Chapter #7 Running For Life

I woke up and called out that we had to keep on moving. Everyone groaned and got up. We packed our tents and walked to one of the animal's closest homes. First it was Major, a panda who was kidnapped by Nightshadow when he was only two years old. We said goodbye and moved on to the next home. We walked 8 miles to get only half of the animals home. When the sun went down Precious said that we had to eat dinner and go to bed. Precious and Mythical worked on making some fire to heat up dinner.  Then Empress and Lucky gathered some fruits and vegetables. Then I was left making spears and weapons if we were in trouble. "How many spears should I make?" I asked Precious. "I don't know.. Maybe 10 or 12." She called out to me while she was rubbing two sticks together super fast. "Ok." I said while I was gathering 6 more long pieces of wood. I stared at the other animals. They looked so sad. "Maybe we could cheer them up by playing a game or roasting some marshmallows.." I thought to myself. I finished making 13 spears when Empress said that dinner was ready. "Can I get some marshmallows from my sack?" I asked Empress. "Sure. Why not?" I crawled into my tent and pulled out a big bag of marshmallows. "Here," I handed a stick with a marshmallow on it to Empress. "Thanks!" she said sitting down and putting the marshmallow near the fire to warm up. I handed a stick with a marshmallow to everyone. When I saw their faces when I gave it to them and sure enough there was a smile on their face. We sang some songs around the fire, ate dinner, chatted, and finally decided we should get to bed. We all fell into a deep sleep that night...... "Blossom. Blossom wake up." Lucky told me when it was already 7:00 am in the morning. I turned on the other side and put a pillow on my head. "Fine. I guess you just want to get up the hard way." she said. She picked up my feet and dragged me outside my tent. My eyes popped wide open when she dragged me. "Now get up." Lucky said still trying to drag me. "Fine! I'll get up! I'll get up!" I said standing up. I dressed for the day and packed up my tent. I got some water in a bucket from a fresh water river nearby and started drinking. When I was done I went were the fire was last night and kicked the rocks. Lucky came over to me and asked curiously, "Why'd you do that?" "So if one of Nightshadow's guards come looking for us he won't see where we were." I told her kicking more rocks. "Ooooh..." she said walking to help Empress pack. Then all of the sudden I heard a crack. "Shhhh... Be quiet everyone!" I whispered. Everyone fell silent and stared at me. I looked out in the forest... Something was moving.... I heard another crack! "Everyone move quickly! Go as fast as you can!" I yelled. Lucky and I picked up some toddlers and ran as fast as we could, others kept up. Then all of the sudden I heard a scream! "Help! Help ANYONE!" I saw Precious tripped and she had a swollen ankle. "Lucky, go as fast as you can and take the other animals!" I said with panic. "But what about you?" she responded looking more worried than me. "I have to go save Precious!" I said quickly. "But you could die!" Lucky yelled with terror. "I have to go! Run as fast as you can with everyone! I'll catch up and meet you soon!" I yelled starting to run towards Precious. Lucky and everyone else ran until I couldn't see them. I was about 2 meters away from Precious when I saw something crawl out of the woods.

