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  “How-”

  She cut me off again, grinning. “Is Digitalis present? Can you spot Rhamnus or Brean? Maybe Sage, Maitre or Xania are lurking behind some trees." She waved at our surroundings. "Be my guest, if you need it; make sure they are not here. But you will find that I am not a traitor. My loyalty lies with you and Vervaine, so ultimately, it lies with the Altors." She raised an eyebrow. "If I had wanted to rat you out, I wouldn't have guided you here. I would have let you keep on walking." She gulped. "Straight into the hands of the Steward. Instead-"

  “You brought me to this place.” I nodded. “Away from them.”

  "I believe in peace. I know that by following a certain amount of visions, I can achieve the end of the war with the help of several people. You are one of them." She took my hands in hers and this time I was less reluctant to let her. "You are the one that can keep Datura from handing Zinc's faith over to Xania." She kissed both my palms quickly. “I know I stopped you from doing what it is you came to do, but I have no intention of keeping Solenum out of your reach. I’m just…" She shrugged, smiling as she took a step closer towards me. “Changing your route a teensy bit.” That poked my interest.

  “You’ll bring me to Solenum?” I asked.

  “No.” Her fingers tightened around mine. “But I’m making sure she’s being brought to you.” Exhaling slowly, I sponged up the feeling of home she was letting wash over me. “Once you’ve been reunited, you must run, Cali. It won’t be long before Xania finds out she’s gone and sends his men into the forest to find you.” She looked so worried.

  “Solenum and I will be fine, alright?” I had no idea if we would be, but I felt the need to reassure her nonetheless.

  She grinned. "So far my visions tell me you will be, but love is irrational. Not even my gift can stop me from worrying about you. You will not find your car, and you shall get lost.” She predicted. “I would show you the way back to Altor territory, but I can’t leave. If my mother finds me gone, she will know I was implicated in Solenum’s escape and many more wrong doings will be triggered from that point onwards.” I let out a noise of surprise as she suddenly wrapped her arms around my neck, hugging me tightly against her. “Someone will come for you. I wouldn't allow you to get lost if I didn't know that. You must trust and allow them to guide you out of Immortalis Silva when the time is right.”

  If I had the luxury of options, I'd allow myself to second guess the trust I was feeling towards her. Although I'd just met her, I knew she was telling me the truth. And, even if I did take the time to second guess my trust placed in her, I wouldn't be able to leave the forest now. I was trapped in its labyrinth.

  "Wait for that person. They will find you when the time is right. If you return to Altor territory before that time, peace may never be a possibility for Zinc."

  I carefully hugged her back. "Is everything truly that fragile?"

  "If only you knew." She breathed. "When you are reunited with Solenum, find the flower in one of her pockets. Use it to heal her hands. She is too preoccupied to remember it now." My sister said. “You and Solenum will be fine, Calycanthus. I’m making sure of it.”

  “What about you?” Pulling away from her far enough to be able to look in her face, I smiled back uncertainly. This situation was so incredibly strange, but so far my instincts had not let me down. Why would it now?

  “Take this.” Reaching down, she pulled out a small vial from her dress and then tucked it into my breast pocket. “Maybe I foretold wrong and it will help me.”

  “Okay...” I frowned at her in confusion, but realized I didn’t need to bother asking for an elaboration as she clearly wasn’t going to give it. Patting my cheek, she stepped out of my arms, giving me a small wave before she turned around to leave.

  "Wait!" I called out, feeling panicked. When she did, I chuckled weakly at the situation. "What's your name?"

  "Mallow." Her smile was brilliant. “Everything will turn out fine.” She assured, looking at me over her shoulder before pointing at the large hole in the ground. “Wait for her, she will be here soon.” As Mallow faded between the trees, I could only think of how I would never be able to live my life without her from here on forward. In Lithium Village I had not believed in pre-defined events. But in this moment, meeting my sister, I somehow knew it had been foretold to happen.

