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Thaddeus, Ballard, and Truman’s captors were swiftly running through the forest, dragging their prisoners with them. Dawn was approaching, but the sun had not yet risen into the forest.
Eventually, the captors reached a large tree. They spoke some words, and steps disguised as branches emerged from it. In a hurry, they started to climb. It was then that Thaddeus awoke.
Without knowing, he started kicking the creature that was holding him. It yelled, and its yellow eyes pierced Thaddeus like a knife.
“He is awake,” it said, slowly reaching towards a large tree branch. Thaddeus began to struggle helplessly.
“Wait Naria,” the captor who cast the shrine spell ordered with authority. “The others are waking too.”
He gestured towards Truman and Ballard, and sure enough, their eyes began to open. They had the same reaction as Thaddeus, kicking and struggling to get free.
“It would not be wise for you to try and escape here,” the creature named Naria said. “In case you haven’t noticed we are up high in a tree. Go ahead; look down if you don’t believe me.”
At once, Ballard looked down. He cursed to himself and groaned. The creature called Naria was right. There was no escape.
“Do not worry, soon we will let you go, we are almost there.” They continued to be dragged up the tree branches.
“Where?” asked Truman. “We are almost where?” I think he should kick a little more. It makes it seem as if he trust them. Or you could rewrite those words so it sounded a little more suspicious, or something…like “Where are you taking us?” Truman demanded, or something like that.
“Sumaya.”
“What is Sumaya?” A little there too.
“Just look in front of you.”
Puzzled, all three men looked ahead. They gaped in awe at what was before their eyes. Before them was a city…a city built in the treetops. The houses were made from sticks and logs, stacked in between the topmost branches of the trees themselves. The trees and the houses were one, and the leaves of the trees acted as a canopy and a roof, completely hiding the city from view. The ground was made of strong branches piled together, with leaves on top of them. The whole floor seemed to be held together with some sort of magic. The balcony he Just a moment before, it was talking about “them”, not “him”. had stood on faced this very place, and the trees had covered the whole city. The entire world below was blind to this city, and everyone in it.
“Welcome…”Naria started unwrapping its dark clothing, revealing its face. “Welcome to the city of Sumaya.”
As Naria said this, Thaddeus realized that his captor was a woman his age. Shocked, he managed to stammer out a few words.
“How are you a…how are we on…How?”
Naria smiled. “The clothing we wear below disguises our voices so they all sound the same,” she explained. “We cannot let people think that we are human, for if anyone knows of this place, then so will the dark sorceress Hedda. She will destroy it, and all will be lost. We have been following you for some time now, but we faltered for a moment as we saw the beast suck you into its cave while you rested. We have no wish to harm you, we just need you to help us, and we could maybe help in return.”
“We still can’t trust you,” Ballard retorted. “You expect us to help you after you dragged us all the way here! And chocked us! We were supposed to reach the shrine, and then travel to Hildegard! We must leave. There is no time for this. Good day! Nice!
“Ballard,” Thaddeus said in a soft, calm, voice, “there was no shrine. It was some sort of spell.” Ballard looked bewildered.
“Impossible!” he boomed. “I saw it with my own eyes! It was there…is there!”
Suddenly, a bear walked up and tapped Ballard on the shoulder. He turned around and screamed. As he screamed, the bear seemed to change form, and then in its place was a man.
“My name is Xaran,” he said, his yellow eyes glinting. “I am afraid your friend is right. Our people are druids. I cast the spell of the shrine to make travelers believe that it is the only way to cross the forest. I place the shrine spell far away from our city, so travelers will rarely come near us. We can’t be discovered, for Hedda would burn the forest, and all hope would be ruined. The paths that lead to the shrine were built by us as well. The real paths have been overgrown by brush and vines.”
“We are on a quest called upon us by the Queen herself to travel to Hildegard and destroy Hedda and her magic,” Thaddeus told Xaran and Naria. “Any help you could give us would be greatly appreciated, and we would be glad to help you with whatever you want.”
