Fitzwilliam quickly lost track of time. He lay down and stared at the cemented ceiling of the cell he and his parents were in. They were both fast asleep, deaf to the loud cheering noises and the thunder of crashing waves not far from them. Sometimes, he would be calm and he could breathe easily; but when he remembered having to find a way to escape before midnight, and there being no option to bring his parents, his heart would start pounding so strongly and loudly all of a sudden and it made him clutch his chest and gasp for air.

He tried to preoccupy his mind with other thoughts to pass the time, though it worried him that it could as well be beyond midnight without him knowing. But he took comfort in the thought that he could rely on the loud noises of the brutes and the enemy horses to tell the time. Surely they would be exhausted and retire early. "As soon as the waves are the only sound audible, then I will leave," he told himself.

But the guilt in leaving his parents and simply escaping into the unknown clawed at him. Whenever he looked around the cell for any small hole or gap, his chest would ache and his stomach would hurt when he thought of the fate of his parents.

Why did he have to live? And why is it only him that will live?

"This is all so unfair," he thought bitterly. Tears were welling up in his eyes again, but he fought them back. The urge to revolt against the mage and stay with his parents until sunrise made him nearly forget the fear of death. "Going through this would be your chance to commit revenge," he tried to tell himself. "No prince of Griffith will lay back and not take an opportunity when given." And yet, he felt afraid.

He thought of being hanged, and the coldness of fear and anxiety filled him like water filling an empty goblet. It washed all over him and for a while he was numb, staring up at the tiny bit of moonlight entering the cell.

He touched his neck, and felt his pulse. He was still alive, after all this. What a reality, he found himself thinking, as if he was astounded by it. Maybe in the end I am meant to live.

But then he glanced at his parents. Why were they meant to die, and him to go somewhere he didn't know?

And could he truly trust the mage? Yes, she may be full of wisdom and power, but she could not be any more than a kid. What if she was a double agent, and was working for Ferdinand and supplying him with the fire arrows? What if she was just used to scare him? What if when he goes out of the cell, he would be immediately killed by awaiting soldiers? Wouldn't it be safer, then, to stay with his parents?

He sat up, his mind swimming with the conflicted thoughts. He pulled his knees to his chest and focused on his heartbeat. "If I stay here," he thought to himself, "then I will surely die. But if I find a way to get out of here, then there is a chance I can still live."

He sighed. "But who will I be then? Where will I go? Griffith is too far away, I will die of thirst and hunger...but then, there are peasant houses and farms on the way here. Maybe I could rest in one of the houses and get a horse, and when I get back to Griffith...no, what if I do get killed on the way out of here? This place is filled with enemy tents! There's no way I will escape unseen!"

He groaned, holding his head in his hands. He looked up at the tiny window (which was actually the space of a couple of missing bricks on the wall), and briefly considered climbing out through there, but forgot the notion as quickly as he thought of it. He would never fit; and besides, if he fell, he would wake up his parents.

His reverie was momentarily paused when he heard doors being closed from either side of the cell. He heard the shuffling of boots mixed with the distant sounds of waves crashing against the shore. He listened as the sound of footsteps grew distant, until all he could hear were the waves. He looked up at the moonlight and noticed that it seemed brighter now.

"I have to go," he said to himself.

But once again the thought of leaving his parents plucked at his heartstrings. Growing up, his parents were always strict with him. If his mother wasn't making sure he memorized the names of various kings and dukes, his father was making sure that he was the best archer in the duchy. And their work paid off, surprisingly: Fitzwilliam memorized every name and birth or death date by heart, and he was a respected archer in the region. But it was never easy, and many nights did he wish his parents were different.

But to see them now huddled together, holding each other as if either one of them would sink upon letting go, made every second harder. He knew he had to move. If he couldn't get out, then he could at least check if there was a way out. If he did find one, then the mage could be right. Only then will he begin to believe.

