Chapter 2: The meeting
I woke up in the early morning to the smell of smoke in the air. This couldn’t have been good at all. My mom never burned food. I went to my door to open it, but an armored man kicked it in before I could. He was standing there looking at me. He looked really strong and his face was covered with sweat. He seemed really angry and looked like a soldier, but he was strangely formed at the face. He finally walked towards me laughing. I started to panic and backed up slowly. My black bag was behind me, so I tripped. He reached out to grab me, but a sword came through his chest. As he fell, I saw my dad behind him.
“Riley, run!” he looked at me in alarm. He was breathing deeply and was sweating fiercely with soot on his hard face. He was still in his nightclothes.
I was astonished, but I grabbed the bag and ran past my dad pulling out his sword from the soldier’s chest.
“Find your mom and Robin. QUICKLY!” he yelled while I ran out the door to the porch. When I looked around, I saw dozens of men running around and noticed where the smell of smoke was coming from. My house was burning down, but it didn’t get in the house yet. One of the men finally spotted me and started to run towards me. Of course, I ran close to the wood line not looking back.
“NOOO!” I heard my dad cry in agony. He was running after the man who was chasing me. The man was getting close until dad threw him off with a rock. As he fought my dad, I strapped the bag around my shoulder and climbed the tree nearest to me. My dad dodged all of the soldier’s moves and made the soldier stumble back and fall to the ground. I gasped silently and my dad turned around from the sound. He looked up at me and put a finger over his lips telling me to be quiet. I pressed my lips together. He turned around and realized that the soldier was right over him. He tried to defend himself, but it was too late. The soldier stabbed him in the chest, and I heard a small shriek come out from his throat. I forced myself to stay silent and not scream. He fell with a thud that rang in my ears. I closed my eyes and hugged the branch as tight as I could. I let that soldier kill my own father.
More soldiers came to search for me, and I held back crucial tears until they gave up. My heart screamed in agony looking at my father lifeless just a few feet below me. It hurt tremendously to see the life leave him and not being able to go down there to help.
“Come on, let’s go tell Logan that the girl has vanished. It will be our lives for this,” he told the group around him. He was obviously the head soldier of the group. I stayed in that tree for hours until I couldn’t hear a sound except for the random flames that burned down my home. It was so quiet now. I fell to the ground gasping for air after the crying I had done. Desperately, I looked for the family that I had left. I held back the tears that were critically pounding into my eyes. There was nothing I could do for my father now. I passed his lifeless body and never looked back. I couldn’t bear to see him again like that. Then, my heart shattered even more as I looked towards our barn that was now crumbling to the ground from the fire.
She was just lying there on the ground. I wanted to hope, and I wanted her to be okay, but I knew it was too much to ask for. I ran towards her with the strength I had. My lungs were screaming, and my legs wanted to give in, but I fought against them. Soon, my legs won, and I fell next to my mother’s feet.
“Oh, please not my mom, please!” I screamed. My throat was dry from the smoke, but I kept talking to her like she was still with me.
“It’s going to be okay mom, I’m here now. Please don’t go!” I crawled to her innocent face that was covered in soot. Her big, brown eyes were open, but she still did not move. I picked up her fragile head and cradled it in my arms. In my mind I could not believe she was dead, but the blood that was flowing from her chest gave me the evidence I needed. She was really gone. Who could kill such a gentle woman? I gave in to my sorrow as tears flowed down my cheeks.
“Mama,” I whispered as I buried my head into her shoulder. They were both gone because of me, and I didn’t even know why. I sat up after serious sobbing and kissed my mom’s forehead. Then, I closed her eyes. It was all I could do. I stood up slowly and looked around once more. I cringed at the thought of Robin’s body lying somewhere. I forced myself to picture him dead. I didn’t want to hope anymore. Still, I couldn’t find him anywhere in sight.
Just last night I had hoped for adventure, but this was not what I wanted. These evil men wanted me, and I was going to find out why. The real problem was how.
Town was my best option now. Thunder rumbled around me as I limped tiredly through the streets to hopefully find someone, but the town was deserted. When I walked towards Mr. George’s store, I realized that he was gone too. It felt like a ghost town. I found an alleyway and cradled myself next to some broken crates. As the rain started pouring down, tears overwhelmed me once again as I thought about the tragic morning.
“Are you okay?” I heard a voice in my head and then felt shoving at my arm. Maybe it was just a dream and Robin was waking me up, but it wasn’t. I could hear rain fall on my head so I must have still been in the alleyway.
I hoped the voice would be Robin waking me up. “Robin?” I opened my eyes in hope and saw a little boy holding out his hand to help me up.
“No, I’m Gabe! What happened to you? You have a really nice bump there,” he pointed out my forehead. It must have been when I fell out the tree earlier this morning. I took his hand and just stood there.
“I’m Riley,” was the only thing I could say, and that was even weak.
“Hello Riley! You look unsteady. Maybe I should take you to see Jack. He’ll know what to do.” I looked at him in panic.
“No, no. It’s fine, really. I can get by. I’ve got to find Robin.” I took a step forward and being so weak, I fell. But someone caught me. It couldn’t have been Gabe because he looked about Robin’s age. He was too small, and this person’s hands were big and felt rough.
“Jack, you came just in time,” Gabe said in hushed tones. Jack picked me up and started walking.
“This seems to be a proper meeting. She needs rest before she knows” He had a deep, rough voice.
I was out before I could hear anything else.
