now fatigued himself and was struggling to stand, from adrenaline he was unaware of his bloodied side. Rexford tried to zigzag as a way to avoid her spells, to move like fluid in a sharp fashion, but he fumbled over himself, getting battered with a spell but overpowered the impact and kneed Isadora in the gut, winding her she fell to the ground.

  Unable to find her voice a sword held by Rexford was levelled to her head, the staff rolled from her long fingers to Kero’s feet, which he kicked away. Humphrey tried to defend but a net shot down and already exhausted made his limbs limp and pinned to the ground. Small flames ate away at some grass wood splinters and wind ripped through trees and clouds covered the sky, leaving them in darkness.

  He watched helplessly as Isadora was picked up by the neck, Rexford had a disgusting smile on his lips. He tried to rise but he didn’t have the strength. Isadora was suddenly thrown back into the cart, wrists chained before she could move. Humphrey, limp, was grabbed and tossed in, and chained around the throat. Darkness pricked his vision.   Isadora yelled profanity as he was forced into the cart.

  Waking the next day despite the damaged cart the chains bolted to the floor forbid them to run. Isadora was looking around, with a steel gag in her mouth, he tried to talk but realized he had a matching one. They were wanted alive, apparently Isadora’s thievery deserved punishment in front of the soldiers. Humphrey was the final mage so also an example was necessary.

  Isadora counted the men best she could as Veyra’s words echoed in the mind: ‘wandering in the uncharted forests is a death sentence.’ She mulled over thoughts. Humphrey could use magic to attract a beast, while killing them they could escape, yet they’re still bolted to the floor it would only gain them a new prison of the monsters belly. She had already tried to make a potion shown by the ingredients strewn about. There were a few dark purple mushrooms, cuts of green grass and orange flowers in bloom however she needed a certain type of leaf to crumble the chains and her tongue. The leaves are naturally dry and crumble easily to involve it in a spell means the chains would mimic the brittle nature of the leaves. However, she scraped at the wood with her chained hands, perhaps the dry, thin wood could act as a replacement.

  Humphrey watched, still light-headed he needed to remove focus from his burning forehead.

  Isadora tried to talk to him through muffled words, but he hadn’t a clue. She raised her eyebrows and tilted her head to the potion to be but he frowned. Taking a point of her hand-encasing cuffs she began to scratch a word into the wood, suddenly a soldier slapped on the side, demanding them to stop whatever they were doing. She rolled her eyes and slumped against the side, hope in a quick dwindle. Humphrey kicked her leg and she snapped her head at him, and she was met with his frowning eyes, his way to tell her to hold onto it, to not let it slip away. She nodded slightly and in repetition and sat back up. Trying to be more discrete she continued to scratch the word. ‘GORSHO’. It was the word for a basic animal attraction spell. He shook his head he had only read other types of spells on animal, energy, physical and illusion, never learning them. He shut his eyes in an attempt to remember the writings.

  Isadora broke off enough wood, and began to mash the mixture together. At the top of her eye she saw saliva drip down… from the ceiling? Looking up a strange-looking creature was on top staring at them through a hole.

  It had three legs stretched out like a centipedes with small, clawed feet, its nose was wide and squirming with large and narrow pale grey eyes. Its tail had a spike on the end, poisoned, for its own protection.

  The saliva splashed into the potion, causing a pulse of cyan. Spreading it like butter onto the bolts couldn’t summon the word. The creature scuttled down into their cell, within the shadows to remain out of sight of the guards. It helped pry off the metal long enough for her to whisper the spell word…

  The metal contorted, strange texture dug itself into the iron yet it did not crumble. Scratching her head with the metal cuffs wasn’t sure how she would ask the creature to attract a predator… perhaps they didn’t need

  spell. Prying if off a final time whispered the spell name into its ear and off it scuttled across the wall and over the roof into the trees above!