Chapter 1
Aquila shivered in the cold night air as Talya slowly trudged on. For three nights she had been traveling, repeating over and over, "I will make it. I will make it." She did not really mean them but for Aiden's sake she said them.
Town life was sparse along her northerly direction and she felt it pointless to break for the whole night so instead she allowed Talya to set the pace as she slowly drifted off to sleep.
A loud crack split the air towards her left and Talya jolted to life, Aquila screaming as she grabbed for the horse's mane. She held her body low against the horse to avoid low branches as Talya flew through the dark woods for only a few minutes before Aquila suddenly felt the horse falling.
Aquila was thrown and sprawled on the ground, she cried out as the horse rolled over her forcing her leg to bend back in the most painful position. Moments later Aquila opened her eyes to feel something pulling on her clothes. She looked over her shoulder to find the figure of a man crouched over her, one hand on his shoulder and the other putting something in a small pouch she had fixed to the side of her skirt.
Suddenly the man groaned and slumped over her. Aquila wiggled painfully out from under the man's lifeless body just to find her horse. "Talya?" Aquila whispered as she ran her hands down the horse's neck to it's motionless stomach. "Oh, Talya!"
Suddenly she heard someone shout through the woods behind them. Other voices answered as a commotion could be heard nearing her position. Frightened, Aquila tried to stand up but fell back onto the dead horse in pain. Her leg must have been broken in the tumble.
The voices grew closer and closer bringing fear to Aquila's small frame. They did not sound friendly and had to have been the party that had shot the man who now lay lifeless. She did not know the story but she was not sure she could trust the group approaching. Obviously they thought him dead as they were not making precautions to hide their location.
Aquila shoved a stick in between her teeth and forced herself to stand despite the pain. If she could get to the tree just a few feet ahead silently, she could climb it until they had left.
Just when she thought they would appear and find her hanging from the lowest limb, she was able to pull herself up and disappear in the thick foliage. Peering through the leaves she could see five men emerge from the far side of where the man now lay.
"He is dead, all right," one said as he leaned over the man.
"Forget about burying him. No one will find him out here," another man kicked at the dead man's carcase.
"Hey, did he come on a horse?" a third man asked.
Immediately all attention was on the dead horse. Aquila wanted to cry over her poor horse but knew she would certainly give away her position if she did.
"He did but that is not his horse. It took off in the other direction, plus it was a brownish color, not no gray," the first man replied.
"He has not been dead for long," a fourth man surmised.
"His nose is still wet," the first man exclaimed.
"Quick, check Davis' pockets and bags and find that thing so we can get out of here," the last man ordered. "I do not want anybody coming back to their dead horse to find us here."
Aquila listened and watched as they searched the man down and everywhere on the ground. A few even rifled through the one saddlebag fixed to Talya's side. "A woman's horse for sure," one mumbled.
"Where is it?" the fifth man growled.
"We cannot find it!" the first man swore.
"I bet whoever owns this horse has it. She heard us coming and ran for it," the man by the horse exclaimed.
"She cannot have gone far on foot. Search the place!" the fifth man instructed.
Aquila silently climbed a little bit higher as the men spread out and disappeared into the woods. One was headed her way and she was hoping that the foliage would still cover her from underneath. When she could not possibly make it further, she looked down and almost fell out of the tree when she could see the sixth man, the biggest one of them all, underneath her tree. Fear that he would see her shook her body and she knew he could just hear the leaves rustling as it shook from her body's movements but a few minutes later he moved on and she let go of her breath.
Still Aquila remained in the tree. They would surely return to their horses this way. Yet hours later and Aquila was ready to climb down. They must have circled around to their horses a different way.
Aquila shifted and was instantly reminded of her broken leg. Aquila hugged the branch to her chest trying not to scream. She would not know if the men had come from a town nearby raising the possibilities of a passerby hearing her somewhere not far off.
When the pain finally ceased she broke off a stick and jammed it into her teeth. She had to get down despite all pain. She took it limb by limb until she could not take any more. Her hands lost their grip on the branch and she fell from the tree into complete darkness.


The falling. It kept going and going. She never landed. She just kept falling and falling surrounded by complete darkness. Then something warm wrapped itself around her body and on and on the falling went. Aquila opened her eyes and suddenly the falling stopped.
Above her was a high wood ceiling. One torch was lit on the wall six feet from her head but allowed enough light to see bookshelves all around a small room. In the opposite corner a brown robe-clad figure stood, its back to her. Concern flooded her mind just before the figure turned around to reveal a monk.
The man looked at her for a moment before nodding and leaving the room. Aquila picked her head up off of the flat hard surface and pulled back the thick warm blanket to look at her leg. It was wrapped and securely tied to a board. Moments later the door opened again and a girl walked in. "Good morning, Mistress."
"Good morning," Aquila replied once she could find her voice.
