edited: 27/06/2017

Remy had thought that the journey to the city had been strange, but it still hadn't prepared her for what she faced now as she limped her way into a metropolis. She had never even been to a city in her own world, never having the money to travel, so the sheer chaos of it was enough to overwhelm her, never mind the pedestrians, with their vibrant hair and eye colours and their strange clothes.

She stopped as the boy, whose name she still did not know, began to walk directly into the madness, barely able to breathe. She wanted to run away, or wake up and realise that everything had been a dream, but she knew she couldn't. She had tried pinching herself several times, and she knew that the pain from her leg wouldn't be so awful if this wasn't real.

He stopped and turned back, tilting his head expectantly. "Are you coming?"

"Just give me a minute," she responded unnecessarily harshly. "You might be used to this, but I'm not."

He pursed his lips but nodded anyway, his arms falling limply to his sides, as though he wasn't sure where else to put them.

She eyed the buildings in front of her, each with towering pillars and sculptures of different creatures, some like angels and some more like monsters. People were emerging from them each second, and even more people were entering them. Remy couldn't even begin to guess what purpose they held, the signs all in strange markings that held no relevance to her, but for the fact that they reminded her of her key, which she clutched tightly now. With the lilac glow of the darkening sky casting eerie shadows along the streets, it seemed even stranger and more surreal. She found herself wondering how she had been living under a grey sky all of her life when somewhere like this existed at the very same time as her world. She knew for sure that this wasn't her sky, that the now materialising stars, illuminating each dark space of sky like a million different torches, were not her stars.

It was frightening, of course, but wonderful too. She couldn't fight the unexpected desire to go home, but she couldn't fight the desire to stay and take every millimetre of this place in before she left either.

"Okay," she breathed finally, wrapping her arms around herself as though it would protect her from the scrutiny of the strange people around her. The boy almost looked normal compared to the crowd surrounding her.

He nodded and led her into the mass of people, nodding to a few of them as if he knew them. He probably did. These were his people, and this was his home. She supposed somebody as beautifully unusual as him could only live in a place like this. Her eyes danced distractedly around the square she was in now, not knowing where to look. There were the street lights lining the pathways, drowning everybody in a sickly white glow; the water fountain that spewed out the clearest water she had ever seen, so clear that Remy couldn't help but lick her lips and imagine how it would feel to drink it in her dehydrated state; the stained glass of older and more intricately designed buildings that reminded her of churches. It was as though she was wearing lenses over her eyes that had magnified everything in her own world to make it richer and more well-defined here, despite the way the colour of the sky reflected itself onto everything in front of her and created a strange and lingering haze. There was the smell of copper, too, that stung her nostrils every so often, though it wasn't particularly unpleasant.

She couldn't help but notice there were no cars or roads, only people and cobbled footpaths. It was nice not to have to hear the constant blare of horns, though it made her feel hollow and uneasy. She could hear the passersby whispering, the same word echoing in her ears over and over as she passed more poeple: 'mortal.' So it was obvious, then.

The brilliance of it all almost caused her to forget about her injury. Almost. She stopped as a particularly painful ache shot through her leg, feeling as though it was piercing through her muscle and bone. "Are we almost there?" she said, disappointed at the sound of her own desperation and weakness.

"Yes. It is just another few minutes away," he responded impatiently, his neck straining as he glanced around the next corner. "I will not be carrying you, so I suggest you either let me heal you or we continue and you stop whining about it."

Remy glared at him, but didn't get the chance to respond. A petite brunette was shouting in their direction, running towards them both with a look of concern on what Remy thought was an annoyingly pretty face. She looked almost like a doll, with porcelain skin and dark long eyelashes. As she got closer, Remy realised that her eyes were golden, and she couldn't help but stare at them.

The girl didn't even seem to notice Remy's presence, her eyes instantly falling on the boy and her cheeks reddening. It was not difficult to tell that she liked him, though by his tensed jaw and narrowed eyes, the feeling did not appear to be reciprocated.

"I am so glad you're back, Maksim," she said excitedly. "Your mother told me that you the two of you had a disagreement and you would be away for a while." She paused, looking him up and down as though judging his clothes, which Remy supposed looked strange to the girl, who was wearing a long silky white dress under a crimson coat, with unusual patterns curling around the sleeves and pockets.

