I opened my eyes again as I felt the bluish hue that signalled the setting of the sun. As the sun disappeared beyond the horizon and behind the trees, the last rays of evening sunlight barely touched the tip of some of the nearby ancient trees. In contrast, the light from the blue moon gradually became more apparent. I rubbed my eyes, but then stopped after realising my hands were just making my eyes more irritated, rather than less. My hands still had bits of dried blood hardened on them, especially between some of the chipped nails and the webbing between bony fingers. It would be nice if we could find some water. The hardened blood was starting to become an annoyance. I stretched my back by leaning forwards and touching my toes then pushing back against the trunk. There, much better. My shoulder and neck seemed a bit stiff, but the injury was mostly fine. I then grasped the branch I had been sleeping on and gently shifted from my sitting position, whipping my right foot over the side of the branch, before sliding to a lower branch as I descended.
I still felt quite fatigued and sleep deprived, but we couldn’t afford to spend any more time here. We needed to decide how we were going to the capital before our food ran out. The half-day of sleep was filled with several moments of alertness. Maybe we should have organised a watch rotation, but we were all too tired to give a damn, so we just ended up relying on ourselves. Besides, there was still some discord between us, so it wouldn’t have given us much peace of mind even if we did take turns sleeping. The poor quality sleep was unavoidable. On the bright side, it seems that Princess Sarratina was quite intelligent and did do a good job mediating last night. 1*
Thinking about the conflict and the princess’s actions, I glanced over towards the tree where the princess was. Well, at least one of us had a good rest. She was quietly snoring away and sleeping without a worry in the world, her lips pulled upwards in a peaceful smile. She was leaning precariously against the main trunk of the tree with her hands dangling to either side, her face squashed side on. Watching her sleep, I felt bad for waking her up, and snapping her back into our cruel reality. I gently shifted to another lower branch that wobbled under my weight, before dropping down to the ground.
I unslung my pack and opened it to check the contents within. The spare cloth was fine, and though the food was a bit jumbled and squashed, nothing too spoilt. I took out a particular carefully wrapped cloth package and delicately opened the wrapping. I had been planning to save this package, but it seemed circumstances would require its usage earlier.
The moment I opened the wrapping, a sweat aroma permeated the air. Though faint, the smell was of a type of heavenly blueberry, which did not falter even in its old age... A pair of nightingales appeared out of nowhere and landed on a nearby branch, twittering away in excitement and eyeing the muffin. I quickly shielded it with my body. Birds were scary scavengers, and one of our biggest non-human competitors back in the slums. I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. 2*
Inside the package, I eyed a cracked ceramic tray that had four spots, three of which were filled with blueberry muffins. Although the package had fallen onto the ground before, the three remaining muffins inside had remained plump and unbruised, albeit less fresh than when I first stole them. This gift was a courtesy of the kitchen staff at Castle Town Frankfurt and I had been planning to save them for later on in the journey when things got tough. Or for when I got bored of the dull and bad tasting rations. Unfortunately, now seemed like a good time to have them. 3*
Unravelling the tray, I carried it towards the already alert Shiara. She stood up on her branch, glaring daggers at me. If looks could kill, I would have been skewered thoroughly. Finally, she snorted before lowering her gaze towards the tray. I smiled in anticipation. A person like her surely couldn’t resist this type of bait. As if to answer my expectations, her eyes widened and lit up as she spotted the muffin and her tongue quietly slipped out as she licked her lips. I could almost see the drool hanging from the edges of her mouth.
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“Here. Some muffins I had been saving.” I didn’t mention anything about an apology. That would only show that I had a guilty conscience and would only serve to emphasise and enlarge the problem at the moment. What sensitive, emotional and kind people like her needed were actions of good will. I lifted the tray. “Do you want one?”
She lightly dropped to the ground, her red hair fluttering and trailing behind her. “Thanks, I’ll take one…. And sorry for before.” She greedily grabbed a muffin before retreating back to the trunk and sitting down. She eyed the muffin, looking almost ashamed to eat it.
