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The calmness, or at least the non-battle time, lasted until dawn. I had been sitting with Fabian, back to the wall of the battlements. My eyes were closed, and I was drawn into my mind, paying the utmost attention to the panther. With her I was practicing my magick, her eyes visiting every colour I could think of so that we would be prepared in the event of the attack we were all waiting on.
Dawn was giving us vague rays, the light we’d been using as a constant being the countless fires that were going, when I heard the first whistle. This was the sound of an axe flying through the air, over the battlement wall, followed soon after by the clang of the axe hitting a shield, held up just in time by one of the lord’s men. I knew it was just in time because I moved quickly as soon as I heard the sound, and was looking over the edge when the first object hit. Then I realized where I was and shot backwards, hitting the wall with undesired force and hoping it wouldn’t bruise.
Fabian grinned at me, already on his feet and offering a hand to help me up. “Looks like its time to get started.”
Swallowing hard, I nodded, “Yeah. Okay. Am I helping others, or just you?”
“Just me, so I can tell you what spells I’m about to be using.” He turned from me and leaned over the battlements, looking straight down. “Damn there’s a lot of these guys. This could take awhile.”
I stepped forward to join him and frowned. “If they’re so stupid, why do those ones have a log and look like they’re about to attack the gate?”
Rekhyt alighted on the wall. ‘Perhaps one of them is marginally more intelligent than the others and suggested it.’
“Anything is possible.”
Around us, the other users had already done some work, in lighting the sky above so we would know what we were attacking. Now I could see several focusing to do what would probably be magick of a far more dangerous sort. Fabian was biting his bottom lip as I watched the Lotti below, having grown as accustomed as possible to the smell, and paying more attention to the ones that were carrying the log.
“Shouldn’t we stop them?”
“No.” Somehow Fabian was grinning again, if he’d stopped at all, despite what we were about to have to do. Or were already doing. “If we don’t let the damn things in the soldiers on the ground would be disappointed.”
“But some of them are going to die!” I looked at him, horrified by how it didn’t seem to bother him at all. By how it hadn’t bothered anyone at all. They were all looking forward to this! “Doesn’t that scare them?”
“If you tell them they might die they’ll only laugh.” The man’s tone was that of the person who exists only to point out simple facts, not carry opinions on them. “They don’t care about that. The rush of battle is what keeps them going. Now if you can turn your attention to the fact that I’m supposed to be helping kill things, I’d like to use an ice spell.”
‘Milady,’ Rekhyt’s voice touched me, and something told me that this was another private conversation, this one being effective, for Fabian made no sign that he heard the phoenix, ‘I understand that this is troublesome to you, for it is to me as well. However, we have no option here. Allow me to loan you my strength, but please, focus.’
So I nodded at Fabian, and moved into the panther, who accepted me with as much ease as she had been, to visit the pool which was the young man’s magick.
“We’re good to go.” I told him.
That was how we spent the next few hours. He would tell me what magick he’d be using, I would put the slightest effort into my panther, and do this while avoiding thoughts of what exactly we were doing this for.
I didn’t like to think that I was helping kill, even if what I was doing it to was the disgusting, mindless creation of a man.
“All of them are inside the city walls.” Fabian was again leaning over the side of battlements, squinting into the light, more of which was coming from the sun by this point.
“So what do we do?”
Now that we weren’t doing anything for the moment, the panther in my head curled up to rest as long as possible, and Rekhyt sat upon my shoulder. His weight was almost comforting. Fabian had been enjoying the battle, the users around me sounded as though they had the same feelings- once I had even heard a shout of glee from below that sounded distinctly like Jasper.
I had to be the only anti-fight person in the city. That, like so many things in my life seemed to be, was probably thanks to an incident with Kai. It’s just that even in a place like Harkness there are bound to be the usual school dramas, and the most popular girls in school (i.e. Carina, Rose and I) are bound to have the rivals wanting to replace them. The previous year in school, those rivals, led by some girl named Katlyn, had decided to start something at a festival. It was the only fight I ever took part in, and after Kai had broken it up, I had sworn to him I would never be involved with one again.
Looked like that promise had just been murdered in its sleep.
“Well,” he paused for a moment of consideration, watching the other casters, some of whom were bolting for the stairs to get off of the battlements, “we can stay up here or go down there. I believe I could be of more use on the ground. However, if you would prefer to stay up here, I can leave you with someone else.”
Without thinking about it very much, I nodded. Many of the Lotti had been killed by this point, which somehow increased the horrible smell from where it had already been. A lot of people on our end had died as well, like I’d expected, and I could only pray as hard as I could that none of them were the ones I cared about(1). If we went to the ground, I could hopefully see if my group was keeping itself alive as I assumed, and besides, I felt plenty safe with Fabian.
“Let’s go down.”
We began towards the stairs as other casters were, and I was on the first of them when Rekhyt made himself heard once more. He was hovering above once more at this point, as I’d told him blatantly that if I was walking, I didn’t want him on me. He agreed with little protest.
‘Milady, are you sure that’s a good id-’
“Shut up, Rekhyt. While I’m content to speak with you at this point, I don’t want to listen to your opinions. Those aren’t welcome yet.”
Disgruntled, the phoenix swooped to the bottom of the stairs where he circled in wait. Part of me felt like apologizing, whereas the conflicting side of me wanted to know what exactly I had to apologize for. My parents wouldn’t have approved of the manners- or lack thereof- but I went with the second side.
Midway down the stairs, Fabian turned to me. “Adrienne, stay as close to me as you can. I’m going to wrap a magick shield around us, more for you, since you’re inexperienced in battles. It should defend against most attacks- the users on the ground will all be using them.”
“I can do that. The channelling works better when I’m close to you, anyhow.”
I’d figured this tidbit out when another caster wanted to do an exceptionally powerful sort of magick and requested my aid. She was on the opposite side of the battlements from Fabian, so I wanted to help him with his even before I could go back, which took awhile due to the requirement of worming between various casters, and took to my panther. I managed to do him some good, but it put more strain on me, and he told me the power factor didn’t seem to be as prominent.
“Good.” He did some fancy handwork, the sort of magick that would take me more practice to grasp, and whispered, quite simply, therefore the opposite of the hand motions, “Shield.”
I felt a presence of sorts forming around me, almost murmuring to me that it would take care of us. The panther within me must have felt it as well, for she climbed to her feet and cocked her head as if not sure what to make of this. She then circled in place, only to sit down again and lick her paw, apparently approving of this new magick.
Feeling better now, I nodded at him that I was okay to go on.
