Under the Burning Stars by Carrigan Richards Page B

boat, hoping she wouldn’t get sick. Nicole quickly bent over the side and hurled. Link rubbed her back. The guard chuckled slightly and moved the boat across the choppy sea.
    Ava exchanged an anxious glance with Link. Maybe they should’ve gone another day. Usually Ava welcomed water, no matter how torrential it was. But this was frightening. She couldn’t control it and didn’t know what it was going to do. “Isn’t it too early for hurricane season?”
    The guard laughed. “It’s like this all the time. It’s designed to drown people.”
    How ironic? Ava could possibly die by drowning.
    “Don’t worry. You’re perfectly safe,” the guard said. The rowboat settled against the tall brick building. They exited the boat one by one.
    They walked inside the tall stone building with its arched entrances. The square castle flanked by three towers was built on an island with nothing around for miles. Ava could feel the wariness of the group as they moved in a single file line past guards and through a small courtyard. They followed the chaperone down stone stairs. The only sounds were their shoes shuffling along the steppingstones and every so often a soft whimper from a prisoner. The place was dark and cold just like a cellar and the lights along the walls were dim. They passed cell after cell with Cimmerians watching them.
    Ava wondered how long they’d been there and how they’d been tortured. She saw a woman with blond hair staring at her. Her green eyes seemed so lost, but she could have sworn she saw a knowing look in the woman’s eyes.
    Ava and Link walked up to a cell with a man sitting in the dark corner holding himself. He turned his head and Ava caught a glimpse of a rugged face with gashes across and a blond beard matching long scraggly hair. This wasn’t the ‘dashing’ Xavier Ava had first met. He no longer looked confident or cocky. Now, he looked like a scared little boy.
    “Well, isn’t karma a bitch?” Link asked.
    “The prisoners are quite sedate,” the guard said. He was so quiet Ava had almost forgotten he was there.
    The place reminded her of those old psych wards she’d read about or seen in the movies with their empty looking glassy eyes. No matter what, she didn’t feel the least bit of sympathy for the prisoners.
    Xavier squinted his eyes. T hen, he slowly got to his feet and moved closer to the bars. “You look familiar,” he said to Ava.
    “I know you know who I am,” she said. “I thought you said it wasn’t over. But from where I stand, it is. Doesn’t look like you can really do much since you’re behind bars.”
    “Who did this to us?” Link demanded. “Why did you choose us?”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
    “Don’t lie to us.”
    Xavier leaned into the bars with a crazed look in his eyes.
    Link shook his head. “How do you get information out of the prisoners?” he asked the guard.
    The burly man crossed his arms in front of his chest. “We have our ways. But the more we torture, the more they forget who they are.” He smirked.
    “You’re kidding, right?” Link glared at him. “I need answers and he’s the only one who can give them to me. I thought we could torture the answers out of them.”
    The guard squared his shoulders. “If there’s a problem with the way we do things here, you can take it up with the Elders. Of course I’m sure they wouldn’t want their time wasted by some scrawny kid like you.”
    The anger in Link’s eyes built and Nicole immediately grabbed his hand. “We should go.”
    “No,” Link shouted. “We came all this way to find out why this happened to us.”
    The man furrowed his eyebrows. “You aren’t anything special, Halfling. So don’t take it personally. There is none nor has there ever been any rhyme or reason as to why Ephemerals were changed into Halflings. It just happens. But now they’re all locked up so no more wars.”
    “It just happens?” Link spat. “I was forced to kill