Chapter 20

The next morning I woke up to a lot of noise. The people in the dining area seemed to be quite troubled and there were people yelling and discussing things. Wondering what it was I quickly dressed and with my sleepy eyed demeanor I headed out.

'How could this happen!' random person 1

'I don't know!' random person 2

'It seems to have happened 2 days ago when that strange human diplomat left!' random person 3

'Humans aren't to be trusted!' random person 4.

I wasn't the only one who had woken up due to the noise. There were already a couple Tamarin near me that were observing to find out what happened.

'Hey, what's going on?' I asked one of them.

'It seems that the human diplomat did not only talk to the leaders but also to the people in the slums who went and followed him to join the war despite yesterday's proposition.' he replied coldly.

'No way!' That means that it was never Yorans purpose to ally Jin to the entire people of the forest. Even if he only gathered a couple the psychological attack that the Dragoon Riders and the people of the forest had joined Jin would devastate the moral of the troops of Joren. Plus there is the dangerous stealthing ability of the people of the forest. This means that my quest had not yet ended.

'Are you alright?' said the guy who I had previously inquired. He looked at me worryingly. It seems that I had quite a shocked facial expression.

'Yeah, I'm alright..'

First I need to find out in which direction they went to go and stop them. I thought to myself. I then ran down the stairs out the Inn and headed towards the council-tree. I was going to ask it to the leaders of the tribes. They must know of a method of finding them.

After reaching the council-tree I saw that the door had once again opened and from inside I could hear loud discussing so I headed inside and upon seeing me Bregader called me over. He left the stage and approached me.

'You must've heard what has happened.' said Bregader.

'Yes I have.'

'What is your plan?' Bregader asked.

'Well since it was my proposition I was going to find and stop those who betrayed us.' I said with a stern voice.

'They went to the north towards Joren. They have a 2 day head-start and they seemed to have stolen a couple birds.'

'Birds?' I asked. Why would they steal birds?

'Yes, they are big birds similar to the dragoons of the dragoon riders. Due to the council-meeting of yesterday nobody seemed to have noticed the theft nor their absent till just this morning.'

'to the north' I said to myself.

'We will give you a couple birds. Gather some people and pursue them.' Bregader said.

He then turned around and signaled to a big Tamarin guy who came at his command.

'Solane, show Frank where to find the birds and do all that he asks of you.'

'Yes sir' said Solane. He was a very colorful Tamarin and nearly twice my size. Very imposing. After receiving and accepting the command he walked up the stairs and out the entrance.

'thanks.' I said to Bregader and I quickly followed after Solane. We went over a root and arrived at a hole in the ground. Solane jumped down and I followed. There were several birds that were twice the size of even Solane. Some of them had saddles on them and there were some Tamarin standing around discussing things. Probably talking about the recent theft.

'Hey!' said Solane to the Tamarin.

'By order of Bregader elder of the Tamarin I command you to escort Frank northwards to the edge of the jungle to follow after the traitors.'

'Sir, yes sir!' said the Tamarin instantly and simultaneously.

They quickly ran to their birds and mounted them. Solane turned to me and helped me mount a bird too. After sitting in the saddle the bird followed after the rest of the Tamarin. One after the other they took off to the skies through the hole that we had previously jumped through. Leading the charge was a Tamarin with a black-greyish countenance. It seemed that he was the oldest of them all and where he went with his bird the rest followed. I did not have to do anything but tightly hold onto the bird as we flew to the north. Slowly we started to gain altitude. Due to me getting more and more accustomed to riding the bird the increasing altitude seemed not as scary. Then when we reached the lowest tree-branch of the council tree we headed towards the waterfall and over it. I could see the canoe down below. We then turned and kept increasing in altitude till we were flying above the canopy and then we headed north.