He stood up and looked around him. The cell was seven feet in width and twelve in height. It was supposedly underneath the sand, but the walls were made of bricks; how that happened, he couldn't tell. He ran his hands over the rough bricks and found them all to be dry...until he reached the bottom layer. Crouching down, he blindly felt for the bricks and found two of them to be wet. Whatever made it wet was cold, and had no scent.

He touched the corners of the bricks and found that there were small gaps. He reached out to pry them off from the wall, but he began to hesitate. If he pulled it out and it happened to be seawater, then the cell would be flooded and they would have no way out.

"But then," he thought. "If that was the case then there should be at least ten or more bricks that are wet. That way it would prove that the cell is underwater or near it. But if it's only at the bottom, then that would mean the water source should be deeper underneath the cell. But what else could it be?"

He focused on one of the bricks and held on to the gaps. Slowly, he began to pull it out from the wall. He paused after a few seconds, expecting water to start flowing in; but the ground remained dry. He took a deep breath, and pulled it out further, expecting a deluge at any second.

For a strange reason, the brick was easy to pull out, as if it was hastily placed in during building. That, or it was meant to be loose for him to discover. He entertained the thought for a while, but shook his head and focused on what was happening now.

He looked into the hole in the wall, and was nearly haunted by the complete darkness within. Then, he heard the sound of rushing water. Puzzled, he leaned in closer until his ear was a few feet away from the hole. There was water outside the cell, for sure; but surprisingly, it was running underneath it, not beside it. It sounded more like a canal, but leading where?

He touched the bricks near the hole, and tested them out by pushing them inwards. As he pushed one in, his heart nearly skipped a beat as it fell in, and a loud plop in the water became audible. He quickly turned to his parents; they didn't stir.

Cautiously, he tested the others by giving them lighter pushes. Most moved a bit. They were dry, but definitely loose.

Though the air was supposedly freezing, beads of sweat rolled down the side of his face. His heartbeat began to quicken when he realized how much time he was already losing. He now had a hole on the cell wall and a passage of water that lead to God knows where. He had no idea how deep the water was or which current did it flow to. There could only be two ways: the sea or the forest.

He looked into the darkness and listened to the water below. If he jumped in, he would most likely drown. If he did not, he had no idea which way to go. And if he kept moving forward in either direction, was there an exit at the end?

He stepped back, his mind spinning. Trying to escape could make him suffer a harsher death than what Ferdinand wants him to experience. But then, the mage had told him that he could not go beyond or do less than she told him to.

But why? Was it all this talk about the cosmos? Such an idea was something he still could not grasp. His whole life he was taught by his parents that each person had a role to play in the world. People were born into royalty or nobility so that they can have the means to govern the people righteously. People were born as artisans to create beautiful sculptures and clothing. Others were born as builders or blacksmiths to create homes and castles that cannot be rivaled. Other people were born to become farmers and servants to contribute to society in their humble ways. He understood how everyone was interconnected, but only by profession and family name.

But to be connected because of their souls?

Were all the souls to be breathed into the bodies of people from the past and the present—and maybe even the future—lined up by some divine being and assigned to a life and a period in time to live and die?

And it would only be then that their purpose would be fulfilled? Were souls never meant to go beyond and live on, may it be in the beliefs of the dark arts or within the personalities of their descendants?

And if everyone was meant to a specific role in life, and their only need is to live until they die, then why was he chosen to another path? If time travelling was true, why did it have to be him?

Was it a coincidence that the bricks in the cell were loose? Or was it supposed to happen?

Or had it already happened?

His head ached and he felt sick and fatigued by it all. If only the mage was here now so he could ask her why did it have to be him. He looked at his parents again; they looked so peaceful. He could not imagine the torment they were put through before he arrived.

For sure, his mother was brutally violated, judging from her torn tunics and the bruises on her arms and legs. His father also had bruises, and was most likely beaten to near unconsciousness until the brutes realized it would be a worse punishment to make him watch his wife suffer.

Nausea took over him and made him shiver and feel like puking. Was he meant to escape and live in whatever way the mage had foreseen, while he would know he had left his parents to die without even trying to help them escape?

