A girl stood gazing over a small metal bed, tattered quilts strayed about, and a single flat dirty pillow leaned against the rusty bed frame. A bag clutched in her hands, swaying from her trembling shoulders. She didn't get sleep the night before, a group of men from the palace had come that day ordering the children of the outlands to be examined and she was chosen with a dozen others. Her heart raced and her mind couldn't wrap around it. "Alora!" a shrill shout came from behind her, an elderly woman stood perched in the doorway. Her face hardened with a slight smirk, "They're waiting for you," she said before disappearing back into the snowy outdoors threw the door.
Alora always knew that she never liked her, ever since the soldiers made her a caretaker thirteen years ago, she seemed to hold a grudge towards her for as long as she can remember. Alora always tried to please her and do what she asked but it never worked.
She let out a long shaky breath before slowly trudging towards the morning light. The cold hit like a heavy hammer, chills ran up and down her body like water. The snow had packed the night before leaving a cold desolate landscape of white around the lifeless tree line. Soldiers stood station around a small wooden cart, children were being packed into it like animals. A soldier trudged over to her gripping her arm and dragging her towards the rest, she struggled to get to her feet as he drug her with ease threw the muddy ground. The woman who harbored her all those years still stood near the doorway of the small hut, her face hard and cold as she watched them take Alora away. With a huff, she descended back into her small cottage not looking back. Alora held back her tears as hard as she could. The soldier grunted throwing her in with the other children, she hit the wooden floor with a thud, she slowly sat up with shaky breaths and shivering limbs.
The wooden cart doors closed with locking sound, leaving the children is desolate darkness jammed together. Alora tightly wrapped her arms around the bag in her lap, trying her best not to let her emotions get the best of her. She untied the small bag, pulling out a tiny poorly sown stuffed rabbit. Its tiny arms dangling by only a few threads each. Alora patted its head and hugged it tightly to her before putting it back into the sack.
The cart jolted to a start, harshly thudding down the muddy dirt path. Alora couldn't help but fear what was ahead, she could only remember ever being in the outlands but now she was chosen to be taken away to the castle, children who were taken never returned.
The outlands where a place for the soulless to be exiled, The lord of that land had them work to the bone for the pack, doing there choirs outside the castles towering walls. Soldiers would pillage their small towns, raping, beating, sometimes even killing. Alora had witnessed it a couple of years back, Ever since she couldn't budge the sickness she felt for the people of the castle. She would look on threw the brutally cold nights into the shimmering lit city that couldn't care less about the one living in the icy trees. But every ten years the lord sends out soldiers to collect the most beautiful, young, and talented children of the outcasts to be brought to the castle.
Alora sat squeezing her bag tightly as the clopping of the horse's hooves clattered threw the mud. She couldn't help but notice how her Black hair shimmered like a ravens feathers at the small specks of light that peaked into the darkness. She always adored her hair, always wondering what her true mother looked like but it never helped because she was soulless, and they are considered orphans at birth, she knew that even if she was to find her true mother she wouldn't want her. That's what had been told to her as long as she could remember, but she never dwelt upon it, she knew the only people that survived this harsh land where strong, she couldn't let her fear grip her now.
It seemed as though hours had passed until the cart finally thudded onto the smooth stone pavement. Alora found a small sliver of light coming threw a notched crack in between the wood boards. She bent down to observe threw it, leaving the frosty forest behind a towering wall of stone came into view, soldiers posted around the fortress, there gleaming silver armor shinning within the cold sunlight.
For a moment Alora had forgotten where she was before the cart abruptly stopped smacking her into the side of someone, "I'm so sorry", her shaky eyes rose to meet a pear of golden-green ones. There sat a boy is wavey long brown hair matted and stuck to his face. He didn't say a word he only staired with what seemed like malice, but before she could discern the wooden doors crashed to the ground clattering soldiers dressed in the silver armor started ripping children from the floor filing them out in a straight line. Alora gathered herself together and stood behind the nearest person hoping to not gain the soldier's attention. they slowly walked out of the cart onto the rough cobble, Her eyes drifted to the massive walls standing before her, an eerie immersive gate stood before them. She jumped when the deafening creak of the gate opening bellowed threw the air. Her heart was nearly beating out of her chest her stomach flipped and churned making her feel sick as the gates slowly opened to her new life.