Falcon Friend

Alita looked out the window of her prison and sighed. She had tried breaking the glass, but it was no use. In the day she had been here, she could find no weaknesses in the architecture. And, Alita thought, sliding down the wall to sit with her arms around her knees, no way out.

But as Alita closed her eyes, she heard a noise at the other end of the room. Alita opened her eyes and stood, scanning the prison for what had made the sound. Her eyes roamed the room until she saw the window, the small, book-sized one. On the outside ledge, a falcon perched. It cawed as Alita walked over and looked at it. It cawed again, pecked the glass, looked her in the eye, and stared down at the floor. It repeated this until Alita followed its gaze. There she saw one of the tiles had shifted. She moved it aside, uncovering a dirt tunnel. Grabbing her things, she crawled in.

After a while, Alita found herself pushing up another stone tile and climbing out of the tunnel into a room full of weapons and other objects. She assumed these had belonged to the prisoners. Looking around, she saw her bow and arrows, sword, and dagger in a corner of the room. She grabbed them and peeked out a window. No trolls in sight.

Alita noticed some bird tracks in the snow leading to a tree. Up on a branch sat the falcon. It cawed and hopped a bit, as if to say, “Come on! Hurry! We must free the others!”

Alita opened the door and walked over to the branch. The falcon hopped off, landing on her shoulder.

“Thank you,” she told it. “Thank you so much. But we must hurry if we want to free the prisoners before the troll king begins the march to Borantis. We must go now if we want to warn the city and have an army to fight back.”

They walked back to the prison. Alita knew she would not fail the quest she had accepted for her city.