To the left I could see the end of the jungle and the ocean in the distance. To the right I could now clearly see the white tip mountains. It was a clear blue sky and the sun shined brightly. Luckily the goggles I was wearing prevented the sunlight from shining right into my eyes so I wasn't too bothered by it. I was then reminded that I had forgotten to tell Angela that I had left. Everything happened so suddenly. I hope that she doesn't get offended. But she's completed what she agreed to do for me. There was no need for a continuation of our relationship but I sure do hope to see them again someday. She was trustworthy and I felt at ease at the Inn of both her father and her grandfather. Maybe its because they looked at me with pure intentions whereas everyone that I had met previously during my relatively short human life were people that saw me as a member of the royal family, they saw me for what I stood for and not as a person; not for who I am. They saw what I was but never who I was. They wanted the things I made and the connections I had. Never were they interested in getting to know me. That is why it was very refreshing to meet people who were interested in who I was. I was happy to have learned what it was like to get to know people normally.

'On to the next adventure' I said with a smile then as I went on to cheer but bugs flew into my mouth. Big bugs which were very prevalent here in and seemingly also above the jungle.

It was still a long flight and as the view was barely changing and the ride on the bird became more and more comfortable I started feeling what all people in my situation would feel. Bored. Nobody talked in fear of swallowing bugs, there was nothing to do and finally; my but had started to hurt. The ride was relatively comfortable but the same can't be said for the saddle that I was sitting on. They were not made for comfort. Or rather, they were made precisely so they wouldn't be comfortable. The curves where you put your knees felt more like a slab of leather put on the corner of a wooden table. At first it was no problem but the longer you sat the more it felt like the corner of the saddle was digging into your inner thigh and knee cutting off the bloodstream to my feet.

I wanted to complain but the bugs that had previously flown into my mouth had tasted so bad and they were so big that I wouldn't dare. Even now I was still dodging the constant onslaught of bugs. The bird didn't seem to mind and occasionally opened its mouth to eat a few.

After a couple hours of non-stop flying there was still no end to the jungle below but the birds started to descend. I guess even birds can't fly forever. We approached a large group of giant trees. The birds started slowing down in their descent but instead of landing on the ground below the birds landed on a branch. After landing on the branch I could make out lots of Druid people. They were on the branch we landed on closer to the tree-trunk. There was a large opening in the tree trunk where the branch and trunk joined together. On either side of the opening were Druid guards posted. I saw some Druid jumping from branch to branch in the canopy of the tree while our birds orderly walked to the hole. The guard Druids kindly welcomed us and after disembarking the birds I finally got to stretch my legs. After taking a couple steps I could see that the Druids had already prepared a fresh batch of birds for us to fly on. I quickly ran; as best I could; to the Druids.

'Hey, wait! Can you maybe provide me with a more comfortable saddle?' I asked.

The Druids smiled; 'sure.'

They then grabbed a batch of blankets and laid them on top of the saddle of one of the birds. It looked like it was going to fall off so I looked around to see if there was something to bind it with. I saw some rope hanging on the wall and asked the Druids:

'Can I take that bit of rope?'

'What for?'

'It is urgent.' I said; not wanting to explain more I grabbed it after the Druid nodded while making a silly face.

I don't know nor care what kind of impression I made on them but I really really just needed to ride comfortably. Who knows how much further we were going to fly. Since the people of the Forest are so xenophobic few have ever traveled to the edge of the jungle let alone beyond it so even after I asked the squad leader how long it was going to take he just shrugged.

After safely strapping the batch of blankets to my saddle I jumped on and sat much more comfortable than before. I wonder why nobody did this before. That is until...

Squad-leader: 'Hey Frank, you can't take all those blankets with you.'

'Why not!?' I asked.

The squad-leader sighed; 'The bird won't be able to fly carrying all of that and even if he is able to he'll fly much much slower than the rest of us.'

reluctantly I took down the blankets and untied the rope with a red face due to the shame and the Druids around laughing at me. I should've known better. Instead I reinforced the padding in my pants along my inner thighs to protect the blood-flow in my legs. I was still kinda wobbly due to the ride. The squad was quickly eating some food and after I made sure that the padding was in place I went to join them. The padding was a bit too thick resulting in my waddling towards them instead of properly walking. The squad tried to be respectful when they saw me waddling but couldn't help but smile at my shameful display of self-preservation.