At the bottom of the steps I almost stopped again. I knew that both sides were losing a lot of… What were they supposed to be called in this case, soldiers? But when I was on the battlements I was too busy channelling my energies into Fabian to have any time to really think about it. Down below, however, it was impossible to ignore. Bodies were strewn everywhere, Lotti falling apart on the ground, some of the men beginning to decompose and twitch, worrying me more than the general dead, and the shield had to be blocking part of the smell too, because I expected it to be far worse than it was turning out to be. My teenaged mind couldn’t press this out, especially with needing to jump over the bodies constantly, and still I did my best not to think about what I was walking over, what that red on the ground was, what the whimpers on the ground were from, what any of it was.
It was at times like this that I especially wanted Kai to hold me, and as luck would have it, he was worlds away. What would he say in this situation? He’d probably yell at the people that brought me to this place and find a way to get me out if it killed him.
So I focused more now than ever at helping Fabian add power, and I stood there and requested that he use a fire magick of any kind, because that was my favourite, and fire should be influenced by anger, and I was getting angrier from thinking about ending up here. Sure, a lot of girls would have freaked out about being in another world and being told that they had to help save it, just like in a million other fantasies, but I’d taken the news well, hadn’t I? I had stayed calm, and made friends with people, and quietly accepted that I didn’t know when I’d go home. And what had this world given me? I didn’t know how much time would have passed at home, everyone I knew could be lost by the time I got there, and sure, a prince and a mysterious man were in love with me, but I didn’t know them, so even though I was already caring for them, I couldn’t stand the idea that I just had to go along with what everyone here wanted me to, and get no say in what I was doing other than being able to storm out of a class, and now I was stuck in a battle, surrounded by death and bad smells, and I couldn’t be more useful than giving someone else power, and I was supposed to just accept it? Damn that to hell.
My rising emotions flooded through into the panther, who was now on her feet growling, snarling, not at anything in particular for there really wasn’t anything, and the way her eyes were changing was more amazing than before. Instead of just going the red-orange of the fire, they were flaming. I could see it within, behind her pupils, rising up until it disappeared into the blackness that was almost a void, swirling as though the flames were the smoke instead and I felt the power of… Something I couldn’t quite touch inside of me, or her, or maybe it was everything around us, except I knew it wasn’t the right time for that something. Somehow I convinced her to sit back down, and still the fireball was more powerful than any we’d made before, while the flames remained with an audible crackle.
Fabian turned to me inside our shield, eyes wide. “Adrienne, are you all right? That was- well, look.”
“I don’t want to.” I looked him in those wide eyes, shocked by how ragged my voice sounded when the use of the magick seemed to have take little out of my physical well-being. “The last thing I want to look at is death I helped cause. Simply accept what I have done for you, and allow me to do it again.”
Unsurprisingly, the man immediately began to put up a heavy protest. “Adrienne, you cannot do that again. Powerful magick like what you just did should have taken you years of practice, years that I know you cannot have had at your age. If you dare to try that again it would surely kill you, so you must simply follow me, and I can take care of what I need to for the remainder of this battle on my own.”
“I am sick of being told what to do!” I said fiercely, feeling rather than seeing the panther snarl once more. “You will accept my magick, Fabian, because I’m not going to stand around and be obedient any longer. If I am to die I will at least have done it on my own terms!”
There was a part of me, a very small one, that was sorry for taking out my feelings on him, since he wasn’t responsible for anything other than taking care of me, and he was only trying to do his job. However, in my rage, my terror, and any other emotion that was harassing me because of or during this whole mess known as a battle, I wasn’t thinking clearly and so didn’t register Rekhyt’s attempts to speak with me, blocked by my power or the shield I wasn’t sure, nor did I recognize the hurt that flickered through the young man’s eyes for what it was.
I never got a chance to do it either. I saw, at that moment, an image that continues to haunt me. For as much as I had been making it a point to not look at anything other than Fabian until this point, that same small part which identified the hurt refused to look at it any longer, and so I saw the battle raging. Specifically, of everyone on the battlefield, I saw Klavier, fighting not one or two Lotti, but five all at once, with the warriors around him distracted with their own fights, therefore unable to give him any aid, and two of them were right behind him, and how could he take them all on on his own?
Forget about thinking. I burst from the confines of them shield, only then realizing it pouring rain, but then the ground was hard, other than being slippery from blood, and what did this mean? Forget about thinking. The panther never left her feet, never stopped snarling, the fires dying down only to rise again as something different that I wanted to identify but- Forget about thinking. I could hear myself screaming Klavier’s name, wondered vaguely when that had started, because the panther seemed to be doing the same thing, but panthers couldn’t talk so I had to be imagining things, and-
Forget about thinking, damn you.
The panther roared, more of a lion’s action than anything else, but by now I really was through with thinking, and didn’t notice, while all I heard for a moment was the panther. So many things were in my sight, and Klavier must have seen me from the corner of his eye, for he was turning towards me, ripping his blade from the torso of one of those things which had forced me into this battle by attacking. His eyes were wide, full of terror, and one fleeting thought did make its way into my mind, and that was: He cares after all, the idiot. I felt my feet slipping on the ground, whether from the rain or the blood I couldn’t tell, and still I was running to my friend, dodging every attack by using that unknown thing I’d felt before, the panther reacting to it in a way I didn’t recognize, for her body was convulsing, the light of whatever her eyes held almost reaching out, not bothering me because it had to be a part of me if it was there.
Now I heard Klavier shout my name, on his way to me, and for some reason all I noticed was how he slipped a lot less than I did, so his boots must have had way better grip than mine. His shout repeated, irritating me, because I’d heard him the first time, over the clang of metal that was hardly reaching me. Why was I suddenly so tired? I didn’t question further than the first time, but then I didn’t have time to anyhow, as I felt the rain pelting me and heard the first roar of thunder, and time seemed to stand still as I realized just what it was I saw inside my panther’s eyes.
Lightning.
The word hit me like what it was, like a crack across the face if my parents had been that sort, to leave me wondering if the moisture on my face was really the water from the sky or from my own eyes. Klavier’s face was frozen in my eyes, the last definite image I saw, and the noise filling my ears could only be phoenix song except it was too feminine to be Rekhyt, and there was wasn’t enough left in my mind to wonder about it, because the panther was taking up all of my mind in one last roar, one that lit up the night.
My power was enormous, my magick may well have damaged more than just what it was meant to do, and it did that quite well, because lightning cracked from the sky as the fire had before, as the word had hit me, and I could see it hit Lotti, yet none of our own soldiers, I could see them fall, and I watched the panther lay down to rest, looking satisfied.
