A home is not just a place. It's the people who you consider comfortable to be around. It's the people who you decided to live with. To struggle with life's bitterness and joy, to shed tears and burst laughs, to have quarrels then make up later with.
As Lester watch the back of Kyra disappearing, he fight the impulse to run back to her side. The empty spot on her left has always been his. But right now, he just denounced his own position. From her life. From her future.
He was selfish he knows it. Yet, right now, he can't afford to be one.
With a heavy heart that seems to be squeezed out of blood and air, he retrace the steps of the Fairy King. Memories flood over his mind. Memories back when he was still a child.
He was a fairy nomad before the Fairy king and the royal guards found him. He lived in the outskirts of Moor Isle. He and his village nomad fairy families made a mistake of venturing into the portal across the mortal realm. There, they found riches and bounties of nature that weren't in the fairy realm.
Architectures and lanterns that were not created in their village. They got curious about the light, hence they followed it and tried to steal it. But what they did not expect….is that the place where they stepped into, is a human lair where entertainment for the night and human trafficking takes place.
When one of the rowdy men saw them, saw the different clothing and the strange appearance, Lester and his friends were immediately captured. They were sold from place to place.
Starved and treated like mere livestocks. They were chained in the ankles and wrists. Injected by strange substances that made them lose their sanity. If they did not eat the strange bobbing liquid given to them, they will be beaten to death.
He and his friends never got to speak with each other again. Despite staying in the same prison cell. They all lose the ability to speak… because of the despair of their situation.
On the first night, one of them cried, and that doubled the whip and lashes on their green skin. On the second night, they beg for mercy, and that tripled the whips. Soon they tried to speak among themselves to devise a plan to escape, but the mortals find out, and they break their legs.
Lester learned his lesson. He had given up hope at that time. He know no one in his family will save him. His friends are dying one by one. The strange bobbing liquid is slowly killing their organs.
It seems it was a poison extracted from the rotten corpse blood. Lester get to watch his friends transformed from nomad fairies to hideous monsters. Lester turn deaf from all the screaming of his friends.
His mind was anxious when he would turn into being that hideous next. He does not want to be a monster. He just want to return home.
One night, when the human jailer is dozing off with a furious flush on his face and an intoxicated strong smell of alcohol in his lips, a soft knock sounded in his cell. The chains clank, echoing in the small room.
When he look up, one of his fairy folk, a little girl with beautiful azure eyes and long obsidian black hair is stretching her lotus vines to undo the shackles on his arms and feet.
Under the pale moonlight coming into the solitary window, she was beautiful beyond words. Even her words that repeatedly say, "Everything's gonna be okay. You're safe now." sound so melodious and hypnotizing.
He can smell the sweet scent of lotus on her white robes. When the last clink of the chains were removed, she held his hand and help him straighten up.
He can feel her vines crawled on his feet. He step back in alarm. But he felt her soft warm palm squeezing his. Reassuring him everything is fine, he stop moving. The green vines healed his wounds, even the broken bones and ugly bruises.
They were gone as if they were never there.
On the other cell, Lester can see fairy men in black and red combat uniform helping his friends who are still alive on their feet. Each of them came out of the prison cell silently.
Fairies and humans have an ancient agreement to never meddle on each other's affairs. To never kill and hurt without valid reason. But treating the little fairy children as if they are worse than livestocks, rubbed Kyra and the fairy royal guards she brought with her the wrong way.
Silently, without a single sound of giving away their presence, Kyra ordered the royal guards to kill every jailer present in the prison cell. The royal guards heed her command.
And not a second later, human blood were spilled in the cement stinking floor. Their lifeless bodies slumped either in the walls or on the floor.
When they get back to the fairy realm, Kyra reported to her father what happened. But instead of listening to her explanation, the Fairy King was furious. He wrapped her in his curse magic and tortured her in front of everyone.
An act of disobedience, the fairy king told her. How can she venture into the mortal realm without permission. Doing things without thinking twice. A pathetic disgrace! Is what he called her in front of everyone. And Kyra endured it all silently.
Lester, even though ten years have passed, still remembers that fateful day. His friends go back to his hometown in the outskirts of Moor isle. Only he decided to stay in the Elven Croft Palace.
He deliberately went closer to the Princess and asked for her help in getting into the royal guards. Just so he can get closer to her. Not once did he regret it.
If only the time will permit.... he still want to stay a bit longer. He did not achieved his goal yet. He still had not seen her laugh. Not even once.
But the current circumstances have no room for his petty emotions. Now he has to stop the Fairy King from finding out Kyra's plan to escape.