I ignored her and approached the sleeping princess. She was everything I could ask for from a friend; rich, courageous, intelligent and loyal. Though her high status may have daunted most, it meant nothing in front of most orphans, including me. She would have just been seen as a fatter lamb. Though she was very intelligent, she was also somewhat naïve. Although I didn’t laugh due to her actions being done in good faith, it was still humorous how she attempted to placate Shiara without realising that it was meaningless. 4*
In order to remain humane, most orphans developed two personalities, one that was hard and one that’s soft. The hard and soft did not mean that they were complete opposites but rather that we had a hard shell which was often used to protect our soft personality which we only showed when we were by ourselves or with people we loved and cared for. Of course, this was just a trend and not a solid fact. Although the difference in personalities varied, it would come as no surprise that the hardier personality would come out after a long flight, and so it would be harder to convince Shiara to let go of her grudge.
“Sarra, wake up! Princess Sarratina.” My throat felt a bit parched from shouting. We really should find some water. The princess groggily woke up, looking around while still half-asleep. Realising her unnatural environment, her face suddenly became startled as she quickly leaned backwards and crazily waved her arms. After she managed to stabilise herself, she noticed me watching and with a slightly flushed face, quickly lowered herself down from the tree to come face to face with me.
“Good morning...evening. Is this muffin for me?” She eyed the muffin hungrily. She must have been starved since her capture and not had anything decent to eat. It almost seemed like she had become a starving wolf eyeing a sleeping lamb.
“Yeah, go for it.”
“Thanks.” As she went to grab it, she noticed the two empty spots. She glanced at Shiara who had quietly started digging into the muffin with her whole face before looking at me while I grabbed the last muffin. “Where did the fourth go?”
“Shouldn’t you know Mrs Princess?” I bit into the muffin. Mhhmmmmm. It tasted great.
“!!! I thought it looked familiar, but it tastes exactly like the muffin I had for breakfast when I visited Frankfurt! Ah…. I see.”
I smiled ambiguously at her and her revelation.
….
We came together after finishing our meal. The sweet aftertaste resided in my mouth, reminding me of a muffin of the past. I glanced at the two of them. Looks like I would need to take initiative again. “Soooo I’m starting this conversation with the basis that we are not going back to loot their camp. You two both agree that it’s too risky right.” The two silently nodded their heads. I pulled out the leather map. “Ok the next issue is how do we get to the capital. Currently we should be here and I have two ideas.” I pointed at our rough location on the map. Somewhere just past the ford to the right. “The first is that we follow the road and avoid the towns. However without a horse, the journey would require about a month’s time and no matter how we stretch our food, we could only end up with food for one and a half weeks. Of course we could buy food with the money we looted, but then that would mean being conspicuous and going into town. We also don’t have enough money to buy a horse-“
“Yeah, we should try to avoid towns. However, can’t I just wait outside of them while you two go inside?”
“No.” Shiara shook her head. “Two dirty kids by themselves drag about as much unwanted attention as you would if you walked down the slums by yourself. Although we could go that route, we would need to handle human complications along with wild ones.”
“Also, this route is too obvious, and the moment the rest of the group after you come back to their camp, which may be quite soon considering that a fireball got shot into the air in the middle of the night, they will probably realise you are heading to the capital or a nearby major city. From there, they only need to wait outside the nearby towns to ambush us. Which brings me to my second option.”
I paused, and looked at both of them to make sure they were paying attention. I stared at them both, confirming that I was ready to trust my past to them. Yes, although they both had their flaws, they weren’t bad choices for friends for life. Besides, fate brought us together. The dramatic pause seemed to increase their tension.
“The other option is that instead of circling around to the capital, we could directly cross through here, the Jungle of Illusions. The journey would be about ten days, barely enough food.” I pointed to the place directly between the capital and us, marked with red crosses on the map. The words “DANGER” and “DO NOT ENTER” were explicitly written multiple times over the area and seemed to stand out.