It was morning when Lucas woke up. He yawned as he at first wasn’t sure where he was. The longer he looked around, the more he realized how far from home he was. He groaned, covering his face with his hands, feeling very tired still. But he wasn’t the only one awake. Not that far from him, Lilly was awake as well. She seemed white as she looked at her leg.

  “Does it still hurt so much?” Asked he with more compassion than he had shown previously.

  She looked up at him, ready to give him an answer that wouldn’t be princess worthy, only to be shut up by her own thoughts. Lucas got up and walked to her, kneeling down. There he saw that he leg seemed to be infected.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me. We can’t have that…” Lucas got up, starting to worry.

  “How bad is it?” Was her only reaction.

  “Oh, not that bad, you’ll survive.” And that was a lie as he wasn’t even sure that she would. He didn’t know much about mortal wounds. “I should really get some sort of education.” That was more to himself than to Lilly.

  Lilly trying to be funny in times like this would chuckle. “Hah… If you want then I can ask Emma to teach you how to swim seeing how you liked her naked.”

  Even though they weren’t talking that loud, Ninke appeared out of the second cave, coming over to them. She looked at them as she too seemed very tired, being clothed because she had guests. “What’s wrong?”

  Lucas walked to her as she walked to him. He motioned to her that she needed to stop walking, grabbing her arm and turning her away from Lilly. “So yeah… Gurgen seems to be our only option. Her leg had been cut open and now it’s infected.”

  Ninke quickly looked with a worried face to Lilly. “Infected? How bad is it?”

  Lucas now looked at Lilly as well. She knew something was up seeing as both had worried face. “I don’t know, I’m not a doctor. But seeing how bad it is… I don’t know… a week?”

  As they talked, Keanu came out of their cave as well, looking at both of them.

  “Go get the tents. They’ll need it.” Said Ninke as she looked at Lucas. “And bring them some food as well.”

  Keanu looked at them before turning around without saying a word.

  “You said that you knew where Gurgen was. Care to tell me or are you going to join us on our quest?”

  She quickly shook her head. “I’m sorry, saving princesses isn’t really my style.” Her tail was slowly moving as she thought about it. “Gurgen lives somewhere close to the lesser used border road between the Human Gruge and the Forest Gruge. Go there if you want her to survive.” As she explained where it was, she would grab a map out of her pocket that she put on the table, pointing out the path.

  Keanu came back with in his arms a bunch of items. He put the food on the table and dropped the tents on the floor. Lucas wasn’t going to decline the gift but he was confused about one thing. “Why do you have tents and why do you have two?”

  This question made Ninke shut up, looking at Keanu who was about to tell him why. Under the gaze of his beloved, he would only smile, looking at her with joy in his eyes. It took Lucas staring at Ninke for her to break.

  “Okay fiiine” I like to go camping with Keanu once in a while even though it’s basically the same as living here. The extra tents because we have more than just two extra are for the wolves to sleep in. I don’t want them to get wet when it rains.” She smiled and a bit embarrassed that she put up extra tents for her wolves.

  Lucas didn’t really see anything wrong with that, shrugging as he knelt down to grab the tents, struggling with the weight even though Keanu seemed to have carried them with ease.

  Keanu smirked, seeing him struggle with it. It was almost as if his struggles were causing him to have fun. “Have fun carrying that.” It was obvious that Keanu didn’t like Lucas and that feeling was mutual.

  Making a quick decision, Lucas walked to Emma, giving her feet a kick, causing her to stir awake. “Wake up, we’re traveling and you’re carrying a tent.” Having said that, he would drop one next to her.

  “What?” Emma was still waking up, looking at the tent. “Nuh uh. I’m not going to carry that.”

  “Well, then you can sleep in the rain.” Said Lucas with a big smile on his face. Then he looked at Lilly. “Here, take the food, that’s all you have to carry.”

  “Hey! Not fair!” Yelled Emma who took the bag of food and dropped the tent.

