Guardian: Protectors of Light (41 page)

James nodded. “In this
situation, we have to take care of each other if we want to make it
through,” he replied. “We need each other.”

Timothy gave him an
agreeing nod. “That’s the spirit.”

Thomas looked up at the
sky. “It’s almost dawn,” he said. “Are we nearly there
yet?”

Timothy nodded at him.
“Yes, we are,” he said. “We can travel a little more through the
day to make it through to the end of this Realm completely, so we
can rest safely.”

Behind them, Bella let
out an agonized sigh.

“
Can we just
slow it down for a bit, then? Please?” she muttered.

“
Bella,”
James said, “Samira needs help. Something to drink. And
quick.”

“
I know,”
Bella said, “but we’ve been walking for hours now! And I thought-
maybe a little rest wouldn’t harm anyone...”

“
Don’t worry,
Bella,” Timothy said. I promise you we’ll be there within less than
two hours, so there’s plenty of time to sleep left when we get
there. We don’t need to cross the ravine to the Land of Void
straight away.”

Bella grunted silently.
“All right,” she muttered. “Two hours. No more.”

Most of the remaining
travel-time, nothing happened. But then, suddenly...

“
Stop,” a
female voice hissed. “Go no further.”

The gang turned around
simultaneously, to stand eye-in-eye with a womanly
figure.

Except for the fact that
beside her shape resembling a human, nothing about her actually
truly was human.

Her skin looked like it
was made from molten lava. A darker, orange pattern covered some
parts. Her glowing skin lit up everything around her in an orange
glow.

Her hair was a pack of
real flames, which blazed around hear head. Her eyes were red, with
pupils like a cat’s.

“
Go no
further,” she repeated. Even her voice sounded like the blazing of
flames.

“
Um?” Antonio
said. “Who are you to decide whether we can go further or not?” He
clearly wasn’t too fond of the Fire Sprite standing in front of
him.

“
My young
Guardian,” the Sprite hissed, yet not sounding hostile. “My name
should matter not to you. But the warning I give you
should.”

Antonio’s expression
didn’t change, yet there was the slightest bit of interest in his
voice. “And that is?” he said.

“
The Master
waits. He has a terrible fate set out for all of you, young
Guardians... And at the end of your journey, one of you shall wear
his Mark.”

She turned around slowly,
to show a dark mark, which had been scorched onto her
back.

“
Beware of
this Mark. Wear it too long, and you shall obey his every word.
Your will shall be lost.”

“
And then
what about you?” Antonio said.

“
I don’t want
a young boy to suffer,” the Sprite said, as she turned to face the
Guardians again. “H shall lose his every free will to the Master’s
Word.”

James and Thomas shortly
exchanged looks with each other. Who was she talking about? Who
would wear the Master’s Mark?”

But the Sprite hadn’t
finished speaking just yet.

“
I warn thee,
Guardians. Go no further. Go home, somewhere safe. You’ll live
longer.”

She closed her fiery red
eyes shortly before speaking again.

“
Yet, if you
decide to ignore my warning, and decide to enter the Land of Void
anyway, I must advise you one last thing. Tread carefully,
Guardians. Make no faulty step, or the Prophecy shall come
true.

Only you can change your
own fate.”

And suddenly, like she’d
never even been there, the mysterious Fire Sprite was gone.
Vanished into thin air.

“
Freaky,”
Antonio said. “Just freaky. It’s getting crazier around here every
minute we stay... What does she think we are? Stupid?”

He flung his arms into
the air, while, without even noticing he was, raising his
voice.

“
Does she
really think we’re just going to sit here and patiently wait for
the Master to find us? To hell with her prophecy!”

Thomas nodded. “Well
said, Antonio. We’ll go on, no matter what it takes.”

“
But Thomas,
aren’t you worried?” Samira said, between two dry coughs. “That
Sprite seemed pretty serious about everything.”

Thomas shook his head.
“It’s probably just another test, Samira. Don’t worry.”

Timothy nodded. “We shall
continue, yet more careful than before,” he said. “Just in case.
Does that make you feel better, Samira?”

“
Yes,
Timothy,” Samira said, while smiling at the blond
nineteen-year-old. “It does. Thank you.”

And so, despite the Fire
Sprite’s warning, the Bond of Light continued on their journey
through the Edge. On their way to battle the Master.

Five weeks ago, they
might have been scared off by words like the Sprite’s. But they’d
been through worse now; they weren’t scared away that easily
anymore. Whatever kind of danger awaited them in the Land of Void,
they’d have to face it and go through with it.

Just because they
could.

At long last, the final
kilometre came in sight, and the Bond of Light was as good as
safe.

The final kilometres had
consisted of mostly chitchat and tiny arguments between Samira and
Thomas.

Samira kept insisting
that she could walk herself, while Thomas refused to put her
down.

The others made jokes
about how the two could have been an old married couple, to which
the two teenagers both responded rather nervously.

Of course certain things
were funnier to the others than they were to Timothy, since he
didn’t know about the situation between Thomas and Samira, but it
seemed as if he tried his best to understand the underlying meaning
of their jokes – or he just simply laughed along.

So far, this place really
hadn’t been that dangerous, even after all Timothy had told them
about it. As long as they didn’t run and stayed on steady ground,
not getting near the lava, everything was fine.

Or was that part of the
test? Was the Master just leaving them be to set up a trap in the
Land of Void to have them caught off guard, making them easy to
catch? Unprepared and unaware?

Perhaps. Perhaps that
Fire Sprite had been right after all. Perhaps they really were in
trouble.

