The Trails of Penthos

Chapter 1

It was cold, dark, and empty. I could only hear the blood roaring in my ears and the sound of my own groans. I slowly slipped into consciousness, opening my eyes to find myself in a familiar room. I was laying on the families cold floor, unable to remember what happened the night before. I turned my gaze up to a window, which only gave me limited lighting and warmth. Surly but slowly I made my way over to the sun spot and sat, breathing heavily. Unable to shake off my aching feeling. There was a light pounding in my head. A familiar sight. A familiar feeling. My prison cell.

The one I've been in a thousand times before, and that I'll be in a thousand times again.
"You took a beating last night, kid." I heard that voice. The voice of someone I've heard before. The guard in charge of western cells.

"You just can't stay away from this place can you?"
His stern voice burrowed into my ears, he's said it every other time I've been here. Yet it still makes my blood boil, and my chest heavy.

"Give me a break, anything I do gets me in trouble. It's like they want me here." I looked up and our eyes met, his stare cold and stern, then quickly returned my gaze to the floor.

"What am I here for anyway?" My memories of the night before were blurred and unclear. Was I poisoned?

"You got drunk and started a fight with four different men." He folded his arms as he spoke, looking down at me, as if he was disappointed. It always bothered me, why was it that he felt the need to baby me. He knew nothing about me, who I was, what I've done, what I've seen. why would he care about a criminal like me? We both sat in silence for a moment before he sighed and loosened up.

"You're always in trouble, you're always here. You should be out, living your life like a normal kid!" His voice rose again, "seriously now! You have potential, don't throw it all away."

I shook my head, hoping he wouldn't notice the quiet  mutters that escaped my mouth. I hated this place. I hated every bit of it. I hated the law, the people, everything.

"Anyway," the guard took another breath and reached for his pocket, looking for something. "That girl is back." He finally pulled out what he was looking for; the cell keys. The ring was crowded with different types of keys, they all looked the same but I decided that they must have all been different types. He gently shoved the key into the hole and twisted it a few times before the cell door popped open. "She payed your fee. Again."

A sigh of relief escaped my lips. Thank the lords for Misti who always had my back, even in the worst times. I glared at the guard and scoffed, "See you later, Ekon."

"I look forward to it, Penthos." he raised his eyebrow in quiet amusement.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Do you have any idea how much money I've spent on you?! If you're going to do something wild then at least be sneaky about it, all I'm ever doing is saving your ass! Do you have any discipline? I swear-"

"-you're a mess, Pen. You get caught so easily now a days, what happened to you? Blah blah blah." I took the exact words out of her mouth, as of course, this wasn't the first time she told me any of this. After every time I'd been caught and thrown in jail she'd scold me like some kind of kid. "Come on, Misti, we're not kids. I can handle myself."

She rolled her eyes and flicked the back of my neck, the way she always did when I said something she didn't like very much.

"You expect me to believe that?" She laughed hard, wobbling as the laughter overthrew her. "You're funny, you know that, right?" She pretended to wipe a tear from under her eye. "If you can keep yourself out of jail for a moon then maybe I'll believe you!"

I decided to ignore her. She chose to humor me most of the time, it was one of the weird "older sister" things she did. Despite not being my big sister she was great at it.

"Fine then, be upset. Just saying though; at least I know what consequences are.. I'm good at doing bad things, unlike a certain person. People are too scared to even look at me, makes things easier to do."

If I was being honest, she was right. By that I mean, people were afraid of her. Her complexion made her look as if she was a demon who the villagers were too afraid to face. She was a decent size girl, about 5'6-she used to be taller than me when we were younger, but by the time I was 14 I grew and surpassed her-her jet black hair was long enough to reach the bottom of her back and the hairs around her pale face curled so they framed it like a little delicate box. Her eyes were a stormy grey, you could never tell what she was thinking. She was practically unreadable. She moved swiftly but gracefully as if she was a black swan, drifting among the waters.

She snorted to keep the silence away, "anyway," her voice trailed off as she crossed her arms. "That ceremony thing is tonight."

"Ceremony..?" I tried to shake the feeling of aching left behind from the night before, "Oh, wait, the priest ceremony. I remember that. Who's being chosen this year?"

"That kid, Fawne. We used to be in school with er.. him? before we got kicked out. He really going places though, He made it to the highest ranks and he's our age." Misti dug into her coat pocket and pulled out a little journal, where she would occasionally write things down. She flipped it open and pulled out her magical item pen.

Magical items weren't allowed in our village, as the people who live here are heavily religious. Anything that is not created from the gods that our people believed in, it was immediately dismissed. But of course, Misti always found a way to get exactly as she pleased.

"Be careful with that pen," I advised her as we strolled down the discreet sides of the locals market place. It smelled heavily of fish and rotten meats along with many other rotten types of foods. Although I had a hard time dealing with the smell, Misti had no problem.

She wiggled her pencil in her hand and wrote down the scribbles she called words; our language.

I looked over her shoulder to watch these scribbles form on her paper, she didn't try to hide it, probably knew I couldn't understand what they said. "What are you writing about, Misti?"

"I'm thinking of a grand escape. I want to leave this place, I've been writing it down for quite some time. Logs upon logs of me planning this." She scribbled down her last words and shut the book, waving it to show me. "We can live in another nation, some where else."

"Why didn't you ever tell me about this?" I squinted at her book then back at her, giving her an obvious look of upset.

She scoffed, "You were kinda in a prison cell." She shook her head, "Didn't have time to plan with you." She shoved the book back into her coat pocket and we continued to stroll, "But it shouldn't matter anyway, all that should matter that we leave this place. You can stay out of prison for once, these people hate us, we don't have to be ridiculed anymore."

I thought; Trying to plan this out in my own head, just as Misti had. But I found myself unable to, my mind felt empty and lifeless when I tried asking myself questions Misti had asked herself everyday. "I mean, it sounds good to be out of Prison and to not be controlled by people who hate your guts, right?" I tried to lighten the mood, my lack of intellect was truly inferior to hers. I would never admit that to her though, not now.

She nodded as response and seemed deep in thought, her stormy eyes looked like a night at sea, when the water was most hostile and the waves crashed. She would tell me many stories of the sea and what she had seen when she was young. She told me she wasn't always in the village, although I don't remember that. She told me about the fire nation and all the others ones she had visited. Said that back then, work had to be done and that sight seeing was never on her list of things to do. I never questioned her, whenever she talked about it, she grew heartless.

I nodded back, acknowledging her moment to silence. We didn't speak after this, as Misti decided the silence was much needed.