Sparrow Truman May 19th,20XX

The chains around my wrists chafed, and my arms hurt from being suspended in the air for so long. Rubella had taken it upon herself to revert my hair to how it was and had attacked my scalp with a knife. I wasn’t too stressed about it because there were spells to make it re-grow but I was concerned about Rubella’s animosity. It was hardly my fault that her hair fell out faster than she could make it grow back.

Dione frittered back and forth as she kept half an eye on the communicator and another eye on me to make sure I was okay. A part of me recognized that she was concerned about me but another more ruthless side acknowledged that she was probably more worried that her support would get hurt and she would be left at the devices of those other witches I had bullied on her behalf.

I wasn’t too concerned about getting hurt since Rubella had told me how close I was to the fairy prince. Even if it only got me half a second of hesitation, it would be enough.

“Dione, if you don’t stop moving around like that I’m going to have Ion take you out of here and lock you in your room.”

Even under the spell, the goblins were much stronger than the average witch, never mind a young one like Dione. She recognized the threat and froze in place, shooting a wary look toward the blank-faced goblin.

“Derela!”

Before she could continue her complaint the communicator began to flash an alarming red at an even more alarming pace.

“He’s close.”

I suppressed a little pride that my plan had worked and cooperated with Dione to get me ready for my part. Dione got to work with a grim expression, painting bruises and cuts onto me with expertise. My throat stung with the harsh feeling of a dehydration liquid and each attempt to talk felt like I had swallowed a cup full of sand.

We had just let the prince and his camp get close to the city that he knew I was in, and would then herd him toward the prison, where I and a squad of others would be waiting for him. It was a bit unscrupulous but compared to the others’ options of fighting a fairy royal, this was the best we could do.

Dione and Ion disappeared, and the squad of witches surrounded me, all posing as prisoners in different cells.

I swallowed the feelings of guilt away and started preparing a binding spell. Although I could use the forest of death spell lightly on the younger witches, I would have to be a lot more careful with the royal. If he had too little magic then I might end up killing him, which wasn’t what I wanted. On the other hand, if he had too much magic and overburdened the spell, then I might end up blowing myself and the whole city up.

Quicker than I could react a gold and silver head of hair popped out from a vent and dropped down into the cell, making the guards we had put in place completely useless. According to the original plan he was supposed to breeze through the guards we had put in place, which would have given him a heightened sense of overconfidence.

“Sparrow”

He whisper-yelled as he ran up to me. I tried my best to look as exhausted as possible and choked out a response from my dried-out throat.

“Cai?”

He worked quickly as he undid the shackles around my wrists and propped me up by putting my arm around his shoulder.

“Just hold on a second. I'll get you out of here.”

I could sense my companions stirring as the prince reached into his pouch and looked over me to make sure I wasn’t too hurt.

The first thing he did was to give me a drink of a foreign liquid. It was a starling mix of pink and neon orange, and sparkled even in the dusty cellar we were in. It went down sour put came up sweet.

He had stepped back as I hurled the contents of my stomach up onto the floor but quickly handed me a napkin and another suspicious concoction of blue and yellow.

“Sorry about that. I just needed to make sure they hadn’t fed you anything weird. This should make it better.”

Trusting in Rubella’s analysis of our relationship in the past I gritted my teeth and took a chug of it. I waited for the nasty side effects only to find out I felt better and better with every passing moment. The blinding headache that usually plagued me had lessened significantly as well.

“Woah, I feel so much better.”

His smile stiffened at the revelation and he reached for his wand.

The jig was up.

“Everyone up now!”

The other witches snapped the fake shackles and quickly got into their positions, surrounding the prince. He didn’t bother sparing them any looks though and kept his golden eyes trained on me. His lips moved as if to ask why, but not a single sound escaped. The guilt went down like acid and burned my throat and heart.

I felt… bad for the fairy prince?

The other witches hesitated as they saw me freeze instead of binding the prince in my spell. it wasn't for long but it was enough for the prince to make a move.

In a single movement, he had extended his wand into a staff and struck out at the witch behind him, sending her flying onto the cemented walls. Taking advantage of her companion’s surprise, he took out two other witches by physical strength alone.

I started the Spell and threw the seeds down but in the middle of blocking a sword strike, he used a single hand to capture the seeds in a magic ball and trapped the growing roots within the sphere.

The roots could absorb magic, so it should only have been a temporary measure, but somehow I kept waiting and the roots kept fighting against their constraints, but they never got free.

“Stop him!”

It was as futile an order as it was an attempt, but I felt the need to try.

The prince launched into the air and shot me one more complicated look before flying up into the unnecessarily large vents and crawling away at a speed faster than any grown fairy should have been able to reach.

I uselessly remembered that although he was un-awakened, he was still half-goblin. He would at least be physically stronger than the average fairy. I turned to the other witches and snapped at them, angry even though it was more my fault than theirs.

“Find Him! And the companions he came with. Now!”

The pressure had returned in full force and made me feel like my head was splitting apart, but a few memories were leaking through. Memories I knew I didn’t want to repossess.