The Fire Within (The Fire of The Soul Series) (23 page)

The lights are brighter now, though that may have to
do with the fact that we are standing right outside of the city. The lights are
beyond blinding, and if we were human, with human eyes and weaknesses, we would
have not been able seen a thing. There is no way for us to go forward. There is
a clear glass surrounding Antadova, acting as a barrier for unwanted guests.
There is only one entrance into Antadova, and that is through the front gates.
I know that we are bound to get caught, and seeing that I am more unwanted in
Antadova then anyone else. I know that this is where I must depart, where I
must split from the men that Victor sent me here with.

"Charlton, it was good knowing you. If I escape
here I will meet up with you again, but this is where I must send you all home,
and I mean all of you. Charlton, you of all people know why I probably won't
return from here." I can see the sorrow in Charlton's eyes, and in Mason
and Nate's eyes. I can see that they don't want to split up, but I refuse to
look in their eyes for too long. I take a few paces away from them to get up
onto Fog, and I can hear one pair of footsteps following behind me. A hand on
my shoulder makes me turn, and I see that Charlton is the one who has followed
me.

"No Shade, I forbid you to go in there alone.
King Menédez sent us here with you so that you will be protected. He wouldn't
want it this way," Charlton says, his anger rising up, and I feel the lash
of it as if he had physically hit me.

"Victor would understand why I am sending you
all home, and with that understanding he would respect my wishes. I am an
outlaw here, the most hated man here. If you are seen with me then you will be
classified as I am. I cannot allow you to come with me. If I must tie you down
myself to keep you here, than that is what I will do. Do not force me to do
that to you Charlton," I say taking a few more paces away from the man
that has been like a father to me. His hand catches my shoulder lightly, and I
swing around, my fist flying towards his face. Charlton falls to the ground, a
red blotch on his left cheek from where my fist had hit.

"Do not follow me Charlton, you will regret
it," I say, before I allow Fog to carry me away. It is a swift, quick
journey to the front entrance of Antadova, and I can feel my stomach twisting
up into knots, at the thought of seeing Emma-Leah again.

I don't get very far into Antadova before I'm
recognized - as a felon - and arrested. The faces I pass in the streets I don't
recognize, a lot of them have been styled in ways that to most people would be
bizarre. Some of them have green skin - like the forest vampires - some have
purple, blue, red, earthly colours that represent their connection with the
earth. Some have clawed fingers, others have horns or different shaped eyes.
However, despite their flaws, despite the fact that they have bizarre qualities
to them, all of them are stunningly beautiful, so beautiful that it makes your
heart clench, that makes a normal person feel inadequate standing beside them.
The most beautiful of them all is the Queen, Emma-Leah, with her fiery red hair
that falls to her waist, her light gold skin glowing with an inner light, her
azure eyes - with flecks of silver - like that of a cat. She above all of these
beautiful creatures is the most beautiful, and I fell in love with her the
first moment I had laid eyes upon her.

There is not point in begging to be released, and to
try and bribe them would be a deadly mistake, so I allow them to drag me
through the streets, to the dungeons where I know I am destined to go. If
Charlton, Nate and Mason were with us I would have tried to bribe the soldiers
to let them go, to take me and to spare them, but this is the reason that I did
not allow them to enter the city with me, the reason why I sent them home,
because I could not afford to risk their lives, when bribery is such a deadly
crime.

I receive a blow to the head, why they do this I
cannot deduce. Maybe it's to eliminate my knowledge of the castles layout, or
to make it easier for them to carry me around, but I'm out like a light before
I know it, as my body slumps to the ground from the sheer force of gravity.