Nobody of the teenagers
had really been thinking about the Fire Sprite’s warning,
though.

Not that they didn’t
care, but they didn’t truly trust the Sprite. After all, she served
the Master. Hence the mark on her back.

Perhaps she’d set up a
trap for them, hoping they’d get scared and go back – and run
straight into it.

Luckily, they were
smarter than that.

Were they?

The sun had started to
rise, colouring the few visible parts of sky deep red underneath
the pack of grey clouds.

“
It looks
like a red sky,” Timothy said. “It might be hard to see, but I see
some red here and there... That means it might rain
soon.”

“
Thank God,”
Samira said. The others also let out sighs of relief as
well.

“
Finally, at
long last, tomorrow shall be kinder... Until we get to the Land of
Void, that is,” Antonio said. “Finally some rain.”

“
Not exactly
“some” rain,” Timothy said. “When it rains around here, it rains
heavily. Short showers, but heavy showers.”

“
Only makes
it better,” James said. “We’re sweating waterfalls
here.”

Thomas nodded. “The more
rain falls, the cooler we’ll be,” he said, while smirking at
James.

James
understood the joke Thomas had made and smirked back. “Pun
intended.”

And Timothy as right.
Within a matter of minutes, the first thick drops of cold rain
started to fall.

“
Everyone!
Take out your water sacks to fill them!” James shouted at the
others, which was exactly what they did. The rain was completely
clean, so it was completely safe to drink – if the Master didn’t
have the power to do something to it, that is.

The sacs filled
themselves quicker than the teenagers could drink. Never they had
felt so thankful for a fresh shower.

“
Finally,”
Samira cheered, while she wiped the wet strands of hair out of her
face. “I felt like I was about to lose it!”

While continuing to enjoy
the rainfall, the teenagers ran over the freshly-set islands which
used to be lava before the rainfall toward the end of the Realm,
where a couple of small grasses started to grow from the
ground.

“
It has
become obviously cooler here,” Bella said, while her hair lay flat
on her head; since she turned fifteen she usually straightened it,
but with the given circumstances, it had started to frizz and get
curly again ever since they arrived in Lunaria.

“
I’d say that
this is the perfect moment to catch some sleep,” Timothy said.
“This shower should be over shortly.”

And, of course, indeed it
was. As soon as the rain had stopped falling, the teenagers sought
a safe spot in the grass and fell asleep underneath their
capes.

It wasn’t completely safe
to just fall asleep like that, but the six teenagers were so tired,
that they fell asleep without even thinking about it.

*

“
Has that
Sprite done any damage, Sabrina?”

“
No, Master.
They didn’t believe her. You can stop worrying about
her.”

“
Sabrina, you
know this is your fault, don’t you? You’re supposed to keep those
pesky creatures in control! If they’re all going to become
tell-tales like that particular sprite, those unknowing teens will
ruin everything we’ve worked for! And I believe you understand that
we mustn’t let that happen.”

“
Y-yes,
Master, I understand, but-” Sabrina was starting to get a little
nervous. Her master had never been this angry with her. “No
disrespect, Master,” she said, “but why are you so focused on them?
I don’t understand...”

“
Some
knowledge is not required to perform a task, Sabrina. I gave you a
task, didn’t I?”

“
Yes,
Master...”

“
So then you
just do what you’re told. It can’t get easier than that. This
Prophecy... We must prevent it from happening. And the only way to
do so, is by taking them down one by one.”

*

James started as he woke
up from his dream. What had just happened?

Had he-? He wasn’t
exactly sure what he’d seen. Had it really been him? The Master
himself?

James had no idea what
the Master truly looked like, after all, so he didn’t really know
if it had been him. But that girl had kept calling him “Master...”
So he was pretty sure that it’d been him.

Take them down one by
one... Did that mean the Master wanted to separate them? Or wasn’t
he talking about the Guardians? But if he wasn’t, then who was he
talking about then?

Somewhere far
way from there

“
Gabriel!
Gabriel!”

Two girl’s feet dressed
in boots rushed across the forest ground. The little girl was
carrying a crossbow, since entering the Twilight Forest unarmed
wasn’t the best idea. A midnight blue cloak fluttered behind her,
while she wore the hood over her head.

She stopped at Gabriel’s
tree house and looked up while shouting his name
repeatedly.

“
Gabriel!
You’ve got to come! And quick!”

A hatchet in the floor
close to the tree trunk opened and Gabriel’s head appeared in the
hole. “Rikki?” he said.

“
What’s going
on?”

Rikki shook her head. “No
time to explain! It’s time, brother! Get your bow and arrow! And
don’t forget Madeleine’s sword!”

Gabriel nodded and went
off to get his weaponry. He came back shortly after, also dressed
in a cloak. Except while Rikki’s cloak was dark blue, Gabriel’s had
a golden colour.

“
Where’s
Madeleine?” he asked, waving the sword around in his left hand. He
carried a silver bow and arrow carrier over his
shoulder.

“
Where’s
Madeleine?” he asked.

“
I’m here,”
Madeleine said, as she approached the brother-sister-duo. Her usual
green robe had been replaced by a dark green cloak.

Gabriel noticed her hair
had been braided up as she took the sword from him.

“
What’s the
matter, Madeleine? Is it finally happening?”

Madeleine nodded. “She’s
back. And she’s made some serious threats against us. We’ll have to
find her and take her down.”

“
And you’re
letting her go?” Gabriel said, while pointing at his little
sister.

“
Come on,
Gabriel! I can take care of myself!” Rikki objected.