"G-Guild Master Orthos," Celia stuttered a bit as she stared into Orthos's stern eyes. "Uhhhh...," she struggled to come up with the proper words.

The guild master sighed and shook his head. "Celia, what am I going to do with you? Here you are, about to run off again." He placed his hands behind his back. "Go ahead and dismount, both of you."

Celia swallowed nervously and silently obeyed. After she slid off of Verbena's back, the young female rider looked up to her superior, unable to speak. Terror racked her mind. If she had gotten out without being caught, Celia believed the return of the final ray of light would have softened the punishment. Now, she was not so sure what would happen to them.

"Perhaps I should begin by explaining how I knew to stop you here," Guild Master Orthos began as he calmly approached the two riders. "Really, it came down to a hunch, but you gave a few clues. Celia, you did not seem too happy when I said you were not allowed to be on the team that will fly after the final ray of light.

"When you left the Meal Hall early, I figured if you were going to sneak out. I presumed you would retrieve the saddlebags from your room, so I used that as a reference point to guess which tunnel you would try. You would avoid many of the main tunnels, so the only options for you were the lesser used tunnels near your room.

"Am I correct?" The tall guild master gazed down to the shorter Celia with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes, Guild Master Orthos," Celia mumbled a bit and hung her head low. She could not force herself to look up to the man before her. 

The leader nodded, "if it makes you feel better, Valiant is waiting on the mountain, you would not have gotten past him if I picked incorrectly."

He approached Celia, then placed a hand on her shoulder. "I know what it is like to feel like you have to do something, but in this case, you do not have to. This is not your destiny." He softly frowned down to her. "There is no prophecy or legend saying you will be the one to return the sun. You have already done Roahla a great service by finding three of the pieces. It is good to be ambitious, but there is a line between going out of your way to improve the world and being careless with your life.

"Sir, we have a plan to retrieve the last ray of light," Xan looked up to the guild master before Celia could fabricate her own reply. "I am almost completely positive it will work, and I have been around Celia and Verbena long enough to know that she makes things happen despite the odds. That is especially true when I do not believe it will. Both she and Verbena are full of surprises," Xan looked at Celia with a small encouraging smile on his face. He turned back to Guild Master Orthos, "It may not be destiny, but it is something we want to do. We want to return light to the world, despite the risks."

Celia's heart fluttered a bit with the knowledge that Xan believed in her. She had no idea the young man had that much faith in her. "Thank you," she turned her head and mouthed the words to him.

As Xan nodded, Orthos removed his hand from Celia's shoulder and looked to the younger male rider behind her. "Oh, and what is your plan? What makes you think it will work that much?"

"I think it will work because I know it will, as I have never seen anyone as stupidly lucky as Celia. It is almost surreal." Xan stated, "With mine and Irin's guts and her and Verbena's luck I think we can do it."

Before Guild Master Orthos could cut him off, Xan continued, "We plan to sneak into the town on foot. I think whatever spell that made the black beast that guards Urre only reacts to dragons, not humans. That would explain how I got into town when I was younger. From there, I can lead Celia through the streets and to the tower the light is in and we can get it from there."

"How exactly do you plan to get out, hmm?" The guild master skeptically raised an eyebrow. "I doubt you can get up to the tower and steal the light without being noticed by guards. You will be trapped in the tower. Even if you escape that, the entire city will be up in arms to protect the sphere."

When Xan hesitated, Celia jumped into action, "I can summon Verbena once we are atop the tower, and then we can flee from there on dragonback." She fished the returning ribbon from her pocket and showed the tangled mass of narrow fabric to the guild master. "I bought it from one of the towns, and it lets me bring anything it is tied around to me. I do not know what the actual limit is, but I believe it will work. It teleported Verbena to us from quite a distance away. I do not know the exact distance, but I still think this will work."

"I know you do not have magic like in the towns out west, but believe me, it will work," Xan attempted to assure the stoic man as he stood before them. "I saw it work. I wish I could explain magic to you better, but all I can say is with the right spell, anything is possible."

Guild master Orthos eyed the ribbon, "I know of magic." He looks to Xan, "Though no resident of Rien can use it, it is in our legends." He released a soft sigh. "I know it is powerful enough to steal the light from the sun and even curse the land to the endless darkness of night."

After another pause, Guild Master Orthos turned to Celia, "Celia, I can see how much you have grown in your journey," a small frown spread across his face. "However, I do not think that you going out and trying to retrieve the rays of light on your own again. Many dragons and riders have tried and even fewer have returned.

"You have the night to get a head start before I am sending a team after you." The guild master exhaled, then lifted the strap of the bag over his head. "If you truly believe your plan will work, then here," he held the cloth bag out in one hand, "bring the four rays of light together."

"Really?" Celia's voice strained to even reach the volume of a whisper, so she tried again, "really? You, you are trusting us with all of the other rays of light?" She looked up to the guild master.

"As much as I know it is foolish to do so, something is telling me to trust you with these. For a mission such as this, two people would be far less conspicuous than a larger force." The adult briefly paused, "It's almost as if a whisper inside myself is telling me that whether you succeed or not is still beneficial. All four rays of light will be in the same place, which has not happened since the sun vanished. So, I am going to allow you to go with the expectation you will return again like you did the first time."

Celia slowly nodded and gingerly accepted the bag from the guild master's hand, "th—thank you," she managed. Though not actually all that heavy, the three spheres in the satchel weighed heavy in her hand.

"One night and riders are coming after you," The guild master reminded in a stern tone, "If we catch you before then, you will be sent home. Make it to Urre and we will be your backup."

"Yay! Approval! LET'S GO!" Verbena barked and fidgeted as Celia quickly mounted onto her back.

"Thank you again, Guild Master Orthos," Celia spoke in a soft tone as she secured the satchel with the rays of light into one of Verbena's saddlebags.

Guild Master Orthos nodded as he stepped aside to allow the party to pass. "May the light guide you," he nodded to them as he spoke the customary goodbye to those about to embark on a journey.

Xan climbed onto Irin's back. "Thank you, sir," he nodded to the guild master as Irin and Verbena walked out into the moonlit outside.

Just before Verbena took off, Celia glanced back to the guild master watching them from the doorway. At first, she could not recognize the expression on his face, but then something about the glimmer in his eyes told her that Orthos was hopeful.

Celia smiled as hope swelled inside her as well and pushed out the doubts from her mind. "We can do this," she told her self as the dragons leaped into the air with a flap of their mighty wings.

The resulting plume of loose snow obscured her sight of the guild master, but nothing at this point could cloud her mind. There was a mission for them to complete, once and for all.

Author Notes:

Thank you all for reading up to this point! In my opinion, we are almost to the climax!

By the way, do you think this conversation flowed well? Is there anyway I can improve it. This is one of the shorter chapters so far, and it ironically follows one of the longest. Maybe that is because of where I place the cutoff points for each chapter.

I would love to hear your thoughts!