Jillian started to grow nervous as the cart rumbled across the moat that led to the Bear's Prison. It was an ominous tower of stone and brick on a small island with fortified walls and a moat of alligators, made specially for the world's worst criminals. Some infamous ones have been Goldilocks, Rumplestilskin, Puss in Boots, and even the Pied Piper (before he escaped).

She felt her stomach lurch as they gates to the prison yard slammed shut behind her, sealing her fate. The other people in the cart looked around nervously and huddled together like sheep in a flock. Jillian doubted any one of them was actually magical. The young wizard had ten times their bravery! Speaking of him,when the cart finally halted, he began to stir and blink confusedly. He caught sight of Jillian staring at him and inched a bit closer to her.

"Where am I?" he whisphered.

"Bear's Prison. We've just been arrested."

The wizard groaned and flopped against the side of the cart. He raised his tied wrists almost pleadingly to the sky. "Oh why? What did I do this time?" He didn't sound like he was speaking to her but Jillian decided to answer anyway.

"As of now, existing."

He stared at her, questions rising inside, but just then, several guards arrived. They grabbed one person each and began dragging them to the tower. Jillian tried to break free but the man's grip was like iron and he only tightened it. She was taken up a winding spiral staircase that wound around and around, passing cell after cell. It was dark and she was dizzy so she couldn't make out the occupants well, but she thought she recognized a few of them from wanted posters. They all jeered and hissed at her, probably seeing new prisoners was the most exciting thing that's come in a long time. With the sound of screeching metal, the bars to a cell were pushed aside and Jillian was thrown in. She landed painfully on her knees and the bars slammed shut.

Jillian sat there quietly on the floor and tried not to cry. She failed and let a few tears trail down her cheek. Her life had gone from bad to worse faster than one could say golden goose. She longed for the orphanage, despite is drearyness, it had food and a good enough place to sleep.

A scraping sound to her left caused her to look and see a finger scrabbling around the stone. Curious, she crawled over and put her eye to the hole. A glowing blue eye stared back at her. She jumped back startled. The eye laughed. "I thought I'd find you," a voice said. It was the wizard!

She was too stunned to speak. His eyes were literally glowing! Before she could voice this he passed a sharp piece of glass through the hole. "Here use this to cut through the ropes."

As she did so, he continued to babble. "I hoped you were in one of the cells next to me. You know, these prisons are made pretty sloppily, so the mortar is weak. Unluckily for me, I tried to see if you were in the other cell. It was some old bat, a cranky, old witch, I expect. Tried to bite my finger off. You'd think she'd be a bit more civil to me, but well here we are."

Jillian sighed in relief as the tight ropes were looseandshe was able to slip her wrists out. They were rubbed raw and she masaged them tenderly.

"Hey, are you still there?" the wizard called through the hole. "Its lonely!"

She sniffed and wiped her eyes. "Yeah, I am," she said croakily. She went to the hole so they were eye to eye.

The wizard's eye widened in amusement. "Are you crying?" He sounded so surprised at this, Jillian felt a surge of anger.

"Yes, I'm crying!" she snapped. "I'm in prison where I'm not supposed to be! And for what? Just because I was accused of being a magical sympithizer!"

There was a stunned silence. "Okay, okay, back up. Do you know what happened back there? Why that guy tried to arrest me?" He laughed bitterly. "And succeeded?"

The best she could Jillian, explained the new proclaimation deeming all magic illegal. "So they appointed Sherrif Anton to search for magic folk. And he found one."

"Two," the wizard corrected.

Jillian blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Come on," he weedled. "You can tell me. Are you a witch? An enchantress perphaps?"

"No! I'm not magic! I'm just a regular girl!" Jillian protested. "What makes you think I am am one?"

He snickered. "If you want to hide it, you're not doing it well. You're eyes are an unusual color, for a start. And they glow in the dark."

"What!?" she screeched. "That's just an old superstition! My eyes do not glow! And I've never done magic at all!"

The wizard sounded triumphant. "Don't deny it. I saw them glowing faintly with my own two eyes when you were hiding in the inn. And they are glowing brighter right now since its so dark."

Jillian looked around to see if she could tell her eyes were glowing, but it didn't work.

"Oh, don't bother trying to see if they glow. Your eyes can't see themselves, obviously. So come on! Tell me! It doesn't really make a difference now whether you keep it a secret or not-."

She threw her hands up in the air in fustration. "I'm not magic, for the third and final time!"

"Okay, fine. You don't have to tell me," he muttered angrily. His eye vanished from the hole. The conversation was over.

