(Previously)

When Drake woke up the next morning, Janna was gone. Well, not gone, they were still in a cell, but she wasn’t beside him in bed anymore, she was on the ground, leaning on the wall.

She said, “Drake, do you think we should be following Tendrils anymore?”

Drake said, “Well, he might not have told us about Zeallott, but he’s told us a lot about other stuff. Knowing the future is useful, right?”

“I was thinking that too,” Janna replied, “I just don’t know if it’s all worth it anymore. I’m getting too old to fool around doing errands for him. Especially the nonviolent ones.”

“Too old? You’re what, twenty-three?”

“Sort of. Did I never tell you? I’m sort of like my father.” Janna said.

“What do you mean?” Drake asked.

“I age slowly, just like my father. My adjusted age is twenty-one, but I’m really around eight-hundred**. Well, 856**, since I don’t like to round my age up…”

Drake lay back down in the bed, dazed. He thought on this for a long time. He was dating a lot more than he had realized. He wasn’t sure how to feel about this, but at the end of the day she had been hundreds of years older than him for their entire relationship. It’s not like much had really changed, just the knowledge.

“Wait,” He said, “So two years in lockup, or even a decade is a lot less for you!”

Janna nodded, but years were still years.

 

Chloe lay back in the wooden bathtub. There were many bathrooms in the castle, but she preferred the one in the northeast of the third floor. Not many people came to this corner of the castle and she was at piece. Sunlight drifted in through the orange, yellow, and pink glass of the window. Chloe had put a lot of plants in here too, and vines grew up the walls and through the ventilation grate in the ceiling. She was also the one that requested wood for the tub. It was a strange preference, but wood felt nicer.

Her light skin was clean now, but she just sat and worried. She worried for Janna. After considering many things, Chloe came to the same realization Drake had. They lived for a long time, and the sentence would be a small fraction of her lifespan.

“No reason to hold back now, I guess. Time to be a genius in the field I think.”

Many people considered Chloe to be a genius, but she never quite believed them. This worried her a lot, and so for the longest time she had been trying to convince herself that she was a genius by calling herself one. It wasn’t working too well. Chloe didn’t think she was all that smart, but she did know she was quite talented at learning. She picked things up very fast, and her mind remembered facts easily.

Chloe pulled herself down into the hot water so that only her head was above, and thought about what she was going to say during the court.

 

“I wonder when they’ll be here to get us-” Janna started as the door creaked open.

It wasn’t the door that lead through the castle, instead it was the door that went upstairs into the guard building.

“Alright, let us go. I hope you are both awake.” It was Natasha

Janna stood up. She was feeling unsatisfied. Drake hurried out of the bed, worried.

“Today is the first day of your trial. Come on.”

Natasha cuffed them both this time, and then let them out. Janna and Drake followed her up the stairs and out into the guard’s district. She led them out towards the six kingdom towers, to the third one. The tower of Poets and Law.

Janna stared up as she walked through the tower’s shadow. It appeared to be looking down on her gravely, implying something about her future. Only now did she start to worry, just a touch.

A short one now. If you missed the last one, or you need to start from the beginning, follow the links!

The next part has been written!

Daniel Triumph.

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