“Thank you, thank you!” Naria squealed, I’m not sure if “squealed” is the best word. her long, mud-brown hair covering her gleaming yellow eyes for an instant as she jumped. “You are not the only below grounders that have been here. A long time ago, a man came and left us a small book. The favor we ask of you is very small. You see, we need you to read this book. None of us can read this language, nor can our ruler.”
Naria took out a small book with a wrinkled leather cover. It was clearly very old, for patches of it were peeling off.
“Let me see that book, Naria,” Truman said, excited that he would have a chance to use his skills.
He flipped through the pages, and then, amazed, said, “This is the ancient writing of Orville! I am sure of it!”
Slowly Truman looked at the books cover, and in shock read it aloud. “The journal of…Sandor.”
“Sandor!” shouted Ballard “That is the warrior Pi…Perdita told us about!”
“So you have heard of him. I thought someone would. Come; let us not stand at the edge of the city like fools! Follow me to my house.”
As they followed Naria to her house, Not a big problem, but I think he could leave out the second word “house”. :) the many people looked at them in awe. Clearly, none of them had seen anyone from below in their lifetime before.
Thaddeus noticed that every person had bright yellow eyes, and brown hair. Their skin, tanned in the sun, was slightly darker than any person he had ever seen. They each wore a dark green robe with a brown rope, or vice versa. Even the children had on the same clothing.
Finally, they reached a small house, and walked inside. The house had a carpet made of autumn leaves sewn together with druid magic. There was a small wooden bed in the back of the room, and a table with four chairs.
“Shall I start to read now?” Truman asked patiently.
“Yes,” Naria replied. She then gestured for everyone to sit down. Truman began.

Hade is very powerful. He curses the land with his evil. Soon I plan to stop him, but I know I cannot do it with my magic alone. I must make the Staff of Light, and I believe I know where one of the pieces is hidden.
For as long as I have been alive, there have been tales of people wandering into the Bradshaw and never returning. This may have something to do with the staff of light. You see, Hade knew about the staff, so he scattered its three pieces across the land: The Orb of Truth, the Essence of Light, and the Staff of Light itself. Together, they can create spells strong enough to destroy Hade.
The staff can not be destroyed by darkness, so Hade did the next best thing; he separated it into three pieces: the essence of light, the crystal orb, and the main staff itself. It seems that a special medallion points to the essence of light, but I do not know what will point to the other two pieces.
As I write this, I am in the Bradshaw. I have found a hidden city above the trees called Sumaya. I met a druid woman there, and we married. Her name is Gloria. She is expecting a baby and is currently in Orville, holding the position of queen. She is expecting a child, soon, and I hope that our child will one day rule Orville, just as I did.
I came upon a city built in the trees of the Bradshaw forest. The High Druid had the medallion I had been searching for, and she gave it to me. I promised to return it, and I will give her this book, but I must finish writing it. The medallion led me to a strange area that I will never forget; A place of dark suffering.
This place was the cave of the beast. I entered the cave, and remembered of the Beast that dwelled within it, which is what the druid villagers called it. I have found out that the Beast is called the Muglod, and it is very powerful. Each ruler of Hildegard must make a Muglod once the previous on comes of age. The Muglod travels through the dirt, and then strikes up with his many tentacles, which are coated with a strange, brown, oozy substance. He takes them to his cave, where they are trapped in the mud. I once became trapped in it myself, and found out that water, as well as other liquids, irritated it somehow, causing it to momentarily harden.
After I fell into the cave, however, I could not get out. To get out of the cave, you must find the ladder I built out of…I shudder as I write this…the remains of many bones left by the Muglod. I marked the area in the cave with a shield, forever stuck in the slime. Outside of the entrance there is a rock. Near it is a small group of three trees clustered together. The tree in the middle, however, is bark less, and very young. I cast a spell on it, so rain, sun, or age would not ever destroy it. That is all I have found out, except for what I heard from villagers…they say that no weapon can harm it, and no shield can block its force…It is also hard to see, for the cave is very dark…I hope someone will destroy it, and find out its weakness. If you do not plan on defeating the Muglod, do not fear, for it rarely leaves its cave.
