Ophelia

1. Journey Towards Getting My Answers

Chapter 1

I kind of stood in the area for a while not knowing what to do with myself. My hands were on my hips as I turned in circles. Where did I go from here? The sun beat down on my face alerting me to how long I had actually been out in the desert.

Did I go to meet the stupid King or make my way back home myself? The latter sounded real good to me at this point.

My hands started itching, notifying me eventually that I had scrapes all over the pads. I must have taken the skin off when I had made a mad dash onto the boulder. A tired breath left my mouth as I rubbed the blood off on my pants. It didn't help that the Head Warriors dried blood was on them either.

Not before very long, I heard the sound of voices coning from the sky. I noticed a flock of large Firebirds land nearby making me freeze up in indecision. Were they here to take me home? Of course not, that would be too easy.

My life was about to get a whole lot more messed up.

A tall man, with long braided yellow hair walked up to me with a confident gait known to only the Royals. He wore a Blue coat. A Sky Patrol. I grit my teeth in annoyance. I hated the fact that he had one good looking face either.

"Evangeline Ophelia. Follow me." He demanded, turning around to go towards the birds. He used my entire name, how disrespectful...

I remained where I stood, feeling a sense of duty towards the women who died today at the hands of the worm. My body refused to move as I didn't want to leave them dead on the ground and also, I was more not inclined to walk anywhere with someone who associated with the King.

The man turned back around after not hearing my following footsteps. He raised one perfectly formed eyebrow in question. Did he think just because he was wearing Royal colours I would jump to attention at his command? What a laugh!

I turned on my heel, walking towards the nearest woman who had fallen. It was treason to turn your back willingly to a Royal but I didn't have a last care in my body after what I had seen and heard.

"What are you doing?" He asked me slightly affronted and curious.

"I'm doing what you Royal's are too lazy to do." I spat at the tall man forgetting all proper etiquette on how to speak to someone higher up than you on the hierarchy.

"Excuse me?" The official asked me almost offended.

I chose not to reply out of sheer mortification. Where was I getting this brazenness from?

The man watched as I heaved the ladies all into a pile with difficulty, yet he didn't move to help me. Why should he, he's a Royal. I rolled my eyes. I wondered vaguely where the last Sand woman had gone to, choosing rather to focus on the task at hand.

"Do you have a match in that bag?" I asked the Royal official curtly.

All Royal warriors carried with them a sack full of survival supplies and I would be really stupid not to exploit the opportunity.

"You are keeping the King waiting you insolent fool!" The guard practically foamed at the mouth.

I swung around, my temper flaring. I could not control my mouth after that.

"Do you not see these ladies?! They're dead. Do you want me to provide you with a definition of the word or the exact reason why they're laying at my feet, lifeless? No? Well too blasting bad anyways because I'm going to give to you anyway! Your lazy probably fat ugly ass King ordered the Divisions to surrender all of their ladies my age because he couldn't go and find his mate himself. We had to trudge through this blasted Desert to get to the pick up point and he knew that each Division has it's own vicious type of creature yet he led us through here anyways. Does that not sound like an execution to you-" I got cut off as my throat closed up.

I realised that it was involuntary as I saw the man's hand lifted to form a C shape. He was using magic? Of course! Sky people had magical abilities! Blast!

"I've had quite enough of your disrespect for our King. I quite admire the fact that he went to such lengths for his mate. As you will see, the King is far too busy to deal with such menial matters himself. Why am I even explaining this to you? We are wasting time." He said fisting his other hand and locking my body in place.

This was no good. I tried to thrash, but my body seemed frozen. Was this the real power of the sky people? I didn't want to know what abilities the King had at his disposal.

I was helpless as the guard threw me onto the back of the bird and climbed on himself.

As the bird lifted off the ground I found myself heaving in my head. The contents in my stomach threatened to burst onto the man and bird. I found myself wanting to puke all over this tall guard just to be spiteful. What a laugh I would have!

The bird seemed to defy all speed rules as I whizzed past the clouds. I decided to dub the bird with a name: Zoomie.

Soon enough we reached the Skylands with the other guards in tow. I heard cheers from an unknown direction.

The man unlocked my body allowing me to release a desperate breath.

"The women!" I heaved almost scathingly at him.

"I've left a guard down there to burn them, calm your mind savage!" The guard snapped back at me.

I bared my teeth at him in reflex at being called a savage. The Jungle folk chose to do that as a ward, just to show others how dangerous we actually were. Our canines were sharpened into points as soon as we grew them in as a rite of passage into being a citizen of the Jungle. It was only visible when we showed our teeth to someone.

The guard reared back dropping me onto the floor. I quickly got up, out of dignity to myself.

The cheers happened again, making my attention divert to a huge screen in the middle of the city. They were displaying something. I walked closer to the area only to see the shock of my life as I stared back at a scene of myself on the screen, dirtied and full of sand.

The Sky people were watching me slaughter the worm.