It was at this point that the pain registered, the realization that the lightning must have hit me as well. I had a split-second to wonder why, to wonder what would happen next, and then I knew no more.
“Is she going to be all right?” A small voice questioned, somewhere outside of my vision. Jasper? “She’s been out cold for so long now. I know she can’t be dead.” Yeah, Jasper.
Of course I’m not dead. I can hear you, for God’s sake! And you have to have checked my pulse, or at least someone must have! Stop being such a baby, Jasper.
That’s not very nice. Am I like that? I don’t think I usually am. Why can’t I see anything? I can’t stand to be like a blind person. I’ll die if I can’t read.
“She’ll be fine, Jasper. It was her own magick which hit her- eventually that same magick will wake her up.”
Oh, Klavier, no one wants your opinion. Go die. Besides, I don’t want to wake up!
I can’t be like that. There is no way that’s me. Who is that? I recognize her voice. I think I should kill her. Wait, did I just think that? Killing is bad. Killing is a sin. And what does he mean about my magick putting me here?
“I tried to stop her from using the powerful magick again. I don’t even know what happened to her. Her eyes had that lightning in them, just before she took off out of the shield. I tried to stop her.”
Stop whining. Why are you all being so pathetic? I can’t belie-
Who are you? Get out of my head! Stop being so cruel towards my friends! And why do you sound so familiar, anyhow?
I’m not telling you anything, Miss Pretty.
Well, stop pretending to be me!
Fine, then, I’ll leave. I’ll look forward to seeing you again soon, darling.
Huh. Somehow I felt much more alone now. Did that mean whatever that voice was had actually been in my head with me? Oh, God, I was that easy to invade?
By this point I really wished I could see. It was entirely black wherever I was, if it was my mind like I thought, or something else. If it was my mind, how could I hear everyone talking?
“Fabian, it wasn’t your fault. Whatever possessed her during that battle most likely wouldn’t have been stopped without you putting yourself in more danger than you already were.”
I frowned, noticing a vague light at the end of… It(2). The thing I was in seemed to go on forever at a glance, but if that was true, obviously that light couldn’t be at the end. While I watched, I found myself moving forward, and after a few minutes of walking, now feeling as if something was pressed over my ears, for the voices I heard were muffled, I realized this was how being in the body of the panther felt.
“How long…before…up?”
That could get annoying after awhile. I glared upwards, not sure why, other than it seemed like the right general direction. When I finally looked straight ahead once more I stopped short. It was still dark, except now another, deeper black was cut into the rest of it. A cave. Oh, why not? I pressed on towards the second blackness.
Somehow I wound up there within what felt like only a further few steps. It had to be a dream- things just didn’t move that fast in normal life. If it was a dream, all right then, I could deal with it, being that I’d had a million or so of them since entering this world.
I reached out a hand, fingers stretching in the direction of the cave, curling back toward me as though recoiling- from what? There had to be something in that cave, and that cave was in my mind, my dream world, my consciousness, so I had no choice but to go in. Or rather, the choice had been sort of lifted out of my hands.
“No fear.” I whispered to myself. “I have nothing to be afraid of if I am inside myself(3). Except for maybe rogue memories of the one time Kai got drunk.”
One more step forward. Another would place me inside the cave. I lifted my foot unsteadily, pressed forward and-
“Dammit, Adrienne, wake up so that Jasper will stop his whining!”
My eyes were open physically now, and there was Jasper, standing expectantly next to me, Klavier right next to him, and Fallon lurking behind with his eyes narrowed at the swordsman. On the other side of the - hang on, when did I end up in a bed? - bed I was lying on sat Fabian and Elderayne. I could feel Rekhyt’s comforting weight upon my lower legs. Just when I’d been about to possibly achieve something, too… Figured. Damn them.
“Adrienne!”
Arms, belonging to Jasper were wrapped tightly around me, and right after I woke up I could already hardly breathe.
“Jasper,” I spoke as loudly as was possible with my chest being squeezed to the point where, again, I could just barely bring air into my lungs. “I rejoined the living two seconds ago. Do you mind letting me stay here, please?”
“Oh!” He pulled back from me and grinned. “Took you long enough to wake up, beautiful.”
I looked away from him, to Fabian, as he was my only other safe option: Fallon was a definite no, it was a distinct possibility that Klavier’s anger hadn’t gone anywhere, and Elderayne… I don’t she was happy with me yet, either, after the incident with Tobias.
The magick-user lifted his lips at me in the smallest of smiles. I returned it before remembering what it was that had put me in the bed in the first place.
“Oops.”
“That’s all you have to say for yourself?” Great. A voice most definitely not belonging to anyone nice. “Oops? You used up enough magick to kill a normal person! I only told Jasper it would wake you up because he was about to start crying, and in all reality you should have been dead the instant you used that power, so we’ve been hovering at your side for the last twelve hours, and all you can say is oops?”
“Shut up, Klavier.” I pulled the covers they’d given me over my face, dragging Rekhyt with them so he was now on my abdomen. “I’m alive in the long run, aren’t I? And for the love of God, if I recall correctly, I took out the rest of the Lotti we had around with that power, so you all owe me some thanks.”
“Klavier, do yourself a favour and keep your mouth closed starting right now. Or I will kiss you, forcing your mouth to be shut unless you want my tongue in there.”
If I hadn’t been determined to stay under the covers, I would have peeked at that moment for the two amazing facial expressions I knew had to exist after that statement out of my darling Jasper: Klavier’s red embarrassment, and Fallon’s angry offence. That I would have paid good money to see. This stuff be cursed, however, I was stubborn enough to resist the urge and remained firmly in place beneath the blanket. The statement did seem to have effectively shut Klavier’s mouth, and I didn’t want to know what was keeping Fallon’s that way.
“Now I would like all of you to leave this room, and I’m sorry Rekhyt, but that includes you. It’s just that, no offence meant, I’m pretty sure she likes me best of everyone present.”
“Absolutely.”
I could just imagine his pretty smile.
“See?”
There were several minutes of muffled movement, general grumbling sounding a lot like Fallon and Klavier somehow conversing about Jasper(4), and a light rustling most likely resulting from Rekhyt’s feathers. Then a hand covered my own.
“Just us now, Adrienne.”
