Chapter 7: Surviving Winter(4 months later)

It's now winter. The crops never grew, and people are dying from lack of food. Not to mention this is the harshest winter moonhaven has had yet. But Danny, my retainers, and I refuse to give up. We have been doing everything that we can to get food out to our people, and it hasn't been easy. And the worst part we know the Dark Warlock is going to attack any day now, so that has everyone on edge. We are all hungry, and sadly the elves can't make food grow in the snow. So we have been improvising and hunting what food we can also fish when the ice allows. The children are scared, hungry, and cold. About four weeks ago, Danny left the kingdom with Flahera and a handful of soldiers to trade some clothing, jewelry, and other goods for some food, medicine, and soldiers from the other kingdoms. It's our last chance to survive the winter and the oncoming battle with the Dark Warlock.

With the temperatures dropping so low, I have ordered all of the villagers to come to the castle. We have set up places inside the castle for them to sleep for the winter. My plan is to have everyone concentrate in one area so that all the body heat is in one building to increase survival. I'm walking through the courtyard, where we have people lined up to get some food. One of my soldiers yells, "incoming enemy," I get into defense mode in my mind. I look at the people, spouting my order. "Anyone who can fight grab a bow—those who can't take the children to the throne room where it is safe. Silvia and Richards have all the staff bring any furniture to reinforce the gate with. We must hold off until reinforcements arrive." I stand with the archers, and Ravensha is getting people ready to hold this spot if the enemy makes it through the gates or the battle will be lost. I look out at a distance and see a massive army. I hold out my hand, and a silver bow appears in my hand and a white quiver on my back. Looking at the army and ours, we don't have enough trained men or weapons to hold them off if they make it through the gates, much less hold them off with only arrows, but we have to try. Then I have an idea. I look to Silvia, who has just come back, and yell, "Have those who cannot fight to make some makeshift weapons with what we have. Tear down the castle if you must. We just have to last until Danny comes back with reinforcements."

I turn my attention back to the enemy. I scan the army, looking for the Dark Warlock, who is nowhere to see, which means that this is only the first of many waves to come. I stand there with my bow in one hand and an arrow in the other. When the enemy begins their march to our gates, I nock my arrow into my bow. The other archers and the hunters that are there all follow my lead. All the while, I'm looking for the leader of this march. I can end this quickly if I can find them. When I cant find them eminently, I ready the archers. The other soldiers are next to us with torches to light up our arrows.

I yell, "READY," we already our bows and drawback the arrow in the bow "AIM." The arrows all get lit by torches in unison. "FIRE" we all shoot our arrows, giving a volley of arrows that the enemy has to dodge. This causes much confusion at the beginning of this battle. The enemy is frazzled for a moment, which is where they have made a mistake in this battle. When the enemy is unsure of what just happened, we fire another volley of flaming arrows taking the opportunity in their confusion. They lost many men from what I can tell, then I can see the general leading this army though I can tell that he is a new general that I have never seen before or fought. I take an arrow whispering a quick spell, then fire it. It hits the man head-on in the eye, causing him to hit the ground in pain. The other see what I am trying to do because the spell I casted on the arrow emits light when it hits the target. The last volley of arrows occurs, killing the new general. The first battle has been won, and everyone shouts in victory. I give them the order to collect supplies from the dead soldier's weapons, clothes, food, and armor everything because I know we will need it. I know our luck will run out soon, and the battle will not be from a castle wall but on the battlefield. It's time to have the villagers trained in combat. They are going to need to be able to defend themselves and not rely on soldiers.

Ravensha comes up to me, along with Jack. They both look at me, and Jack says, "Milady, we got lucky with that attack. What is the plan." I respond, "we train anyone and everyone that can fight, and those who can provide the food and sort through the spoils of what we take to see how we can use it." They nod, then walk off to carry out my orders. I go into the castle to find Silvia, but I stop at my chambers, not feeling well before I do. I sit on my bed. It makes a cedar wood with a pattern I can't quite make out because the bed is so old; thinking about the type of bed makes me miss Danny that much more. It also reminds me that he has to come back soon, or else we may not survive. I don't want the others to know that I am worried about the future of this kingdom. The people are looking to me for strength to save them. Still, I don't know if I can from what my spies have reported; the only stone that the Dark Warlock doesn't have is mine, and if he gets it, he will be unstoppable. That is why I am worried. Still, the people cant know that they can't see me tense, or they will lose faith and give up, and we cant do that. We have to continue to fight. I go to stand up and start to feel sick again but why. I just shake it off and go back out with a new resolve and hopefully a plan. As I walk out, I see Silvia, and she says, "Milady, are you feeling alright?" I smile and say, "don't worry, I'll be alright," she looks at me and says, "Milady, you look pale. Have you eaten yet?"