"I am Xeldra Blaintoff. I came in this morning to say a prayer and the monks indicated to me that they had a visitor but I did not imagine one so young."
Aquila looked the girl over. She could only be seventeen and yet she called her young? "How old do you suppose I am?"
"Oh, well you...at first glance I would think fourteen," Xeldra answered sweetly.
"I suppose you are seventeen?" Aquila arched an eyebrow at her.
"Yes."
"I am older than you by two years, Mistress Blaintoff," Aquila informed her.
"Oh, I am terribly sorry," Xeldra looked at the floor.
Aquila giggled. "That is all right. I know I do not look it."
"Well, the monks want you to know that you will be welcome here as long as you want to stay. If you ever need food or water let them know. Clothes they can also help with although I am sure it is all brown robes," Xeldra wrinkled her nose.
"Thank you," Aquila smiled to her and then turned to the monk standing beside her.
The monk nodded and smiled in return. Xeldra sat and talked with Aquila for a few minutes before she begged her leave. The monk followed her out and Aquila was left to her thoughts.
Aquila looked up at the ceiling and tried to remember what had happened before she passed out. It suddenly struck her that the dead man had stuck something in her pouch and it was now pressing hard against her thigh. She rolled slightly to the side and pulled her pouch out from under her. Inside was a small red vlevet pouch closed with a single pearl button.
Aquila fingered it for a moment before opening it up. Inside was a small but heavy gold cross with a star-shaped emerald in the center of it. She rubbed her thumb over the emerald and gaped at it.
Just then the door opened and Aquila hid it in the folds of her skirt. A monk appeared by her side with a bucket of water. Aquila lifted her head and accepted the cool drink of water he offered from a crudely crafted ladle.
"Thank you," she said just before he left the room. Aquila pulled the cross out of her skirt and fingered it for a few more seconds before putting it back in the velvet pouch and into the leather one at her side.
Over the course of the next few months, Aquila's leg slowly began to heal, she upgraded to a sitting position where she washed robes, dishes, made candles, and churned the butter to do her part although they turned out to be disastrous. One morning she put a whole in her skirt as she was trying to trim the wicks on the candles. Just hours later as she was lighting a few of them to see if they needed any more trimming, she caught her sleeve on fire and burned her arm bad. The candles did not even look pretty and the robes were more wrinkled than clean and the butter never seemed to come out right. Aquila knew the only reason they did not lock her in a room was out of kindness.
Then when she could walk and had recovered from her mishap with the fire, she kept up those activities but added cleaning chores to her daily routine. Unfortunately they were just as big of disasters as her first jobs were. One afternoon while cleaning a window in the main library, she tumbled off her stool and grabbed a hold of the curtains. It produced a bruised hip and torn curtains that would have to be mended. While mopping the kitchen she tripped over her mop and knocked the bucket over just in time to land in the suddy water.
Finally one morning, Aquila was mopping the main corridor and thinking to herself as she often did what she wanted to do with her life. I think I could really get to love this life. I work from sun up to sun down but it gets me food and board and my robes are not quite so bad.
Now Aquila's leg was completely healed and she could go about her way. Father Suriya had even written a note telling her she could choose a horse from the stables as final payment for all her work. But Aquila was steadily growing to like her place in the monastary.
Aquila paused a moment and leaned on the broom of her handle. "The only thing I lack here is a man," she said aloud. "No one here can have me and that is the one thing I have always longed for."
Aquila sighed and picked up her broom. She extended it out and pulled it back but was stopped abruptly when it hit something. She gasped and turned around to find Father Paduma standing there holding his nose, blood running through his fingers. "Father Paduma! Oh my goodness! I am so sorry," Aquila cried as she pulled a clean rag out of her belt and handed it to him.
The blood kept coming no matter how hard they tried and by the time Xeldra came on the scene, Aquila and Father Paduma were both bloody messes. Xeldra quickly took control and was finally able to bring it under control.
Nevertheless, Aquila hung her head and sighed. She would be packing come morning.
********
Aquila brushed away the leaves from under the big pine tree. She had been traveling by foot for a week. Now she was just too exhausted to go any further. It was a mountainous range that she had stumbled onto two days before. It had been alive with trees until she reached the mountains and then it was nothing but rock. She found it rather strange that this one lone Pine tree should be there, but it was, and she had used it as a shelter for the past couple of days. Now she laid down beneath it's big branches and hugged herself.
“You will make it, Aquila. I have faith in you.” Aiden's last words rang in her head. He had followed her out that evening she had left and assisted her onto Talya. But when she showed the least bit of doubt that his faith had been accurately placed, he had made her say it herself.
As she so often did, she pulled out the cross pendant and fingered it for a short moment. Now she was more than ever determined to make it through.
*******
Aquila trudged up the small ledge on the side of the mountain. The ocean was alive and she enjoyed the cool breeze that blew off the sparkly blue waters beneath her. She had been at this for a couple of hours now and it did not seem like it was going anywhere but the breeze and the smell of the ocean helped to rejuvenate her. She did not know what she was looking for. A place to stay? In these mountains? She was better off going back to town and finding a place there but then again, she would have to face people and that she could not handle. Not anymore.
