The Rose Thief by Claire Buss

Author:Claire Buss [Buss, Claire]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: CB Visions
Published: 2017-11-10T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

It had been hours. Or minutes. Or days. The difficulty was that they had no frame of reference, no distinguishing mark to try and orientate themselves upon. They were literally nowhere, plus everything looked the same. Every time they tried to separate and cover more ground Brogan and Ned soon became overwhelmed with grief, unable to do anything other than weep. There were now three pools of tears in the sand which might have been a useful point of reference except for the fact that once you had walked away from the pool it ceased to glimmer and was absolutely no help whatsoever. They had to walk along in a line, holding hands.

'Anything?' Ned glanced along the line. Jenni scowled and Brogan shook his head. It all looked the same. Ned stopped walking. 'There has to be a better way. We must be missing something. Jenni – any ideas? Please tell me there's a magical solution.'

Jenni was drawing shapes in the sand with her toes, she shrugged, paused then snapped her fingers and looked up with a grin. 'Yeah! Boss – I got it. We've gotta find luv.'

'Isn't that what we're trying to do already?' Brogan looked confused. More so than usual.

'Yeah, but no. We gotta find our luv. Wo's inside us. Wot we luv the most.'

The two men stared at the sprite. She bristled under their scrutiny. 'Wot?'

'Find our love?' Ned was incredulous. 'I thought love was lost. I thought that was why we were in this whole mess in the first place.'

Jenni kicked piles of sand, trying to find the right words. 'Yeah, but it's your own luv you've gotta find, not everyone else's. That will lead us to the rose, I fink.'

'Can you show us what you mean, little sprite?' Brogan asked.

Jenni nodded and motioned the two men to come and stand closer to her. When they were within touching distance she stood one foot on one of theirs and let go of their hands. Sadness washed over the men but it was manageable, they didn't feel the need to dissolve fully into sobs, yet. Jenni closed her eyes and concentrated, her brow furrowed, whispering words under her breath. She cupped her hands in front of her as if she was holding a ball. Nothing happened. Ned's nose started to itch and Brogan began picking his teeth. Minutes ticked by and still nothing happened. Then Ned noticed there was a faint pinkish glow emanating from Jenni's hands, it got brighter and brighter until there was a glowing pink ball of energy fizzing slightly in her palms. She grinned up at them.

'I found mine – watch.' And she threw the ball out into the nothingness. It arced up and gradually disappeared from view.

'What's supposed to happen next?' Brogan looked wistfully into the distance at the pink glow that was gradually fading.

'Wait for it.' Jenni had puffed out her chest in pride.

They waited. Still nothing. Minutes ticked by and the silence grew more and more uncomfortable. Jenni started biting her nails.

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