Jillian left the hole and moved to lean against the wall. She wasn't sure why being accused of having magic made her so furious. Perhaps it was that she wouldn't want to be associated with people like him! Ugh! He was so infuriationg! Sounds so confident and self-assured about everything. She couldn't believe she ever felt sorry for him!

"What was that?"

Oh no. Did she actually say that out loud?

"You felt sorry for me? Well, I'm touched." His voice dripped with sarcasm.

"No, that's not what I-."

"Listen, girl. You're new to knowing me, but let me tell you this. You can call me sevreal things. I don't really care except if you feel sorry for me. Oh boo hoo! Poor little wizard! If he was normal and could fit in, then he wouldn't of been exiled and arrested! Oops, we all make mistakes don't we? I don't want a pity party, thanks."

He hurt lacing his voice was so strong, it sounded as if he'd been through this several times. She had half a million questions but she picked to one that was bothering her the most.

"You're a wizard, right?" She mentally slapped herself for asking such an obvious question.

"Last I checked," he grumped. "Wait, one second. Yep, still a wizard."

Jillian ignored that and asked, "Well, then you should know why King Palumer hates magic so much, right?"

The wizard didn't answer right away. Either he didn't hear her or was still mad. Finally, he heaved a great sigh. "Well it hardly matters anymore, but I'll tell you. Okay, you've heard of the Snow Queen, right?"

Jillian nodded, but them remebered he couldn't see her face. "Yes."

"Well, she is a powerful ruler up north and had a lot of loyal subjects, mostly magical creatures and people. Her growing strength became a threat to King Palumer so he ordered her execution. But the attack on the Snow Kingdom didn't work. The king had to return a failure. So as revenge, he issued a proclamation to kill any magical creature found, because they were most of the members in her army."

"Who were the rest?" Jillian questioned.

"Magical folk. My father was one of them." She heard the pride in his voice. "So after that proclaiamtion, a lot of us went into hiding, for fear that we could be next, for years we seemed to be safe, until now. I was traveling between two villages at the time, so I didn't even know what had happened until you told me."

"If you did, you wouldn't of used your wand, right?"

"Wrong," he said defiantly. "I was taught to never hide who I was, so either way, I would have fought them."

"I see," Jillian mused.

"Do you think I'm foolish?" he snapped.

"No! I think that's very brave. Probably the bravest thing I ever heard."

"Aw, shucks. Now I'm blushing. You're too much."

She giggled despite herself.

"AH HA! She can laugh! Its a miracle!" the wizard shouted. He was shushed by other prisoners. He lowered his voice to a whispher. "Now here's the really good part. No non-magical folk know about this. Come closer."

She inched over to the hole and put her ear to it. "The Snow Queen has, of course, noticed the attack on the creatures and will eventually get wind of the new proclamation. She is rebuilding her army."

"What?"

"SHHH! She's going to defeat King Palumer and bring peace between all people, isn't that great?"

"Yeah, it is." Jillian imagined seeing gnomes, elves, and imps again. She wanted to see a mermaid or a pheonix, not just in books and pitcures. She even imagined being friends with the wizard. Woah, why'd she think about that?

"I reason I know is that they tried to recruit me." He took her silence has surprise and continued. "I know, right? Me? I wanted some time to think about it, but they weren't going to take no for an answer. That's why I bolted." He chuckled. "I guess she's really desperate for volunteers, with so many creatures gone. Man, if she could only convince the giants to join, well, we would already win."

"Giants?" Jillian breathed. "There are actual giants?"

"Of course there are! You've heard of the Giant Slayer, I hope."

"Yeah, I have but I didn't know it was true."

"Oh it is. That crash caused so many earthquakes that day. The Snow Queen has tried serval times to make them join but they are perfectly content with staying in the sky. Before the Giant Slayer, they were perfectly untouched and want to remain so."

Jillian got an idea. "What if we convince the giants?"

The wizard laughed aloud. "I'm sorry, but have you forgotten? We're in prison. Sentenced to death in a day or two."

"But if we can prove we're not magic, they'll let us go. Sheriff Anton said we would be tested for magic."

"Its doubtful. They would more likely not take any chances and kill us anyway. We're already dead."

"But we have to try!" Jillian urged. "Come on! The Snow Queen would be so grateful! If we're already dead, we have to try, don't we?"

She could sense him coming around. "Oh alright. Let's se if this will actually work-uhh...I don't know your name," he laughed bashfully.

"Its Jillian."

"Kenneth, but no one calls me that but my aunt. Call me Kit."

They stuck their fingers through the hole and shook.