Maksim's—she assumed that was his name after the girl's greeting—eyes darkened ever so slightly, and Remy raised her eyebrows at his reaction to the mention of his mother. He had looked the same just hours before, when Remy had taken him to his portal. "Yes, well, that does sound like something my mother would say," he said, his tone laced with bitterness.

The girl's eyes fell on Remy then, and she gasped dramatically. "Who is this? She looks..."

"Like a mortal girl, yes," Maksim finished her sentence, looking and sounding bored. "She is. I am hoping to send her back through the portal before she is reported."

Remy bit her lip, wanting to say something but too afraid to do so. She didn't belong in this world, and she did not want to make that more obvious. Her hands were clammy under the excessive scrutiny from both the girl and the majority of people in the town square, and her breath had been coming in short ragged bursts since she had seen the first building.

"Wait, you don't know?" The girl gulped, looking suddenly worried. Remy couldn't help but notice the way her gaze never left Maksim, her eyes round like a child's. It seemed rather melodramatic to her, as though she was dying to get his attention and used her innocent façade as a way to do so. It didn't seem to be working; Maksim was busy looking onto the street before them, his dark eyebrows knitted together distractedly.

"Know what?"

"The portals have just been closed temporarily." Remy's heart stopped for a second, and a wave of dizziness caused her to sway towards Maksim as though the statement had caused the ground beneath her to tremble. "Nobody can enter or leave Refilyn until further notice."

Maksim's expression hardened, his hand instantly running through his hair in distress. She noticed that his hands were shaking against the auburn strands.  "Why?"

"It is the Dark Ones," she said hesitantly. "They are here, in the realm somewhere. They think that your brother is among them."

Maksim stiffened momentarily, and then seemed to relax again as though he was brushing it off. Remy was beginning to panic again herself; it didn't take long for her to guess that the Dark Ones were the men who Maksim had been running from—their black clothes had been a bit of a giveaway. She couldn't make sense of anymore of it, though. She was hoping that she wouldn't have to deal with whatever it meant herself, though the girl's words still echoed in her mind, telling her that she couldn't leave.

"How do they know?" Maksim questioned, though he didn't seem like he particularly wanted to hear the answer. To Remy, everything sounded as if she was underwater, and she felt dizzy. She was sure she might faint if she didn't sit down soon.

"A portal was created from dark magic down in Atrury. We have members of the Council on the way there now to confirm who was responsible, but they are already certain that it is them."

"But it is impossible. I have been tracking them in the Mortal World for days. Why would they come back now?"

Remy tuned out of their conversation, her gaze falling on a group of people—if one could call electric blue-haired and yellow-eyed girls with sparks flying from their fingers people—that had been staring at her since she arrived in the square. They were frowning, or perhaps scowling, discussing something quietly among themselves. Her back tingled in fear, and she shuffled slightly closer to Maksim. When she did, her leg gave way, and she fell onto the cobbles, her knee stinging from the graze. "Ow!"

"What on Refilyn are you doing?" Maksim pulled her up quickly despite the pain it caused her and examining her leg whilst the brunette girl gasped with wide eyes.

"Nothing." She tore herself away from him and tried her best to stand up straight. "Just please take me back. I need to go home."

"Were you even listening to what Annika said?" he asked disbelievingly, pointing to the girl—Annika—as though she could not work out who he had been talking about for herself.

"No. I don't speak wizard." She lied simply because she hoped that it wasn't true, that she had misheard. She knew it was not the case by Maksim's frustrated expression. She was not going home.

"I'm a witch, actually," Annika interrupted lightly, a false smile painted wearily on her lips. Remy rolled her eyes in response, her heart racing too much to care what the other girl was or was not.

"You are not going home. The portals are down."

Remy barely heard the last part, the ringing in her ears and the nausea in her stomach too much to bear. "But I can't stay here! Use your magic or something to get me home."

"It does not quite work like that, I'm afraid," he said in a hushed voice, glancing around him at the no doubt gawping passersby. "I need to talk to my mother about this. We will figure something out."

He clutched at her upper arm and began to pull her away from the square, and this time Remy did not flinch away from him, for she was too focused on not fainting. The humid air pressed against her like a weight on her lungs, and darkness teetered at the corners of her vision. She was not going home.