I start walking and say, "Honestly, I'm not hungry. Now, how many days' worth of food do we have?" she has something on her mind, but I am not going to worry about it. She then responds, "Ten days giving everyone the bare minimum." I begin to think of a plan. 'we have ten days of food, with freezing temperatures, we will have to cut that in half. People will start to get restless, but we might last at least an extra four days to eliminate the cold factor if we have enough water. But also, we don't know how many more attacks we will go through. Nor how bad they will be, so we will have to take in that factor. The next attack will be soon, so we may only last seven days, depending on the next attack. We also need to get the villagers trained in for a battle to protect themselves and others.' We stop at my study and go in. I take my seat at my desk. It's the first place I met Danny. I take my quill and a piece of paper and write a letter to Danny. Then one to all the kingdoms asking for aid and that we at most could last up to fourteen-days but at the unknown factor of not knowing when the next attack will be. It could be as little as seven. Once I Finnish the letter, we go to the hawk balcony where we keep our messenger birds. We tie each of the letters to their legs and send them on their way in different directions. I also placed a spell that will make them invisible to the enemy.

Five days later

Five days have passed, we have faced many battles. The villagers can at least defend themselves, and sadly no response from our allies or Danny. Everyone is starting to lose hope, and without hope, the next battle will be fatal, for no one will have the strength or courage to move on and fight. Also, some of us haven't slept in the whole five days. I am one of them. I have been trying to develop new plans, not to mention several of the battles have been all night and into the morning. Still, the lack of sleep is just making me sick and weak. I don't let anyone know this because they would all give up before it's even begun. Some may say that it already has with the first. Still, I have been fighting the Dark Warlock for a long time. I was even on his side of the battlefield. I know they have the power to make it through our gates. Still, he is trying to make us weak and not want to fight that first battle was just a test to see what we were capable of. The real battle has yet to come. As I am in the study making plans, I finally end up passing out from exhaustion.

When I wake up, I'm in my chambers with Jack nearby. When he sees that I am up, he says, "No, the villagers do not know that you almost killed yourself by not sleeping for five days and also not eating for three of them. Also …" He stops what has him at a loss of words, then I start to notice that there is a tint of pink in his cheeks. He continues, "just tell me, why were you still fighting in your condition?" I look at him, confused, saying, "what do you mean I've just been stressed?" he then says, knowing something, "As you royal Guard I… Advise that you don't fight anymore because we can't lose both of you." He walks off what he said, swirling in my head 'the both of us?' then it hits me why I haven't been feeling well, not because of stress. Then I say to myself, "come home quickly, Danny. I can't do this without you. I…no…we need you." I look out in the distance through my window, hoping to see him in the distance coming home to help his people and me, and that is when I see the next battle coming. Still, instead of one general, it's all of them, including the Dark Warlock leading the way to our end, but I won't let that happen; I have too much to lose now. I won't let him take my new beginning or my family from me again.

I get my armor on and make my way to the battle. Once I get there, I have a sword in hand instead of my staff. When I take in the sight of the courtyard. I notice that the gate has given out before I could get there, and there is a whole battle that has erupted in the courtyard. I make my way to the first enemy that doesn't pay any attention and take him out from behind. I go to the next, which is charging straight at me. I move off to the side. As he comes closer, I move my sword up and take him out with ease. The enemy doesn't know that I have improved my sword skills. Which is giving us the upper hand right now. I end up taking down 30 of the Dark Warlock's men before Maloney noticed me. We are all locked in battle, and by sunset, everyone is exhausted, and it's starting to become evident that people are on the verge of giving up. Then I see something that none of us expected a flaming arrow, then several following, and it's hitting many of the enemy soldiers. In the shock that has been created, I knock Melony back.

I then yell, "Our luck has come. Allies have arrived along with our future king. Let us fight for the future, and nothing can stop us." That gets the soldiers riled, and they start fighting back with everything they have not given in once. Melony is distracted by the Dark warlock giving out an order. I take the opportunity to make a lethal blow, but she finishes a spell as I make it, but there will be no way she will survive the impact I made. All of the enemy soldiers have disappeared. Everyone shouts in victory, but I just run. But I don't care about the victory; I was more conserved with looking for Danny riding Midnight. I run through the bodies and blood-drenched snow. To find the one I have missed so much. I have so much to tell him about everything. Primarily what I recently discovered about our future as king and queen of MoonHaven.