  * * * *

  Chapter 17

  Solenum Everhart

  My eyes were heavy and my mind was nearly as numb as my muscles. My belly was grumbling, my mouth dry as I drank only small amounts at a time. I was shivering. When I looked around the room, my vision seemed to go fast, then jump back and redo the route in slow motion. Sometimes things were blurry before I could focus on them properly. My shoes were starting to become uncomfortable around my feet, but I didn't want to take them off as there wouldn't be any space to put them. The things inside my pockets dug into my skin, but I wasn't throwing anything down into the darkness, however tempting it may be.

  "Sol?" Robinia's voice came through the loud speaker. I tilted my head slowly towards the camera, giving him a slow wave.

  "Did you sleep?" I slurred out.

  "You look terrible."

  “Thanks, any girl loves to hear that.”

  "And yes, I slept for about an hour."

  I frowned. "You should have slept longer." And then I yawned, stretching my legs so I could put my feet onto the cables.

  "Drink some more water. Put some on that handkerchief again to dab it on your eyes." I did as he instructed.

  "It felt like you were gone longer than an hour." I stated, kneeling down on the rock to change my position. At this point the skin on my legs was red and bruising; I'd checked a while before.

  "I had to take care of something." He replied vaguely. I'd ask him to elaborate, but I was too tired and my eyes were drooping closed. I really just wanted to sleep. "Mallow came to see me." He paused. "She told me things of the future."

  "Well," I shrugged. "She is Seer."

  "I'm not trying to strike up a conversation with you, Solenum, I'm trying to explain something." Alright, that was a relatively stiff and polite way of telling me to shut up. "Quite a bit of things aren't going as they are supposed to, and in order to help righten the wrongs that have been committed, Mallow suggested I do something to help her with this task." I closed my eyes as I tuned in on his words, a certain calm washing over me.

  "She asked me for a favor, but said that if I didn't want to do it, then I didn't have to."

  That meant that whatever she asked of him was pretty high up on the favor scale. It's good she didn't force him or use his feelings to her advantage.

  "Sacrifices need to be made. I told her I would help." He sighed. "The line between right and wrong is starting to become more focused in my head. I haven't done any good deeds in my life. Although, I take pride when it comes to helping you through this dungeon."

  "I wouldn't have survived without you, Robinia." Sitting up, I looked at the camera, hoping I could convey my gratitude and honesty to him across the virtual imagery. "And not just because you acted as my guide, but because I consider you to be my friend. Although the situation was most definitely tense and sometimes bordering death, you made this hell hole a lot less scary." A beat of silence followed my declaration, leading me to feel as if I'd said something wrong, but before I could ask if he was still there, he spoke.

  "I'm getting you out of here."

  I frowned. "But-"

  "I always knew the way out of the dungeon, Solenum. If I didn't tell you, it's because Xania's hold over me is strong enough to make me a coward and thus making me incapable of doing what is right. I should have given you this sooner, but I couldn't." There was so much sadness in his voice; it felt unnatural to hear.

  "Robinia." I gave him a smile. "I understand. You're forgiven. It wasn't even your fault to begin with. It took me a while, but I realized that you are as much Xania's captive as I am. We-" I laughed softly, shrugging, "We're in this together."
r />   "I can't leave with you. I must remain here and help Mallow."

  "I am not leaving without you." I clipped out, crouching up onto the island, feeling a lot less tired all of a sudden.

  "Yes, you are. Let me be the hero for once, please?"

  Frowning deeply, I tried to tone down the internal battle that was taking place within me. How could I just leave without Robinia? Or Mallow for that matter? Whether Cali knew of his sister or not, I was certain that once he learned of her existence, he wouldn't stand the idea of her being stuck here with the Regius. He wouldn't care about her nature, he wouldn't question whether she saw the difference between right and wrong. Even if she turned out to be tainted by the Blue Bloods, he would want to give her a chance at redeeming herself.

