Light in a Sea of Darkness

Chapter 1- The Beginning

Running, running, running, Jaslyn Latair tore through the woods. The pounding of her feet like drums beating in her head. Her once beautiful pale blue parka and pale blue mukluks were now dirty and torn. Jaslyn's fiery golden hair whipped into her midnight blue eyes. Hard breathing sounded to her right but her twin brother matched her stride for stride. She had always been faster than him, but the older he got, the stronger he became. Even at their young age of eight she thought they were some of the fastest runners in their kingdom of Blancwai.

It was the one time of year that Blancwai was not blanketed in snow. Instead there were patches of grass and the snow was only an inch thick, making the ground muddy. This was the one thing that was going right for the Latair twins. The more snow on the ground the slower they would run.

"Jas! I can't keep running...I...I...need to...stop," wheezed her twin beside her. He had always prefered books over physical activity and read more books than most adults did. Because he read more than exercised, he was scrawny and had little muscle tone. His copper hair was tightly curled and weighed down by mud. His eyes seemed so bright even at the darkest times. They're green with hints of brown and blue around the edges. Like Jaslyn, he was wearing a pale blue parka but he had black mukluks. They were also torn and muddy. It always seemed that he cares about his appearance more than Jaslyn. Nevertheless he was still crown prince.

"Just a bit farther. You can do it," Jaslyn encouraged. "Please, hold on." Jaslyn wasn't winded in the slightest. She chased the hunting dogs, for longer than they had been running so far. Jaslyn began to remember better days when things were peaceful.

The crack of twigs nearby snapped her back to reality. Her twin began to slow his pace as the snapping of sticks got closer. Jaslyn ran a couple more steps before she realized that her twin wasn't following her. Grumpily turned back to get him. She saw to her horror that he was standing in the middle of the woods shaking like a leaf, but she could only hear snapping twigs. Instinct had her in front of him ready to spring at whatever was coming their way.

"Wh-what is it?" he managed to stammer so only she could hear.

"Well how do expect me to know that," she snapped back. "Probably just some woodland creature coming to eat you." Jaslyn liked to tease her twin, but she instantly knew that was the wrong thing to say when he suddenly shifted into a rabbit and fainted.

Groaning, she scooped him up and resumed running at a faster pace now that he wasn't slowing her down.
But even as she listened closely, the snapping twigs still followed at the same pace ever so slowly getting closer. Jaslyn kept running though. She ran and ran with her unconscious bunny brother in her arms. At dusk, she couldn't hear the sticks anymore. She found a little hollow in the roots of the towering trees and snuggled up next to the bunny to keep him warm.

Exhaustion crept over her, and within five minutes, she was asleep. Jaslyn dreamt of an attack on her kingdom, everyone in the castle screaming. Her mother, the queen, telling her to take her brother and run! She dreamt of tireless running through the woods going God knows where, and of a shelter. She dreamt of a white stallion finding her and her brother in a hollow and taking the bunny while he transformed back into a screaming human. His screams sounded so real, so full of fear. She stood up to grab at him but pain pulsed from the back of her head and darkness crept over her.

Jaslyn awoke. She was no longer in the hollow. Instead she was on a horse with her hands in chain. Her twin was laying back on her chest passed out and drooling in his human form. Men surrounded them. They wore expensive cloaks with golden clasps. One of them had a silver chain that looped around his right shoulder and another had a thick braided strand filled with many colors around his left shoulder. Lastly one of them had a golden chain around his right shoulder. Jaslyn's chains were connected to the one with the braided strand and her brother was connected to the one with a silver chain.