  “Yeah well, your leg aint torn open and your leg isn’t infected. Now carry it because I’m leaving!” He turned around, waved at Ninke and then left the cave, Lilly and Emma quickly grabbing whatever they had and going after him, Lilly hobbling as she came closer.

  As they left, both Lily and Keanu waved them goodbye, Ninke a bit worried about all of this. “Do you think that we should’ve gone with them,”

  Keanu shook his head. “No… it is better this way. I can’t protect you when we leave this cave. Not when enemies are everywhere. I rather have you here next to me.”

  She nodded and put her head on his shoulder, watching them disappeared into the woods.

  As they walked, Emma came to Lucas. She seemed a bit nervous, throwing looks at her sister. “Tell me, how bad is it?”

  Lucas just moved a branch out of his face as he looked at Emma. He didn’t want to tell her the truth but it seemed like not lying would be the better thing. “Not good… If we don’t make it to Gurgen… Yeah well, I don’t know enough about wounds to really make a judgement call; but it won’t be good.”

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  She looked at her sister, white as a sheet as she nodded. Trying to distract herself, she decided to ask him about his crossbow. Her voice cracked as she tried not to cry, but tears still slowly appeared. “I saw you busy with your crossbow once m-more… D-Do you expect more t-trouble?”

  He stopped walking, first looking at her and then looking at her sister. Her sister was a bit behind, slowly making her way forwards. He put his hand onto her shoulder as he didn’t know what was the best thing to say. “I know. I wish that I could say that I understand your pain but I never loved anyone. You have to keep strong if you want to get her to The Armenian Beast.”

  As he talked, she hid her face from her sister, knowing that if she saw her upset that she would know that it was because of her leg. Lucas on the other hand would be occupied by something else.

  “So much for your compassion…” Said Emma as she got a bit mad, shaking her head. She still felt like a princess although she knew that Lucas wasn’t impressed by that fact. Nor did anyone they meet lately. This showed to her that many people if not all actually don’t care that they are royalty.

  Lucas held up his hand, trying to get her to shut up. “Shhh… be quiet.”

  He looked back at Lilly, wanting to say to her that she had to stop walking, but that was too late. One he looked at her, he could see that there was a man holding an arm around her throat, pulling her against his chest as he had a dagger pressed up against her side. He had a cloak, hiding his face.

  Emma turned around as well, seeing her sister having been capture. Not wanting to lose, her, she would draw her bow and put an arrow on it, immediately aiming at the man and her sister.

  The man didn’t seem to be moved by the fact that there was a bow aimed at his head, slowly turning around his hand to show a mark being burned into it. It seemed to be three vines in a circle running down as at the bottom seemed to be a fire. A very specific symbol, one that Emma didn’t recognize but Lucas did.

  The man started to poke the knife into Lilly. It wasn’t hard but hard enough to make her feel it, almost puncturing the skin. She let out a whimper as she would try to move away from the knife. Lucas saw everything going downhill.

  “Wait hold on!” He got in between the both of them, trying to keep them from doing something that they might regret. “We don’t seek peace but freedom!” He sound panicked and unsure as he looked at the man, hoping for something.

  “And with freedom comes peace.” The voice of the man sounded deep as he let go of Lilly, taking a step back.

  As he had taken a step back, multiple creatures started to emerge from behind trees and bushes much to Lucas his irritation. There were creatures from a multitude of different gruges.

  Lilly stumbled to Emma, looking at the hooded figures. It wasn’t easy top see but they could distinguish multiple different creatures. There was skeletons, humans, elves and so on. The only creatures missing were the wizards, zombies and mermaids. That didn’t surprise her though as wizards keep to themselves, zombies were too dumb and mermaids didn’t go on land ever.

  “If it were up to me, we’d be burning down these bushes.” Said Lucas softly but didn’t go unheard. He put a hand on the bow that Emma was pointing at the people.

  That move irritated her as she almost gave him an elbow to the face. “What’s the point in having a bow if you never allow me to use it?” She sounded mad, still being upset from the lack of empathy.