I peeked out just a little to confirm that it was in fact just us before pushing the blanket entirely away and groaning. “Jasper, what happened? I mean, I remember the lightning and everything, and what it did to the Lotti - not that I have any idea how I did it - and anything from that point on is sort of…”
“Well, you fainted, if you could call it that. For a few minutes you weren’t breathing, and I don’t think Fallon wasn’t too happy when I decided to resuscitate you myself, but he was gone for a long time and I’m not the same exact Jasper he left, so he’s gotta get used to that if he wants to keep me- anyhow. We all sort of got to your body within a few minutes, and Klavier was the one to carry you inside. You were really messy, so Cylmar asked Lyei to wash you and change your clothes. Then we all just waited here, Klavier grumbling and me worrying, and Fallon not talking, and Fabian working - but not as much as me(5) - and Elderayne didn’t seem to be doing much of anything. Rekhyt was, uhm, being Rekhyt.”
I cocked an eyebrow at him, pushing myself into more of a sitting position. “That’s it?”
“That’s it, yeah.” He puffed out one cheek, doing what Jasper apparently does when he’s thinking, instead of just looking really focused like the rest of us do. “Cylmar went to be with Lyei. We were supposed to let him know once you woke up, ‘cause we need to get back to the city as fast as we can.”
“Oh, joy. So I suppose I need to start moving?”
“Only if you have the strength!” Jasper moved into the ready-to-push-you-back-onto-the-bed-if-necessary position, the concern for me practically emanating off of his body. “I mean, I’m about ready to make Fallon ride with Cylmar on the way home and take you with me so I can keep an eye on you, and you don’t have to get up if you aren’t ready!”
“Jasper.” I looked him firmly in the eye. “I am fine now. Let me up, please?”
He smiled meekly as I swung my legs over the side of the bed, the thought at the forefront of my mind being a sense that I would be lucky to get alone time back at the palace- as soon as Leander heard about my incident of unconsciousness he’d definitely be downright determined to stay next to me at all hours.
“Jasper, can you ask Cylmar if I can just live here forever instead?”
(3) That could sound horrible. It did sound horrible, actually. Not that the way it came out occurred to me until- well, after it had come out already.
(4) Presumably about how much he was frustrating them. …Pissing them off to be more accurate, it’s just that I was trying to be slightly more eloquent- which brings up the point of, what is the most eloquent word for anger?
(5) Oh my. Jasper feels the need to be competitive about worrying over me. That’s actually sorta cool…
“So you’ve known Cylmar for how many years?”
Lyei set the cup of tea she was drinking down on its saucer(6) beside the tray of pastries she’d brought in. I didn’t know what they were, just that they were some of the most brilliant things I had eaten in my life. “I believe he became my tutor in Musicka almost five years ago. Since then we’ve become very close.”
I pictured Cylmar’s smiling face as I’d seen it just before Lyei came in with lunch, as he visited around then after hearing I’d woken up. The death of the Lotti’s army of sorts made him very happy, my waking up made him very happy, and I think being around Lyei made him happier than both of those things combined. Ah, the smell of love- also known as carnations for bonds of affection. Those were all over the room, rather than the sort of love flowers that were stalking me, and preferable to them.
“Five years is a good amount of time to fall in love.” I mused softly, eyeing the last remaining pastry and my tea. “A very good amount.”
“Huh?”
Upon looking back up, I found Lyei to be blushing and wondered why. Love wasn’t anything to be embarrassed about. Plus Cylmar’s mother had made the relationship impossible to miss even if the man hadn’t told me about his friend beforehand.
“Lyei, is something wrong?”
“Oh no, Adrienne, I just wasn’t expecting you to say something like that so- so openly.” The young woman was still blushing as she started to stand, moving to retrieve the tray from the table.
I smiled wryly. “Expect the unexpected when you’re in a room with me. I was just thinking about how you and Cylmar should have a good relationship after all that time, and you do, and I somehow have the prince of this country declaring love for me after I just met him. I’d say you have better luck than I do.”
Lyei lifted the tray from its position after gathering up the other small plates, and of course the saucers. “Yes, Cylmar mentioned to me that you are from another world, though he didn’t explain all of it to me. Apparently he felt it wasn’t really his right. I suppose it isn’t my business either, having just met you, but I have to ask- do you have someone wherever you’re from that you love?”
“Yes, his name is Kai.”
Well, that came out before I gave it permission to do so. I never said I loved him like that. He loved me like that, I should return the feeling, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to do that. It occurred to me that I had known him for somewhere in the vicinity of seventy-five percent of my life. Me and my stupid uncontrollable mouth- just another of Adrienne Harkness’s most endearing qualities, right?
Even Lyei looked a little surprised at the speed with which I had answered her question. Still, all she said was, “That’s wonderful for you. I hope you two can be very happy together someday, after your stay here has ended.”
I didn’t say anything to her about the flow of time stuff, being that I was trying very hard to not think of it at all myself.
“Adrienne.”
I froze at the sound of my name coming from the mouth of one of the men I didn’t particularly want to interact with. Presently I was standing beside Jasper in the dragon field we’d landed in, watching him have what appeared to be a staring contest of sorts with Fallon. It was like how in order to show a dog you’re dominant, you keep eye contact until it looks away, right? Well, Jasper had brought up wanting me to ride back with him, and Fallon had immediately(7) put up a protest. Instead of arguing with me there however, they were doing- this. Sort of strange, yeah, but all right then. What in my life had been normal lately anyhow?
“Yes, Klavier?” My tone was subdued as I wasn’t looking away from the men in the staring contest. I really wanted to know who was going to win.
“You’re riding back with me.”
The staring contest was murdered right there without even being given a chance to fight back. Three heads whipped around at the same time to look at the swordsman, whose eyebrows lifted in a ‘what the hell?’ fashion.
“What?” I wasn’t sure I’d heard him correctly.
“You’re coming with me this time and Elderayne is going to accompany Cylmar. D’you have a problem with that?”
“Are you kidding me?” I wasn’t exactly screeching yet. It was, however, at this approximate time if I was home that Kai would rush in and start calming me down before I blew a gasket. I reminded myself of this very important fact and pushed my temper down, able to hear Kai in my head telling me what to do. Still working on the repression of bitchiness, I spoke again, “Klavier, you have been giving me the silent treatment, or doing your best at it, and the first thing you did afterward was yell at me. Now you suddenly want me to go back with you, so suffice to say I’m a bit confused. And what about Rekhyt?”
The phoenix was hovering near the bronze beauty I’d come here on, somehow having failed to realize I might be going with Jasper. Or at least, might have been. I wasn’t now. Did any of them have a reason - like, a real reason, I mean - to not give me a say in what I was doing?
“What about him?” Klavier snorted. “I’m not in the mood to argue with you, so just come on so I can help you onto Nerithon. He’s rather impatient.”