Aquila was about to turn around and go back when she leveled off onto a large cliff covered in thick, lush, green life. There seemed to be a big rock covered in the beautiful greenery. It was almost like another part to the mountain but something was oddly peculiar about it. She frowned and put her hand into the greenery to feel the wall of the rock. It was flat and not bumpy and jagged like the mountain had been so far.
She stepped back and looked up. The wall went up for a hundred feet. There was a slightly smaller wall on top of the rock. All of a sudden a bird flew out of the smaller wall on top. Aquila's eyes widened. Was that a window in the wall?
Aquila walked around the big green wall. She was completely worn out after the long trip around but now she was convinced more than ever that she had found her a place to stay. The closer she looked at the large wall the more it was evident that it was not just a big rock. It was a palace and most obviously abandoned.
Her job now would be to find the door and clear it so that she could get in and out. Unfortunately it was getting late and the sun was already disappearing behind the mountains. She would camp here tonight instead of going all the way back to the pine tree she had called home the past few days and would wake with the dawn. It was sure to be a beautiful sunrise.
*******
Aquila frowned in exasperation. She had been looking for a door all day and had come up empty. It was nothing but vines, wall, and more vines. She looked up at the retreating sun. Had she really been working that long?
Aquila was about to give up. Maybe this was not a castle. But every time she looked at it the more she was convinced that was what she had stumbled across. Just as she was about to pull away she felt something. It was small and barely even there explaining why she had missed it altogether the first two times. It was a small line that ran straight up and down. She pulled the vines away from it and looked. It was indented slightly and it was a darker gray than the rest of the wall as if someone had put mortar in the crack. Had someone been actually trying to conceal it from the outside world? Was there someone living inside? Surely there was no way someone could survive closed up in there for so long.
Aquila pulled out the knife she had concealed in her robe and began chipping away the thin layer of mortar in the crack. It was easy and with only the help of the bushes to climb on to remove the mortar from the top part of the door she had it finished by nightfall. Unfortunately the same vines and bushes she had used would have to be dug up and moved before she could open the door.
It was the work of another day.
********
Aquila pulled furiously at the base of the vine. She grunted in the effort until she had to pause and catch her breath. She pushed her sweat-dampened hair out of her face. She had been digging with her knife and hands all morning and afternoon pulling vines out of the ground. Now there was only one left but it was the biggest one and was proving to be just as big a challenge as it's size.
Aquila looked around before grabbing the root at the base and throwing her body into an all out battle with the vine. Her face turned red and her fingers white, sweat pouring down her body, as she let out the biggest battle cry her lungs could give. Suddenly she heard the vine groan and she felt it giving way and there was nothing she could do to stop it. “Oh, no!” she muttered as the vine let go of it's hold and she fell backwards landing hard on her derrière.
“Ow!” Aquila almost screamed. There was a rock perfectly situated so that her tail bone landed on the jagged top.
Aquila held up the vine with it is dirt clod vines and cursed it. She stood and winced. It would smart for a few days...maybe even weeks. Just then she remembered the reason she had gone to all that trouble. The door was free of the pesky petiolaris vines and she could open the door. Aquila grabbed the knob and pulled it down. The door groaned and complained with the stress that she was putting on its old rusty hinges but it eventually complied and she was able to get it open.
It was dark inside but the light shining through the doorway revealed cobblestone flooring. Aquila stepped just inside the doorway and felt oddly cool. Just to the right of the door there was a torch and she took it from it is anchor. Now for some way to light it.
Aquila stepped outside and looked inside her small bag for something with which to start a flame. There was a flat stone inside and she pulled it off. She grabbed the rock she had landed on and sat down. Anchoring the torch in between her legs she struck the jagged rock against the smooth one several times. Nothing was happening. She tried some more and finally saw something so she kept at it. Something started going for her and she was able to get a big enough spark to catch the cobweb covered torch.
She dropped both rocks into her bag and took the torch. She held the torch high as she stepped through the doorway into the chilly air of the castle. It was a slightly large room with cupboards along the wall. In the middle of the room was a big black cauldron covered in dust and cobwebs. It hung at an awkward angle as one end was sitting on a blackened hearth and the other half was held up by a rusty chain from a pole affixed above it. This must be the kitchen, Aquila mused. Aquila swung the torch around until she found a door. She opened it to find a pantry. Rats quickly ran for cover from the light behind various tins and hole filled boxes all over the floor.
She shut the door and shivered. She hated rodents. She found a second door. This has to be the door into the corridor, Aquila told herself. As she put her hand on the doorknob it was as if something was awaiting her on the other side. The hair on her neck and arms stood on end. Something was not right about this place. She froze as a cool breeze hit her, taking her breath away.