MEHJABEEN
Chapter Seventeen

She stared up at the moon, partially obscured by the ominous-looking clouds. She brushed a loose flake of clouds of dust from her hair as she tried to forget the overwhelming, acrid stench of dirt that had nearly overcome her lungs. Elffy shivered. At least she was still alive is what her thoughts were as she merely thought back over the past dawn, knowing her life would never be the same again.

All she knows is that before one’s life can become a beautiful butterfly, one must break out of the old shell and fly into an unknown world.

Similarly, her life has also gone through that phase. But, to gain the honey as its life's journey, life was to provide many ups and downs, and to have some sorts of efforts will be needed from her side to overcome the problems and get to the success ratio.

However, if she was to live in this world, her life shouldn’t be without ups and downs, otherwise, she would be dead.

Thinking of which, in everyone’s life, many people come and go. Many people come and stay in our lives forever and many come only for a short period. Almost 10 years ago when Elfie started her life in the Kingdom of Elffenda, all she felt was like she was entering an unknown world, a world that is sometimes scary without anyone to teach her good and sometimes enjoyable with the presence of her beloved comforting love.

Also, it was the first time in her life that she feels like she should be responsible for the things— and the opportunity they gave her to live as one of them.

Now, when she finally returns to the live reality happening around her, she's back to her alarming state with her guards on. Never knew what might pop up from the darkest hours ahead of the sunrise.

Bored of what to do, among playing with little Kubri and the wise talks she had with Willow, now she is indeed in need of other company apart from those non-stop background music artists, the night owls, and invisible cloaked insects in the thick bushes.

She tried to signal her live location to Quentin through Willow, but Willow can't wander around in the unknown world without its master, which is Elffy.

Without their master's presence, they're merely just a natural source in this world.

Willow tried to locate the arena but it was hard and different compared to their forestry.

So it retreats from the mission to reach the love of its master's life. Wherever Elffy is they both live and stay no matter the circumstances.

Earlier in their home Kingdom, Willow lived as an entire family, with family and friends. Being the younger one, Willow was assigned to serve, or can one say, that their bonds were connected from her birth? But still, it needs both sides to play the orchestra.

This unknown forest is serving its hand with no good luck compared to their Kingdom.

The description and all goes well with the connections of the Forbidden Territory or even the Enemy Kingdom's borderline. But she isn't in the direction of the latter region which is on the other end of their respective Kingdom.

For now, the Forbidden Territory must do. Or that's what she believes it to be. sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ FɪndNøvel.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

To say, it's debatable, which on the contrary explains the magical place that she is in now along with the poor little Kubri hidden beneath the shell walls and for

Willow tries to act peachy while she knows that he is crying out of sadness with his trails of water dripping from his sides, as he roams around from side to side, for he can't be threaded to his friends, nor can they hear Willow’s call.

Either way in addition to all, Elffy noticed Willow’s powers are being quite low compared to the early dawn in their Kingdom. Like something is blocking the spell. It never happened beforehand. If it counts once, in her Dreamy Paradise. They were present on her side but Willow couldn't help. As Willow is allergic to the substance polished in the walls of their tree house.

That's the only thing that can block him from parading out her locket... With a sole person who has achieved that target.

Whom in the name is Quentin Tarantino (a.k.a.) Tarantula.

He's the one who found the secret that the lotus leaf’s refined oil can prevent Willow's excessive attention at the arena.

Can he do such things to get rid of her? Does she not matter to him anymore? And all the things he said to her were gone like the water under the bridge. Isn't it what it is? The more she pulls her brain to think about the possibility of how they come to this end. The more her head hurt as well as her heart which got pierced more than twice in a row.

This got her worries which overtook her senses as she hums a sad tune as she does the only thing which is capable of at the moment.

••

At the early dawn, with the climate utmost denser with coldness, the sky breaks the midnight blue and reaches the sun-bleached frosting hue. Connecting to the skyline, nature was slowly blooming its wings with its thickened freshness while the earth line seemed still moisty with the ground near her covered with a mish-mash of nonsensical doodles, all done by herself.

The silence was peaceful yet so distanced from feeling at home as she was conditioned to remain low-key for the time being.