If he left and survived, he will forever live with the thought that he left his parents to die. On the other hand, if he stayed and died, the whole family line would be ruined, and Griffith would fall apart.

His only consolation was that he wouldn't be alive to see the downfall.

But if he survived the escape, he could somehow stop it from happening.

A sudden burst of light from the darkness before him distracted his thoughts. He looked down, and suddenly he could see the canal itself, as three moving beams of light moved underneath the surface –

Wait, he thought. Moving. That can't be right.

But it was. There were three objects moving slowly in a circle underwater. The light was a bright blue, and after a few seconds it dimmed slightly, but it was still bright enough for him to clearly see the waters of the canal and the canal walls. It looked to be about four feet deep, and the canal walls were made of stone.

Fitzwilliam squinted his eyes at the three objects, and saw that they were in the shape of a fish. He began to see the figure of the tail and the head, and they all seemed to be the same kind.

But the shape of the fish was odd. It was wide in the belly, with a small head and a tiny tail. They circled one another, and all illuminated light bright enough for him to not see their eyes. He had never seen a fish the shape as such before...but then again, no one had ever seen fish that had their own light.

A strange, new feeling seemed to have taken hold of Fitzwilliam. More specifically, it felt like a large, invisible hand grabbed hold of his chest, wrapping its fingers over his heart as he watched the strange fish move in a slow circle. He felt his body begin to numb, and after a few seconds the fish and the water seemed closer.

Fitzwilliam was only able to tear his gaze away and see the sleeping figures of his parents for one last time, until his whole body was drenched in freezing canal water.

The cold water brought him back to his senses, and Fitzwilliam quickly tried to find his bearings. He stood up and found that the water reached to his waist. He blindly held on to the sides of the wall, and looked up to see the hole in the cell wall nearly three feet above him. I went through the other bricks, he thought to himself, dumbfounded. There was no way to climb back up, unless he jumped.

But standing where he was currently was a danger in itself. In a few seconds, Fitzwilliam felt his feet sinking into the water; and the longer he stood there, the quicker he sank. He looked around him and saw the fish: they were bigger than he thought, a full arm's length in size and nearly thrice the same length for their girth. They seemed to watch him expectantly, as if waiting for him to move. Then, they swam forward into the darkness.

Fitzwilliam knew he had to follow them, whatever they were and wherever they were heading. A part of him feared that the fish were some sort of hallucination brought by the small quarters of the cell and the possible lack of oxygen. What if he was actually following them to his death?

But then, the face of the mage came to mind, and her words echoed in his head louder than the splashes he clumsily made as he followed the fish, his feet sinking into the earth underneath the moment he puts it down. The fish could only be from her. It had to be from her.

The fish were swimming faster by the second, and Fitzwilliam could feel the pressure of time pushing against him. Sometimes, he could hear heavy footsteps above him, and he tried to guess where he was. He tried to distract himself from letting fear take over him, but the farther they went, the more afraid he became.

After what felt like ten minutes of laboriously walking through water, his legs ached, his arms shook with exhaustion from holding onto the canal walls, and the fish were five feet away from him. The darkness and its fingers were curling up onto his torso and shoulders, and his heart began to quicken. "Wait!" he cried out, and his voice bounced off the walls. But it was stupid to ask the fish to stop. They kept on going, and soon the water was once again like a black pit.

Fitzwilliam grabbed his chest and leaned his head against the canal wall to his left. For a strange reason, he couldn't breathe. He tried to move but his legs protested. He looked back and saw only darkness. The cell where his parents slept was obviously too far away, and the thought of walking back made it harder for him to breathe. For a second he considered screaming for help, but he knew no one would hear him.

Yes, I'm not meant to die with my parents, he thought almost angrily. But am I meant to die here, alone in the darkness?

He shut his eyes tight and felt the earth hungrily swallowing him up from below. The earth was colder than the water underneath, and was almost soothing. I'm sorry, Mage, he thought bitterly. I'm not as strong as I thought.