Chapter #6 Escaping Under Moonlight

"I finished packing my bag", I told Precious when she was stuffing some clothes into her backpack. "Need any help?" I asked her when she was carefully putting in a necklace. "No thanks, I'm good. It looks like some others need help though," she responded looking at others who were sitting on their bags so they could close it. I walked over to Lucky, another girl who was the same age as Precious and I. I asked her if she needed any help. "That would be great!" she said with a smile. "You sit on he beg while I close the zipper, ok?" I told her. "Sure." she said climbing onto the bag so she could sit on it. I zipped up the bag and told her it was done. "Thanks so much! I'm gonna go help others too now!" Lucky told be very thankfully. When everyone was done we went outside the tent. "It took a pretty long time to clean up that oatmeal!" Nightshaodw growled looking at us all suspiciously. We all looked at each other wondering why he said "long time". "We were only gone for two minutes...." Lucky said thinking Nightshadow was going crazy. "Well it's long enough to be away from working!" he yelled. We all sighed and went back to work. We worked from the sunrise to the moon rise. Nightshadow made us go to bed four hours later then when we usually go to bed so we could finish another den. It was 11:36 when he told us the lights must be off. "I was 2% satisfied with the work you did today. Tomorrow, you must work 21 hours so you can the satisfaction from me up to 7%." Nightshadow ordered. "You wake up at 3:00 am and work until 11:00 pm. Is that clear?" he snapped at us. My jaw dropped open and my eyes popped wide when he said this. "At least we won't be here tomorrow......" I thought to myself. Everyone responded to Nightshadow, "Yes, sir." we groaned. He walked away and shut off our light. I stared at the ceiling dying to be home with Liza. My eyes filled up with tears just thinking about her. I tried to hold back them but they just kept pouring down my cheeks constantly. Precious's sleeping bag was right beside me so she saw my tears. "It's gonna be ok." she told me knowing that I missed home. I looked at her and realized that she was really a true friend. I noticed something else. Before I got here, Liza was the only friend I ever had. I smiled at Precious, "Thanks for not letting my faith drift away." "You're welcome," she responded. 30 minutes later we tiptoed out of our tent. I pulled out the map one of Nightshadow's guards dropped down on the floor and looked at it. "It says that only four guards will be guarding tonight." I told everyone "Where?" Lucky asked curiously. "Right over there," I pointed north and looked back at the map, "there, there and there." I said while pointing in different directions. "Ok," said Precious, "let's go this way." We walked for 4 hours straight to be sure that the guards wouldn't come after us. We decided to take a break and camp for a little while in a cleared area. Precious gathered wood and stones to make a fire, Lucky and I carried logs and rocks for chairs and tables, then Mythical and Empress, two other bunnies, collected some berries and pulled out some food frm their back packs. I saw Precious sitting on a rock that Lucky and I carried. I noticed a tear rolled down from her eye and splashed onto the ground. "Are you ok?" I asked curiously. "No..." Precious admitted. "What happened?" I asked sitting next to her on another rock. "It's just....." she tried to talk. "It's just what?" I asked more curious than ever. "Well..," she cried," I am escaping for nothing... I don't have anywhere to go when everyone will go home," she told me with a sigh. "What do you mean? Won't you live with your parents?" my eyes were focused on her. "My parents died. It all started one morning when my father, mother, and I went out for a picnic. I spotted a very rare orange bird sitting in a tree. I showed my dad and mom and they saw it too. We walked closer to the tree to see the bird. But the bird was just a stuffed animal. My dad picked it up and said, " It's just a plush. Probably a kid left it there by accident," he told us. But we didn't know that it was planned to be there to kidnap me. Nightshadow's guards jumped out of some bushes and held me back while they killed my parents... I was only five when it happened.. I screamed and cried.. They gave my parents some potion and dragged them to another secret hideout. I'm pretty sure the potion was poison..... Then Nightshadow's best guard, Thunderrock, came and took me here.. I never heard from my parents since..." she explained me while tears dripped down. I looked at her.. her life must have been so hard... mine was hard too but I never knew my parents so it was easier for me..."Listen Precious, I feel super bad for what happened... the truth is.. well.... my parents couldn't afford to take care of another person when I was born... So they left me with Liza, the shaman.. Since the first day I was born, I lived with her. I'm 10 now and it's still hard to say goodbye to parents.. It's never easy to say goodbye. But I promise. I'll ask Liza if you can live with us." I told her. "Thanks," Precious said and gave me a hug. I looked at my watch. It was 3:49 am. "I guess Nightshadow wanted us up and working by now." Precious said wiping away her tears with her sleeves. "Ya.. At least we don't need to be bossed around by him anymore." I responded. "Hey guys," Lucky came up to us. "You talking about Nightshadow?" she asked. "Ya," we told  her. "I left a little surprise for him before we left," Lucky added. "What surprise?" Precious asked. "Oh let's just say.. I destroyed the crops and new dens with a club I found.. and I also dumped all of our dinner.. on the grounds and at top of his tent.." Lucky said hiding her smile. "No way! You didn't! Man that would be so funny to watch when he woke up!" I laughed. "I know right?" Lucky said. Precious, Lucky, and I all laughed together. "We should probably get to bed," said Precious. "Good idea," Lucky told us. We told everyone it was bedtime and we slept in our tents relaxed and happy knowing we didn't have to wake up early and do backbreaking work.