“Sort of like his rider, hmm?” I said under my breath as he walked away.
I turned to face Jasper, rolling my eyes, and looked up at him. “Jas, part of me thinks he’s really a girl. Think about it for a minute- he has more mood swings than I do.”
My friend gave me a small smile, ignoring Fallon - who was grasping his hand and trying to approach their dragon - and therefore pleasing me to point his eyes skyward. “He sure is something, isn’t he? I could always get a bird to annoy him for you.”
“Adrienne, hurry up!”
For just a moment I glanced behind me. “Shut up, Klavier, I’ll get there when I feel like it!” Eyes returned to Jasper, I frowned. “I’m sorely tempted to accept your offer. Whatever happened to the birds you had when we met? I’d love to have Tallow be the bird for the job.”
Jasper made a face. “I’m sorry to say birds tend to be set in their ways- none of them were willing to leave the forest with me.”
“Oh, that’s too bad.” I looked behind us for another moment and followed up by giving him a hug. “Wish me luck with the Lord of Mood Swings.”
“Good luck and good health.”
There may have been a joke embedded in that sentence, I suppose. With Klavier’s behaviour, erratic as it was, however, I wasn’t sure I really wanted to go with him. Horrible tempers don’t work well with- er, horrible tempers. His and mine especially.
I walked away from Jasper feeling surprisingly upbeat, giving him the ghost of a smile, and wondering why Klavier wanted me. The sudden change in attitude came from the realizing that as ticked at me as he may have been, he wouldn’t ever try to kill me(8), and therefore I was going to be safe for the duration of the ride. If we blew up at each other we’d just have to get over it or stop talking again.
Along the way to where Nerithon was standing, not looking at all impatient, I spied Cylmar bidding farewell to Lyei. I wondered for a moment what I would have said to Kai had I known I’d end up here, how I would have said my good-bye. Or how I would have said good-bye to everyone else I knew. Or what they would have said to me. If I’d had a choice at all, would I have come here to begin with? Probably not. I would have gone to Kai and cried like a baby at the idea that I had to be part of a stupid prediction from a pool. And why had the pool done this to itself in the first place?
Realizing my mind was straying from its place and I had stopped walking, I resumed my path to Klavier.
Neither of us said anything right away, or as he climbed onto the dragon’s back, or helped me up and strapped me in behind him. Rather than look at him, I turned my head to where Cylmar was giving Lyei what appeared to be one last hug good-bye, and Elderayne was already seated atop Pariasa. I let my eyes slide shut, not wanting to look at a couple when my own romantic life was so- what was the word for my present romantic life? I couldn’t call it a flurry, since that didn’t quite cover it. Tumultuous, on the other hand, might just do it.
“Aren’t you supposed to have been in Westminster for like, the last week-and-a-half?”
Wait just a minute here! That was Rose’s voice- in my head(9). Since when did that happen? Dreams and visions were one thing, but hearing voices? Was I just officially losing by this point? I opened my eyes, wondering if this would turn out to be just another vision in the end, only to have those hopes immediately dashed- I was still sitting atop Nerithon, looking in the direction of Pariasa, although I was able to note in relief that Cylmar was now on the dragon as well, rather than standing with Lyei.
“Well, you see Miss Toothpick, I tried calling her yesterday, only to learn from her parents that she was here. I was thus influenced to beg my grandmother to bring me to London and find a hotel so I could be around. I succeeded, because I wouldn’t shut up until I did, and here I am. Hello, Kai.”
I apparently meant a lot to my friends. Kai I knew, but the other two-
“Rose and I have been here for the last three days. We’re leaving in two because our parents suck.”
Mickey, too, huh? Make that three.
“It’s a pity we aren’t related to the prime minister like lucky Kai.”
“Carina,” Kai’s voice came to me for the first time, very low and almost resentful, “I have been spending most of my time at the bedside of a girl I am entirely in love with, the person who matters to me more than anything else, and you are sitting here calling me lucky? If you’re going to do any more of that, get out of this room now.”
I flinched. He just had to sound so damn upset, didn’t he? Even when I wasn’t there he was managing to pull at my heartstrings in the way only he had. Stupid Kai.
“Adrienne, are you okay?”
I snapped to attention to find we’d already lifted into the air, and Klavier was turned around as much as he could be, staring at me. He didn’t look anywhere near as angry with me as he had when I’d first woken up, just puzzled. Sort of like me!
“Uhm… I’m fine.” I shook my head and gave him a smile. “So why, may I ask, was I ordered to ride with you, O Lord of Mood Swings?”
“What did you just call me?”
I repressed the urge to roll my eyes or snort. “Nothing.”
“Lucky for you, Adrienne, I’m going to completely ignore your new name for me.” Klavier looked around us in what would have looked to be a random fashion, if I weren’t smarter than that, enough so to know quite well that he was checking on Elderayne. God, was he expecting Cylmar to be beating her? “I demanded you come with me because we need to talk about what you saw when you were being a little invasive brat.”
I opened my mouth to argue before noting to myself what I’d noted immediately after he stormed out of the library: he was right. Besides, in this situation, it was safest just to keep my mouth shut even if I thought he was completely and utterly wrong. Needless to say, I let my mouth close and swore to myself that I wouldn’t open it until he wanted me to answer(1)0 something he said.
“What you saw was, as I’m sure you’ve realized, my father killing my mother.” He spat his words, hands curling to fists at his side, making me feel even more that my decision to be silent was good one. “He didn’t know I’d seen him. I asked him later that night, to see what he would say, where she was, and he told me she’d just gone away for awhile, like a vacation. The experiment he did with my mother’s blood, heart, and body, was the first successful Lotti. I think he thought I never noticed the people he brought in, or the smells, or anything else strange. It surprised me that he never tried to lure me into the back room.
“Lucky for him he never lost control over them, but when I was twelve he made his attempt on Noevre. I wasn’t present, but of course he failed. I left him when I was six. That was the greatest decision I made, because it led me here, to the position I now hold, and I won’t bore you with the details of my training and all of that.
“In any case, I think you should have minded your own business. Since you didn’t, I’m going to give you some more information in order to keep you out. I have a vague idea of how this power of yours works, though I’ve never seen it up close, so I am inviting you into my mind now. I’ll be thinking of a particular thing in my past, and I want you to watch it.”
I stared at his back, being that he’d yet to decide it time to look at me again. My mouth was agape for several undignified moments before it occurred to me that, “Hey, this looks undignified!” and I snapped it shut. I reached out, fingers pausing briefly in midair, before I allowed them to rest on his shoulder.
