Yunara tried to imagine why Cadri would come to her with such urgency this morning when she summoned her to the garden.
She found her sitting on a bench beside a rose bush, looking more nervous than she'd ever seen her. Cadri's hands writhed in her lap anxiously, her eyes staring blanking at the ground. Even as Yunara approached, she didn't seem to notice her.
She had to clear her throat for Cadri to finally turn her head in surprise.
"Oh, Yunara. I didn't even see you standing there. Please, sit down."
"What happened?" Yunara asked.
"It's Renen. I think he's in trouble."
"In what kind of trouble?" she asked in bewilderment. Could this have to do with the concerns she expressed the night before? She knew that Cadri worried for her uncle's influence on Renen, but she didn't think he was capable of getting into anything dangerous.
"Something's wrong, Yunara. I just know it. He's gone too far."
"What are you talking about?"
Cadri fixed on her with watery chocolate eyes. "Take this." She reached for her chest, taking out a necklace that had been under the collar of her dress. She took it off and held it up for Yunara to see. The pendant of the necklace was large, about as wide as a thumb, and of an oval shape. The pendant looked to be made of silver, with three small circular emerald stones in the center.
Yunara's eyes widened. "Princess, I-I can't. A pendant so valuable in my hands? It isn't proper--"
"Yunara, you're the only person I can trust with this. I took it from Uncle."
Her eyes widened even further. "You took this from him?"
"Yes, and you must promise me you'll never let him have it."
She could barely believe what she was hearing. The princess was only sixteen, a little younger than Yunara, and would never steal. And yet the urgency in her eyes made it seem as if this single pendant was worth the consequences. There was more to this. "Why?" Yunara asked.
"You wouldn't understand. But you have to promise that you won't let anyone else have it. Renen's been talking with our uncle, and they're planning something together. And this pendant is evidence of it. You have to protect it."
What could the princess be talking about? She was starting to feel like maybe Cadri was becoming a little paranoid about her uncle. Perhaps her worry about her growingly distant brother was making her easily upset.
Just then, Cadri's eyes widened with fear. Yunara turned around to see Prince Renen looking through his bedroom window, up in the castle. His black eyes were like steel, glaring right at Yunara and Cadri. She felt his gaze hit the necklace in her hand. Quickly, she put it around her neck. He left the window running.
"We have to hurry," said Cadri, getting up and grabbing Yunara's arm. "Please believe me, Yunara. If uncle had that necklace, it means that he's a part of the Aracs. And I think he's convinced Renen to be part of them, too. You need to understand. He'll kill to have that necklace back."
The Aracs. Just the mention of the cult filled Yunara's mind with memories of her rough childhood running from them. In Crila, they made life there a miserable because of the cult members that used people as the offerings in their dealings with... the Dark Ones.
"There's a parallel point not too far from here," Yunara offered. "We might be able to lose them on Earth."
Caorfi was a world sister to the one called Earth. They paralleled each other, side by side, though the inhabitants of Earth were none the wiser. However, Caorfians had discovered that between both worlds were millions of hidden portals, scattered throughout, that connected the paralleling realms.
But Yunara never thought she'd use them to escape the prince of Ecencia.
She always knew where a parallel point was. It was an instinct that came from running from the Aracs all her life in Crila. The closest one could be found deeper within the garden, near the fountain in the center of the garden maze. They entered the garden maze, the entrance of which flanked by beautiful bushes clipped into shapes of elephants.
As they ran through the maze, they started hearing the footsteps of people following them, running. Cadri tugged on Yunara's arm. "We have to hurry!"
"What's going on, Cadri?" Yunara demanded with seriousness in her voice. What were the Aracs doing in Ecencia? She came here to get away from them! How is it after all these years she found herself right in the middle of them once again? And for what? A pendant? "What's so important about this necklace?"
In their hurry, they had skipped a turn and ended up at a dead end. Hurriedly, they doubled back and turned down the other path.