Suddenly, something warm brushed past his leg. Before he could even completely open his eyes, something so large—and warm, almost hot—was between his thighs. And by the time his eyes were open, one of the large fish had lifted him from his feet, and he was riding on its back like a rider on his steed. The fish sped through with him on its back, and it was so fast that Fitzwilliam had to grab onto whatever he could just to not fall off. It was as if he was riding a bright white cloud that sped through the waters, the other two fish following behind him.

It was the strangest sensation, to ride upon a giant fish's back, but the feeling of the air rushing past him and the labor of suckling earth no longer an option to him, made him breathe easy again. I'm getting out of here, he realized, and he felt a smile starting to form on his face. I'm getting out of this hell.

Seconds later, he saw a dot of bright light growing larger in the distance. But as he kept his eye at the bright dot, he began to feel his strange ride starting to shrink. He looked behind him, and he saw that the two fish behind him were shrinking rapidly as well. In seconds, they were half the size of a grown man's arm, and they were shrinking horizontally as well. Fitzwilliam looked below him, and the water was closing in on him again.

But the bright light, which he saw soon enough to be light from a hole from aboveground and near end of the canal, was coming in close. There seemed to be a wall of earth before him, but he noticed a clearing on its left side, leading to darkness and seemingly deeper waters. As he was feet away, he found he had to half run, half walk through the water as the fish did not only shrink to normal fish size, but shrank even smaller and smaller, until they disappeared into the water.

He reached the end, and looked up to see the moon shining down upon him. He saw tall trees and heard the sounds of owls and other night birds and animals, and he realized he was most likely somewhere in the middle of the forest.

He was about to climb up the rocks when a small hand reached out to him from above. He looked up again and saw the mage herself, looking at him with a small smile on her face. Her eyes seemed to shine brighter than the moon ever could.

"Need a hand?" she asked him. Beside her, a familiar looking horse whinnied.

Fitzwilliam forced himself to tear his gaze away from her eyes and gave the horse a good look. "Hey, that was my horse! It went rogue this morning!" he exclaimed.

The smile on the mage's face grew bigger, like she truly was a young girl keeping a secret. "It knew the way your story works, that's why it went rogue and ran to me," she quickly explained. "It always does that anyway. Kind of like he knows the cue."

"Always?" Fitzwilliam asked her.

She seemed not to hear him. "Come, we don't have much time. The moment the soldiers find you missing they will be searching for you here. Now, will you take my hand or not?"

"I'm too heavy for you," Fitzwilliam remarked, almost grinning. She shook her head. "Just take it, you need it more than you probably would admit," she said, and she was right. His legs ached, and he knew he could barely manage moving them.

He took her hand, and suddenly the earth beneath him disappeared, a whoosh of air filled his ears, and for a second the world was a blur of shades of blue, until he found that he was standing on the forest floor, the trees around him, the moon above him, and the mage in front of him, looking at him expectantly.

"W-what was that? Did you just lift me out of there?" he asked her, his eyes wide in surprise.

"With a little help of my magic," she smirked teasingly. "Also, you're going to need this before we run," she added, and she snapped her fingers.

"Run?" he weakly said. He opened his mouth to explain how much his legs ached, but suddenly, as if blown away by a gust of air, the pain in his legs disappeared.

"What the...how did you..." he stuttered, but he was cut off when the mage suddenly grabbed hold of his hand. "They just opened the cell door," she told him, and he felt his heart skip a beat. "Follow me." She turned and began to briskly walk away from the canal, and Fitzwilliam helplessly followed.

"Why not just ride the horse?" he asked her, watching the horse with renewed interest. The forest floor was covered with moss and treacherous roots that could trip anyone and any horse, but this one managed to not fall over any, and seemed more obedient and trained than any horse he had ever seen.

"It's too dangerous to ride him here," she said. And just when she said it, Fitzwilliam realized where they were. They were at the edge of the forest, where the soldiers had led him away earlier that day. The thought boggled his mind. Could this all really have happened in a day?