After eating some nuts and fruits we reembarked on our birds flying further north. Part of the way some Druid followed us through the canopy as we flew through the giant trees but where the giant trees ended and the normal trees started we began gaining altitude and the Druids simply waved us goodbye. I tried to wave back but due to the bird flying up I was more focused on holding the reigns as to not fall off than waving the Druid goodbye. The sun had started its descent signaling that mid-day was over and afternoon had come. We had been flying all morning and there was still no end in sight. At this pace we'll be sure to catch up to Yoran and his followers.

He seems to have promised wealth and goods to the weaker Tamarin to convince them to come with him. They had been mistreated by the general populace. They were too weak to catch their own prey but flying birds or stealthing did not require strength so they would still be useful to Jin in an assassination attempt or reconnaissance missions. They were however untrained and they hadn't been able to switch birds along the way like we did so they must have also dropped in speed. The squad-leaders guess was that we would be twice as fast as them meaning we'd catch up to them by the end of today. But since we weren't exactly sure which route they were taking we just took the direct route to the palace. I was certain that their objective was to take out the royal family of Joren to usurp the country. Maybe this was Yorans plan all along. Finally after several more hours we reached the edge of the jungle. We then again descended. After we landed near the edge the squad started smearing the birds with their invisibility-liquid which they later activated with mana. I was asked to join on the squad-leaders bird since I wasn't able to stealth my own bird while flying. All I needed to do was to remain unseen myself. The plan was that I would take on the appearance of a normal human when we arrived at the palace to easily infiltrate into the royal quarters. From there I would be in the perfect position to prevent any attempt at the lives of the royal family. Because the Huin Seseum were shape-shifters I am supposed to be able to do that but... I am not a Huin Seseum. I am a human in a Tamarin body. I can't even change into a human.

Still worrying about how I was going to get out of this mess we took of and because we flew in a direct line in formation at the same speed we didn't bump into one another when we started stealthing ourselves and the birds. We went for a small test-round. There were no collisions so we flew out of the jungle. The moment we left the jungle I could see the capital in the distance. With the setting sun providing the air and lands around us with a red hue I could make out a big palace on top of a hill with the capital Joren having been built all around it. Through years of expansion the city even went up and over the surrounding mountains only stopping at the lakeside. In the lake were many ships and boats of all sizes and there were roads going on in every direction. It was less than an hour to reach the capital but it would take another 30 minutes to reach the palace.

So we stayed quiet and kept our mouths closed no matter how beautiful the sight was none of us wanted the sensation of bugs flying into our mouths. The bugs here were smaller but they were in much greater numbers. The birds were quite elated and the squad did their best to keep them from breaking the formation by chasing after the bugs.

Due to my mana-detector glasses I could see where everyone was but I was the only one who enjoyed this luxury. I could probably use this when I infiltrate the palace.

Darkness set in over the capital of Joren as we flew over the outer-walls which due to the recent quick expansion didn't consist of more than a movable palisade and an shallow ditch. The capital too was called Joren and though I was of the royal family of this kingdom I had never been to the capital much less the palace. at least I won't have to feign ignorance about the palace's interior to my Tamarin comrades. The palace was up ahead. Soon I would be reunited with my father. I decided not to think about it too much in fear of getting too emotional. There were now many emotions rampaging within the confines of my heart. Part of me missed him, another part of me was afraid of what he might have become. But I knew that his love for me and my sister was real and I hoped that that still remained.

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Its kinda busy in real life for me at the moment but I'll try writing on a more regular basis. Though I have not completely figured out how the next part will go. Need to figure out what the capital and the palace looks like first. If you have any suggestions and I have not yet put up the next chapter please post them below and you may very well see those suggestions being used in the upcoming chapters.

I might even borrow (steal) your names to be used in the story since I lack the creativity to think of all of the names myself.