Chapter 7

Prince Roman toys with Aurelia. She finds herself in a frightening situation.

Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t move my head to look at the Darkling Prince. The tight net surrounding my body prevented me from moving much. I heard, rather than saw, him slowly approach me. He slowly walked through the grass, the blades bending underneath his weight. Something sharp suddenly poked me in my side.

“Ow,” I complained.

“I’m a little disappointed,” he said. His voice sounded sad, although I knew it was just an act. “It was incredibly easy to find you.”

Although the dominate emotion I had was fear, I was also a little aggravated with his smug words. It wasn’t that easy to find me. Just earlier, I was hidden among the tree tops where he was completely oblivious to my location.

“You really thought you could just hide in the branches of a tree?” He suddenly laughed. It was bitter and without any real humor. “This is my territory.” He said slowly and defensively. “You can’t hide from me, Tiny High Elf.”

“You knew where I was hiding?” I somehow found my voice, but it shook and didn’t have any real volume. I could barely hear my own voice. I doubted he could either.

“Of course.” He sounded offended at my words. “Anyone could hear you snoring from a mile away. It gave me enough time to set this little trap up.” He paused for a moment, considering. “I guess I should thank the pixie for that. You would have missed it if it weren’t for her.”

I suddenly felt something sharp against my side, and I cried out in pain. “Stop!” I shouted, fighting tears. It was bad enough that I was dangling helplessly in a net from a tree. He didn’t have to poke me like I was an animal. I tried to regain some of my dignity as an Azrain princess and attempted to put as much authority in my words as I could, “Release me at once!” I commanded.

I heard a dark chuckle, followed by the rasping of something metallic coming free. “As you wish.” He suddenly slashed through the top of my net, just barely missing my head, and the ropes came tumbling down. I slammed into the ground with enough force to knock the breath out of me. I’m not going to lie; it hurt. Bad.

It only took a moment for me to process that I was free, and that I desperately needed to get away from him. I took off running, knowing it was pointless, but also knowing that I couldn’t just stand there and be killed. I had to do something.

I didn’t get very far, maybe a couple of paces before he grabbed my wrist, pulling me towards him. “Oh, no you don’t,” he said in an amused voice, as if he were talking to a child.

“Let me go!” I shouted, struggling uselessly against his hold. He was too strong. His iron grip around my wrist was unyielding, and he mercilessly pulled me into him.

“I cannot let you go. Dead or alive, my queen wants you. She didn’t specify how,” he said darkly. “Personally, I want to kill you.”

His words sent genuine terror down my spine. My heart thudded loudly against my chest; my fear making my movements fast and jerky. Regardless of the prince’s incredible strength, I couldn’t give up. I had to keep struggling in the off chance that I might be able to escape him.

He suddenly shoved me, hard, on the ground, laughing at my expense. My reflexes were slow, and I didn’t have enough time to catch myself before I fell. I landed on my bare right thigh and slid a few inches in the hard dirt. The force of the blow made my black hood fall down, which made me feel hideously exposed.

I was certain that my ribs would soon bruise from where he shoved me. My leg was scraped as well as my hands from the blow. It was as much painful as it was humiliating to be thrown down on the dirt like that. My light blonde hair fell over my face, concealing my silent tears.

Out of my peripheral vision, I could see his dirty, black leather boots, and I saw that he was carrying a gleaming sword. I also noticed that his silver wolf was nowhere to be seen.

The Darkling Prince suddenly grabbed my wrist with his free hand, yanking me to my feet. “Look at me,” he said loudly and cruelly. “I want to look at your face as I kill you.”

I stubbornly turned my head in the opposite direction, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry as I die mercilessly by his hand.

“Tiny High Elf, you are trying my patience.” He suddenly gripped my chin and forced me to look at him. I grimaced and closed my eyes. “Look at me,” he commanded, pushing my hair out of my face.

I could feel a dark shadow cross my vision, and I was certain that it was from his sword high in the air, preparing to deliver the fatal blow. I quickly opened my eyes out of fear. I didn’t want to die blindly.

Cold, ice blue eyes met mine. His expression was mocking and cruel, something I would naturally expect from a darkling prince. Loose, black hair framed his face, falling out of his messy ponytail. I watched with terror, looking at the last face I would ever see in this world. He was going to kill me. I could see it in his crystal blue eyes. His sword was raised high above his head, seconds away from piercing my flesh.

And then something amazing happened. Those ice blue eyes blinked once, and incredibly, I immediately saw his hard expression dissolve as wonder replaced it. His eyes widened in disbelief. His sword suddenly dropped and clattered noisily to the floor, his eyes never leaving my face. He regarded me with wonder.

“You... you're,” his incredulous voice was barely above a whisper.

Without warning, a massive, gray stone suddenly slammed into the side of his head, making him stagger backwards. I screamed, unsure of what was happening. Were we under attack?

“Princess, catch!” Zame’s voice suddenly filled the air. I have never in my life been more relieved to see a darkling. There she was, dressed in all black, my deadly, drow savior. She tossed me a red stone, and I instantly caught it. It looked just like the blood stone she had given the River Guardian. The stone felt warm and wet, but it strangely didn’t leave any moisture on my hand. It just felt that way to me.

Prince Roman stumbled and fell to the ground, not moving. He was out cold from the blow.

Zame grabbed my wrist and pulled out another red stone. “Swallow it, hurry!” I obeyed quickly, watching her do the same. I plopped the stone in my mouth, feeling it suddenly dissolve into a thick liquid on my tongue. I shuddered, noting that the taste resembled its name perfectly, and swallowed hard. I tried not to think about the bloody taste in my mouth. Instead, I tried to think of something else to distract me. The mischievous pixie was the first thing that came to my mind.

