The Fight for Nemazania Chapters 2 & 3

Elgrada sat in her tent watching the festivities in the distance below her. The village centre was full of people, their bonfire burning high above the small rooftops and the sound of laughter filled the air for miles around. As the villagers danced and sang the rebels Princess sat silently waiting.

“Princess Elgrada. I have your team here to see you.” Nostarion said as he approached. He was followed by her friends Fayne, Escariet, Vanya and Salvador. Nostarion said goodnight before leaving and retiring to his own tent for the evening.

Vanya was astonished by the size of the Princesses tent. There was a curtain separating one half into a bedroom and the other into living space where meetings were held, without Elgrada having to make her bed every morning.

“We’re going into the forest tomorrow.” Vanya sighed as she took a seat on one of the large pillows that lay all around the edges of the tent walls, “Nostarion has given us a map with route marked in blue.”

Elgrada looked at the map. The route was clearly marked as Vanya had said but the Princess was still nervous about the whole mission.

“I don’t like this idea.” Escariet whispered quietly, in her perilously quiet voice, “There are only five of us. What if we get ambushed?”

Elgrada felt the same. She didn’t think the group was big enough to deal with large attack.

“I agree with what Nostarion said.” Salvador replied. He took a seat across from Escariet who was fiddling with her hair anxiously, “If we’re just a small group of teenagers wandering through the forest no one will suspect us of anything. If there were more of us we would just be drawing attention to ourselves.”

“Salvador’s right. Everyone’s suspicious of large groups of young people, especially those who live in the forest. The smaller the group is, the less attention we’ll receive.” Fayne added, seeing that Elgrada felt the same as Escariet, “If there is any trouble we can all defend ourselves and if Salvador forgets to bring his weapons, again, we’ll help each other.”

“That only happened once!” Salvador grumbled from the corner.

“Yes I know we can. I’m just worried about what will happen when we reach Nildale. You can see it from here if you look out over the trees.” Elgrada said, pulling back the door flap. They all looked out to where she pointed. Far off in the distance the Kings’ castle was barely visible against the darkening sky but still sent a shiver down the spines of those who looked in its’ direction and could only make out the dark silhouette on the horizon.

“It’s not very nice. When you’re Queen you’ll have to live there you know.” Salvador said, skulking back to his pillow, “Will you leave it all scary looking or are you thinking about decorating?”

Vanya and Escariet smiled. Salvador always managed to lighten the mood and make everyone feel better with his silly jokes and observations.

“I’m going to decorate.” Elgrada replied, “The way it looks now makes it seem like the place is emanating evil.”

“Well technically it is. The closer you get, the nastier Nemazania becomes.” Fayne had a good point. The closer to Nildale the people were less friendly and the grass was dull and the trees grey. Unlike in Varmount where pixies, fairies and unicorns inhabited the enchanted forests of the region, the biggest of which, the Aravian enchanted forest, they would venture through in the next few days. Nildale, on the other hand, had goblins and dragons and many other dangerous creatures.

“We leave in the morning Elgrada. I’ll wake you if you’re still asleep.” Vanya said as she got up to leave. Escariet, Salvador and Fayne walked out after her. They all said goodnight to each other as they headed in opposite directions to their own tents. Salvador turned back and called to Elgrada, “Don’t worry about the small group thing. The worst thing that could possibly happen is that we’ll get attacked by an army of little fluffy rabbits who’ll lick us to death.”

Elgrada woke up early the next morning. She tried and tried but could not get back to sleep. It was a few hours until they started out on their trek but she was wide awake. There was no way she was going to get any more sleep until late that night after a long day of trudging between the trees of the forest. Since she was up she decided to pack what she needed for the journey now to get it out of the way. Then, when she was ready to leave, she sat outside on a boulder overlooking the small village of Eravada below the ridge where they had set up camp the day before.

The small houses were quiet after the nights merriment that had lasted long into the small hours of the morning. As the huge bonfire finally burnt out Elgrada surveyed the surrounding area while she waited: Bluebells and snowdrops grew around most of the little buildings. Many different kinds of bright, colourful flowers also stood beside the large rocks that were thrown all around like a wall. The grass and the leaves and the pine needles all glistened in the dim morning light making everything look magical.

Perhaps that’s why it’s called the Aravian enchanted forest, Elgrada thought as the first birds of the day flew out of their nests and launched to sing their cheerful song, That and the fact loads of mysterious, magical creatures live there.

Eventually the sun began to ascend slowly to it’s position overhead. There were no clouds in the sky except those storm clouds far off in the distance over Nildale. Elgrada watched the sun rise behind the forbidding castle. She noted the differences in the weather and landscape between here and there. The closer to the castle, the more dismal and bleak both the land and weather became. She had been told that the Kings evil oozed out his castle and into all of Nemazania but she had never seen it this clearly before. The King must be angry, she thought.

“You’re up early.” Salvador said, making her jump, “And jumping too. At this hour! Well I’m going to wake Fayne now. You want to come? It’ll be fun.”

Fayne was already awake. Salvador was disappointed. He had been looking forward to waking everyone up because it would annoy them that he had ‘interrupted their beauty sleep’.

“You’re determined to wake all of us up when we’re all ready to leave an you haven’t even started to think about packing.” Fayne complained as she pushed Salvador in the direction of his tent. Vanya and Escariet were both sitting on their bags at the side of the dirt track also waiting to go. The girls watched to make sure he was going the right way when he tripped over the branch he was kicking and fell on his face. They laughed hysterically and woke up the entire the rebel army.

When Salvador finally turned the corner again they burst out laughing again. Vanya started first and the others joined in. She had one of those laughs that makes everyone around join in.

“Okay. I had a lovely trip thanks. Can you just get over it now so we can go.” he said. The girls followed behind him as they walked to Nostarions tent, continuing their giggling.

Nostarion gave them the food supplies they need for the mission so the five of them could get a head start.

“I didn’t expect you girls to be up this early.” Nostarion said as he handed out the supplies, “That was why the suggested time was after eight. You have everything you need?”

“We were up and packed, completely prepared for the off. It was Salvador who held us back.” Fayne giggled. This made everyone laugh again.

“Oh, get over it already!” Salvador groaned, “Nostarion what happened was I hadn’t packed so I was going to get everything and I fell over. Now they won’t stop laughing. Make them shut up!”

Nostarion smiled and once the girls had calmed down they said goodbye.

“Be careful all of you. Don’t talk to strangers and remember we’re counting on you.” Nostarion said as they headed off down the sloping path. They waved to him and the rest of the rebels who stood on the ridge as they passed through Eravada. When they came to the edge of the forest they paused for a moment so Escariet could fix her shoes and Salvador could check he had picked up the extra arrow, which he had. Then they began their journey to Nildale as they walked between the first trees of the forest.