"We don't have time for me to explain much," the princess started. "But for reasons I can't explain, they need that necklace for a summoning. A big one. They're after the throne."
Then they reached the fountain at the center of the garden, where a beautiful white stone statue of spitting fairies stood.
The footsteps were getting closer. The hedges of the maze were too tall to see their perpetrators, and thankfully, for their perpetrators to see them. The two walked around the fountain and felt the parallel point and the slight headache that went with feeling one in proximity.
They closed their eyes and stepped forward to use the point. Suddenly the world went black, and Yunara's consciousness sank, feeling like she was almost at the point of sleep. She felt like she was drifting, in a world of nonexistence, of not being nor here nor there. Then awareness came back suddenly, like emerging suddenly from underwater, and she opened her eyes, finding herself in a different place altogether.
They were standing on a beach, gentle waves kissing the shore. Where the beach ended was a quaint port town.
"We can't stop," Cadri said, bringing Yunara back into focus. Paralleling always left her fazed for a few moments afterward. "They're going to figure out we used a parallel point once they discover they can't find us."
Yunara looked around. She'd been to this little town before when she explored the parallel points about the castle for cases of emergency like this one. She just didn't think she'd ever have to use one. Then she spotted a familiar landmark.
"There's a parallel point in the bell tower of the cathedral here," she remembered. "It leads to--"
She was interrupted by the sound of people running on the sand behind them. They looked, and Yunara saw the same image that haunted her dreams at night when she was but a little girl. Men in crimson hoods the shade of blood, with masks that came halfway up their faces. A swindly white spider on the mouth of their mask was their insignia. An image that was burned in her mind at a young age, every time she closed her eyes.
Yunara and Cadri had already reached the end of the beach, enabling them to run much faster.
"Hold on!" Cadri shouted suddenly. Grabbing Yunara by her biceps from behind, she started to take flight, Yunara's feet leaving the ground as they climbed in altitude. At first, they were taking off frustratingly slow, but once Cadri had gotten used to the extra weight, she picked up speed quickly, the local humans below totally unaware of their presence. Or if they were, they might have seen birds fighting, or whatever else their minds could accept. Humans were incapable of seeing Caorfians for what they really were. Yunara was only hoping the Aracs wouldn't call on the Dark Ones here on Earth. Or there would certainly be bloodshed, and the humans would have had no idea of what hit them.
Yunara's hope was quickly dashed by the sound of otherworldly shrieks coming from behind. Dragon-like snake creatures were following close behind them as they slithered through the air, black ooze dripping from their mouths like saliva. Dark Ones. She should have known the Aracs wouldn't have come without summoning them.
The bell tower of the church was looming ahead. They only had to make it a little bit farther.
Cadri got close to the building and placed Yunara on the ledge of the inside of the tower. "Yunara, you have to go without me," she said suddenly.
"What? Don't be crazy!"
"Just do what I say, Yunara. I knew this was going to happen."
Suddenly, she understood nothing. How could she have known this would happen? "Princess, I'm your handmaiden. It's my job to look out for you. Don't expect me to let anything befall you and myself go free."
"You're going to have to," she said with finality, and with a loud flap, flew in another direction.
"No!" Yunara shouted, but it was too late. The dragon had wrapped itself around her quickly, choking her in its hold and chuckling in pleasure at her strangled screams.
"Cadri!" Yunara cried without thinking but realized her error quickly as the second dragon fixed its green-eyed gaze on her, then on the necklace on her chest.
Yunara quickly closed her eyes and paralleled, her senses numbing as the world around her fell away. Then the everything came crashing back, and she almost stumbled when she arrived in one of the castle's hallways. Her mind was racing. At least she was directly inside the castle. She could alert the guards. They would get Cadri back.
She started running just in time. The dragon creature appeared soon after her, but in the small space of the hallways, it moved clumsily and loudly.