Soon they were away from the forest, and he saw the half-burnt wooden castle, the dangerous seas as black as ink nearby, and the camp not far away to their right. He could hear distant shouts, and the whinnies of horses. He glanced at the camp, and saw dark figures running into the forest...but in the opposite entrance.

"Come on!" the mage urged him through gritted teeth, tugging at his hand. He shook his head and tried his best to match her speed as they reached the large expanse of land before the shoreline, where the battle was held earlier that day.

"On the horse, now. Quickly!" the mage pushed at him. Fitzwilliam turned to the horse and looked into his eyes. The dark eyes looked back at him, and Fitzwilliam saw no anger in those eyes. He touched the horse and ran his hand across its skin, and the horse gave a soft, welcoming whinny. He found himself smiling.

"He already trusts me," he said to the mage.

"Of course he does, he's going to be your horse for the rest of your journey. By the way, his name is Arrion," the mage replied absentmindedly, as she kept looking back at the enemy camp, tapping her left foot in impatience. "We're really running out of time. Get on the horse, my prince," she added.

Fitzwilliam nodded and got on the horse. He held onto the reins and gave it a gentle kick at the side, and Arrion began to move.

"Make it gallop towards the wooden castle. Don't wait for me, just get there quick," the mage said as she briskly walked beside them. She snapped her fingers again, and she was gone.

Fitzwilliam wanted to let shock take over him, but he gritted his teeth and forced himself to focus on the task given to him. I'm a prince, he reminded himself. A prince of a soon-to-be-ravaged duchy, to be sure, but a prince nonetheless. I must do what I am told.

He clicked his tongue and snapped the reins, and Arrion quickened to a gallop. In no time, they were right in front of the wooden castle, its roof and towers gone.

Fitzwilliam stared up at the dark and charred castle, and he could almost still see it full and majestic, and the pride and excitement that surrounded its magical creation. He could remember spending days of the journey roaming the place and finding it too dull and brown for his liking. But he knew now that seeing it full again would remedy the aching in his heart, as a soft voice at the back of his mind chanted his parents' incoming death.

The thought of their death nearly consumed all his thoughts until the mage suddenly appeared beside him, holding a white stone in one hand, and a tiny black book in the other. "Get out of the horse, please," she said, not even looking up at him as she pored over the book. Fitzwilliam wordlessly obeyed, and he stood to Arrion's left.

The mage nodded to herself and closed to book. She bent down and began to draw on the floor with the white rock. She encircled them, until she created a perfect circle around the duo.

"The enemies are closing in, so we must be as quick as we can," she said almost breathlessly, tucking the white rock into a pocket. "Prince Fitzwilliam of Griffith, you are to be sent into the future, to the farthest time my powers can reach. But believe me, it is far enough for all of our enemies here to be long dead. Dead they may be, but their descendants live and thrive. The moment I finish my spell, you and Arrion will be transported to this new timeline. Mind you, sir, you will not wake up in the country you know. You will wake up somewhere foreign, where the people speak our language but everything else is wrong. But you will not be alone," the mage explained, so quickly Fitzwilliam strained to understand her.

"What am I to do in this...strange, new place?" he asked.

The mage looked at him with those bright eyes. "Look around you, my prince. There is absolutely no way that you can avenge yourself against your uncle and his enemies in this time. I can tell that you have weighed your options and found none to be possible. And so, I am sending you to that new timeline not only as a chance to find a way to destroy your enemies, but also for you to continue to live."

Fitzwilliam raised an eyebrow quizzically. "I know that you are a wise mage, however the instructions are far from clear. Are you trying to say that I have to somehow find someone linked to the Duke in this new timeline, because I cannot do that in this current place?" he asked her. And then, like lightning, the plan he came up with earlier that day came back to him. He has to find the descendants of his uncle and destroy their line. If he could not see Duke Ferdinand's downfall here, it would be a much sweeter sight if he knew it was by his own doing.

