smiled broadly back at him.
“I really can’t believe it. Your brother told me you were safe, but I still didn’t want to believe it until I finally saw you.”
“C—Cerise?” Ackerley chocked, forming the word with great difficulty. It was the first time he had said her name aloud in over three years.
She nodded, a tear running down her left cheek. Without saying another word, she grabbed him in a tight hug. They stood there, embracing for quite a while. The whole world disappeared around them.
Ackerley’s eyes burned as the tears flowed freely. He closed his eyes. He didn’t want to open them again. He knew—he just knew that if he did she would disappear; the same way she did in so many dreams.
“I thought—” he sputtered, “I thought for sure you were dead.”
“No.” She sobbed, squeezing him a little tighter. “They took me as prisoner.”
She let him go, wiping away her tears on her shoulder. “Let’s go somewhere. I’ll tell you about it if you tell me what you’ve been up to all this time.”
Ackerley grabbed her hand and led her over to his little boat and away from the growing crowd welcoming the Chells. They walked the length of the shabby pier to where the boat was tethered. He helped Cerise in, climbed in himself, and quickly untethered it. The little thing bobbed merrily away from the pier, out into the ocean.
He couldn’t help but stare. He tried to find some semblance of the beautiful princess he once knew. It was there—buried deep under a guard he could tell was starting to fade away. She no longer needed it.
“I built this.” Ackerley said awkwardly, picking up the oars. He had fantasized about talking to her again countless times, easily forgetting all of it now that the real thing was back in his life.
“It’s really good.” She said, looking over the boat.
“The first two sank when I got in. Old Mr. Thim—he was an old fisherman who died a few months back—he helped me with this one.”
Cerise stared at Ackerley unflinchingly. “I can’t believe you survived. The Welgos that took me said they killed you both and buried you. They kept telling me how great it was for them to kill the boy who injured Victor.”
“I never injured him.” Ackerley confessed.
“Well, Victor made it sound like you were the one who did it. He sure was glad to know you died. They took me back to him; thought we were cohorts. He turned me and everyone who survived in the basement into slaves. We cleaned up everything and did whatever the Welgos wanted.” She stroked her arms thoughtfully. “I got a slash every time I did something wrong. One day the food was too cold; another it was too hot. Sometimes it just wasn’t there fast enough. This lasted for the first year. After that I went with Victor to Welgland to stop a coup. Evidently the people there thought he was spending too much time in the South and thought a new leader was in order. Anyway, I went with him as his assistant—or whatever it was he called me in that horrible language.”
“What was it like up there?” Ackerley interrupted.
She shrugged. “I don’t know, pretty much the same as it is anywhere.” She skimmed the top of the water with her hand, frowning at the memories. “He decided to quell the people there and tell them that I was going to be the queen. I don’t really know why that quelled them. He was the only one I could understand and he didn’t exactly keep me well informed. I think he was going to use me as a second ruler, since the territory had grown so much. He said they always liked Indigo, and that most of them didn’t even know it had been destroyed.”
Ackerley clenched his fists, refusing to accept what she was saying. He convinced himself that it was alright; this was all in the past.
“He didn’t have any interest in me to really be the queen. He just wanted to shut them up. He’s good at that, getting people to shut up.” She stared out at the water, steady and impassive. “I escaped. The first time they caught me, brought me back, and did this.” She didn’t have to point to her face, Ackerley knew what she meant. “I spent—I don’t know how long—slowly making my way back down to Chell. I found a little village like this one where Chell’s had gathered. I lived there for a long time. But I always remembered about coming here with you. After saving up a bit I finally made my way down, hiding whenever I could. It took a long time. I got up to another little Chell town near the border. That’s where I was when Kenton found me. I sure was surprised to see him. He helped me get here.”
“He’s good at getting people to safety.” Ackerley mused thoughtfully. He watched the people on land celebrating the new arrivals, sneaking little peaks at Cerise. Each time he looked at her it felt as if for the first time. He thought back to that day he saw her walking around the cloister. That same magical feeling returned in full force.
“So what about you? What’s your story?”
He laughed nervously. It wasn’t exactly as heroic as escaping a potential life of slavery and painstakingly making his way through a large country, but it was still something worth telling.
He told her about escaping the Welgos, finding the village, and about the boring endless days since then.
“Wow.” She said, awestruck. “That’s the life I always wanted. A little village where everything’s casual—no danger, no overly strict rules. That sounds so wonderful.” She giggled nervously. “I think I want to stay here forever.”
“Me too.” Ackerley agreed quickly. “This is a great place.”
They spent several hours in that little boat talking about all the things they wanted to do in life. When they got back the largest feast ever held in New Chell was being set up. It consisted mostly of fish, but no one cared much about what was eaten, least of all Ackerley and Cerise. They pulled the table out of Ackerley’s round house and ate with everyone else.
For the first time in a long time Ackerley felt like he belonged somewhere. For the first time in years, both Cerise and Ackerley could think about their future in happy, vibrant discourse. And for the first time in either of their lives, there wasn’t a better, brighter future someplace far away.
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