Cinnamon, Part 7 - Campfire

The Freedom Fighters led me further, deeper into the forest. We walked for what seemed like hours. None of them said anything to me the whole time. For some reason they had recognized my name, but I had no idea how. They hadn't tied my hands or anything, though. So I guess I wasn't captive. And in a way the walking was nice, just following whoever walked in front of me. It gave me time to think. I thought about home. I thought about my dad and my little sister. What if I never got back home? What would they do? We had already lost a mother. And now Christmas was coming up. How would they make it without me? I thought about ways to get home. Any possible way I could think of. I came up with nothing. I knew nothing about this world. I didn't know how it worked, what was possible, what normal. There was no way for me to just come up with how to get home by just thinking. I would need help, and I knew it. The Squirrel that had been guiding me sat on my shoulder for a long time, but after a while jumped down and disappeared into the forest.
It began getting darker. Not dark yet, but dim. My feet hurt from walking. My stomach growled and I remembered I hadn't eaten anything the whole day. Then I saw a flicker of light in between the trees ahead. As we grew closer, I saw it was a campfire. There were more creatures there, seemingly the same kind that I was with. I recognized a lion (on two legs) and a gnome. There was a light floating around in the air, that I figured must either be a firefly or a fairy. I guessed a fairy.
There were cheery greetings when we stepped into the circle of light. High-fives and slaps on the back were exchanged.
"And this is?" a lion wearing a light armour came towards me and the troll guarding me. He wasn't wearing a mask, so I could clearly see his face between huge locks of long, golden fur. It was weird, staring into a face that looked so animal, but in the eyes you could see the understanding of a human.
"Cinnamon", the troll said in a low voice taking his (her? It was a troll. How am I supposed to know?) mask off. The lion smiled. As much as you can smile a human smile with a face of a lion.
"Come, Cinnamon", the lion said, "You must be hungry."
I nodded, confused. I felt that was the most common feeling I had had during the last couple of days. At least someone was talking to me now. I wanted to ask... Well, everything. But I didn't dare. The lion led me to the fire and everyone turned to look at me. None of the faces looked threatening. Merely curious. I sat down in an empty spot around the fire the lion showed me. He let out a small, but strong roar. More creatures began to appear from the woods to gather around the fire. I assumed they were never far. They were all looking at me. There were all kinds of creatures. Anything I ever read about in books that I never knew were real. Some I had never even heard of or even imagined.
"This", the lion began when everyone had gathered close, "Is Cinnamon", the crowd broke into an applause.
"From tomorrow onwards", the lion continued after the noise had stopped, "we have new hope. We have talked about this, planned this. Go, get ready."
The crowd departed as fast as it had gathered. I felt uncomfortable, all the faces staring at me. But the faces looked happy.
"Umm..." I said to the lion, who sat down next to me, "Umm... Thank you", I said to a small creature that looked to me like a house elf, who handed me a bowl of soup.
"I just..." I began again, to the lion, "I don't know what is going on. Do you know me?"
"I'm Azer", the lion said, "I lead the White Island Freedom Fighters. This", he gestured to a fairy in the air next to us, "Is Em. She is my second in command."
"Nice to meet you", Em said. She was about the size of a hummingbird, and her wings were flapping so fast I couldn't see them. I still thought it safe to assume she had wings.
"You're beautiful", I answered. Then I realized how stupid saying that must sound as the first thing to say to someone and blushed, hoping no one would notice it in the light of the fire. The faery laughed. It sounded like a tinker bell. It sounded like Christmas.
"I... What is going on?" I asked.
"How much do you know?" Azer asked.
"Nothing. I think. I know I just appeared in this land a couple of days ago and spent last night in a goblin village", I answered. Azer nodded.
"Eat your soup", he said. I tasted it. Once again I didn't know exactly what I was eating, but it was good, so I kept eating. And besides, I was hungry enough to eat something not-so-good also, if I had had to.
"On White Island we have a Queen", Azer began.
"Oh, that I do know. One of the goblins said I should go see her", I interrupted, "But that's all, really."
"Years ago", the lion gave me a look saying he didn't like interruptions, "Our Queen took an apprentice. A young high elf named Folius, only a child, who she found alone in the woods. Our Queen doesn't have any children, you see, or even a king, so she decided to foster a child, who could one day take her place as a king after she leaves us. So she raised the elf child, and for a long time all was fine. But now Folius, our prince, has grown up, and he has began to terrorize our country. The Queen knows this, but Folius has her silenced with ways we do not know. The Queen is but a human, and Folius is an elf. He is simply too powerful for her to control, even though she tries her best, which isn't much. He has gotten his will, and there is very little even the Queen can do to him.
"But we are fighting to get back what once used to be, a life without the fear of a terrorizing prince. The Queen is a good and just woman, and a good queen. We want her back."
"And what has all this to do with me?" I asked, drinking the last of the soup from my bowl.
"There is a prophecy", Em said. "A prophesy that goes like this:
Once the days of despair shall come
With a ruler of good heart muted away
The people shall want good hope and strong taste
With Cinnamon tasting strongest, showing the way."
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Whoa, I really didn't see the freedom fighters coming. This story is getting bizarre.
You didn't give me a topic, so I just came up with one of my own. I wanted to write now instead of waiting for you to wake up and maybe remember to come back to give me a topic. And yes, I am not a poet. So now you have a very lousily phrased prophecy.
Your topic for tomorrow: Hat.

Also, why do you think I meant the details are bad? The details are good. They're very good. It's just funny to find out things about your own character, like "Oh, apparently she's twenty. That's cool." (I wish the same thing would happen more often with characters I'm making up alone.) I don't know why you assumed I don't like details simply because I mentioned them.
It reminds me about this anti-gay marriage ad I found on youtube, where there is a kid saying "If my dad was married to a man, then who would be my mom? I'm confused." And every time I see that, I wonder why people think confused is a bad thing (also why I keep watching it again). Confused simply implies something unexpected came up. It doesn't take any side on whether the unexpected thing is good or bad. I think most times I'm confused it's because of a good thing.

One more thing I have to comment on. The hahas you've started to add into your text. I've understood that it's a thing in English chat language that's supposed to make what you're saying sound less mean or more relaxed or something. And the hahas are superannoying to someone like me who doesn't speak chat-english. Or maybe it's just me. The point is, you've caught chat-english, and I really don't like it, because I think there is nothing more annoying to read than that. At least you haven't sunk down to the level of using u and i and r and luv and 2 and 4 and all the other shortened words that I simply don't understand because they've stopped being anything like the actual words they're supposed to be. But you know, not trying to tell you how to talk. Just wanted to make a point. Chat-english hurts my eyes.

~matu