The Stone Of Death ☑️

V. Escaping

The next day, well I'm not sure if it was the next day but I woke up and felt ready to go back to the green woods. Now the issue was to think about how to make my way back there? I didn't know if there was an alternate path besides that long, red colored waterfall from which I fell.

Theo was sitting drinking something. I guess it was coffee or hot chocolate.

"Hello, good... evening?", I greeted him.

"Good afternoon, Miss Sarah. I guess it's afternoon in the Green Woods. If you want to leave, I suggest that you leave now, before it gets dark there", said Theo.

I nodded and walked towards the door, opening it.

"OK... I'll be back as soon as I retrieve the Stone", I said.

"See you, Sarah, and be careful out there", he said.

"I will. See you, Theo", I sighed and left.

I was running through the dark forest. This time was colder than in the past hours, and I was hugging myself while trembling. When I arrived where Xenon and his men had died, they weren't there anymore.

"There she is!", I heard a monstrous voice. I turned to see those ugly men with bows.

I started running, but they didn't pursue me, they were shooting arrows at me instead. I crouched, rolled, jumped, I did everything I could to dodge those arrows. When I was far away, I heard: "She's escaping, you fools!". They sounded angry.

I jumped over a big rock but then I tripped over a tree branch. I stood up quickly because they were now pursuing me. Then I heard they fell to the ground. They probably tripped over the same branch. I finally arrived to the red river. I jumped into the... blood, and started removing some rocks from the ground with all my strength, hoping that there could be an exit.

When I removed a big rock, a big hole was revealed and all the blood flowed into it. The current took me through the little tunnel quickly, it made me hit and scrape against other rocks. Sometimes, I screamed in terror, because it was too fast, the tunnel quite small and I wasn't sure where it was going to take me.

My whole body slammed against a wall, breaking it. I flew some meters more until resting on the ground, wet with blood; some of it was from the river, some of it was from my wounds. I was in an open space, the sky black with stars, and then I saw a man looking at me. Was I in the dark woods again?

"Hey! How did you get here?", he said resting my head on his arms. Then he turned to see the opening where I came from. "Oh no. Soldiers! Block that path!", he ordered. The air felt fresh and lighter here. I was in the yellow woods. I sighed of relief and stood up.

"Sorry. I just escaped from the black woods", I told the soldier.

"What?! But how?", he said surprised. "And why did you go there?".

The other soldiers had started to work to block the path. My friends from the green woods approached me.

"Sarah, you're alive! We were so worried", said a woman.

"What happened?", said a child.

"Xenon, my brother, is dead", I told them. They all gasped. "But there's still one way to make everything go back to normal. I'm going to the green woods for the Stone of Death".

Some of them didn't know what I was talking about, but the soldier said: "Oh my God. Do you know where it is?".

I looked at him. "Yes. A friend from the black woods told me the location, and I'll be heading there right now".

"But the green woods are destroyed. Some of the Red Fairy's creatures must be lurking over there", said a guy.

"I can defend myself. With this", I said and showed them the sword.

"Wow, who gave it to you?", said the child.

"It's Xenon's... I better leave now before the Red Fairy can kill more people", I said.

They wished me good luck, I told them goodbye, and I left.