That gave her an idea. She was in the halls that led to the bedrooms of all the royal family. She ran into Cadri's room. There was a bucket of water sitting in the corner for washing Cadri's face in the morning. Yunara exerted her power over the water to make it quickly leave the bucket and cover the shape of the door, then solidify. Her water would hold better than that wood against a Dark One.
The Dark one started banging on the door, and she could hear its claws scratching against the wood. She threw the doors to the balcony open, took the sheets off the bed, and quickly tied one end to the foot of the bed, and threw the other end over the balcony. Then she hid in a closet and left the door open by a crack.
Now all I have to do is wait, she thought. The creature banged away. Then blue cracks appeared in the watery sheet that covered the door. With a final thud, the cracks became like a web, then exploded into water, and the Dark One rushed into the room, saw how the bed was left, and rushed out the window.
She sprinted through the remains of the door and ran for the King and Queen's bedroom.
"Your Majesties, Cadr-- ah!" She was stopped short, letting out a shrill scream. The King and Queen's dead and bloody bodies laid strewn on their bed, like the maulings of a wolf.
Yunara's eyes were stinging, her entire body trembling. Her voice felt dry in her throat, a squeak coming from her mouth when she tried to cry. She felt like she was trapped in a nightmare. A terrible, endless nightmare. Could it be as Cadri said? Was this all happening because Renen and his uncle were after the throne?
Just then, she stopped, tears staining her cheeks. Footsteps.
Quickly, she slid under the King and Queen's bed, trying to keep from gagging at the smell of blood.
The door opened, and Yunara could see two pairs of feet.
"The entire castle has been overtaken, your Highness," one of them said, a man.
"And my sister?" said Renen. Yunara wanted to come out from where she was and slap him hard. "What has become of her?"
The man paused. "She was captured but..."
"But?"
"The necklace wasn't recovered. She was with her servant. We believe she gave the necklace to her and the servant escaped. But as the second Dark One we sent has yet to return and report, she will most likely be soon captured. But we are certain that the maid got away."
"My uncle will not be pleased if that necklace is not recovered," Renen said angrily.
Lord Francis Stretton, Yunara seethed inwardly. This sort of treachery isn't strange coming from him. But Renen, why? Why would you help him? By dealing with the Aracs and their Dark Ones, you will only bring devastation to this country as it has to mine.
"I know that, your Highness," the other man said, regaining confidence in his voice as if reminding himself that the person in front of him was younger. "But don't fret over easily solved matters." He chuckled as he said, "she is but a maid!"
"Very well, Lord Sherwood. I see your creatures have done an effective job with the King and Queen."
An effective job? Yunara could cry at how twisted prince Renen had become, a seed of hate planted by his uncle to manipulate him. What happened to the boy that only enjoyed teasing his younger sister at times? Now he stood before his parent's dead bodies without a second thought.
"Yes, and with the Ancients' chosen, we can begin getting ready for the journey to the island. Now, the journey there is perilous, with dangerous waters and even more dangerous creatures living in it. Humans are forbidden from trespassing. We'll need powerful escorts. You will need a sufficient amount of blood for this offering. Anything less simply will not do to summon these Dark Ones from the forbidden lands. Now, have you brought the wine?"
"Yes. How much blood should I take from my parents?"
"Take the King's handkerchief out of his pocket. It's soaked pretty thoroughly."
Yunara held her breath as Renen neared the bed and leaned over it, partly not to make a noise, and partly to keep from vomiting. He returned to his companion, who had started a fire in the hearth. The floor glistened with a red color from the reflection of the flames.
"Summon the beast, your Highness."
"Red meat," the prince said, throwing it onto the fire, the meat sizzling. "White wine of the finest kind," The flames roared as he poured it. "Human blood," He threw down the handkerchief. "Gold." Gold coins dropped from his hand. "I summon Nexa and Pitrious to guide us on our journey. We have no intention to deceive you, we two men. Come forth, Nexa and Pitrious!"
Then went out beastly screams, even deeper than the ones from before.