word count...63,559

Before Jules really knew what had happened he found himself facing a pirate’s sword. He had come to an agreement with Slim, he would fight him if his men would back down. Then he did a very honorable thing, he made Slim agree that if he won he would not harm Leah and Mark. Slim agreed adding that if he won he was going to make Jules walk the plank.
Mark left the helm and joined Leah as they watched Jules fate, there was really nothing either could do. The duel started without warning, Slim attacked Jules and the young pirate found himself fighting off blows that would have ended his life. Jules was doing quite well nonetheless.
Slim was amazed that for someone so young Jules was able to ward off the blows so well. Jules on the other hand was having a very hard time against the much taller man, though he refused to show it knowing it would only make Slim press harder.
For a long time neither moved, they stood in one place, their blades flashing at great speeds. Then Jules lunged and Slim stepped back at the unexpected movement. Jules moved forward and soon Slim found himself on the defense as Jules advanced on him, not giving him an inch to recover.
Slim scowled knowing that is Jules won this duel he would never be able to show his face to another pirate again. He tried to lunge and instead was pricked in the shoulder. He leaped back and hit Jules’s sword full force in an attempt to knock it out of his hands.
The blow was powerful and for a moment Jules almost did loose his sword. Slim saw this and advanced while Jules had his guard down for a brief moment. Jules regained his guard in time to deflect a blow to his head, but then he found himself on the defense line.
Slim laughed about the whole thing, relieved because he was now certain that he would win. He did not expect Jules to jump up on a barrel though, nor did he expect Jules to jump off the barrel and kick it at Slim. The barrel hit Slim and he was knocked flat on his back, before he had a chance to raise he found Jules’s sword at his throat, one thrust and he was a dead man.
Jules looked up at the men who were gawking at the sight. “This will be the fate of any man who dares mutiny against me again,” Jules said in a commanding voice. “Now take this man below and lock him in the hold.”
Two men stepped forward to do their captain’s bidding when there came a flash of white light and a man came crashing to the deck. He plowed into Jules knocking him flat on his back. Before anyone had time to recover from the surprise at the man’s sudden appearance there were two more flashes of light and two other young men dropped to the deck. They sat on the deck for a long moment, too stunned to move.
“Get off me!” Jules snapped to the man on his chest as Slim rose to his feet and picked up his sword.
The man moved off of Jules and nearly lost his head when Slim attacked, he did not care who he had to take out to get at Jules. The man jumped out of the way and snapped, “Can’t you give a guy even a moment to recover?”
“Jason!” Jules snapped. His eyes flashed with anger and relief all at the same time.
Sonega and George had by then stumbled to their feet. The found themselves surrounded by pirates who were looking at them as though they were ghosts. Mark took one look at his character and thundered, “You are dead when I get my hands on you Sonega!” Sonega decided he would rather take on the pirates then Mark.
However they had more pressing matters at that moment, mainly the mutiny and Slim who was still trying to get at Jules.

Cael, Meg, and Anna knew what they were getting into long before they got there. However the moment they found themselves in the black forest with yellow eyes watching them, they wondered if they had made the right choice.
By the time the three characters had arrived the four girls had armed themselves with sticks and rocks, they had given up on the man, he did not seem very willing to help. However, the moment they saw Cael, Meg, and Anna they froze, and then without thinking nearly pummeled them with sticks and stones.
They might have done it to had not Cael turned his head at that moment making it so that Beth, who was behind him, could see his features. The rock she was holding slipped from her fingers and fell to the ground with a thump. Both Cael and Anna turned to see what the noise came from and were surprised to see their authors behind them.
Cael’s face turned as red as a tomato and Anna lowered her head in shame. Meg shifted her feet and did not say a word.
“Cael!” Beth cried and she seemed to forget that her predicament was his fault. She rushed over to him and gave him a hug.
Cael turned redder but was glad that Beth had forgiven him.
Anna, hoping to seem something of the same treatment, lifted her head, only to find Mariella was giving her a scolding look. Anna slowly walked toward her stammering, “I am sorry, I did not really want to kill you.”
Mariella looked confused because she like the others did not know about the killing author in books fact. Cael and Beth joined the others as the wolves again started their howling, only this time it was sharper and louder. The man looked up long enough to say, “We are done for, they have decided which one of us is to go first, now they are coming.”
Once more Beth picked up her rocks and Cael drew his sword. Gabrielle shook her head and said gravely, “I would feel better if we were all armed.”
Even as the words left her mouth swords appeared at their sides in sheaths, all but Cael who already had a sword.
“What?” Mariella asked as she drew her sword and blinked in surprise.
“That was unexpected if not rather cliché,” Christina said as she thankfully drew her own sword.
Anna smiled as she said, “We may stand a chance after all!” Then she yelled, “Thank you Cassandra and Elsa!”
The man burst her sudden joy when he looked up at them and said, “Don’t you see? Not even swords can help you this time!”

