Athena's descendants and the Jewel of Barthimia (Greek mythology)

Chapter 3 - In the clutch of Jordan's claws.

Chapter 3 - In the clutch of Jordan's claws.

He let curiosity take hold of him and trotted off towards the woods. When he got closer he heard some giggling behind one of the closest trees. He could hear some small, squeaky voices chattering,

“Woble, they’ll chuck us out if you keep doing that.”

“Yeah, we need them to trust us, remember.”

“They need to trust us, because you know what we must do.”

“Shh there’s someone coming,” one of the voices said, “shh.”

Jay edged closer very slowly, but stopped a foot away. He stretched out his hand towards the leafy branch and then slung it backwards to find four, small, pointy-eared dwarfs.

“Aaah,” screamed one the dwarfs. “Please don’t hurt us, we only poor liccle elves, we very sorry for knocking your door Mr., eh?”

“It’s Jay, and you are elves, real elves?” Jay said, taken aback by the sight.

“Sorry, so sorry Mr. Jay, we did not mean to…”

“Jay, what are you doing going into the trees, JAY!” Hollie screamed, stopping the elf mid-sentence.

“We must go now, we very sorry.” The elves ran back into the woods with their little, bare and hairy feet and their innocent little faces with bulging black eyes. Jay kept his stare as they disappeared in the rustling, he barely had chance to decipher their peculiar features.

Jay closed his eyes, trying to divulge into this new world, keeping his eyes open and arms open to anything – except at the moment his eyes were closed. A shake of the head and another smile as he let go of the tree branch, letting it swing back into position.

“Jay! I didn’t know where you were,” Hollie panted as her jog decreased to a walk. She was now face to face with Jay, fully flustered and rosy cheeked.

“There were some elves. I think they knocked on my door. I tried to see who it was and when I found them they were really scared,” said Jay, feeling sorry for the wide-eyed little creatures.

“Oh, don’t worry about them. They’re just a pain in the backside. None of us really trust them, as they are very mischievous. Not trustworthy what-so-ever!” Hollie said meaningfully as if she’d had her experiences.

“Oh, eh where are we going?”

“We are meeting at the column. I can introduce you to the rest of the camp then,” Hollie explained as they began to walk back to the meeting area, which they saw on the way to the dorms.

Jay lost himself in a casual stroll with Hollie, staring at the grass beneath his feet. Everything seemed so alive in his life; all of a sudden he felt open and energetic to do something, anything! And everything he saw felt like an adventure. Even now the evergreen blades of desperate fingers bowed to his shoes as he marched with pride along the battlefield, but really, he was simply walking…in the grass.

“By the way, don’t be going into the woods by yourself,” she warned.

“Why?” Jay asked as they got close to the river again, shaking away from yet another one of his hourly dazes.

“Because there are creatures in there. They won’t harm you, but they might do something or muck around with you. See they’ve done this before; the satyrs I mean.”