It feels like we are running forever through the halls of the palace. Although I know it like the back of my hand, the palace looks very different now that it is not lit and it feels like we are running in circles all the time.

"Mama, where are we going?" I ask her pantingly. My hand, which she is holding, begins to sweat and I feel how I am beginning to lose my grip on her.

"We're going to dad's study," she answers me in fits and starts.

My father's study is at the very other end of the palace compared to my bedroom. That's the reason we've been running for quite a while.

Suddenly I hear a second explosion. A painting next to us falls to the ground and I lose my balance as the ground shakes beneath me. My knees come into contact with the marble floor and I let out a cry of pain.

"Aire? Honey, are you okay?" My mother has come to a stop and looks at me with concern. She holds out her hands, which I gratefully accept, and looks at my knees.

"Your knees are bleeding," she says worriedly. "Will you be able to walk anymore? Or do you need me to lift you? We can go bandage your knees in dad's study, right?"

I nod and bite my teeth together. The stab of pain has now been replaced by a dull and prickly ache.

I grab my mother's hand and together we run on. On the way, we see several armed men in uniforms running past us. They are shouting at each other and don't see us through all the commotion.

"Raymin!" my mother shouts with relief when she catches sight of her husband. They give each other a quick kiss and my father then gives me a brief hug and stroke on my head.

My father opens the door to his study for us and lets us in, then closes and locks it behind us.In the middle of the room is a beautifully finished wooden desk, which is loaded with all kinds of books. Some are open, some not. Although there are many books laid out on his desk, most of the books are in the two huge bookcases, each on one side of the desk.

He leads us to the left bookcase and holds his hand on the cover of a fiery red cover. The cover lies up and becomes a bright blue colour. I watch with wide eyes. He whispers words I have never heard before. Only then do I notice that the size of the blue glow increases. With each sentence, the blue colour grows brighter and brighter and beads of sweat form on my father's forehead. By now it is so big that it reaches up to the ceiling.

I take a step toward my mother and grasp her hand. She gives a reassuring squeeze. "Everything will be all right, Aire." She tries to calm me, but her sad smile creates the opposite effect.

"Aire, Lavinia, will you come and stand next to me?" my father asks us, but it doesn't sound like a question. Nevertheless, we listen to him and come and stand next to him.

"Okay, listen carefully. In a moment I will count down from three to zero and at zero all three of us will jump through the portal at once. Got it?" He looks at us quickly. I nod and see my mother do the same.

"Three." I feel my heartbeat quicken. I look at the endlessness of the blue glow. What will be on the other side of the portal? Emptiness? One of the other elven kingdoms?

"Two." My father looks briefly in my direction. His head gives a small nod, while a drop of sweat runs down from his forehead through his eyebrow right past his eye. I feel it running down my face too, but it's not from the exertion.

"One," my father whispers exhaustedly. I squeeze my eyes shut and squeeze my mother's hand. Although it must hurt, my mother doesn't flinch. A snort escapes from my mouth when I hear my father say 'zero'. I feel my mother's hand move away from me.

"Jump, Aire," I call to myself. But my legs feel like lead and I cannot move them. The warm hand that used to be in my hand has disappeared. I hear my mother screaming my name in panic. As if struck by lightning, I open my eyes and become aware of the situation.

Both my parents have disappeared, swallowed up by the blue glow. "I should have jumped. Dad told me to do one thing...one thing and I didn't listen," I say to myself.

I look in front of me, at the bookcase that has turned into a portal. I've been in this room so many times, but I never imagined that a bookcase could turn into a portal to whatever.

My feet seem to have awakened from their frozen state and each takes a step forward. I carefully extend my arm and my fingers are a few centimetres from the portal. When they touch, I feel as if I am being pushed and thrown into the portal. Startled and frightened, I withdraw my arm and quickly take a few steps backwards.

"Aire!" I vaguely hear both my parents call out in sync. Automatically I rush towards the portal, forgetting what had happened only seconds before and that it could drag me into it at any moment, and call out, "Dad! Mom! Are you there?"

But I don't hear an answer from the other side. I'm about to call my parents again, but then I hear some loud banging on the door. I startle and almost get whiplash from the speed at which I turn my head towards the door. Locked. A relieved sigh escapes from my mouth.

"Open the door!" shouts a man in a loud voice from the other side of the door. I don't recognise the voice. It must be one of the intruders.

My heartbeat increases due to the suddenness of the man and I feel the adrenaline rush through my body. I nervously look around for furniture that I can slide in front of the door, but all the furniture is either tied up or is too heavy to move. But then I see my father's office chair. It is as beautifully finished as the desk and is made of the same type of wood. Sprinting, I grab the chair by the backrest and pull it squeakily across the floor to the door.

The banging has increased. They are trying to break open the door.

The back of the chair fits exactly under the handle of the door and quickly I run back to the other side of the room. As far away from the door as possible. "What should I do?" I ask myself. I look around me, but there is no way out. Then my eyes fall on the porch. It no longer reaches the ceiling. At most, it is only about half a metre above the ground.

I take a deep breath. Breathe in. Breathe out. I bite the inside of my cheek and then run towards the portal. Tears stream down my cheeks, but I don't bother to wipe them away. I make a quick dive forwards, my arms stretched out straight, into the portal.

In slow motion, I see the door being broken down and men in black leather uniforms running into the room. Each and every one of them is armed from head to toe. The frontman, the man who most likely ordered me to open the door, sees me fall through the portal. He points at me and takes his gun from his back to shoot at me. I squeeze my eyes shut and put my arms in a cross in front of my head. But I hear no bullets and then see that the portal has already been closed. He is too late.