Rufus shoved open the door, it swung back on its hinges, squeaking, and banged against the wall. He paused in the door way for a moment to look at his prisoners, then he slowly entered. He walked tall and commanding knowing full well that he had won, and wanting to make sure everyone else knew it as well.
He stopped in the middle of the floor and rising his head an inch higher said, “As you can well see you are now all captives, captives that I intend to torment! However, being that I am a gentleman I plan to only torment one at a time, and I will let you four choose who gets to go first.”
The captives looked at each other with wide eyes, though they were not wide from fear, more like amazement. How were they supposed to choose who was to go first? They were thinking over this when R.K. snapped, “Oh hang it all! Take me!”
The girls all turned and looked at him in wonder. He glared at them. “What? I may be a villain but I am not heartless, yet. Besides we are all going to get tortured, might as well go first! And what have I to loose, I am not real remember?”
Pip blinked several times but could not think of anything to say, which was probably a good thing being as R.K. would not have put up with last minute speeches on how brave he was being or anything like that.
Rufus laughed at the villain and ordered his men to unchain him. “How grand, the man is going to go instead of the girls, he is going to play the hero! But know this, all your gallantries are useless, I shall not let them be just because you are trying to act brave! They will all pay!”
R.K. was forced to his feet and, with rats on all sides of him, was made to march out of the room. The whole way he kept muttering under his breath about how he would like to get them into his dungeon some time and show them what a REAL dungeon and torture room was like.
As the door closed upon the retreating figure of R.K. Meggy could not help but say, “He is rather brave wither he will admit it or not.”
Pip nodded. “I have always been fond of him, he is one of a kind.”
Sam was about to say something when Mark, Torjan, and the sassy cat who had no name, stepped out from the shadows along the walls. They did not get the warm welcome they might have been expecting. Instead the three girls threatened them, not that there was much they could do being that they were chained up.
“We came to get you out!” Mark said once the girls were silent long enough for him to speak.
No one said anything else because at that moment a loud cry drifted into the hall and Pip’s face went white with pain.
The cat actually looked worried when he saw her face and demanded, “What? Are you sitting on a tack?”
“No,” Pip glared at him as she winced in pain. “They are tormenting R.K….” her voice trailed off as another yell reached their ears.
Meggy understood before the others. “R.K. is part of Pip,” she said thinking how weird it sounded as she said it. “If they torment him they torment her!”
Torjan did not need to hear more, he turned and began to try and pick the lock to the chains. The cat moved over to free Pip as Mark, who seemed to be an expert at this sort of thing, managed to free Sam. Once all three girls were freed Mark turned to the door to pick that lock, only to have it swing open on him. Rufus entered the room and glared at them all saying, “Did you really think I would let you escape?”

Cherise, Katie, Jane, and Sarah broke for a stand of thick trees as arrows were continually rained down upon them. It was amazing done of them were shot as they sought cover behind the trees. Once they were in the stand of trees they continued moving until there were well out of range. By then the sun had set and the moon was casting her light over all the land.
“What should we do?” Cherise asked as she leaned against a tree to catch her breath.
“Do you think they are still back there?” Jane asked.
“I would think they would be,” Sarah said softly. “They are probably waiting for us to return.”
“But why would they think we would return?” Katie asked.
“Because if we don’t go back and warn them the Rangers are going to walk right into an ambush,” Sarah looked back they way they had come as she spoke.
None of them said anything for a while. They knew Sarah’s words were true, they knew they had to go back and warn the rangers if they could. But they also knew going back would mean death. In the end they all stood up and once more made their way back to the archers.
They had not gone far before three men and one woman came running through the trees. They ran up to the girls and before the authors could do anything, they grabbed them and whispered, “Don’t go back!”
“Kallen?” Katie asked in wonder as she recognized her character’s voice.
“Reamann!” Jane gasped in amazement.
Sarah grinned widely at Jake and her character Jane, and then scowled at Jake and scowled him.
“What are you four doing here?” Cherise asked once everyone was somewhat over their shock.
“We have come to save you four,” Reamann said as he smiled again at Jane. How he could ever have done this to her he was not sure, looking at her he was again reminded of her sweetness and he vowed he would never do anything like this to her again. He always vowed he would be a saintly character from that day forth.
“Come we must get you out of this forest,” Jake said hurriedly.
“We can’t leave yet!” Katie gasped. “We have to warn the Rangers or they will be killed!”
Jake looked over at Kallen who was looking at Reamann, who was looking horribly ashamed. He lowered his eyes and looked down at the ground, not wanting to meet Jane’s eyes.
“What?” Cherise asked. “What is wrong?”
“Well,” Kallen looked like he wanted to sink into the ground.
Jake was staring off into the trees so he would not have to look at either Sarah or Jane who was glaring at him.
“The problem is…” Reamann started. He was interrupted as a hooded man stepped out of the trees and said, “The problem is, you all are our prisoners!”
“Isaac?” Cherise asked in disbelief.