I was out before I could hear anything else.Chapter 3: EverythingI woke up with tear-stained eyes. It hurt to move my face because of the dry tears. Still, I had this calmness to me and felt warmth against my stomach. A cat was lying on my stomach just purring away. Where was I? I sat up and the cat leaped down. It ran into the other room where Gabe and Jack were. I also heard a woman’s voice I couldn’t recognize. When I stretched and pulled myself out of bed, I then went into the other room. Gabe was twirling his fingers into his silky, black hair, smiling away with the cat on his shoulders. The cat was mostly black, but it had some silver across one of its eyes. Jack finally realized my presence and bowed his head slowly towards me. “Good morning sleepy head!” Gabe looked at me and smiled. I rubbed my forehead where the bump was.
I had forgotten how hard it was to ride a horse. It was a whole lot different from riding Jake back at home. My legs ached as we rode along, and I was hoping we would stop soon so I could stretch my legs. As the sun began to fade, we were in the woods. Obviously, we were out of the little town of Grysmont. When we all stopped at a random clearing, Marie jumped down to look around.“We’re in Recap Forest. It should be safe here,” Marie said as we all sighed in relief. Gabe and Jack dismounted, but I couldn’t. My legs were so sore I couldn’t even move. I blushed red in embarrassment.“Need some help?” Gabe looked at me smiling.“That would be a little nice.” I called down to him. He faced the horse and pointed his finger down. The horse sat and I fell to the ground. I laughed, but my legs ached even more as I sat up. “You&
Winter wind blanketed over me as I walked closer to the house that I once lived in. Blood trickled down my cheek from my head, but that wasn’t stopping me from getting closer to the nothingness of the house. The sound of Robin screaming in the house was drawing me closer. I wanted to help. I wanted to protect him, but there was nothing I could do. When I walked into the center of the house, I could see him cradled into a ball in a corner. A cloaked man was standing over him as he cried in his own arms. Ignoring my wound, I got closer and held Robin in my arms. “You shouldn’t have come Riley. That’s what he wanted. I’M THE BAIT!” He scrambled out of my arms and tried to run, but the cloaked man grabbed him and slammed him onto the floor. Robin screamed in agony. I flinched and stood up to face the cloaked man. I couldn’t see his face, but I could hear his cold voice.“Riley, I kne
I decided to shake the night off. It wasn’t too hard to forget about because I found it so amazing to watch Landon run with ease next to us and Andrew right behind him in wolf form. He seemed to be ready to pounce on him at any moment. Marie rode with me again and I again felt an overwhelming sense of calm with her presence. Honestly, it really did help me stop thinking about the pain the dream caused and the pain of my family. My head was still pounding with pain, and it was hard to keep focused anyway. Every time I looked up I felt dizzy and wanted to fall over, so I kept my head down, but occasionally looked at Landon or Andrew. Jack guided us out of the forest and into clear plains filled with grass and flowers. It took my breath away. The wind made the grass sway back and forth. It was like a lullaby for my eyes. I couldn’t help but look up to enjoy the beautiful scene.“Landon!” I heard Jack shout and then I
Gabe almost dived off his horse before Jack pulled him back. “Wait Gabe. We’ve got to make sure Landon’s in control.” Landon didn’t acknowledge the remark. He still paced back and forth shaking his head every now and then. “He’s ok.” Andrew said. Andrew had just changed back to human and was walking towards me. Gabe jumped off his horse and raced to me. He got to me before Andrew could. I was sitting on the ground, so he sat on my lap and wrapped his arms around my neck to hug me. That felt great. It almost felt like Robin in my arms again with smiles on our faces and the family still together. That was too much, so I concentrated on Gabe. He seemed worried. “Oh, I’m so glad you’re ok! What happened?” Gabe looked up at me. I felt so content with Gabe in my arms that I forgot my frustration with Landon. There was so much to say and a lot to explain, but I wasn’t the one that was going to. Landon was the one that knew what just happened. I gently moved Gabe out of my arms and
Robin's POV“What you mean you let them go?! Lucas, I thought I told you specifically that I wanted Landon and Riley in your grasp as soon as you saw them!” Frustrated, Logan picked up Lucas from the collar of his shirt. “Sir, I have Landon right at my grasp. I can feel it!” I looked at the strange looking man that was standing close to Logan. He saw Riley! He put him down and looked at him. “This has nothing to do with your group Lucas. This has to do with Riley remember? I must get it before she turns seventeen! Do you want to end up like the soldiers that I brought along to get the girl?”I gulped and stood up. “You won’t kill her will you?”They both turned to look at me. Lucas chuckled sickly, but Logan stopped him.
Riley's POVChapter 9: The Decision“Landon! No, get away!” I flinched when I woke up to see Landon staring at me. He had his hand on my cheek, but I pushed it away. “What? What happened?” He backed away and for the first time, he looked terrified. I scrambled to my feet and looked around. It had been days since I had my last dream, however, this one was horrid. We were still in the forest where I saw Lucas and his group. Jack decided to travel in the woods to be safe since Lucas worked for Logan. The morning was harsh with fog and cold air. I knew it was just a dream, but it felt so real.“Why did you do that? I told you to stop! And you charged at me anyway!” I slammed my fists into his chest. It felt like stone, but I didn’t care. He looked shocked so he let me hit him un
I couldn’t believe how much time had passed since yesterday. Nobody dared to speak much unless it was important, and we traveled all day yesterday without stopping. My legs ached from riding the horse because I wasn’t going to be carried by him anymore after that kiss. Even thinking about it felt painful. Gabe looked at me in sympathy a few times after he saw me flinch from pains and aches, but I kept looking straight ahead. “Okay, we’re here I believe.” Jack looked around as he dismounted his horse. I looked around and all I saw were trees and flying leaves. This couldn’t be it.Gabe dismounted and looked around also, but in disappointment. “This is it? It can’t be! Where’s all the magic?” He walked around the small area."Oh, we’re here.” Landon walked further into the area and pressed against the air. &ld