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THE children are still wondering about this boundary line. They are still wondering what it might possibly hold for them. Life? Or certain death?
“Why here?” Hazel says. “Why must we go here?”
“It is the only way across,” Arthur says. “Into the land of Rosehaven.”
The only way across.
Desperation will make a man do things he might never do without it.
It is more than a little frightening to consider the problem with this plan. Arthur and Maude and the children stand at the very boundary of lands that have not been crossed since King Sebastien stole the throne from The Good King Brendon and drove all the dragons from their place beside humans. King Sebastien could not trust the dragons, you see, for they fought on the side of The Good King Brendon. And from that day forward, the dragons were forbidden to step into the lands of Fairendale, just as the people of Fairendale were forbidden to step into the land of Morad.
The dragons and humans lived in harmony once upon a time. But, alas, that is a long time past.
So it is with trepidation that any foot might cross this boundary, for no one knows whether the dragons live or whether they disappeared when they could no longer find purpose in the lives of humans. But if they have not disappeared, well then, Arthur, Maude and all these children are defying an agreement made long ago.
Arthur stares at the line, the green giving way to brown sand. He grabs the hand of his wife, who grabs her daughter’s, who grabs Chester’s and on and on and on down the line.
Once they move, there is no turning back. Arthur knows this. They could all die in these lands, and no one would know. The dragons, right now, could be waiting. They could be hiding behind the peaks of mountains or in the oversized caves, waiting to destroy them with great puffs of fire, and how might he, Arthur, feel, watching all the children, who have come so very far, who have lived in spite of all the odds against them, disappear in a cloud of smoke?
And yet it is true. They have come so far. They have escaped the king’s men. They cannot turn back now. To turn back now would be to certainly die, and while it is probably certainly death to continue forward, they cannot risk anything but this.
Fate, it seems, has been on their side. Perhaps it will be still.
Arthur stares. He thinks. He takes a deep breath. He looks at his wife.
“Ready?” he says.
Maude’s eyes are large, but she nods. “Ready,” she says.
The children around them shift.
“We all understand that we could die,” Arthur says.
The children nod.
“I do not know what will happen once we cross the line,” Arthur says.
The children nod again.
He looks from one of them to another, staring at their faces, meeting their eyes. They must make it. They must.
“I love you all,” Arthur says. “I truly do. Every single one of you.”
They nod again, waiting for him to tell them it is time.
He closes his eyes, so, of course, they all do, too.
And then, as if they are one single body, one person held together by muscle and bone and sinew, they step across the boundary line.