  "But!" Gritting my teeth, I pushed the angry bubble back inside of me. Although I certainly didn't know Robinia as well as I did Cali, I had learned enough of the wise ass extraordinaire to know that once he made a decision, nobody could make him change his mind.

  "I will be okay."

  "You promise?" The exhaustion I was feeling was not only heavy on my body, but my emotions as well. While I did not like to cry, I felt like I wanted to.

  "I promise you that I will end up where I wish to be."

  Gulping, I nodded my head unwillingly. "And Mallow?"

  "She always gets her way."

  Letting out a weak chuckle, I smiled up at the camera. "Okay." I breathed in deeply. "Set me free." I should argue more, refuse to leave without them. But I wanted to get out of here. If I remained, I wouldn’t last much longer.

  "Stand in the middle and you won't fall down." He'd said that exact same thing when I'd first entered this room. "Jump, and the world will turn upside down." He added for a finish. Goosebumps erupted; covering my skin as I peeked past the edge of the island that had been my sanctuary for so many hours.

  "Jump?" I asked uncertainly.

  "Yes. I allowed you to believe the black pit of nothingness led to, well, nothing. That is in fact not true. Jump and-"

  I cut him off. "I trust you, Robinia. If you say that jumping will get me out of here, then I'll do it."

  "Just like that?" His sounded dumbfounded.

  I grinned. "Yes." While I needed to show him I trusted him fully one last time, I also strongly believed it was best if I just didn't know what was down there. I was better at taking action under pressure rather than thinking things over. I was going to 'blurt' my way out of here.

  "It's been a privilege, Solenum. I am honored you see me as one of your friends." He was so formal.

  "I'm going to miss your genius. Be good and take care of yourself." I was trying to steady my breathing, mentally preparing myself for the leap. Turning away from the camera, I fixed my eyes on the black pit below. I'd believed there had been no way out of here. Or at least, no way towards the end I wanted. I hadn't answered Xania's questions, and although that led him to believe he hadn't broken me, in a way, he had. Sitting on this island for the last couple of hours had me thinking that maybe I would never see Cali or Galax again. Panicking had seemed unnecessary. I'd been ready to accept my fate and had worked on coming to terms with the idea that I would never go home. While excitement was building up inside of me now that Robinia showed me a way out, I didn't want to hope too strongly either. Things could still go wrong. I was afraid. I didn’t want to jump off this piece of rock. But, it couldn't hurt to believe and it's not like I had anything to lose.

  "I've always wanted to fly." Robinia murmured.

  I closed my eyes.

  "Maybe someday you will." I answered him before letting gravity do its job, my body falling forward once I gave it permission. I didn't scream, but I did feel scared. The wind was cold and quick along my face and body, my breathing echoing as I fell downwards.

  * * * *

  It was a while before I could get used to the sensation of falling and the nervous butterflies in my stomach slowly faded. Opening my eyes carefully, I tried to take in my surroundings best I could, but with the wind, they teared up pretty quick and so whatever I could capture in the dark was slightly blurry. On the sides, I was able to catch glimpses of what I assumed to be walls. They were brown with an earth type texture and small details sprung to my eye, such as tiny roots sticking out of the sides, becoming longer as I fell deeper underground. There were no sounds except the wind and my own breath and while there was nothing to see ahead of me, I kept my hands forward, bracing myself for some kind of impact. Though it never seemed to come.

  A soft long exhale that I hadn't breathed caught my attention, my eyes darting in every which way to figure out where it had come from. My heartbeat picked up as I heard movement along the walls, and when I looked, I thought I could see something move.

  My eyes widened in fear as a cloud of white smoke appeared below. And as I wondered what it was, I tried to tilt my body up so my feet would connect with it first. The closer I came, the more powerful my fear and I screamed when I fell into the white.

  The breath was knocked out of me as my body was suddenly stopped in its motion and although I didn't fall onto anything, the sudden halt led my stomach to make a nasty somersault. Placing a palm over my mouth, I managed to keep in whatever small amount of food I'd been allowed to eat during my stay in the dungeon.

