Princess in tennis shoes

Chapter 11 "New hideout"

Finn starts shaking me. I groan.

 "Alex get up! The Méchant army's here!"

 "What?!" I jump up from the hard floor.

 "There's some méchant army uniform behind that pile of hay, and there's a hat too, use that to cover your hair." I look at Finn. He is in a dark red uniform, with a black cap on. His dark blue eyes are full of excitement. I go over to the pile and there are two more of the same uniform.

 "Finn. We don't have weapons." I point out.

 "We grabbed the ones from the cottage. They are in the back left corner." He says. I look and sure enough all of the weapons from Zamira’s cottage are laying in a pile. I grab the old bow and my dagger. I hang the bow over my shoulder and put the dagger in my belt, and I tuck my hair neatly  under a black cap. Soon we are all ready. Finn leads us to the back of the barn. There were two horses tied to a tree.

 "I found them running around here. Unfortunately I could only find two. Zamira and Alex you ride on the white mare, and I will ride the brown stallion.” Finn orders. Zamira and I jump on our horse.

 “Just follow my lead. Do not make eye contact. Alex look down and hide your face. Don’t try to fight unless I give the signal.” We ride to the nearest guard. I keep my head down.

 “Sir, do you know if there are any of our men at the bonté castle?” Finn asks the man.

 “Why should I tell you?” The guard replies in a deep voice.

 “We are on a mission. And we need to know if we can trust anyone at the bonté castle. We also have a mission form.” Finn pulls out a folded piece of parchment, and hands it to the guard. The guard opens the parchment and raises his eyebrows. Then folded the parchment, and gave it to Finn.

 “Sorry boy. Did you not hear? There are no more people at the bonté castle. The place caught on fire. We they were trying to capture the prince, but luckily he escaped. So now everyone is looking for him.” The guard whispers softly.

 “Thank you kind sir.” Says Finn and he hands the guard a silver coin. The coin was different than our normal coins. It had a unfamiliar symbol on it. The symbol was gold and had four circles forming a squarish shape, with a circle around it. The guard quickly put the coin in his pocket.

 Finn thanks the man again and then we ride north toward the castle. I don’t know what Finn is planning but whatever it is, it’s probably something crazy.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At dusk we stop at the tallest tree I have ever seen. The tree looks to be thousand years old. Zamira and I sit in awe at the tall tree, while Finn jumps off his horse, and walks over to the tree. He closes his eyes and opens his hand. A small silver key, appears in his hand.

“This is an enchanted tree. Only people worthy enough can enter. Once worthy you will be able to enter it anywhere in the world. Alex you will go first.” Finn says and I walk over to him. “Hold out your hand and close your eyes. If you are worthy the key will appear in your hand.” I hold out my hand, and suddenly I am in a memory.

 I am at home in our training arena, and about the age of 13 at the time. I am hiding behind a big pile of rocks, watching my brother train. He is fighting a big man. The man is his trainer. My brother dodges the mans swing, and tries to strike a blow to his knee. But the man blocks it with his sword, knocking my brother to the ground. The match ends.