The Atheil Chronicles: A Call to Fire

Chapter 25

Ariana felt the air whooshing around her as she fell, and then she was landing on Ryonen, both of them flying backwards and tumbling through a cluster of dried branches. When they finally came to a stop, she pushed away from him, running back to the stone wall and beating her fists against it.
"No, come back!" She yelled, feeling the wall for anything that would bring her back to Lamis. It was solid, no evidence at all of there ever having been anything there besides rock in the first place.
Ryonen came up behind her, shushing her. "Ariana, stop, you have to be quiet. You don't know what might hear you."
She whirled on him. "Why did you do that? I was talking to him!" She was so mad that she didn't know what to do with herself. She kicked at some leaves on the ground.
He looked taken aback by her reaction and stepped back. "I'm sorry." He said. "I didn't know-"
"Are you sure you didn't know?" She asked him, looking him full in the face now.
"I don't understand." He said. He looked genuinely confused.
"You didn't want me alone with Lamis. Why?"
"I-"
"And don't lie to me." She said, pointing her finger at him warningly.
Ryonen hesitated. "I saw the archway closing and I didn't want you to get stuck there." He said, averting his eyes.
Lamis' last words echoed in her head. 'Don't trust him, Ariana. He isn't who he says he is. Trouble will only follow you if you stay with him.' She stepped closer to Ryonen, jutting out her chin in determination. "Who are you?" She asked.
The question seemed to throw him off. His face turned stark white. "You know who I am." He responded.
"Do I, though?"
"Ariana." His voice sounded so hurt that she almost stopped herself. Almost.
"Tell me the truth." She insisted. "You promised you wouldn't lie to me and you're doing it anyway. How am I supposed to trust you? How am I supposed to be with you when you can't be honest with me?"
He swallowed, then anger flashed across his face. "Lamis said something to you, didn't he?" He was so mad that she could see the whites of his knuckles as he clenched his fists at his sides.
She folded her arms. "And if he did?"
"It isn't his business!" He yelled, completely ignoring his own advice to keep quiet.
Ariana just stared at him. She'd never seen him yell like this. "So is this why you two haven't been getting along?"
He looked away, his cheeks flushed with anger. "He's been hinting to me since the first day we arrived that he would tell you about me if I didn't." He turned to her, his eyes drawn together and full of resentment. "I told him to stay out of it, that it wasn't his concern, but he said you deserved to know the truth."
"What is the truth?" She asked him quietly. Her heart was pounding in her chest but she knew she couldn't stop.
He just looked at her, his jade green eyes begging her to stop. "Don't ask this of me." He sounded so small as he said it.
She tightened her arms across her chest. "Tell me."
"Ariana, please-"
She cut him off. "Ryonen, now."
Ryonen swallowed. "I'm-" he stopped, taking a breath and looking away. "I'm not just some traveler. My parents aren't the advisors for the King and Queen. They ARE the King and Queen."
Ariana felt her breath catch in her throat and she brought her hand up to her mouth. Whatever she thought he was going to say, this was not even on the list of possibilities. "So you're-"
"The Prince of the Eastern Kingdom." He finished, his voice bitter and resentful.
She just stared at him, her mind reeling. She thought back on their time together and, suddenly, so much made sense. "Is this why Vultan was so quick to help us after you talked to him? And why you and Lamis got into a fight that first night?" She stopped, the worst realization coming to her, then. "Malor wasn't after you because you wronged him somehow; he was after you because you're the Prince of the Eastern Kingdom. You consciously put my mom and me in danger when you knew full well that he would do just about anything to have you." She screwed up her face in anger, shocked beyond belief at his selfishness. "How could you do that?"
"Why are you all of sudden angry with me about that? You never held it against me before this, why now? I had no way of knowing they'd follow me there."
She let out an exasperated noise. "Please don't act like you don't understand why I'm mad. I thought you were just the victim of some tyrant, like everyone else here is. Turns out you're like public enemy number 1 to him. How could you come to my forest knowing he wanted you so desperately? You aren't just some common person, Ryonen, you're the freaking Prince! Of course he wants to kill you, you're one of the last things standing in the way of him taking over Atheil. You practically have a neon sign on your head saying 'Here I am, shoot at me.'" She shook her head at him. "And you just kept coming back, letting them know where to find you, where to find my mom." Her voice cracked as she said it.
Ryonen was looking at her like she'd slapped him. It was obvious that he had never intended for her to find out any of this and, now that she had, he had no idea what to do. "I'm sorry." He said, his voice soft. "I'm so sorry for everything, Ariana."
She could feel her heart wrenching at his words. She felt like an absolute idiot and, even worse, she felt the sting of betrayal piercing through her. She felt hot tears forming in her eyes. "Was anything real, Ryonen?"
He stepped toward her, his hand reaching out. "Of course it was! How can you even say that?!"