  “How about you lower your bow. If you haven’t noticed it yet, we’re pretty outmatched right now.”

  Most of the creatures surrounding them were carrying bows. Some had spears and swords. One had a battleaxe and another had throwing knives. The most important feature was that they were all wearing capes. As Lily started to look around to the man who almost cut her, she saw that her had disappeared between the others as he looked rather similar to the others with that cape of his.

  A centaur came forwards, holding a greatsword in one hand. It was unusual to see a centaur wielding such a sword like this but that was besides the point as he started to talk. “You know our code yet you have such a violent outlook on nature.”

  Before he could respond, Emma came forwards, angry as ever. “Lucas? What is going on!? Who are these people and why did they threaten us!? You almost killed my sister, assholes!” That last part was aimed at the centaur, although he didn’t seem very impressed.

  He shook his head slowly as he put down his backpack. “Try dealing with them for a full day and you’ll see that staying civil is rather difficult.”

  Emma was about to let out an outburst but was stopped by Lilly, grabbing her hand. When her sister looked at who grabbed her hand and saw it was Lilly, she saw her shake her head slowly.

  Lucas saw this and took a deep breath, needing a clear mind for whatever was going to happen. He reached in his back, starting to look for something. This movement caused multiple bows to be raised and pointed at him, probably expecting some kind of weapon. Instead he stood back up, holding a ring in his hand.

  The centaur saw the ring and immediately held his hand up, causing everyone to lower their weapons for now. “So… you saved one of us.”

  “Yeah… It was a long time ago. He was being hung by the neck for trying to free some of you people the day I arrived… here… Before he was dead, I cut the rope around the tree causing him to fall and be saved until you guys could show up to help him. But that was years ago. He said his name was Lentefin or something?” He put the ring back in his bag.

  “Lentefin is dead…”

  That news made Lucas freeze for a second. He looked up at the centaurs, not being fully sure what to say about that. “I’m… sorry?”

  The centaur only nodded, not giving another answer as he looked at Lucas and then to Lilly and Emma. As he looked at them, he squinted his eyes as if he recognized them from somewhere.

  Lucas saw this and knew that they are probably very recognizable. He didn’t think it was that common to get identical twins as a royal. “Well… I have a question for you. What if we didn’t know who you were? You just grabbed one of us so if we didn’t know your secret group, then what?”

  After that was said, it was rather obvious that their way of dealing with things weren’t really thought through. “Well, we heard that there was two girls and one guy, stealing from hard working people and leaving them for dead. You know what we stand for.”

  After that was said, the screaming of the centaurs that night sounded back in their ears. They didn’t do it but corpses could’ve been a reason to be hunted by not only their attackers but also the freedom movement. “So you came to check on us to see if we were those killers you heard about. I think you’ve been misinformed.”

  Even though Lucas was being reasonable, the centaur didn’t seem to like admitting fault, still searching for any flaw in his story. “You could’ve killed someone and stolen that ring. So I ask you this. What are you doing in this part of the forest where we stay hidden?”

  Lucas straightened his back as he looked at the centaur without any hesitation. “My name is Lucas and I’m trying to fulfill my task so I can go back home and live in peace.”

  The centaur now looked at Emma and Lilly. Emma was the one who decided to answer the question. She had enough of all of this and seeing as her sister almost got gutted, she demanded respect. “We are Emma and Lilly, princesses of the Human Gruge! And you dare to attack us!”

  Lilly immediately facepalmed, closing her eyes before pinching the top of her nose, letting out a soft groan. Lilly had started to think about everything that had happened and decided that perhaps keeping their identity hidden was better. The damage had been done though.

  “Death to the princesses!”

  A small humanoid threw off his cape, revealing a dwarf, holding two battle hammers. Nobody else joined him as he started to charge. Lilly and Emma were frozen in either shock or fear. Lucas didn’t really care which one it was, lifting his right arm ad revealing the crossbow before anyone else could react, shooting off the bolt.