When I wake up I find myself in the mouldy, damp
dungeons. There is the smell of sick and human waste, and to top it off the
smell of rotting corpses, the maggot-eaten flesh still clinging to the bodies.
There is a body in the corner of the cell, and there is little light falling
into the damp space, but it illuminates his gold cat eyes which watch me with a
deep, focused intensity. I do not know his crimes, or why he is being punished,
but I know that he is here, aware of everything with his intelligence burning
brightly behind his eyes. He doesn't say anything, and I do not say anything in
return. I have no idea how much time passes while I'm in the dungeon, it could
have been hours, days or weeks, I will never know, and whatever time passes I
know I will never regain.

There are times where masked men come in and torture
us, they would torture cat-eyes as I watch helplessly as they mark his russet
skin with bloody stripes. Cat-eyes' cries echo around the sealed cell while he
is tortured, his cries becoming pained screams as they pour alcohol into his
open wounds. They soon turn on to me when they push Cat-eyes further than he
can handle. I lose my hold on sanity in those times of torture, my thoughts are
distorted, images of truth and memory become things to fear, events to fear
just like the majority of my human life. I see days of darkness where Victor
has died, and the Skin-walkers have won, where Anna has turned against us, and
she reigns with the enemy. I see Emma-Leah turning away from me as if we had
been together all of this time. Her azure and silver eyes loathing me with a
ferocity that burns like liquid fire. My hopes and dreams are turned into
nightmares, everything I ever want to achieve taken away from me, and used against
me. My past brought into my future making me feel weak and useless. If I had no
reason to hate torture before then I find reason to in these moments. The pain
is all consuming, and no matter how much I wish it to end, I feel as if my wish
will never be answered, that this pain will be with me for all time, that the
circle of this torment, of this torture will continue to go on for all time.

I awake one morning to find that Cat-eyes has gone,
that I am alone in this cell. When my captors come I demand to know where they
have taken him.

"He died in the middle of the night. We took
his body out of the dungeon to give his remains back to his family," They
say with no compassion in their voices.

"How long have I been in here?" I ask
hoping for an answer. They must be in a communicative mood because another
answers my question.

"You've been in here for a week and two days.
Do you have anymore requests?" His voice is bitter and filled with malice.
I don't know what I've done to deserve this kind of reception, and then I
remember why I'm a felon because I broke their Queen's heart.

"I want to see Emma-Leah," I say with
determination, the bitterness in his eyes become full with malice and loathing.
I wouldn't be surprised if he was about to start shooting flames from his eyes
from the way that they are burning with such a deep, dark hatred for me.

The slap across my face stings more than it would
have a week and two days ago, and I fall back against the stone, my hands
scraping against the flooring trying to prevent more harm on my body. "How
dare you demand to see her! You, an elevated human asking to see the Queen of
the Fae! As if she would waste her time on someone as filthy, and unworthy as
you!" He screams and I start to laugh, the madness of the torture starting
to finally show. He spits on me, and I can't help but continue to laugh. He
gets into a deep conversation with the other guard who has been impassive and
silent throughout the whole ordeal. The other one, the one that was screaming
at me, kicks me in the stomach a few times, trying to release his pent up anger
and frustration. The conversation flows for a long time, I cannot understand
what they are saying, perhaps because I have heard nothing but tortured screams
for over a week and a half, or perhaps its because they are speaking in a
language only known in Antadova, but their words have little meaning to me. My
laughter falters after the first kick to my stomach, and I struggle to regain
my breath as their conversation flows swiftly, enriched by some of the
Antadovian slang.

Finally they stop talking, the one that had been
yelling and kicking at me leaves in a huff of frustration, and the other kneels
beside me, his kind face not one that I would have expected to see in the
dungeons of the palace. "Why have you requested to see Queen
Emma-Leah?" He asks, his fully white eyes staring at nothing yet seeming
to look directly at me.

"The Vampire King has sent me here, to ask for
her help in the war against the Skin-walkers. If I had a choice I would not
have returned, as I know how unwanted I am here," I reply, struggling to
catch my breath in between the words, speaking only the truth as I look into
his white eyes. I can feel the hopelessness at ever getting out of here, and I
know it shows in my voice. It is the fact that I feel so hopeless about the
sticky situation I am in, that I am surprised to see his open hand reaching
across to me, kindness etched into every line of his face.

