“Are you mad?” he replied, “If they see us they’ll kill us!”

“They’ll only kill you, I’m already dead.

Travelling through the forest and away from those blasted guards, we would need supplies. We needed anything if we were ever meant to survive this. Well, if Fel was meant to survive this. I’m not sure I needed any at all. Do spirits eat? Anyway, I already had a plan in mind for taking the things. All Fel would need to do is meet me when I got back. Since gaining back my arms, I could actually touch things now. And besides, I’m sure the people in town would be scared enough by floating hands that they would give me gold. Maybe I did need something? Gloves would be nice. The winter breeze had started to kick in and I did not want constantly cold arms, even if I wouldn’t die from the frost.

By the time I had settled on the idea of gloves, Fel had already made up his mind.

“Can I do anything to help?” Fel asked.

“All you need to do is wait for me kid. After that, we’ll head to Merford Town,” I noticed he was about to say something and I shushed him, “I know that the town sucks, but it’s our best bet right now. We’ll need to talk to someone about why we’re like this. Someone who won’t kill us.”

“You’ll be without your spirits, are you sure?”

Fel made a good point, the spirits were constrained to Helton for now. Just another reason to dislike Merford I suppose. I tried to grasp the pendant I usually had on my neck, but it was gone. I quickly searched around for it, but it had vanished. Looking at Fel now, he held up his hands.

“I didn’t take it!”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

“Give it! It’s important to me, please!” I pleaded.

“It’s not on me!” Fel backed away.

“Fel!” I yelled, causing the elf boy to run into the forest.

Shit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fel’s Perspective.

I ran through the forest, my heart racing. Knowing what happened when someone accused me of stealing, I had no desire to stick around that weird girl. I couldn’t trust her. Even if she “saved” me. She was a part of that town, Helton. Its name suited it well. I never should’ve gone there, even if the forest killed me. I would rather die by that than the tip of a sword or by ghastly hands.

Snap. A twig broke under my feet. I didn’t have on shoes and I could feel splinters embedding themselves into my soles. Stopping wasn’t an option, however, as I needed to get out of this place. The wind whipped my white hair into my face. My split ends striking me. Crunch. If the twig didn’t give away where I was, the dry leaves I just stepped on certainly did. Where was I even? The forest around me was endless and unrelenting. Light seemed to stop completely above the leaves and the whole area was just shy of pitch black. A rainbow of different shades of eyes looked at me from all angles. There was no doubt about it, I wasn’t alone.

“Leave me be!” I yelled out, my vision had started to blur from the forming tears.

Something out there was… It was bad. Evil. Whatever it was, it was nearing me. I grabbed my trusty knife and gripped it for dear life. Taking a step back, I stepped on another twig. Crack. And then, it began to charge. A beast larger than any I had ever seen! Its white fangs were barely shown in the darkness. Those and its dull, red eyes were the only thing I could see of it. But I somehow knew just how large it was. Its presence commanded fear in my heart. Its very existence could shatter the confidence of the wisest kings or the strongest of knights. And yet, there I was. A puny kid with nothing except for a dull, bland, steel knife. I was going to die again. And again, I could do nothing to stop it.