Chapter #5 The Map

The sun beamed down on my tent, looking as if it was the sunniest day of the year. I found everyone still sleeping. Then I saw Precious open her eyes. She said good morning to me and she changed into her work clothes. "Luckily we woke up before Nightshadow and the guards did, they would make us work before everyone else." she whispered to me. We heard someone yawn and zip open their tent. It was Nightshadow. He told the guards to blow the horn for the beginning of the day. Seeing everybody waking up with having dark circles under their eyes I saw something that suddenly fell out of one of the guard's pockets onto the dusty ground. I crawled out to see what it said. It was a map of the new settlement and where the guards are on duty! "I have to show this to the other guys..." I said to myself. Seven hours past of the work with having no break. But finally we got one. I showed it to the animals and Precious said," We could use this when we're escaping tonight! We can escape through the areas where the guards are not there!" she whispered. "Ya! We would sneak past them without them even knowing we left!" an animal whispered. "And we could make dummies of us so they won't think we would be gone! If they check on us during the night, they'll find our dummies sleeping!" another animal added. "Okay, we will escape 30 minutes after the lights go out!" I quickly said not letting any of the guards or Nightshadow hear. "We pack in our next break, we can say we're cleaning up out tent because someone spilled some oatmeal on the mattresses." Precious whispered again. "What are one of the rules on my list? NO TALKING! Is that clear?" Nightshadow yelled at us. "We were just talking on how to make the dens more... um... beautiful your majesty" I lied. "Well get back to work!" he roared.

Chapter #4 Planning the Escape

I woke up from my sleep and saw the other kids picking up clay from the ground and molding it into bricks for the new dens. Molding a clump of clay into a brick I thought if maybe I could escape and go home. I tried to memorize a plan to escape. When It's evening, maybe I could escape and help the others too! But I have to see who I can trust........ I looked around and found a girl the same age as me. I got up from the hay stack and went over to talk to her. "Hi, my name is Blossom. What's your name?" I asked her curiously. "Oh hi, I'm Precious," She smiled talking to me. "How are you?" I added to the conversation. "Great and you?" Precious said while plowing the field. "Good," I lied. It was horrible! No food, no breaks, no water, nothing! "It's good to have someone to talk to. Nightshadow never lets us ta-" "Hey! Stop talking and get back to work! Those dens won't build themselves you know!" Nightshadow cut off. "We could whisper maybe," I suggested. "Good idea. I don't think he'll notice." she said quietly. "Have any of the animals ever thought of escaping?" I asked. "Yes, all of them have and I have too. It's so horrible here. We tried it in so many different ways! We tried to escape in breaks, at evening, when Nightshadow was eating his meals, even when the guards took a bathroom break!" Precious told me. Picking up a shovel I told Precious,"I have a great idea! What if all the animals and us dressed up in camouflage at evening when all the guards and Nightshadow were sleeping!" "That would be good but guards are on duty guarding each one of our tents.." Precious said. "We can go out through the back and sneak off!" I replied with excitement. "Great idea! I'll go and tell the others animals secretly!" she said as she went over to the other animals pretending that she was getting a shovel. "At least I planned my escape," I said to myself ,"and a new friend."

