Queen of Ash

Two Choices

RYE

"She could be lying," Jase said, his hand still on the pommel of his sword. He tends to do that when he's stressed about something, so he pretty much has his hand there all of the time.

"She's most definitely not lying," Nina paced back and forth in the hallway. "It's the only thing that would explain what happened in the tunnels and how she got into the Arena undetected."

"I know but-," Jase mumbled.

"Wait, what happened in the tunnels?" Some how, no one filled me in on what happened. I knew Jase came in with a white burn on his wrist, but I assumed that she just fought until the chains were on her.

"I was going to tell you, Rye—" he paused for a moment, "I just didn't want to distract you from today." His knuckles turned white as he clutched the pommel of his sword harder.

"Well then tell me now." I hated being kept out of the loop. Especially when everyone else seemed to know what was going on and I was standing there aloof.

"When we were down there," he paused and took a deep breath, as if he was replaying those moments for himself. "There were filters of light coming in from the slits in the wall. It wasn't the brightest but I could see. I snuck up on her, she seemed distracted, like something was wrong. She had her bow drawn, she could have shot you and the rest of us would have been to late. Then she looked at you, really looked at you and paused for a moment. She relaxed her bow and that's when I managed to press a knife to her throat. The next thing I knew, there was no more light at all. It was darkness that swallowed everything, it was darkness like I had never seen darkness before. Then I was blinded by this bright white light. It was burning white hot. The light went out and I felt her burning hot hand on my wrist. I thought she was going to kill us all. I heard her footsteps, but then she hesitated again, something stopped her from running. Then the light just slowly came back into the room and she was just standing there with an arrow nocked. She didn't fire, I don't know why she wouldn't fire."

"Well, we can add that to list of things that aren't making sense today." I was starting to get a headache from all of the information that was being crammed into my head. I rubbed my temples with my hands, the stress of this job was going to eat me alive.

"I just want to know how she managed to stay hidden for all of these years. You need to speak to Adrianus," my Mother piped in. We all turned to look at Isla, her face flushing red.

"I think she is telling the truth," Isla pipes in her voice strong but soft. "I've seen her use powers like that first hand. I always thought she was just a gifted half-breed but it would make the most sense in this scenario if she was an heir."

"She can prove it," I stated. I faced my Coterie, my hands clasped behind my back. My mind was churning with every possible outcome, every possible failure that could come out of this. All of them made the Brande's look bad, not just bad, terrible. "We have to be careful about how we handle this, we very well can't just kill an Heir, let alone a Queen, especially when she's the last of her line. If that kind of thing got out to the other Heirs, we would have a serious problem."

"Well, then son," my Mother spat from across the circle. "What do you propose?" She was the type of person to never voice her own opinion, just tell you when yours wasn't a good one.

"Let's take her into the Arena and see what she can do," I paused letting my brain work out a plan. "Then we can see if she really possesses the power of an heir."

"And if she does?" My Mother forced her gaze on me, but I didn't falter.

"Then—then we can, um" I knew what I wanted to do, but I knew my Mother would disapprove, but I was willing to put my region over the opinion of my Mother. "We use her to our benefit." I was King now; my Mother's opinion was only an opinion. "Then we can place her in this court, with her power it guarantees her a spot. She can be apart of the my Coterie."