I had expected the flight through the portal to be short, but there seems to be no end to it. It feels like I am falling endlessly. As if I am being thrown down a ravine, but the ground never seems to come up. The endlessness makes me even more afraid of the moment when I do hit the surface. I open my mouth to scream, to express my fear, but my cries are muffled by the air that rushes past my ears. I do not manage to open my eyes for the same reason.

Because of this, I could not see that my fall was coming to an end, my head would not have hit the ground and I would not have been gasping for breath like a fish out of water.Groaning and coughing, I try to get air into my lungs. I put my hands against the hard ground and try to scramble up.

"Aire, darling!" I hear my mother calling me worriedly. I slowly open my eyes and see her running towards me. Not like I'm used to her – running decently. I see her being followed by my father and a young boy. Lorsan?

My parents crouch down beside me worriedly and my mother puts her hand on my cheek. "We were so worried when we noticed you hadn't followed us. Why didn't you jump, Aire? Why?" She falters at the last sentence and my father looks at me with a look that says "she was just worried. Don't blame yourself." Only now do I notice that her eyes are red from crying.

"Sorry, mom. I was going to jump, I really was. But...but I..." I can't resist uttering the next words. I was too scared. I don't even want to acknowledge that I was scared. That's one of the most important qualities an elf must possess; bravery. And I, the crown princess of Paeral, do not possess any bravery. I shake my head, disappointed in myself. When I tell my parents, they will be even more disappointed than I am in myself and I don't want to see that expression on their faces.

"It's all right, dear," my father interrupts me, noticing that I'm having trouble formulating the sentence. I smile gratefully at him. "Mum didn't mean it like that either. We were just worried, but everything is fine now that you're back with us.

My eyes fall on the boy behind my parents. He stands uncomfortably looking at the three of us and shuffles his feet back and forth, not knowing what to do. Only now do I see that it's not Lorsan, but Cian, my cousin. He is the son of my father's younger brother. After both his parents died in a serious accident, my parents decided to take Cian into the palace and treat him as their own son.

"Where is Lorsan?" I ask no one in particular. We've ended up in some sort of cave, which is well lit, but apart from my parents and cousin, I don't see anyone else.

"He's somewhere else, Aire." Somebody answers my question vaguely. I don't know who. I can only think of Lorsan. Is he safe? Has the dark lord got hold of him? Why are only the four of us here...in a cave I've never seen?

"Where? Is he safe? Why are only we here?" My breath falters halfway through my last sentence, but I can tell by the look my parents share that they did understand me.

"We don't know where Lorsan is. And you are here..." my father points to Cian and me, "because we want to keep you safe, so you don't end up in the hands of Vulmon."

Cian steps forward and speaks for the first time since I entered this cave. "Uncle Raymin, if we are going to go ahead with the plan we must do it now. The longer we wait, the sooner they can find us."

"Plan? What plan? I am not aware of a plan," I speak. Why does it feel like I'm being left out of important decisions but they're about me?My mother's response is a sniffle and a big tear rolling down her cheek. "We love you, never forget that Aire. Your father and I would never want to leave you. Never." Her words sound serious but scare me.

"Dad, mom, what's going on?"

"We're sending Cian and you to another dimension. A place where the dark lord can never get hold of you. There you will stay until you are sixteen, because from then on the dark lord can also track you down after you have undergone your first transformation. And Cian will go with you to protect you." He smiles gloomily at me.

I look at Cian. He too has the same sad expression on his face as my parents. There is something they are keeping from me, but I don't dare to ask anymore.

"Come over here." My father beckons us to the other side of the cave and places his hand on the wall, then utters words I've never heard before. Just like the bookcase, a blue glow emerges and gets bigger and bigger.

Cian takes my hand in his and leads me to my father. Silently we stand beside him and see how he makes the portal bigger and bigger. My mother comes to stand beside my father and puts her hand on his, then she too repeats the words at the same pace.

My parents' cries echo through the cave and, just as in my father's study, I can see the exhaustion on my parents' faces. Suddenly, my father falls to his knees and breathes in a gulp, but continues to repeat the words, even more determinedly. My mother is holding on to a point sticking out from the wall of the cave.

I want to step up to my parents and tell them to stop. That it's taking too much magic, too much energy from them, and that they could go under in a moment, but Cian stops me and shakes his head dejectedly. "They know how it ends, Aire. Let them complete their last task. It's already too late to save them."

"No!" I yell at him and try to pull my hand out of his, but he won't let go. "Cian, let go of me! Don't you see that if I don't help my parents now, they will die? See it anyway. I have to help them," I yell at him and squirm in all directions. Tears are already streaming down my face again. "Please, let me help them," I beg him and look with wet eyes at my parents who are both on the floor exhausted, but talking persistently on.

The portal now extends to the top of the cave. I shout to my parents that they can stop. That the portal is now big enough, but they don't listen.

"They have to keep going until we reach the other side of the portal. Aire, come...we must hurry. We have to jump now," Cian urges me, but I can't take my eyes off my parents.

That's why my mother wanted me to remember forever that they love me. Because there is no next time to tell me again. This is the last time I will see them.

I look over my shoulder at my parents. They look exhausted and half lifeless. "I love you, mom and dad. Promise me you'll never forget that either," I whisper to them. For a moment I think they haven't heard me, but I see my father nod lightly at me and a tear escapes from my mother's eye.

For the last time I look back, then I look at my older cousin and grab his hand.

"Three...two...one...GO!" I count down, before we jump through the portal together.