The pastel blue sky seems too complex for her saddened mood.

And a mere sound came. Gruh Gruhh!! It's different and it's vibrating from her tummy. It's the weird sound that she heard, in the earlier dusk and now the sound stopped when she patted her stomach.

She had never heard this sound before. She was once heard by her friend Inés that her stomach will growl like a hot bubbling tub whenever she neglects her meals. Earlier, she denied her sayings, as her ways of storytelling. But now it's been proved, in a horrific way for Elfie.

Aww... seems like her stomach is scolding her like an oldie in her Kingdom, for all the fellow beings who skip their daily meals.

When she finally gets her head out of her Prince’s trance, she reaches for some affordable fruits and follows the buzzing bees for her daily potion, containing the honeycomb’s drizzles up from the giant trees.

The ancestral Elvian had found that the buzzing bee can feed and raise their immunity to a level more than the other intakes possibly could. And it's an all-around cycle for the bees. So it's manageable as well as easy to find. As her custom-made bag has fallen somewhere in the dark, now she is bound to in-search for those slightly sweet, rose-gold drizzles.

In her search, she runs off following the sound of the bees, thus reaching their hive.

Suddenly from nowhere, Elffy heard a clap of thunder. The echo was still ringing in the air when the blinding lightning started flashing up in the sky again and again. Suddenly, powerful lighting hit the trunk of the giant tree before her, for it to blow open into two symmetrical halves.

As the breeze whirled through the gap in bigger waves, bringing forth with it, the smell of dead, decaying things. Scrunching her nose, she tried to identify the source of the smell as she tried to rush in the opposite direction.

But what she found made her prefer back to the comatose stage she was in earlier.

Because, before her, near the fallen tree was an unknown animal looming around in search of something, with its pupils gleaming red with anger.

Following that, a mist of clouds from the plants which emit colorful eye-catching hues beams off the ground and covers the existence of the creatures from her eyesight. Till now, Elfie wasn't alone, with the crickets and other brittle insects frogging in the background, in contrast to her prayer to get rid of those noises ... But now she can't hear a single sound, as if everything died through the night and gone as good riddance in a wrong-wrong way on her behalf.

Sadly, the bygone misfortune is in denial at her desperate calls to reactivate those noises to accompany her sides.

But the silence was a so-called warning, to the upcoming meetings, as it later reveals out with the accessory of some grotesque figures of rouge wolves who came marching in two's with a couple of draped corpses all together towards Elffie’s seated frame...

As for the wolves, their eye sockets glowed with blue fire smoke. But the corpses had no eyes as their sight was blinded by the thick ropes of worn white ribbons.

When the two of the corpses try to capture her, while the wolves block her from behind from crawling back, as she tries to struggle- free from their rotten hands off her limbs.

But her shoves died out when they plucked her off the ground and threw her at the feet of a thick bootstrap being, thereby hurting her back with their unimaginable force, which caused her to whimper out in pure pain.

This day was long enough for her to believe in these creatures. But the pain in her back was too excruciating to feel immune to the happenings.

Elffie does not believe in ghosts. It was her belief until she experienced the truth of this unknown forest.

Now the atmosphere was chilly cold but still quite warm for Elffie to find crawlies gazing at her scrunched petal form.

Acknowledging the presence of the mere being, she tries to reach out for some help but is cut off when she sees the dripping wetness from its bootstrap boots... It seems to be thick with a nauseating smell emitting from those boots.

Which indeed was the same smell, that brought all those creatures to her.

Fearing the worst to happen, she tries to back away from them for good. But got struck when the huge being got a hold of her torn dress and held on to it.

Even though they are behaving like an animalistic side, they seem sharper than they appear. And that mere thought made her lips tremble so hard.

Even after this event, she refused to give up the thought to fight back.

When the mere being sees her struggle less posture it releases the hold on her and takes a step two back and leans down on its knees to see her face.

Comically, Elffy shivered at the scene playing off on her and found this actual momentum to her escape, with no matter the chance of winning from the scary wolves, she dashes off as she sprinkle the dirt on the fellow being’s eyes as well as the animals and took off in a random pathway.

Author’s Note:

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