Once thing, however, must never be put into the hands of Hade or his descendants; the essence of darkness. Hade already has the staff for it, and the orb. If ever the essence of darkness is given to his line of evil, then great peril will fall upon those trying to defeat him. Here is a simple sketch of what the essence of darkness looks like.

Inside the book was a drawing of a small round, glass case with a small lid. The liquid inside was pitch black, with occasional drawings of purple lightning inside.

The time has come for me to leave this place. The druids have been kind to me, and I have sworn an oath to them that if I ever where to tell anyone about this place, that I and the one I told would be turned into a tree. I do not wish to live my life as a tree, so I do not plan on telling. I must go now, for I have stayed with the druids for too long…I fear if I stay any longer someone will come looking for me and it may be someone I do not want to meet. I can only hope that these few pages will help someone. I now must go home to my wife, who is having her child…

After that, the rest of the pages were blank. Truman flipped through the pages again, making sure that was all there was to the book.
“Is that the end of it?” Ballard interrupted, breaking the momentary silence and shock.
“Yes,” was all that Truman replied. “Yes, that was all of it.”
“This makes no sense at all!” Naria exclaimed. How could weapons be unable to kill the beast?”
“This does make sense, and I am beginning to understand what we must do.”
Ballard, Truman, and Naria stared at Thaddeus, faces as blank as a piece of unused paper.
A thought occurred to Thaddeus; none of his companions had been there when he saw the slime with Julia, or when Titus told him of all the cases.
“There is something I have forgotten to tell you. It is the way Julia died. After reading this journal, I have figured it out completely. The guards at Ritussia had disappeared, and so did Julia. All that was left was a mud-like slime, just as Sandor described. Titus said that they had had many reports of disappearances leaving behind wet slime a lot recently. This was all caused by the Muglod, and Sandor said it rarely leaves its cave. This must mean that…”
“Hedda has recently created a new Muglod, and has just sent it out to replace the older one in the cave!” exclaimed Truman, excited. Well done on writing the part about the slime!
“It also means that the new Muglod must be tired, for it had to have fought with the old one not too long ago as well!” Naria realized, just as excited as Truman.
“Huh?” gawked Ballard, overwhelmed by all of the news.
“Ballard, Truman, we must go to the cave and defeat this beast. We may need this book though…”
Thaddeus met eyes with Naria. “May we have it?”
Naria seemed to be in thought for a moment. Then all of a sudden, her face turned into a mighty grin. “Of course!” she yelled
joyfully. The faces of Thaddeus, Ballard, and Truman all swelled with relief. It seemed as if a load of mystery and weight had been removed from each of their backs.
“Under one condition,” Naria said, almost giggling. “I have to come with you.”
The men stared at each other uneasily. “Don’t worry, my druid powers may be the weakness of the beast!”
“You can come,” Ballard groaned sarcastically.
“Oh thank you, thank you!” Naria squealed, overjoyed. “How could I have forgotten? The High Druid wants to see you! Before we leave, you must go to see her.”
“Very well,” said Thaddeus. “We will see the High Druid. Naria began to lead Thaddeus, Truman and Ballard to the High Druid. But Ballard stayed behind for a moment.
“Keep going,” he said, “I will catch up.”
Ballard opened his pack and looked through it. That potion, he thought, that essence of darkness. I would have sworn I had it. That woman gave it to my family, with the waters from the healing spring years ago. Where is it? Ah well. I must have left it at home. First, why was he looking for the potion? Second, I think you should put the part where he’s thinking in italic
Then, Ballard put his pack back on, and caught up with the rest of his friends.