“What should we do with them sir?” a man stepped up to the head dwarf, that’s what the men were, dwarfs but they were of an older and rougher bred then most.
“I would say lock them up, but that is too easy,” the leader said as he looked the five girls up and down. “They seem like a sturdy lot, put them in the mines!”
Rose glared at the man but said nothing, just let the dwarves lead her off with the others. They went farther under ground until all hope of escape was crushed under the rocks. Once they had gone so low even the lights had trouble making the darkness flee they stopped.
The dwarves handed each of the girls a pick and a light and said, “Work here, make the tunnel go lower.”
Then the dwarves left and the girls set to work. They had not been at it long when C, Justin, Cedryck, Sonega, and Thaddeus appeared. The girls all stopped working to stare at them as they crashed into a wall, they were not used to the sudden dimness of the cave.
“How did you guys get here?” Jo asked once the character’s eyes adjusted to the darkness.
“Through the computer,” Thaddeus said as he ruefully rubbed his head which he had smacked against the wall.
“Can you get us out?” Laura asked hopefully.
Thaddeus looked over at her, relieved that she was not throwing things at him. “That is why we came, to take you back home!”
“We would not even be here if it was not for you guys!” Rose said as she placed her hands on her hips and glared at Cedryck. His face reddened and he tried to beg forgiveness. She rolled her eyes at him but once the story was out she forgave him.
The others did likewise and once they had made peace began to try and find a way out of the cave. This was easier sad then done, and in the end they realized they had to head back up, back toward the dwarves. No one was really looking forward to this but there was really no other way to go about it.
 Slowly they moved up the tunnel, moving as quietly and quickly as was humanly possible. Still their feet crunched over the rocks and to them they thought they were making enough noise to raise the dead.
“We are going to get caught!” C hissed though he knew there was nothing they could really do.
Justin rolled his eyes and whispered, “I will go ahead and scout everything out a bit so we will know if anyone is coming.”
This he did, only to make it about five feet before he ran right into seven dwarves.

They were creeping through the dark trees when they ran into each other. Jordaan tumbled backwards into Prinz who shoved him to the ground, needless to say he was still irritated with him.
On the other side Alex, who had run into Jordaan, lost his balance and was caught by Justyne and Hanz, they shoved him to his feet and prepared to fight off whoever was in front of them. Thankfully, at that moment, Maddock muttered, “Klutz.”
“I am not!” Jordaan hissed while Theobald tried to clamp a hand over Maddock’s mouth.
“No way,” Hanz moaned.
“Not them!” Sybil muttered.
The characters froze, and then slowly stepped into the moon light. Alex, Hanz, Sybil, and Justyne glared at them, though their faces softened a bit when they saw Jonathan, Prinz, and Theobald.
“So I guess tossing us in here to die was not enough,” Alex finally said breaking the silence. “Now you had to come in and make things worse?”
“No,” Damrin lowered his head and looked repentant. “We came to help you out.”
“By plowing into us?” Hanz demanded as he glared at Jordaan.
Jonathan ignored the scowls and walked over to Justyne, she grinned and hugged him. Timothy hung back with a pale face and a worried look.
Prinz stepped forward, scowling at Jordaan as he passed him, and bowed to Hanz. “We saw your danger and came quickly, what are your orders?”
Sybil was busy glaring at Maddock who for once looked half way ashamed. Theobald moved over to her side and said, “I am sorry Sybil, had I known I would have come sooner.”
Sybil smiled. “I know you would have Theobald.”
 Damrin looked over at Alex who still looked annoyed but also like he would forgive his character for all the trouble he had put them through. Alex then remembered that they were being followed. “We need to get out of here,” he reminded the others.
Hanz nodded his head and explained what the characters already knew. “They will be upon us soon,” Hanz concluded.
“Then we must flee, come morning we shall stand and fight them,” Prinz said as he reached into his cloak. “I brought your pistols with me,” he added as he handed the weapons to Hanz.
Hanz grinned and stuck them in his belt. Then once more they set off. They walked until  the sun rose, lighting the world in soft rays. It was nearing seven when they entered a small clearing.
Moving quickly they prepared to cross it, they made it to the center when an army of heavily armed men stepped out of the trees, bows aimed and ready to fire.

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