Without warning, something compressed my body, squeezing all of the air out of my lungs. Panic began to seize me as I realized quickly that I couldn’t breathe. Along with my lack of air, a red tint covered my vision. Soon, all I could see was red. I vaguely realized that Zame was still holding my wrist. I began to feel lightheaded as the crushing force continued to squeeze the life out of my body. I couldn’t see what I looked like, but surely I must be nothing more than the size of a twig by now.

I suddenly wished that Prince Roman hadn’t paused in his attack. I would welcome death over this. Death would be a release. The terrible, crushing sensation wouldn’t ease up, and my lungs burned for air.

Finally, it ended. I suddenly tumbled down to the floor, face first. I caught myself just in time, watching Zame tumble down beside of me.

“What the hell?” She demanded angrily, righting herself at once and glancing around at our surroundings.

“My thoughts exactly,” I told her. “I couldn’t breathe! I almost died because of that stupid stone! What was that?” Zame suddenly turned her violet glare towards me.

“Oh, be quiet.” She snapped. “Where the hell are we? What went wrong?” She began pacing around, her arms folded across her chest. Her brow was furrowed in thought. “We shouldn’t be here.” She muttered to herself.

I took a deep breath, feeling relieved that it was pain free, and glanced around at our surroundings. I gasped, blinking in awe.

There were literally hundreds of varying shades of blue pixies swarming around us, soaring high into the sky. So much for supposedly going extinct.

In front of us was a teal pond, glowing brightly against the darkness, with a magnificent, cascading waterfall pouring into it. It had a surreal, ethereal effect. Surrounding the area were giant lavender tree-like plants unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Instead of bark, the purple trunk was absolutely smooth and shimmered against the glow from the gleaming water. The branches were also smooth and housed tiny lime green huts that seemed to be homes for some of the pixies.

A few would poke their heads out of the huts, study Zame and I for a few moments, and then shyly disappear back into the safety of their homes. Others, the more daring and brave pixies, flew right up next to our faces, wearing angry expressions, probably wondering why we were intruding on their hidden oasis. I was wondering the same thing.

“Uh, Zame?” I said warily, watching more and more pixies notice our arrival. And believe me, they did not seem pleased. “Are you seeing this?”

Zame promptly ignored me, although it was hard to miss the swarming pixies coming closer and closer to us. I took a step backwards, suddenly tripping over a log that wasn’t there before. I fell on my rear, grunting. A light blue pixie flying next to me bent over, laughing loudly as I tried to stand back up. I was certain that he was the one who summoned the log.

Others, watching my fall with fascination, flew closer to my head and used some of their magic to yank on my hair in several different directions.

“Ow, stop that!” I said, trying to brush the pixies away with my hand. That seemed to only entertain them further. More and more pixies began pulling my hair, along with Zame’s black cloak. They finally managed to pull the cloak off of me, flying off with it. “Give that back!” I shouted, watching the flapping cloak ascend higher and higher into the sky.

“Seriously?” Zame muttered, clearly annoyed. “I want my cloak back, Princess,” she grumbled.

“I’m working on that.” I said sarcastically. A thought suddenly came to me. “Hey, why aren’t they doing things to you?” Zame was propped up against one of the purple trees, her arms crossed against her chest with her violet eyes narrowed in thought. The pixies were completely ignoring her, which really aggravated me. Why did all of the bad things have to happen to me?

“I guess you’re more fun.” She grinned in spite of herself.

The pixies suddenly stopped pulling on my clothing and focused on something much shinier. A few started to pull out my silver dagger, excited by the way it reflected the light from the water.

I could tolerate getting tripped, getting my hair pulled, and even having my clothes ripped off of me, but I would not tolerate this. Aelrah had given me this dagger as a present, and it was one of the few things I had that reminded me of my home. I would not allow these pesky creatures to steal this from me.

“Leave me alone!” I shouted angrily.

“Woah,” Zame said in appreciation.

The pixies abruptly stopped what they were doing, stunned for a moment. Suddenly, they simply flew away, completely forgetting about me. The pixies who were carrying Zame's cloak dropped their hold on it. The black cloth billowed in waves as it drifted back down to the ground in silence. I numbly walked to where the cloak had fallen and grabbed it. Without words, I slipped it back on.

“Impressive,” Zame commented in approval.

“Thanks,” I said warily, hoping that my shaky voice didn’t give anything away. In my anger, I had accidentally tapped into the darker side of me. My words had been laced with magic; it was something similar to a compulsion spell. I had forced them to leave me alone; it wasn’t a suggestion. I had done something dark and twisted, and the worst part about it, I didn’t even consciously choose to do it.

Usually, I had to make a conscious effort for my power to express itself. Up until recently, I never had to worry about the magic happening unless I was asleep. Now, the harder I tried to keep my magic dormant, the more desperate it was to break free. A few slip ups like that were becoming more and more common. That uncertainty of myself was the real reason that I had left Azrain.

There was only one place in the universe that claimed to have no magic at all. Only one place rumored that could heal my condition. It was a long shot, I’ll admit, but it was much better than waiting around for another slip up and have someone find out that I was a magi elf.

“Zame, get me to the Human Realm.” I said darkly.

Reviews

[InsanityWriter]

Ooooh! :] I love this. ^_^

[Strigoikillerr]

Yay! So glad you like it ^^