She pulled away from him. "What do you mean 'how can you say that?' Ryonen, you've lied to me since the day I met you. Then, you continued doing it day after day knowing full well that the one thing I value above all else is honesty. Even after we became a couple you lied to me." She shook her head angrily. "Just this morning you looked me directly in the eyes and swore you'd always tell me the truth. Do you deny it?"
He was quiet for a long time, his eyes drawn down to the ground as he twisted the silver ring on his finger. "I don't deny it." He said finally, his voice cracking now, too. He looked up at her suddenly. "But Ariana, I never lied about how I feel about you. You have to believe me."
She turned her face away as the tears fell from her eyes. "I'm not sure I know what to believe anymore, Ryonen." She reached up a hand and wiped away the trail of tears that had made their way down her face. "Let's just go."
She heard Ryonen take a breath like he meant to argue but then he just said, "Okay, if that's what you want."
She turned around to look at him and saw that his face was filled with sorrow. She swallowed back her guilt at the sight of him ; he was the one that caused all of this. He was the one that had been lying to her for almost a month and a half now.  She held her head up high, straightening her face so that it wouldn't show the grief that he had caused her. "It is." She said, walking away from the wall, regret filling her heart.
* * * * *
It had been hours since they left Lamis' domain and Ariana had barely spoken a word to Ryonen. He had tried multiple times to engage her, asking her whether she was hungry or thirsty or if she needed a break, but she only gave him one word answers. She could see the regret whenever she looked into his face, but she didn't care. He had blatantly lied to her over and over again without hesitation, even when she had asked him something directly to his face.
In the time they had been walking, she had been thinking back on all the moments where he had lied to her without her knowing. Back when she met him in her forest and she asked him where he was from, when he told her he didn't know why Vultan was helping them, how he repeatedly insisted that Lamis and him had squashed there issues when, in reality, Lamis was telling him to come clean, and all the small moments where Ryonen had hesitated before answering her. They had all been lies. 
She felt so incredibly stupid. How could the one time she let her guard down and let another person in, end up so badly? She bit her cheek, trying to fight back the tears that were threatening to come out. Not only did it hurt to think he had been deceiving her the whole time she'd known, but he had broken her heart, too. She cared about him, she'd been vulnerable with him, she had even been starting to think that she was falling for him...
Ariana shook herself out of her darkened thoughts, looking around her. The further they walked, the more desolate the landscape became. While the trees near the archway had been twisted and dark, the trees around them now almost seemed to be dead. Their blackened trunks were mottled with dark brown spots, fuzzy white fungus sprouting from the rotting tissue like explosions of cotton. Their leaves, long fallen away, were decaying on the blackened earth that lay below their low hanging branches.
"What happened here?" She said quietly.
Ryonen looked over at her, surprised that she was speaking again. "Malor." He replied. "When he took Orlac, he spread some sort of sickness through the land. Everything that once grew here is either dying or already long dead."
Even the sky seemed to be darker, a heavy sort of fog hanging in the air so that the sun was muted as it shone down on them. It was an eerie sight, adding to the terror of the place and her own anxiety about being there. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Ryonen taking in breaths like he meant to say something, but stopping himself. She ignored him, waiting for him to speak. If he had something to say to her, he could come out with it on his own.
"Listen," he said finally, his voice tentative as he addressed her. When she didn't stop him or immediately start yelling again, he continued. "Ariana, I'm so sorry for lying to you. I know it was wrong of me, but I didn't want you to know who I was."
She looked at him, his face even more pale in the reflection of the fog. "Why? Would it have been so bad for me to know who you were?"
He swallowed. "You don't understand what it entails." The bitterness had returned to his voice.
"You never gave me a chance to understand." She said, trying to keep her voice level. "You decided for me that I couldn't handle it, for whatever reason."
Ryonen was looking at her with something like desperation. "I didn't do it to hurt you. I did it because-" He stopped, his face flaring red.
"Because what?" She demanded.
He turned away from her, his fingers once again coming up to fidget with the ring on his other hand. He let out a heavy sigh. "Nothing."
She stopped in her tracks, suddenly angry all over again despite her best efforts to control herself. He stopped walking, too, looking at her. "You say you want me to trust you, to forgive you? Stop hiding things from me, Ryonen."
The anguish was all too clear in his eyes as he gazed into hers. She knew he could see the anger and pain in her own eyes and that it hurt him to see it. His shoulders sagged. "Fine." He said, resigned. "Fine."
She waited as he seemed to decide how to tell her whatever it was that he wanted to keep secret. He brought up a hand to rub over his face, his green eyes closing at the touch. She felt fear rise up in her chest at the sight of him. What could be so bad that he was this conflicted to tell her about?
After what felt like forever, he opened his eyes. "I don't want you to hate me." He said, distress thick in his voice. When she didn't respond, he breathed heavily. "It was decided, long ago and before my birth, that I was to become engaged to another monarch."
Ariana felt the air being sucked out of her like she'd been punched. "You're engaged?" She repeated, her voice raising. She could feel her heart pounding wildly in her chest.
He raised his hands out in front of him. "I don't even know her!" He said quickly. "I've never met her before."