  I tried to see where I was and my mind was trying to figure out how I was floating. While the ivory cloud had scared me before, now that I was hanging in the middle of it, I felt a slightly eerie quiet, but not dangerous kind of calm. As the white flashed a bright azure, I managed to let go of the fear as curiosity overtook, leading me to frown at the images that shot on and off before me.

  I don't know how, I don't know why and I had no clue as to what, but whatever I was currently floating in was showing me things I couldn't make out at first. They were like photographs, moving from left to right, snapping on and off, most likely telling a story as the things inside the picture were animated in a static kind of fashion. It was all in grey tones, but when a figure appeared, I saw she was a Regius as her heart shone blue. I'd never seen her before. She had short, curly cerulean hair, large eyes that were hooded, as if she were always in deep concentration. While her mouth and face were softly shaped, her body was tall and sharp in its features; elegant, but you could see the authority in her.

  Squinting, I could see that she was running away, and what had me surprised is that she was running from the dogs in the dungeon.

  "What is this?" I whispered, reaching out with one hand to touch the image lightly with the tip of my finger. I retracted my arm and moved my body away as the image suddenly flashed, ending the scene where the woman was running and instead, skipping ahead as I could see her in the exhaustion room now. She looked frightened, the way I had felt when I'd been there, but the difference from me was she didn't look lost, because the moment the ground had found its way into the wall she got up onto her feet, looking down into the black pit of nothingness with determination rather than panic. She was clearly aware she had to jump down. Who was she?

  "Why are you showing me this?" I asked the cloud, wondering if it was even something with a voice and an opinion. The air around me became colder and started flowing harshly. Crossing my arms before my face, I squeezed my eyes shut and let out a high pitched scream as whatever had kept me floating, let go. My heart skipped a beat at the sudden motion, falling sensations returning to the pit of my stomach as I tried to steady my breathing. I opened my eyes to see the ivory cloud.

  "What?!" Instead of falling into the cloud as I expected, I was moving away from it. Was I falling upwards? How was that even possible?! I actually couldn't even be sure if I was falling. Maybe I'd been launched upwards? That would make more sense considering gravity. But it's not like I'd felt something push or shoot me up into the air.

  The cloud became smaller and smaller, until everything around me seemed to stop. Coughing as the breath was knocked out of me once more, I tried curling up in a ball so I could hug my stomach. I felt
faint, and I knew that if one of these sudden stops happened one more time, then I wouldn't be able to keep the food down.

  "Stop this!" I shouted, the frustration I'd been able to keep hidden away this entire time finally bursting out. Glaring at the air around me, I tried to convey to whatever it was that was making this happen, I was unhappy. I waited for a response, needing some kind of sign that told me there was actually something that lived inside of this place. But before I could tell it to show its presence, gravity seemed to turn back on, and unlike before, this time I was sure I was falling as I was going back in the direction of the ivory cloud.

  "Help!" I shouted, eyes wide as I realized whatever had been helping me on my way before, was no longer here. Was I to return to the dungeon?! Knowing that this time I wouldn't be able to avoid a deadly impact, I braced my arms before me, wondering what would it be like to die.

  Before I could search for the answer, something caught a hold of my ankle, my breathing hitching as I was suddenly hanging upside down. Tilting my head in a way so I could look at whatever was making sure I wouldn't fall back down into the ivory cloud, and thus, the dungeon next, I tried to control all the emotions that were flowing through me. Was that...

  "A tree root?" My voice was dumbfounded as I stared at the thin, but strong, branch that had twirled itself around my leg. The other end disappeared into the side of the wall. I wasn't close to it though, the root had somehow stuck itself out to the middle and then caught me along the way.

  Dirt crumbled from it and along my body, making me blink my eyes as some sand landed there while it twirled itself more firmly around my leg. I'd have been scared, but I suppose that at this point everything was so surreal, I couldn't really wrap my head around anything anymore.