Meis abhorred using glenas to turn herself invisible. She hated it even more when the village alarm bells rang and Delys was nowhere to be found. It was still dark outside, but somehow her sister had already left the cottage. One of the sensors far out of the village had been triggered by intruders and the alarm stirred Meis out of a perfectly good dream. She couldn’t remember what the dream was but the feeling of warmth and quiet bliss lingered for a handful of seconds after she’d opened her eyes. It didn’t last. For one thing, the “kk-ko, kk-ko, kk-kk-ko” of the alarm system bothered her ears, for another, Delys was missing. Delys being absent in this early hour would not have been a problem if the alarm hadn’t been triggered by a potential threat to the village. Now Meis knew she must gobbled up a double share of glenas to generate enough magic to make the cottage disappear.

Meis found glenas red balls repulsive at any given moment of the day; but early morning, on an empty stomach, they were even more disgusting. And she had to take two mouthfuls of the pomegranate-like fruit. She stared at the purple fruit in her hand before she mustered the courage to bite into it.

Krrruch-h.

One bite, the tears were already coming down. All those red balls falling down her digestive system made her feel queasy. She already felt full, that she couldn’t take anymore bite, but she had to, for the safety of the village. So she swallowed up, closed her eyes, wiped the tears with the back of her hand, and dug-in full teeth for another serving. She hit the heart of the glenas, where the grains were more acidic. She nearly choked on her second serving.

Quickly. Let’s get this out of your system, Meis.

Meis focused her thoughts on the glena’s grains inside her digestive tubes. She cornered them with her mind and in one small effort, like the flick of a switch, she opened the grains and let them bloom into oblivion, elevating her entire body and the cottage into the unknown, into the invisible to the human eye.

When she was invisible, Meis always felt her body was floating in the air. Of course, it was a misconception. She could still feel the hard soil under her feet, but she couldn’t see her feet. She stood still and waited. Because the cottage was invisible, she finally found her sister: Delys was right there, by the last cottage, or the first, depending how you looked at it, at the edge of the village. When Meis saw her standing by the empty cottage, which was still visible, because no one lived in there since Errus had left a few months ago, Meis bit her lip and kicked herself.

How can I be so mean? Why are all my first thoughts so evil? I blamed Delys for abandoning me, but she didn’t. She was the one who remembered Errus’ cottage was empty and it needed hiding. Delys is… she’s such a good person, and I am the evil one. Wait… what is she doing?

Meis watched her sister running out of the village to a… boy. A foreigner! She was holding a foreign boy by the arm and dragging him with her. The boy had shiny black curly hair falling down to his nose. Such hairstyle was unlike anything Meis had ever seen before. They made for the cottage and seconds later: poof! The cottage was gone, the two of them too.

Now, everyone just needed to wait. Wait for the threat to pass by the village, if this boy was not the threat who triggered the alarm, although he was an intruder. Meis quickly put two and two together when she saw lights agitating themselves in the distance. Three lights shining in the dying night. The day was rising now, the obscurity rescinded, and the intruder’s lights with it.

Moments later, the cottage at the edge of the village reappeared. The alert was over. The intruders were gone. Meis took a deep breath and expired all the loose glenas grains out of her body. She watched her hands and arms reflecting the light again through the cottage window standing between her and Delys. Everything was back to normal. Meis pushed the front door and stepped outside. She was met by Gladys, up on that little clod. Since Gladys considered herself the village leader, it was no wonder she came out of hiding first. Her father, Merrus, the oldest man in the village, took much longer to come around. Within seconds, all the villagers came out of their cottages. They each gathered by the town hall, right next to Meis and Delys’ house. All the villagers waited for a sign. They got one from Delys.

Delys pulled the foreign boy into their field of vision. Instead of acting surprised, because she had already seen the curly head boy, Meis observed the other villagers.

Ellis and Ducus, the two siblings, stood with their arms-crossed, leaning on each other, looking disapprovingly at the curly head boy.

Pheren, the outsider who had been a member of the village for a number of seasons now, looked scared. She held a hand before her mouth. Her eyes were riveted on the boy.

Respetus sat on a bench behind his two boys, Parrus and Linckus who were busy slapping each other’s shoulders and speculating about the boy standing beside Delys.