Chapter #3 Discovering the Kidnapper

The next thing I new was someone pulling off the black bag from my head. Staring around I wondered who would do such a horrible thing, kidnapping someone when they were picking berries. Then I heard footsteps coming my way. A wolf walked in front of me and said, " Hello, I'm Nightshadow. You must be wondering why we have taken you away from your home, we did this because we need people to work our new settlement." I looked at him confused and thought he was joking. "You're settlement?" I asked curiously. "Yes a settlement. I am the leader of a pack and we moved to a new area of land so we can make a home. We need people to start building the dens and plowing for the new farm." I looked at him again still in shock knowing that I might never be able to see my home again. Also that I would never see Liza. "So are you taking me as you're prisoner..?" I asked wondering if i could ever go back home. "Well.. yes I guess that is the right way to put it. After maybe ten years we will let you free again." Nightshadow said to me. I yelled, "ten years? What I can't be away from my home that long! Liza will be wondering were I am!" He stared at me for a while thinking of something. "Liza? You know Liza?" he asked. "Yes I have lived with here for 4 years since I was born!" I yelled even louder. "How can you speak so well? Plus we cannot let her find you! She is a shaman, she'll take you home and ban me from ever seeing Jamaa again!" "That's your problem not mine! I know how to speak so well cause a shaman taught me.. Anyways I'll be in the most populating places so she can find me!" I replied to the nasty wolf. "Lightshadow, Thunderrock, take this girl to the new settlement so she can start plowing the farm!" Nightshadow called out to the some warriors. "What you can't do that!" I said quickly. "Oh ya, watch me." He looked at me and then saw me being taken to the farm. The warriors threw me in a pile of dirt and said I had to start plowing the fields. I looked around and saw other hopeless kids just like me working on back breaking work. I joined in afraid that the warriors might punish me if I didn't do what I was told. After an hour of plowing the fields Nightshadow came and said we could take a one minute break but we would go and start working on the new homes for the clan. I felt so tired I could sleep anywhere. Then I found a huge pile of hay and fell into a deep sleep.

Chapter #2 Kidnapped at Dawn

When I heard the sound of my home-made alarm clock go off I knew it was time to go picking for our breakfast's berries. I dressed up, put my blue locket on, opened the door, and headed outside. Liza and I always had blueberry jam on bread for breakfast. We would make the whole breakfast ourselves. I was in charge of picking the blueberries and making the jam, and Liza was in charge of making the bread. Liza was still sleeping so I had to be quiet when I was picking the berries. I looked around the garden and found a new bush that I have never seen before. It was  filled with raspberries and roses. "What a interesting bush," I said to myself. Picking the raspberries and roses from the bush I heard a twig crack from the forest. "Hello..?" I called out waiting for an answer. I saw some gleaming blue eyes staring at me. Then I noticed something, the eyes looked so familiar! It was my mom, at least I thought it was. But my hopes faded away when I realised that parents must have already passed away. I went up closer and said hello again. No answer. Then the eyes quickly dashed across the woods and disappeared. "That's odd...." I quickly said. Then I heard another twig crack form the other side. I turned around, but it was too late. Someone had already put a black bag over my head.

Chapter #1 The Very Beginning

As any regular day for me, I woke wake up and saw my temporarily guardian, Liza the shaman.

I lived with her since the first day I was born. When I was born, my parents decided that they couldn't have enough gems to take care of me. So one night they wrapped me in a white blanket and left me out on Liza's welcome mat so she could take care of me. My mother put a blue heart locket around my necklace. Inside was a picture of her . She wanted to let me know that they will always love me no matter what. That morning when Liza went outside to feel the fresh air she saw me right in front of  her door. She picked me up and looked around for who left me there. Then she decided that she would take care of me until someone would adopt me. Looking at how small I was, she named me Blossom, the tiniest bud of the flowers. Now since every day for the past 4 years of my life she has taken care of me. Anyways after I woke up, I went downstairs ate breakfast ,and opened the door to play outside. I went on the swings and felt the gentle breeze across my face. Looking up at the sky I  wondered, would my parents ever come back to get me?