“Tell me when you’re ready.” I whispered, mouth dry with what may have been surprise, or nervousness- the two were beginning to blend together at times.
“Tell me when you’re ready.” Came the response.
Now I slid into the panther, and, sitting back on my haunches, flicked my tail, proud at how I could do it without thinking now. The panther form fit me like a second skin, felt as welcoming as my real body, and was just as gorgeous. If I could walk around as a panther 24/7, I would do it in a heartbeat.
“Ready.”
(8) Not if he was all that concerned with the safety of his world, in any case.
(9) I also noted that she said it had been a week-and-a-half, meaning I couldn’t have been gone much longer than that, despite having been here longer, but that wasn’t my primary concern.
(10) Which could be never with this man. If that was so, so be it- I’d wait to talk until we were back at the palace and there were people who wanted to hold conversations with me. It wouldn’t become problematic until our next lesson.
A younger Klavier stood before me, looking basically as he did now. His face was a bit softer, maybe, but there was no other difference. I took a peek at our surroundings to find them a forest, mostly of oak and pine trees. What interested me about the place wasn’t the trees, however, because that was just like any other forest in the world, it was the stone house barely visible among the trees.
I padded toward it, only to slip halfway there and fall over in another of those humiliating moments, and be thankful I couldn’t be seen when in memories or visions. Rolling off of my side, but staying on the ground, I glared at the house. After a moment it warped before my eyes, everything twisting and blending together and making me think of certain Photoshop capabilities. I blinked, looked away, and found Klavier studying the stone dwelling carefully.
Eventually a slow drew itself across his lips. “For Noevre’s sake, father, you don’t expect that to keep people away, do you?”
Oh, excuse me for not being able to figure whatever ‘that’ happened to be out! It was sure keeping me away at the very least.
Klavier made his way forward confidently, whereas I, not willing to stand up, inched along behind him on my stomach. He shook his head and touched a pine, and this is where I felt it got rather ridiculous. The tree wriggled, stood at attention. It seemed to face Klavier, who rolled his eyes at it.
“Break the enchantment, will you?”
The tree returned to normal tree behaviour as a small girl with wings came out of the branches to glare at him, hands on her hips. Ooh, pixies. She flipped her hair back and opened her mouth to make a noise sounding to me like just a load of screeching, but Klavier apparently understood.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know what he’s paying you to do. But you remember our deal from the night I left, right? Of course you do. Now break the damn enchantment so I go to the door and visit my father.”
She glowered at him for a few moments prior to snapping her fingers and zipping back into her tree. I heard her screech again, something which didn’t sound very nice- Klavier just laughed and told her to shut up.
He went on ahead. I considered my options - continue on my stomach or get up and try this again - and in the end pulled myself gingerly to my paws. I placed one paw forward, putting it down carefully so as to make sure I wouldn’t just fall over again in two seconds(11). After ascertaining this, I trotted happily after him, my tail doing a sort of success dance.
Klavier knocked on the door, actually looking almost-bored(12) whilst he waited for it to open. There came sounds of things being tossed aside from within the dwelling, the door opened, and there stood the man from the memory I’d invaded, only now with streaks of gray in his dark hair.
His eyebrows lifted at the sight of the swordsman. “This is a surprise. I wasn’t expecting you for at least the next thirty years after you ran off. It’s only been what, half that, perhaps?” The man stood aside, pushing the door open wider. “Come in, my boy.”
“Hello, Father.” Klavier stepped into the house, not moving stiffly or anything. His hand didn’t even move toward his sword like I was expecting.
I leaped forward, needing to get into the house before the door closed behind him. There was success, although the tip of my tail was caught in the door and I wanted dearly to be able to swipe at the back of this man’s head. I sat for a moment, licked my tail delicately, then followed the pair down the hall.
“You know your beasts ravaged another town recently.”
The man rolled his eyes. “Son, I am a scientist, I cannot concern myself with what they are doing now. I‘m too busy for such things.”
Klavier’s eyes narrowed, a spectacular counter. “You should have destroyed them to begin with, not dropped the ones you had in some other forest so they could start developing at unnatural rates. Because they are unnatural.” His fingers were curling, a ghost of a clench, then straightened out quickly, hiding what he was feeling, from his father at the very least. I was too perceptive not to notice.
“Why did you come here, son? Is it just to bother me about the Lotti? Because if it is, as I said I’m busy. Feel free to sleep here this evening, your room is as it was when you left, I had no reason to change things around. I’m afraid I don’t cook, however, so if you want to eat you’ll have to fend for yourself. Now, my son, I have experiments to return to.”
“More experiments? Father, you really must quit this. And no, I didn’t come here to speak of your Lotti.”
His father turned around and gave him a queer look. “Then why have you come to interrupt my studies?”
“To ask you a question.” My friend glanced around the hall. “You’re alone here, right?”
“Of course I am.” He snorted. “Who else would be here? My son, stop being ridiculous.”
“In that case, won’t you tell me why Mother never came back?”
Silence.
“Come now, Father, I’m curious. Mother must have a good reason for never returning to the family home.” Klavier’s fingers now twitched on the hilt of his blade. His face, however, remained neutral. “I’ve missed her quite a bit all these years.”
“You see, my boy, about that- I was planning to tell you one day, the truth-”
“Save it.” The tip of Klavier’s blade, in a matter of seconds, was pressed to his father’s throat. “I know the truth. I saw what you did to her, you bastard. Why else would I have run off when I was five?”
A bead of sweat rolled down his father’s cheek, something I noticed only because I was close enough to him, and watching carefully for a reaction. I cocked my head slightly. There was no question about what was going on, I had even had the foresight to accept it.
“I hope you don’t have any living experiments right now, Father. I’ll be forced to kill them. Right after I do away with you.”
“Now, Son, reconsider this for a few minutes, if you will-”
“I’ll do nothing of the sort.” Klavier laughed as though this were the dumbest thing anyone had ever said to him. “I’m sure you never reconsidered what you were doing to her. Here’s the result of that, Father.” This last word was the most scathing of them all.
For a moment he pulled the blade back, only to reposition it. I squeezed my eyes closed, but that didn’t stop me from hearing the result. Now I swallowed, turned away without opening my eyes, and started walking away.
I could hear him walking after me, but not sliding the sword back into its sheathe- well, of course not, the blood would be bad for it. I opened my eyes only after I’d followed him out of the house(13). I saw him looking around, heard his sigh of relief, or something, and looked around myself. The pixie was floating out of the tree, towards him, but he appeared to be focusing on something else, so I turned where he was facing- a shadowy figure was running through the trees, away from the house.