Blas kept his three kid daughters well out of the distance, standing to safety on their high clod, the highest point of the village.

Titus remained by his cottage, all the way back near the waterfall.

Avanis… now Avanis, she looked like trouble. Meis watched her staring down at the boy and she knew that sooner of later, peace in the village would be challenge. Especially if the boy was to stay in their midst and occupy one of the empty cottages.

Delys brought the intruder to the main place by the town hall, past Meis’ cottage. “Hey, everyone,” Delys said with a broad smile. “This is Mallory. He is a boy, from a castle, somewhere.”

“Mallory?” Gladys said. “That’s not a boy’s name.”

“It’s my name,” said the boy, his voice slightly trembling. “I’m, huh, I’m from the castle nearby. Outside the forest. Castle Bartack. I’m sure some of you have been there or visited before.”

“No, we don’t leave Cozy Forest.” The words rushed out Ducus’ mouth.

Immediately, Gladys shushed him, imposing herself as the village leader which was somewhat passively understood by everyone but not officially agreed. “We don’t like to mix with anyone else. Especially people from a castle.”

“But I’m not, anymore. I’ve… how do I say it?”

Delys encouraged him. “Say it.”

“I’m the prince of… I was the prince of Castle Bartack. My name is Mallory. Prince Mallory. But I-I don’t want to be prince anymore. I don’t want to live in the castle.”

“Why is that?” asked Gladys.

“Because, they’re going to make me king. And I…” Mallory shook his head as if he was experiencing a malfunction. “I can’t be king. I don’t want to. I’ll be a terrible king. People of Castle Bartack deserve better than…”

“Than you?” said Delys, candidly.

“Than what I can offer.”

“Makes sense,” said Pheren with a clear voice. Mallory’s story had appeased her. She wasn’t timorous any longer. “I think he should stay.”

Everyone choked on the word ‘stay’.

Mallory more than anyone was embarrassed. “Stay? No, I’m just trying to get way. I want to go far from Castle Bartack so the guards and the ministers and the queen will never find me.”

“Where are you going?” asked Delys.

“I don’t know. I’ve never left the castle before. I’ve never even set foot inside Cozy Forest before. Although I often watched it from my window.”

Ellis opened her eyes wide.“Was your window high?”

“High enough. My chambers are, were, on the top tower of the castle, so…”

“It means you could see the whole of Cozy Forest? Tell me, how big is it? How big is Cozy Forest?”

Mallory shrugged his shoulders. “As big as the eye can see. It’s endless, as far as I know.”

The two siblings Ellis and Ducus let out a joint ‘wow’ of admiration.

“Maybe he should stay,” said Ducus.

“No. Thank you, but it’s… I appreciate it, but it’s not far enough from Castle Bartack. They’ll find me.”

Dely’s brow furrowed. “No, they won’t. We’ll hide you. We have the gift of invisibility.”

“I saw that, but I don’t understand it. Can you use it at will? Can you become invisible when you want?”

All the villagers but Gladys and Avanis said ‘yes’ together.

“It’s incredible.” Mallory scratched his head. Then he considered Delys and the rest of the villagers. “Well, I… don’t have food. I lost my satchel and all my provisions back when those guards were chasing me.”

“We have food,” said Ellis. “But if you stay, you’ll to get your own. We barely can afford to feed ourselves, you see. And with the village festivities coming up, it’s going to blow a hole in…”

Gladys shut her down. “Ellis! Please, would you let me do the talking? Excuse Ellis. She is the village accountant. She can’t help herself.”

“Accountant?” Mallory was surprised to hear such a small village would have an accountant. There were only a handful of houses and Mallory only counted about sixteen villagers.

“Treasurer, actually.”

“Accountant, Ellis. That’s how we always called your job.”

Mallory was very impressed. “Wow. Accountant. That’s incredible. I would have never imagined that such a… that you would have an accountant here.”

“Why?” asked Gladys. “Don’t you have accountants at the castle.”

“Yeah. We call them treasurers.”

Ellis punched the air. “You see? I told you it was called a treasurer. From now on, I want everyone to refer to me as the treasurer.”