But did the mage subconsciously know this, or was there an underlying quest? He decided to not say any more.

The mage shrugged. "If you must, you may. But remember that I am giving you this opportunity, because this path is your life's destiny. This is why you were born and put into this world: to show your worth when all believe you are gone, and to continue to live and defy the odds."

"And so, the main reason you are giving me this chance," Fitzwilliam clarified, "is so that I can live in this new world? But, what's the point if it will not be able to change Griffith for the better, as my father did?"

The mage shook her head. "Just because I am sending you to that new timeline does not mean you won't come back. In that new time, you will learn more and grow unlike you can ever do so here, because you are meant to die in a few hours." She continued on even as Fitzwilliam's eyes grew wide in fear at her statement. "I will explain further on how this will work, but you will have to trust me."

So I will come back, Fitzwilliam thought to himself. And when I do, with my uncle's line destroyed in the future, they will unknowingly come to an end in a future they all won't see. Perfect.

"Will I...will I see you there? In that new world?" he asked her, more gently this time. It was dark, and the moonlight was their only source of light, but Fitzwilliam saw a flash of a blush on the mage's cheeks.

"If you search for me, you will. But I will only appear when you need me the most. Do you understand?" she said. He nodded.

"Good. Now, hold out your hand," she said, holding out a hand to him again. He half hesitantly held a hand out, palm open upwards; and the moment it was in front of her, the mage forcefully grabbed it and took out a sharp dagger from seemingly nowhere. She drew blood from his palm in a swift and quick motion, so fast that he barely felt the pain.

The blood quickly fell from his palm and onto the lines on the ground, turning the white chalk into pink.

"This is for emergency precautions," she quickly explained, letting go of his hand and tucking the dagger into another pocket. She seemed to not run out of pockets. "If you fail in any way in that world, you're going to be led back right into this one."

"What do you mean, if I fail?" he asked her, but he only received a shove in reply. "You're walking out of the circle. Stay in, please," she said almost coldly.

She took a deep breath, stood up straight, and closed her eyes. She began to murmur words he could barely hear. A second later, a bright white light shot out before him, right where his blood fell. The white light followed the shape of the circle, until he and the horse were surrounded in a bright halo of it. As the mage continued to murmur her spell, the light grew brighter and brighter, and he noticed it was also moving in a circular motion, like a moving wall of light.

The mage opened her eyes and suddenly as she closed them. She took a step forward, and raised a hand and held it out at the moving wall of light. Hesitantly and unsure of what to do, Fitzwilliam began to raise his own hand. The mage nodded her head solemnly, and he raised it, and he held onto her hands, their fingers intertwining.

She leaned in closer, and suddenly she seemed older and taller. Her face seemed slightly longer, and so did her hair, but her eyes were just as bright. She was suddenly almost as tall as him. He gasped, and leaned in closer, as the wall of light moved in between them quickened. He held onto her hand as if he was afraid she would disappear.

"You're going to become drowsy soon," she said, and her voice was deeper and seemingly adolescent. "When you wake up, you will be far from this time. But if you need me, you will find me eventually."

"Do you promise me that I will find you?" he asked her, raising his voice slightly. The moving wall of light was making a humming, monotone voice that grew louder and louder every second. Her face began to blur, and he strained to see her bright eyes through the even brighter light.

He figured he could see her smile just then. "You will find me, I promise that," she said. She closed her eyes. "Take care, my prince," she said in a soft, almost sad voice.

Fitzwilliam leaned in close and it was as if their foreheads touched, save for the wall of light between them that was strangely solid. Drowsiness was creeping up on him, and his head began to ache with the effort to stay awake. But soon, the strength he thought he had begun to leave him, and the next thing he knew, he had fallen to the ground, his hand still warm from her touch.

Arrion too was asleep next to him, and Fitzwilliam helplessly watched as the mage disappeared, and he could swear he saw two dark figures by her side as the wall of light blinded him, and the moment he opened his eyes, everything was black.