Four

Two days passed, and Nathaniel was still angry with Donatello for knocking him out and taking him away from the confrontation. For the sake of breaking the horrible atmosphere, I asked George where we were going, and he told me to check the map. I opened it and it was moving. As in the map was getting smaller with every step the horse took. We stopped and so did the map. We were puzzled by what was happening, but decided to continue along. 

    We set up camp in the woods outside the town the map led to and decided that Donatello and Joan should go and see if he was really there, while we stayed. We figured that no one would notice him with his long hair and disheveled beard. They were back to acting like a married couple as they left for camp. They usually shifted between the newlywed phase and old couple rather frequently. It was quite entertaining and helped soften the atmosphere often. They returned at dusk and told us what they had found. 

    Apparently they followed the map and met an old lady who knew of Merlin’s whereabouts. They wanted to ask her where, but she rushed them off and told them to go back the next day and warned them about the curfew that had been imposed. As they were leaving, a few soldiers passed them and intentionally bumped into Joan, which almost started a fight between them and her, but Donatello resolved the conflict before it got out of hand and they came back to camp.

We were confused as to why the map led us to a person who knew where Merlin was and not him directly, but there wasn’t anything we could do about it. At dinner, Donatello pointed out how George was like our overprotective mother, and that started an argument amongst the guys. Meanwhile, Joan asked me about my nightmares and suggested that we ask the old lady the next day, which I hesitantly agreed to.

After dinner, everyone except George went to bed, since he was on watch duty, and that night I was back in that darkness, but the voice I heard wasn’t my parent’s voices. It was someone else.

*****

    I followed the voice and as I did, the scenery around me changed from darkness to an endless white plain with nothing but white. I saw a small corgi in the distance and followed the voice to it. When I got to the corgi, the voice disappeared and the corgi turned to leave. I didn’t know what to do, so I just followed the pup. As I did, my surroundings turned into a forest.

    In a distance, I saw a few guards and hid instinctively, but I saw them put a girl in a shed. When they left, I went to free her, but my hand went through the door. I walked through the door and tried to get her attention, but she couldn’t see me. Perplexed, I turned and left to find the dog once more, but the outside was back to the previous white, and the shed was gone, too. 

    I then saw a woman about my size, but older than I was. She asked me if I wanted to help the girl and I told her that I did. She told me that I couldn’t help anyone if I can’t even help myself. I was told that my parents were behind me and all I needed to do was look at them. I tried to make every excuse possible, but she saw through all of them and  told me that it’s okay to be scared. 

    I turned around and faced my parents. I could only barely see their corpses through my tears, but that acceptance hit me so hard that I fell to my feet. As I cried, the woman crouched beside me and comforted me. She was proud of me for coming to terms with my parents being gone. She mumbled something about her own death, but Nathaniel woke me before I could ask her. 

    He was worried because I was crying in my sleep, but the only thing I could say to him was that they’re gone. Our parents are gone and we never even got to say goodbye. That made him cry as well, and we fell asleep in each other’s arms, tired from crying. Joan teased us about it, which sweetened the mood a bit. As we were following the map into the town, I told them about the girl in my dream.

*****

    At first everyone brushed it off as a bad dream, most likely induced by the trauma I had experienced in the last month and a half. However, I didn’t think it was “just a dream.” I thought it was a sign of some sort, but I didn’t know what to do about it in the first place. We arrived at the old lady’s (Sage) shop and found quite discouraging news. As fate would have it, Merlin last visited the town decades before I was born.

    George and the others turned to leave, but I asked Sage about any young girls going missing, and she confirmed it. I asked for a description of the girl, and it matched the girl in my dream perfectly. She asked me if I had known anything about her disappearance, but Joan got me out of the conversation before I could incriminate myself. 

    At camp, I told George that we should stay one more day, so that I could find and save the girl, but he was hellbent on getting us back to Ceres as soon as possible. He said that the map led us to a dead end, but Nathaniel jumped in and mentioned that finding the world’s most powerful sorcerer was never meant to be easy, and that’s when we struck a bargain. 

    If I could find the girl in one day, then we’d help her and then leave quickly for Ceres and never have to worry about her anymore. I accepted his challenge and did the only thing I could do: sleep. I fell back into my dream world and followed the little pup to a large house instead of a shed. We passed guards and made our way to a basement, and instead of one girl, there was a whole room of them.

    I wanted to tell them that help was on the way, but I couldn’t even talk to them and left. I sat down and tried to figure out what I could do to convince them that help was on the way. As I was thinking, the corgi gave me a rock and instead of falling through, it stayed in my hand. I managed to write the girls a message telling them I was going to help them as well as a message outside to show to George. 

    I took them to the large house from my dream and showed them my message, and none of them were pleased. They knew how hard it’d be to help the girls escape their captor, but we all love a good challenge.