Free The WishKeeper (The Paragonia Chronicles) by Maximilian Timm Page B

that it’s your wish,” said Thane, thinking he was making sense.
    “Watch me,” Shea quickened her pace. Thane stopped and dug in his heels.
    “Shea. You can’t fly!”
    Spinning on her heels and staring at Thane, rage swelled within her. She charged at him, red-faced.
    “Don’t you tell me what I can or can’t do. This is my wish! Who’s gonna grant mine, huh?”
    He was stunned such a small fairy could be so intimidating. “But…fairies don’t make wishes.”
    “Well I do! And none have come true,” her reply seethed through her teeth. She quickly turned and continued her speed-walk to the F.I.A.
    Thane followed, making sure to keep his mouth shut.
     

 
     
    13
    A General’s Plea
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Ever since Beren lost Elanor, he was never quite the same. Word had gotten out among his Keepers that the General would occasionally go missing for hours at a time without any report to the F.I.A. He knew there were rumors about him; rumors that claimed he’d lost his spark. Not the spark of energy he once had as a young fairy, but the spark that keeps a fairy sane and intact. For Beren, it was just easier to let his troops and civilian fairies talk all they wanted. There was a spark that was missing, but it had nothing to do with his sanity.
    Every night in bed he would stare at the empty space next to him with his hand outstretched caressing the sheets back and forth, back and forth. It was all he could do to make himself fall asleep. Somehow the soothing nature of the slow waving of his arm eventually made him tired enough to fight off the insomnia, though it didn’t always work. The only good thing about insomnia was that he wouldn’t have to manage his nightmares, even though his worst one was re-lived day after day - forgetting her.
    On the one-year anniversary of Elanor’s death, The Other Side was covered by a grey, clouded summer sky. Determined, Beren stepped through a fir tree’s Gate and looked out over the small town of Abdera.
    He set a cautious foot onto the skinny fir’s branch and pulled back a few needles. Peering out into the park, he covered his head with a brown hood and flew off toward a rusty well a few hundred feet in front of him. A wooden bucket dangled from a mangled leather rope onto which he jumped and slid down. Carefully peering over the bucket’s edge, he looked down into the blackness of the well below. Voices could be heard, though nothing discernible, just muffled orders barked by a low, angry voice. About to climb down, he quickly ducked when a figure in all black launched itself up and out of the well. The figure used a grappling spell to pull himself out and eventually landed, sure-footed, on the green grass a few feet away.
    Beren stared at The Captain, partially in awe and in an odd way, longingly. Flying out of the bucket, Beren slowly and quietly landed behind him. He removed his wand and though it was ready to fight, his eyes weren’t. The Captain whirled around and lightning-quick, armed his crossbow. It was pointed at his face before Beren could raise his wand.
    The Captain motioned for him to drop it, but the General refused. Beren tried to look into the darkness of the hooded cloak, but a thick shadow cast away any light from The Captain’s face. He was a dominating figure, The Captain. A couple inches taller than Beren and his arms, as if unnaturally stretched, they seemed even longer than they normally should be. Walking toward Beren with his bow fixed on his forehead, The Captain was forcing him back. Step after step, they stared at each other until finally The Captain, with a quick thrust, pushed his crossbow inches from Beren’s sweating brow.
    Beren crashed to the ground and looked up at The Captain in front of him. The General’s eyes were begging for something. Please, they said. Please. The Captain stood over the fallen Beren, pointing his crossbow at his heart.
    “Elanor,” Beren said. “She needs to come back. Please.” Tears welled