Sunstones and Children
Getting back to her lair, her piece of heaven, oasis normally out of eyesight, the Crow brought with her Kai. Arthur was joyous as soon as he saw the two come in. This meant victory on their part!
However, soon after, the two had entered a discussion that he wasn't a part of. Arthur was annoyed, he would make Kai pay later. But for now, he closed in on them on his tip-toes, listening in as he knelt behind a small bush.
"Yeah, sure!" Arthur heard Kai say. "I am sure you are real motherly!"
"I am giving you a choice," the Crow said. Her beautiful voice was unmistakable. "I'll help you if you convince him."
"He is a child! What do you want him for?!" Kai flipped out as he took a few more steps back. He was afraid of the Crow, but he wouldn't just give away the kid who saved him to a witch. Who knew what she would do?
"He is like me, I will train him," the Crow replied with a soothing tone. If worse came to worse, she would still destroy the skeleton and take the kid, but she could feel the kid's fascination with the skeleton. If she did that, the kid may turn away from her forever.
"Or eat him, for all I know!" Kai interjected.
"For you, that child is a burden!" the Crow responded harshly. Let alone getting into an argument, she hadn't spoken so many words for years. Her patience was running out.
Arthur tried hard to hold back his tears, whilst being so happy to have met such nice people. But now, the nice lady he had just met wanted to eat him and she said he was hurting his Big Bro Skelly. Skelly was his since he freed him!
Before waiting any further, he tip-toed back out and left the nice oasis they had found. Arthur felt betrayed once again, but he yet wore another smile, not thinking about what he had just heard. His mother's last words rang in his ear,
"You have no soul," she had said. "You will always be alone."
But Arthur smiled anyway. No one had ever stood by him, and anyone close to him had died until now. He wore a large grin on his face as he walked through the woods.
None of the creatures really tried Kai as a hulking skeleton, but the forest was not a safe place for a child. Already hidden behind trees and bushes was a wolf-like creature salivating in hunger. It had found its prey.
If Kai could see this beast, he would describe it as a mix between a wolf and a deer. Its face resembled more like a wolf, but its legs were nimble like a deer's. It could manoeuvre and run very rapidly. It had no antlers, but its head was hard enough to stop regular weapons in their tracks.
It was called a "forest spirit". More senior of these creatures could have intelligence rivalling that of sentient species, but this one seemed younger, it was a creature who acted on instinct. It closed in on Arthur who had been silently crying with a big smile on his face.
The forest spirit, finally figuring it was close enough, got its claws out and lunged from behind the bushes. Arthur only had time to turn his face to take a glance before the beast, a forest spirit, was inches from his face.
…
"Are the Elite Guard ready?" a commanding voice resounded in the halls, demanding a status report from a puny-looking guard. The voice demanding the report very distinctly belonged to Gort, City Lord Lloyd's number one.
"Yes, sire, we await your command."
"Tell Azazel to find me."
"At once," the puny-looking man replied yet again in a submissive manner. It seemed he was scared this giant of a man would be displeased and crush him.
Gort and the man spoke in a very desolate part of a torn-down castle that they had stumbled upon at the outskirts of the forest Kai was in. It seems they weren't far behind.
After sending the man away, Gort proceeded to a well-lit room and see his liege, Lloyd and Alexandra were in a discussion yet again. It was about the same damn topic, too! That dastardly skeleton!
Alexandra's kind voice was the first thing Gort heard. But seeing her as a spoiled child, Gort was almost annoyed at the sound of her voice that could comfort thousand. Her beauty rivalling the treasures of rooted empires was nothing to him. And her insolence albeit being utterly weak repulsed him greatly.
"Father, I still think this was too much of a burden on Kai. He may look like a monster, but he is a gentle soul. I can tell," Alexandra tried to reason with her father.
Lloyd was tapping on the armrest of the throne he was sitting on with his fingers as he listened. He wanted his daughter to be at ease, but he couldn't even convince her to stay behind. He had taken down many influential figures that looked down on him in the past, but it was hard for him to win an argument against his daughter without breaking her heart.
"Father! He will get himself killed!"
"So be it!" Lloyd roared, his voice almost seeping outside of the castle, slightly echoing in the pitch-black darkness. "I will do all I can to save him!"
Alexandra didn't think her father's words were genuine and true to his heart, but pressing any further would only serve to make him mad. Seeing Gort patiently waiting for a chance to speak, she left for her designated room that was prepared and left the two to speak.
As she rushed to her room, she watched the thousands of glowing rocks on the ceiling of the underground, thanking Gods that they didn't need to live in absolute darkness. The glowing rocks were dimming, which meant that the sun had gone down above the ground, as well.
There were glowing rocks in the underground, or as the kingdoms above called it, in the "dungeon". These rocks were called "sunstones".
These sunstones were lodged at the ceiling of the "dungeon", that absorbed and reflected the heat and the light from the sun. However, the sunshine that one could experience inside the forest was wholly different from what one experienced from these rocks. It felt real. That's why the forest was called the "Forest of the Blessed".
Not only it was a magical place, but also very dangerous. Very few nobles would actually pass through without an army guarding them. But Alexandra looked forward to entering it as she had done it once before, and would experience it with a big smile on her face.