The Lost Kingdom (The Fifth Element Chronicles)

Chapter 17 [part 2]

I never wanted my dreams to come true.

I hated having the power to see fragments of the future in them. For my dreams had warned me that there would soon be a war, and that in it Caelus would not be alive.

But in the cave of fears, it was impossible to escape it all coming true.

I had to face that fear, I had to tell Caelus that I had repeatedly dreamt his death, and that there was a good chance it was true.

But... how was I supposed to do that?

'Tell me what?' Caelus pressed, annoyed by the image of the man he seemed to know.

'Will you tell him or should I?' The stranger challenged me, pushing me to the edge.

'I can't,' I replied automatically, believing it impossible for those words to come out of my mouth.

I couldn't do that to him.

If it wasn't true, I would be conditioning him to a false future. And if it was true...

'I can't,' I repeated once more and the green-eyed man smiled at my weakness.

I knew that if I stood up it would all be over.

But I also knew that if I didn't face it now, I would have to face it later, and if I refused again, I simply wouldn't get to the Tree.

There was no escape.

I could not hide.

'Just say it princess,' Caelus' tone softened, as if he could sense all the anguish this was causing me. 'Just say it, don't be afraid. There is nothing to be afraid of.'

He didn't know what he was asking of me, he had no idea.

'Though you do fear it, you're terrified of it,' the stranger insisted.

I had faced Marco, the memories of a childhood I'd rather forget. I'd looked Russell in the face and witnessed what it would feel like to lose him.

But this was different.

My fear wasn't just of losing him, but of hurting him right now.

'Don't...' I was about to stand up, but his hand grabbed my shoulder.

It was all so fast that I don't know when his lips reached my cheek.

The contact was like a homely warmth that made my whole body steady.

'Whatever it is, don't fear, I can take it,' he whispered in my ear, before the stranger pulled him back, pinning him to the wall.

'You have to choose right now darling, or I'll be the one to tell him that...'

There was nothing more to do.

Nothing more to do but face my fear.

'It's a dream, a dream where I go to war. When I started dreaming it you were there Caelus, even before I met you. But in my last dreams you were no longer there.'

Caelus seemed unaffected by my words, which infuriated the spirit even more. He squeezed his throat with his arm, as if he was pressing me to say the word I was hiding from.

'In my dream... in my dream you are dead.'

'And what else?' insisted the spirit. 

'And my dreams often come true.'

The moment I said it, the spirit and the battlefield vanished.

All that was left was Caelus, against the wall and an expression that looked rather like confusion, and me still sitting, turned away, with tears that very carefully, fell from my eyes.