The cell door clanged shut as if delivering the final verdict on how unbelievably stupid she was. With incredible effort, one of Elizabeth`s eyes cracked open. Behind it a brain began to slowly clunk and whir.

　　Another eye opened. Three-dimensionality popped back into life.

　　Through the rusting iron bars of the floor Elizabeth gazed down onto the faraway streets of Caranthis, where tiny lanterns of flickering life struggled against the night. The cage that she was now in wrapped around the upper reaches of the Darkstone Tower like the belly of an engorged, colossal python.

　　"So they caught you as well?" Barnaby, along with the others, was sitting cross-legged in chains. "We were hoping that you might have got away".

　　Elizabeth rubbed her eyes and ran her hands over the manacles that were clamped about her ankles and wrists. Her head throbbed to a powerful drumbeat. "Where am I?" she groaned.

　　"The Skycage", reported Aelgren. "The view`s nae bad but the room service is deplorable".

　　It was several brain-loops before Elizabeth realised that Aelgren was back in his furs and that Izzario, chained up next to him, was shrouded in purple robes. A simple process of deduction led her to conclude that the guards in the medicine room must have been discovered.

　　Memories drifted back into focus like sunlight through a twisted piece of glass.

　　"I couldn`t get to the hatch in time", she croaked. "There was someone there. I think it was the Empress".

　　"Penelope!?" exclaimed Barnaby and Luella at once.

　　Elizabeth winced, nodded, and squeezed a hand down the side of her boot. "I heard her talking about catching you. And there were letters on her desk. I found this when she had gone".

　　Elizabeth passed the note to Barnaby, who read it aloud with a grim, despondent expression.

　　Luella bristled with anger. "Arraflax - I knew it had to be him. That explains how the Dominion found out about the Omnaria and the North Star. The stinking low-life traitorous scum!"

　　Barnaby looked utterly dejected. "All these years . . . how could he betray the Free Lands like this?"

　　"Yes, but now you can prove it", said Elizabeth, trying to sound upbeat. "This letter shows that he`s been helping the Dominion. Once the other members of the Wyse Council see it then they`ll have to do something".

　　"Perhaps, but delivering it might be slightly tricky", Barnaby pointed out, gesturing to their far-from-homely surroundings.

　　The long cage was divided into a series of smaller cells. A pile of rags in the cage to the right was curled up in the corner. The only exit was a sold iron door.

　　"Okay. So when do we break out?" said Elizabeth, expectantly.

　　Barnaby and Izzario swapped a grave and worried look.

　　"Be my guest", invited Aelgren. "We`ll follow you".

　　Elizabeth couldn`t understand why everybody looked so depressed. "But before, in the jail . . . What about picking the lock?"

　　Luella answered with a firm shake of her head. "There isn`t one. The cell door`s bolted shut from the other side".

　　"But . . . " Elizabeth gazed searchingly at Aelgren and Izzario. "When you were here the last time . . . You said you escaped".Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

　　"Aye, but then we were at the bottom", said Aelgren, dolefully scratching his beard.

　　"We broke out through the sewers", Izzario explained. "Before they decided to guard them".

　　"Ohhhhh", said Elizabeth, as the gravity of the situation began to sink in.

　　Barnaby sighed. "I`m afraid", he said, sounding as glum as a wet day in November, "that this time we really do appear to be stuck".

　　Elizabeth stared at her chain-clad feet.

　　And Luella`s next question made it all a million times worse. "How did they catch you?"

　　"I, um . . . " Elizabeth felt her cheeks turning a hot grilled, sizzling red. "I thought I could magic my way past the guards. I didn`t want to hurt them, just make them go to sleep for a while . . . it must have backfired".

　　Aelgren struggled with a chuckle. "You mean you knocked yourself out?"

　　"I`m glad you find it amusing". Elizabeth`s head pounded again. She winced with embarrassment, smothering her face with her hands. "Oh, how could I be such an idiot?"

　　"Ach, dinnae be so hard on yourself. It cannae be easy finding out that you`re a . . . "

　　Aelgren stopped, as if realising that he was about to say something he shouldn`t.

　　But it was already too late. The unsaid words turned into exotic birds with brightly coloured feathers that squawked and screeched and flew wildly around the cell.

　　Elizabeth suddenly had the all-too-familiar impression that there was something wrong. Again.

　　"I`m a what?" she said, slowly and suspiciously.

　　"Um . . . "

　　"A witch - is that what you were going to say?"

　　"Er . . . "

　　Izzario drew back his cowl, his maroon eyes glittering in the dark. "No, Elizabeth. You are not a witch".

　　"What then?"

　　"You`re a Shadow Breaker".

　　Obviously Elizabeth had no idea what to say to this, and now she could feel herself growing annoyed with Izzario too. "I haven`t broken anything", she protested. "Not deliberately anyway. What are you going on about?"

　　Izzario smoothed his robes and cupped his hands together as if the answer to that particular question was going to require a lot of explaining . . .

　　"The holy book of my Order", he began, "is called the Principles of Zinn. In it is written an ancient prophecy that many of us believe refers to the fate of our world".

　　Izzario adopted a sombre tone as he recited a section of the relevant verse: "Through the shadow of the veil / In the light that comes from stone / Shall the One From Beyond be known".

　　Izzario looked as if he had been waiting for this moment the whole of his monkish life.

　　"The Order of Haryll", he went on, "believe that these words will be fulfilled with a new dawn of magic - a coming of the light to drive away the force of darkness. We believe that magic wanes and rises like the changing of the seasons, and that the birth of a new cycle is marked by the arrival of a Shadow Breaker - a person of immense and extremely rare powers. Powers so great that they can defy the will of death itself".

　　Elizabeth listened in silence. The only sound next to Izzario`s voice was the nameless howl of the wind. "And you think that this has something to do with me?" she said, when he had finished.

　　"I do".

　　"But that`s ridiculous. I`m only twelve!"

　　"And what about the magic - we`ve all seen what you can do?"

　　"Um . . . All right, there is that", said Elizabeth, with a scrunchface. "But I can`t be the only one. What about actual witches?"

　　Izzario shook his head. "Magic like yours hasn`t been seen for a very long time. It`s the only explanation. The prophecy speaks of the girl from another world - the one who will rid the lands of evil . . . and here you are".

　　"Yes, but only because you brought me here!"

　　Elizabeth tugged at her chains, wishing that she could cross her arms properly for extra cross effect. An unreachable itch of frustration began to wiggle inside her. "And I don`t want to be here any more . . . I just want to go home to my mum".

　　Elizabeth pushed her face back into her hands, her stomach twisting as a swell of warm tears forced its way out through her fingers. "Why couldn`t you have left me alone?"

　　The question was followed by an unbreakable silence.

　　"And it doesn`t even make any sense", she sniffed, unthinkingly.

　　Which, when she did come to think of it, was a very good point.

　　Elizabeth frowned as patches of head-fog slowly began to clear. "Because if you thought that I came here because of the prophecy then why would you go to all this trouble to get me home?"

　　"Er . . . " Barnaby shifted about uncomfortably, "because . . . you know . . . the . . . thing?"

　　"What thing?" Elizabeth demanded.

　　Another icy salvo of wind swirled around the cage and Barnaby drew a very, very, very deep breath. When he exhaled it seemed as if the only thing that would be left of him at the end was going to be a floppy, professor-shaped, piece of rubber balloon.

　　"This", he said, "is going to sound extremely strange. But the real reason I brought you here . . . was because you asked me to".