Oh, the mystery, right? I shook my head, wishing I could roll my eyes.
(12) I could just picture him standing among the popular crowd at school - mine - blowing bubbles with gum, and rolling his eyes at Mickey while us girls carried on about clothes or ‘some such nonsense’ as he’d likely put it.
(13) Animal senses come very much in handy.
“Oh.” I said in a small voice.
“Do you find me detestable?” His face transformed into a wry frown.
“No!” I said immediately. “Not at all, Klavier. He- he earned that, for what he did, for killing your mother even more than creating the Lotti, I would say. But I have one question- who was that running away?”
Klavier shook his head. “I have no idea. I always did wonder. I just couldn’t motivate myself to follow at that moment, right after avenging my mother. Besides, that damn pixie started ranting at me a few minutes later. She’d have been pissed if I went away without letting her. Do you see now, though, why I don’t talk about that?”
I looked away from him. “Yeah. And I really am sorry, it wasn’t my business, but-”
“No, don’t say anything else. I understand. Teenagers.” Again he was watching Elderayne, who happened to be asleep in her own place on the dragon, Cylmar looking at her as though he weren’t sure what to do about it.
Ignoring Klavier’s teenager thing, I said, “What happened between you two, anyhow?”
He didn’t look at me. “Why don’t you ask your friend Tobias Et’erial?”
Okay, that one made me fall silent- Klavier, you win for the moment.
Our return to the palace cursed me. I didn’t want to deal with Leander, because God knew someone would tell him what had happened with me. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with him, since I was wondering about Klavier’s comment on Tobias. What on earth could he have done to affect Elderayne and Klavier’s relationship?
Did I even want to know?
I slid off of Nerithon’s back with Klavier‘s help, sent a thanks the dragon’s way, and called Rekhyt to me. He came right away, since he hadn’t been too far away anyhow - because irritably, he still didn’t want to get away - and I started out of the dragon field, hoping to get to my room before Leander could get out here.
Wishful thinking.
“Adrienne!”
Flinching, I turned around. I pushed a smile onto my face for the prince, not wanting to disappoint him. “Hello, Leander.”
He wrapped his arms around me, leading to difficulty not flinching again. I wanted to reach up and touch his face, to tell him I was fine, or even to drag him off before someone else had a chance to come over and inform him of what happened to me in Reimyo(14). I pulled myself from his embrace and grabbed onto one of his hands, intending to do the dragging thing, when he stiffened in the way I hadn’t allowed myself.
His eyes grew narrow as he lifted one of my hands and studied the palm. “What did you do during that battle, Miss Princess?”
“Uhm… Helped?” I offered bleakly.
The prince snorted in a very unprince-like manner. “I want an answer, Adrienne. How exactly did you help?”
I opened my mouth to further protest telling him anything at all - no need for him to know, in my opinion - when someone else decided to give him their own input. Lovely. Just what I’d been aiming to avoid. I give up.
“She helped by almost killing herself.”
Fallon, go jump in a lake. I wanted to say it aloud, but I didn’t want to break my promise to Jasper so soon after making it. I would consider myself a horrible person in the event I did that, because promises mean forever, right? In my life, you have to undergo challenges of the bad kind in order to escape the constraints of a promise you made, or things will be done to you- things you don’t want done to you(15) and it generally sucks. Needless to say, I’d learned to keep my promises. If Jasper didn’t love you so much…
“Excuse me?” Leander turned stony eyes back to me, and I’d say he thundered but he just wasn’t big enough to do it. “What did you do?”
“Fallon!” Jasper burst in before I got a chance to even reopen my mouth, pulling me away from the prince and ‘protecting’ me in his own arms. Him, I was perfectly happy to snuggle into. It’s hard to not love a guy you know doesn’t want you, who will hold you so nicely anyhow. “She didn’t want him to know about the- about what she did, and now you’ve just ruined it! I would have kept quiet, and I bet you the others would have too!”
‘I certainly would have.’
“See? Rekhyt would have stayed quiet, and now you’ve- you’ve- Adrienne, let’s just take Rekhyt and go to your rooms so my ass of a lover can keep telling your ass of a, uhm… Whatever you two are. So mine can tell yours about what you did, and we’ll do- something, I dunno.”
I wasn’t being given much of an option in going, as he’d lifted me off of my feet and was heading in the direction of the palace already. I curled my arms around his throat, and thank God he took the message, switching from carrying me in the awkward way from my still being standing to bridal style. From where I was now, I waved cheerily to Fallon and my prince.
“Thank you, Jasper.” I whispered in his ear, watching Rekhyt skim the air above us. The phoenix wasn’t so bad, if I could make him give me my space, and he was getting better. “You’re the greatest.”
After the first day back from Reimyo things calmed down for once. I dealt with accepting my classes, like them or not(16), actually started learning things (I shocked Leander in my progress in Magick, but I gave credit to the panther), and spent time with the people who wanted me to. Usually I was with Leander, leaving Rekhyt wherever he was, having convinced everyone he needed responsibilities of his own(17) and learning he was a good babysitter for children of the servants, although I also enjoyed being around my Jasper(18) and Cylmar. Klavier didn’t tell me anymore of his past, nor did I try to invade the minds of others at random - I’d learned my lesson - but I also didn’t stop wearing the glove.
That was another thing. Today had been the last day of my lessons, and Tobias still hadn’t come to see me again. I even made sure to have my cloak at all times so I wouldn’t need to leave the rose behind in my quarters. I wanted to talk to him.
Spending so much time with Leander was sort of a difficult experience in itself. I was willing to kiss him as I got to know him better, but I wouldn’t declare to him I loved him as he would to me. I didn’t even believe it when it passed through his lips, because, well… It’s always been something in books I consider frustrating, relationships moving so fast. People don’t just fall in love over the span of what seems to always be a month, tops, and have perfect lives together forever and ever. Right? That’s what I thought.
For that reason, when Jasper asked me, if I had to choose between Leander and Tobias - he’d learned of my situation on that end from Klavier - I thought for a moment and said neither. As things stood right now, I was on those grounds. For both of them.
Another thing that hadn’t happened was the book. Kuoros not only hadn’t returned it to me, he never brought it up. I wasn’t about to rush that one. I could have lived without the stupid thing for a long, very very long time. Not only had he not mentioned the book, though, he hardly mentioned anything now- most of his time was spent in his sanctum, which according to Leander, was nothing new.