She took in a shuddering breath as she tried to calm herself. "Who is she?" She asked. The pain in her heart was almost unbearable now but she needed to know.
He looked away, unable to bear the sight of her. "The Princess of Atheil."
"THE Atheil?! As in-"
He finished for her. "The heir to the Throne of Atheil, the future High Queen of Atheil itself."
A hush fell between them as her mind reeled at this new information. "So you're going to be the High King of Atheil?" She was trying to contain her hurt, but it was beginning to creep into her voice.
"I don't want to be." He said in an exasperated voice. He crossed the space between them, grasping her hand in his. "Please believe me, I never wanted this. I don't want to marry some woman I've never met or be a King. I don't even want to rule my own kingdom, let alone all of Atheil."
Ariana let him hold her hands, not pulling away from him. Some small part of her still felt comfort at his touch, though the bigger part of her was telling her to push him away. She met his gaze. "If you knew your parents would never approve of us, why are you taking me to the Eastern Kingdom?"
The question seemed to throw him off. He scrunched his eyebrows together in confusion. "Because I promised you I would help you find your mom." He said.
"But what's going to happen once we get there? Are they just going to send me away? Where's your fiancé?"
He visibly recoiled at the word. "I told you, I'm going to petition for help to get her back for you. I swore I'd help you get her back. As for her," he said the word as if it were poison in his mouth, "I don't know and I don't care."
Ariana searched his face. He seemed to be sincere. "How can you not know?"
"No one knows where she is."
"Then how do you even know she's alive?" Ariana asked. She felt like that was a valid question to ask, especially since it meant that she wasn't a cheater, which she really didn't like the idea of being.
His face was bitter. "She is." He said, then saw her look of irritation. "It's been prophesied."
"Ryonen." She knew that they were technically in another world with magic and fantastical creatures, but this felt like it was taking it one step too far.
He shook his head at her, a small hint of annoyance showing on his face for the first time. "Prophecies are no joke here, Ariana. They're rooted in ancient magic that very few even understand anymore. You can't escape them."
She thought about this. "And you're in the prophecy?"
He nodded, his eyes drawn down to their interlocked hands as he recited words that had clearly been relayed to him his whole life.

"From the darkness shall come the light,
The daughter of Karuin returns.
Born will be a child of great power,
Stronger than all who came before her.
Fair will be her skin,
          With hair touched by starlight
                           and eyes like a dazzling sea.
Her heart will lie in the East;
The union of the kingdoms
will be Atheils great victory.
In the darkest hour she will come forth;
She alone will bring about the Dawn."

He looked at her now and she saw the desperation in his eyes. "Don't you see? I'm supposed to marry her and save Atheil, but I don't want that. I want to live my life how I see fit, not the way that was already planned out for me. I want to be with you, Ariana"
Ariana stalled, unsure of what to say. For whatever reason, she felt all her anger at Ryonen ebbing away as she stared into his weary, defeated face. Instead of being mad at him for lying to her, she felt, well, pity for him. She couldn't imagine how it felt to have the weight of the whole world on his shoulders. She sucked back her own pride and gently pulled her hand out of his, bringing it to rest on his cheek. "It's okay." She said softly, her voice barely a whisper. "It's okay, I understand." And she did understand; she knew how it felt to not feel like you were in control of your life. It was exactly how she felt back home with her mom constantly trying to make her fit the narrative she wanted for her.
The relief was clear in his face as he visibly relaxed under her touch. "You do?" He asked, so hopeful that it made her heart ache.
She nodded. "Yeah, I do." He smiled and leaned in to kiss her but she pulled away. Hurt crossed his features. "Ryonen," she said slowly, "I understand, but that doesn't mean that things can just go back to the way they were. You still lied to me repeatedly. It's going to take some time before I can trust you again."
He still looked hurt, but he inclined his head.
She pursed her lips. "And I can't be with you until I know for sure that you aren't marrying someone else." She said, firmly. Her resolve on that front was nonnegotiable. She refused to be someone's side piece.
He swallowed but, again, nodded. "Okay." He said.
Ariana dropped her hand from his cheek, extracting her other hand from his and letting them settle at her side. "Here's how it's going to go: We're going to continue with our original plan to travel to the Eastern Kingdom and try to get help finding my mom. I don't want to fight about this subject anymore; there's no point when we don't even know if there's a future for us.  If we decide we want to pursue a relationship, we can figure out what to do then. For now, we're going to go back to just being friends again."
Ryonen looked like he wanted to argue but thought better of it. "I can do that." He said, attempting a smile.
They stared at each other for a long moment, neither one of them speaking. Finally, Ariana took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. "Let's keep going, we don't want to fall behind schedule."
He mumbled his agreement as she took her spot by his side, the two of them starting to walk again. There was still a bit of tension in the air, but it was better than it was before. She looked down at his hand as it swung by his side, so close to hers and yet so far away. She turned her eyes on the way ahead, hoping with every fiber of her being that they might be able to bridge the gap between them one day.