"And the truth shall set you free," He
whispers softly, as if his words are nothing but an echo on a dead breeze. I
accept his offered hand, and he helps me to stand up. He takes my hand and
leads me up the stairs, sharing his strength with me through the simple
contact. I can feel my own skin and strength, my whole body being repaired
through the energy flowing from his body into mine, the whole time as we climb
the stairs.

When we near the top he pulls out his sword from the
sheath hanging on his thick belt and whispers "This is only for appearance
sake, I cannot allow them to see that I've helped you, or have allowed you to
be free, if only for so long." He points the blade into the middle of my
back, and pushes me along at dagger point.

The name-less man continues to push me along like
this, the point of his dagger digging deeply into the small of my back just
above my tied hands. He doesn't say anything, and I believe it is for the best
as we are watched as we walk toward the Queen's throne room. I can see hatred
and scorn for an outsider in their eyes, and I refuse to bow my head in shame,
my pride giving me the courage to stand tall. However no matter how proud I am,
I can still hear their whispers. Lying, deceiving little whispers that play and
twists any mind that listens to them. The walk is not a short one - for why
would a Queen keep her throne room near a dungeon? - and it seems to take
forever to get there but I blame this on the nervousness I feel at seeing her
again. I can feel my stomach doing strange things at the thought of seeing her,
to the point where I start to feel slightly sick.

As my captor pushes upon the heavy oak doors, that
glints with the jewels of Antadova, my tongue dries up. I'm here, about to
enter her throne room once more, about to see the look of scorn and hatred on
her face, and despite all that I know she will be as beautiful and young as
ever. I've dreamed of this day for so long, dreamed of her welcoming me in with
open arms, telling me how much she misses me, and that I cannot ever leave her
again, that somehow I am not surprised at her order for her guards to leave,
but I am surprised at the slap I receive as a welcoming gesture. My body -
still weak from the week and a bit of torture - crumples to the ground at her
slap. I turn my head to look up at her as wind rushes through a still air, and
I find that she is straddling me, her very own dagger held against my throat.
There is a combination of misery, scorn, anguish and loathing deep in her
azure-silver cat eyes, that I cannot think of what to say if I had even the
slightest ability to speak.

She doesn't say anything for a long time as she
holds my gaze, and I cannot understand why, if I had returned a century ago she
would have been yelling, screaming doing everything within her power not to
kill me, and trying desperately to prolong my torture but now... now there is
nothing, nothing but an icy silence which wounds the soul.

"Emma," I whisper her name, half-pleading,
half-exalting in her presence. She does not make a movement at her name upon my
lips, but I breathe in heavily at the smell of her pear and honey shampoo.

"How dare you come back! After all this time
Adrian. How dare you!" She breathes, her breath is chilled, and it makes
me shiver, if only slightly, remembering the dagger she still has a hold of at
my throat. I am surprised that she uses my given name instead of my chosen one
that she still remembers that I loved hearing my real name upon her lips.
"I should kill you; it's what you deserve for making me suffer for so
long."

"Emma, if I could have come back I would, but
you banished me, made me a felon with in Antadova. You were the one who didn't
want me, who made me an undesirable so that I would be forced to never
return," I say, my voice is soft, hoping to get through to her if I talk
rationally with her. Her eyes are still burning with her anger and she realizes
the position that she has me in. Getting off of me, somehow we are still in
sync after all this time as she sighs heavily with me.

"If you knew that you are undesirable in
Antadova, then why did you return?" She asks, her voice is so soft that I
almost don't hear her, but getting up to my feet I walk over to her, putting my
hands on her small shoulders. Unlike all of the Fae she is not tall, in fact
for a Fae she is indubitably short, so short that I could rest my chin upon her
head.