So basically, in my eyes, a lot of progress was being made here especially on the front of myself. I mean, I’m not saying I was the Epic Perfect Master of All in regards to everything people here were working to teach me, I just happened to be improving. I was no great shakes at history, but then I never had been, and the best I could do was scrape through my lessons with Knala, as opposed to geography. I’d learned at an early age to keep track of where things were so I wouldn’t get lost in the Arcadi Forest(19), making maps easy. Once lessons in culture and races started with Elderayne I was afraid, because she didn’t seem to like me much anymore after the Tobias thing, but she was a good teacher and I was a student in the gray area with her. Cylmar was an educational genius, I had to give him that. Still all I could do for him in his subject was a few song-spells, and I wasn’t half-bad with a sitar(20). And weaponry? Ahaha- I think most people who watched me had to try not dying with laughter, and I mean they had to try really hard. See, at this point, I could maybe kill something with a dagger and a ginormous stroke of luck(21) leading me to declare that I’d just keep Jasper with me at all times as defence and offence.
Yes. Magickal Genius Adrienne very much had the power to be Total Crap Adrienne at everything else. And to be proud of it. Bet you didn’t see that one coming.
What was I doing now, after lessons were finally over and they had yet to tell me where we were going from here? I was standing on the balcony of a dining room - not a hall for once - with a glass of wine in hand(22), leaning against the railing and waiting for Leander. I also happened to be thinking, something I hadn’t had an exceptional amount of time for lately. Hanging out with people does that.
God my plans for holiday had gone astray. First I'd wound up in another world and been informed I had to help prevent its destruction. Then I met a mysterious man who may or may not have been involved with things I needed a chance to ask him about. And after that came the prince who declared his love to me for no apparent reason like an idiot, which he was. The book couldn't be forgotten, much as I wished it could, and neither could the quest we'd have to go on to do whatever we were doing. Oh, the quest. How not exciting.
With a sigh, I flexed the fingers of the hand on which I wore the glove, staring at it wistfully. Damn you, Tobias. In a vague, two-finger motion, careful not to drop my wine, I stroked the soft fabric of the glove. And Leander, and Kai. Just… Men.
I flinched, feeling a vision start to come on, something else I'd developed the ability to do within the last days of my training. I shut my eyes, not particularly in the mood for it. The panther was there, waiting- she never went away anymore, just lazed around until I had need of her. She stared at nothing for a moment before sighing as I had and walking in the direction the vision was coming in from. As soon as I saw what it was of, I sent her bolting in the other direction. I especially wasn't in the mood to see the first time I met my best friend. Not when I was trying to work out what exactly was most important to me.
Men made life far more difficult than it should have been.
"Adrienne?"
While I knew instinctively and from the voice23 I whirled around as if in surprise. "Hello, Leander. How are you?"
"You saw me an hour ago." He snorted. "Nothing else has happened to me between then and now. At least not anything interesting. Except your phoenix realized about ten minutes ago, something about the children he's watching getting crankier when getting tired. I told him he's an idiot right before coming here."
I rolled my eyes, taking a small sip of the whine and making a face at it. Good, but a bit too sweet for my tastes. "Good job, Leander. Now you'll have offended him and he'll complain to me soon as I get back to my quarters. He won't stop complaining, and I'll go to sleep annoyed, wake up annoyed, and slap you out of annoyance." I took another sip of the wine. Part of me wanted to get drunk, something I'd never once done because Kai always confiscated my drink long before the option presented itself.
Sometimes Kai frustrated me.
"Are you looking forward to tomorrow?"
Blankness flickered on my face. "Huh? What's tomorrow?"
"Are you kidding me?"
My expression answered the question for me.
Leander slapped a palm onto his face. "The festival, you twit."
I blinked. I still wasn't sure what exactly the prince was on about. Before he had a chance to say anything else, it hit me. "Oh! Oh, I remember now! I am looking forward to it, I promise."
He rolled his eyes. "Of course you are. You're looking forward to it so much that you forgot all about it until I pushed you into remembering, right?"
I grinned. "Absolutely." I looked from him to my wine glass, realizing in disgust that it was nearing empty.
Not caring if he followed, I moved beyond his form, out of the night, fully intending to get myself a refill.
(16) The only way they got me to stay in my lessons with Fallon was to have Jasper present at all times so we wouldn’t slaughter each other.
(17) Partially because I didn’t want to be stalked, partially because I felt he needed something more useful to do than hang around me.
(18) Thankfully this didn’t always involve being near Fallon as well. When it did, I tried to have fun the best I could. One time I tested how much I could get away with in annoying my weaponry teacher by first begging Jasper to sit next to me, leaning on him when he did, sitting in his lap, and then kissing him. Rather than strangle me, Fallon stormed from the room because Jasper refused to chastise me. Another thing I discovered that day was Jasper’s damn good kissing skills (maybe it was him kissing back that really ticked Fallon off).
(19) One time doing so made me learn my lesson. Guess who found me? I hope you can guess, I’m not actually planning to answer.
(20) Admittedly, I paid the most attention to practising my sitar skills, ’cause I, er… I thought it looked awesome and wanted to be allowed to keep it. Which I was.
(21) It would be kind of like those moments I’ve heard of from gamers where you’re terrified of an enemy, so you just close your eyes, attack randomly, and pray.
(22) My parents were fine with my drinking wine thanks to all of those parties. They’d even set a bottle out for my sixteenth birthday (no, the wine did not have any involvement in my scene with Kai).
(23) And just 'cause only one person knew where I'd be right now if we weren't including my servants.
Argh!! The authoress has officially DIED!! So much writing this last week...
Anyhow.
3 important things (important to me, at least). First of all, while I wrote the last of this part, I was listening to 'One of Us' from the second Lion King, and it's a haunting song... I especially love the part, 'Let him run, Let him live, But do not forget what we cannot forgive' and 'Someone once lied to us, Now we're not so blind, For we knew he would do what he's done, And we know that he'll never be one of us.' Just wanted you to know.
Second of all, I am sick and tired of seeing X Amount of Hits, having this on the favourites and alerts of people, but only having ONE loyal reviewer. How am I supposed to keep track of who actually reads it?! So, this is what I want: every few chapters I'm doing checks by way of simple questions, and if you don't answer, in my eyes you aren't reading the story, so... Yep.
The question this time is 'Who is your favourite character?'
And third of all, chapter eight still isn't done. When I finish part 3 -eventually- I know where it's split into three chapters already. The first ends at 'and then I knew no more' the second ends when Jasper carries her away, and the last one ends at the current version's end.
So here's the newest for you! Thanks!
Let him run,
let him live,
but do not forget what we cannot forgive