Isle of the Damned

The village

We'd walked into a lively village square. Judging from the stares we were getting James was completely right, we were sticking out way too much. Clothes will need to be found really soon. The longer we walked round in clothes from Kamaria, our home, the more the danger increased. It would probably only take a few rumours of weirdly dressed strangers for King Seth to come sniffing.  

Our clothes were very different from what the villagers adorned. We'd made use of leather and basic fabrics whereas their clothes seemed to be made from softer, brighter and more detailed cloth. I had no idea how it was all made or where it was sourced from.

Although we'd used basic materials, I still preferred our style of dressing. Myla, Ava and I tended to dress in tight-fitting tops and trousers with little cuts or lace detailing to make our outfits more personalised and unique. This seemed to be very unlike the females here, which from first glance, wore long, flowing and graceful but heavy dresses. I certainly would not want to have to fight in them. Some of them looked like they were wearing the person and not the other way round.

 James, Alvaro and Evander all adorned casual clothing with some accessories (swords, pendants etc) which, again, is very different from the outfits the men here were wearing. They wore smart, well-made clothing often resembling a more suit like style. It'd be odd seeing them dress up this way. 

"we'll split up. Evander and Alvaro will go with me to the shop over there whilst you three go find some dresses. Meet back in the centre of the square when we're all done," James decisively said.

"Don't take too long Myla, we want to make it to the castle before we starve to death," Evander said with a small laugh as she glared at him.

"See you guys soon," Alvaro said, with a smile from his twin's statement.

They turned to leave but before they did James turned around and looked me in the eye. "Be careful Arabella. We can't afford anything to happen to you."

I nodded solemnly. "I will be."

"Don't worry, she's got us We'll take care of her," Ava piped up, taking my arm in hers and Myla's in the other. We yelled out a goodbye as we walked away, hopefully in the right direction.

We headed off towards a row of shops and stalls. It looked like merchants were selling a vast variety of items. I could see hats with multicoloured feathers attached, stones with the colours of the rainbow ingrained into them, fresh pastries, large necklaces that looked like they weighed more than my arm in gold and a variety of kid's toys. I can't recall a time ever seeing something like it. 

"It's amazing isn't it," Ava gasped in awe.

"Is it even real?" Mayla asked incredulously.

"Let's go and find out. Look on the left, over there. There's a dress shop," I said with anticipation. The clothes may not be what we normally wore but it was still exciting. 

We headed over. It was hard ignoring all the stares directed at us but I knew we would fit in soon enough. Hopefully. 

I looked at the shop. It seemed to be quite large and had a variety of brightly coloured dresses in the window. The wood framing the shop had been painted an alluring green and the word "Carina's" had been painted in gold cursive at the top of the building. It looked welcoming enough, 

We stepped in together and a busy woman, I think around 60 years old, yelled hello from behind a counter. 

"Hi!" I exclaimed back as she turned round to face us. The shock on her face was evident. We needed those dresses now.

She shook her head and calmly asked, "How may I help you, young ladies?"

"We're looking for dresses for all three of us. We do a travelling show, hence these costumes but we were robbed and now we need to buy more," I lied smoothly. I couldn't say we were from the 'isle of the damned'. That would naturally only land us in trouble, most likely dead. 

"Oh, I see. Of course, have a look round," she said pushing her glasses high up on her nose. She had long brown hair scooped up on her head and a pencil behind her ear. She gave off the aura of being a bit scattered and disorganised but I found that warmed me towards her. 

"Thank you," Ava said, smiling warmly at her before dragging us off to a section of dresses.

There were hundreds of dresses to search through, there was bound to something in here that we liked. I started sifting through them, unsure of what I was looking for. There were greens and silvers and oranges and browns, all starting to blend in my eyes together when something caught my eye.

A shoulderless dusty pink dress hung from one of the hangers. It was elegant and silky. Hand-stitched flowers lined the top and a gorgeous thin blue ribbon acting as a belt was tied around the middle. The bottom of the dress was puffed out but not overly so. I knew that I wanted this one, so I picked it up. 

I found a few others that weren't as dressy-up. I found simple red, purple and emerald green dresses that would blend in well with the general population. Hopefully, it'd be enough to disguise us. 

I looked over and saw Ava and Myla with a variety of dresses. Though as predicted Myla looked like she just could not decide between them all. Ava has already picked and bought hers and so was now dragged into helping Myla with her tedious decision-making process. I never understood it because Myla could probably rock a flour sack and still look amazing. 

"You have good taste," A voice said behind me making me jump. "My bad, I do tend to unintentionally make people jump."

It was the lady from behind the counter. 

"Thank you, I wasn't sure if I'd find what I wanted," I replied.

"People always find what they're looking for in here, my dear."

"It's a gorgeous shop," I complimented her, not sure of what to say now. 

She smiled warmly before saying, "That's kind of you. I've only just gotten it up and running after the raid."

"Raid? What raid?" I asked with feelings of unease. 

"Didn't you know? King Seth's men were looking for people from the isle about nine months ago and tore the whole village to shreds saying that this is the first place they'd turn to if they wanted to spread their evil. That's why it all looks so nice now. Our Queen, Helena put a load of money into restoring it as an apology for the village folks," she explained with a glazed look in her eyes as if she could still see the horror of it all happening now.

"Why would they just turn up here without true reason?" I worryingly questioned.

"Oh, that's just how they are. One stray rumour that's someone odd has been here and they come searching. If you ask me, they're raving lunatics."

"I'm sorry about your shop."

"Not your fault, dear."

She smiled at me, causing crinkles around her eyes before walking away to sort out some more of her dresses. 

Given what she said to me, we were in immediate danger. If one stray rumour could do that then so much worse could happen. I knew we had to get a move on as the longer we spent here the higher the chance someone would see us in these clothes and tell Seth directly or start spreading it around that we here. I didn't know where Seth's closest men were. It just occurred to me that they could already be lurking in Helena's land so it could only be a matter of hours before someone came looking for us. As quickly as possible, without trying to seem too overly rushed to the shop keeper, I dragged Myla and Ava out of there as soon as I possibly could.  

"What's wrong? Why the rush?" Myla asked in an almost whining voice.

"Well, I for one am grateful she pulled us out of there. You were taking ridiculously long in picking an outfit."

"I'll explain everything as soon as we meet the boys," I said feeling my anxiety rise and my guilt for the destruction of this village grow.

We quickly made it back and before any other discussion could happen, I quickly explained everything. 

"That's horrible. I don't know how I didn't hear about this before," James said in with what I can only describe as quiet rage. Whether it was directed at himself or King Seth's men I did not know.

"If all this is true we need to make it to the castle as soon as possible. The more time we spend here, the more likely rumours will start. Some people may even just attack in an attempt to kill us before Seth raids the village again. We need the protection of the castle's walls," Ava said. She made another good point I hadn't thought about, the villagers themselves although in an allied land may want to protect their village from harm. Before now, I guess we all considered here safe due to it being an associated land but if Seth was willing to raid here for one stray rumour and anger all its people then we couldn't stay any longer.

"Let's move. Now!" Evander ordered.

Alvero spoke next as we started to head off, "We got some horses whilst we were waiting for you to finish, it'll only take five minutes on horseback."

We walked at an insanely quick rate to the area where they put our horses to wait. I grabbed a black horse as quickly as possible and hopped onto her, putting the stuff I'd been carrying around on her back. The others did the same and in what felt like the speed of a flash of lightning we were off. There was no time to waste.