Come Love A Stranger

Thirty one

Mariah gasped and her breathing came in shallow pants as she felt the beast’s breath on her face and the foul smell of its mouth made her stomach churn in an uncomfortable way. She found herself praying to both the gods and the Almighty that Alador should appear from wherever he was. The worst of all was that she couldn’t even see her surrounding and if she should start to run, she wouldn’t know which way to go.
“Please…I…I bear no ill will, do not harm me, I beg of you,” she whispered, gulping as she could sense the beast leaning closer. A low growl escaped its mouth and Mariah felt a sharp pain on her arm, she quickly covered it with her hand and felt warm liquid staining her hand. She knew she was in danger but what she couldn’t understand was why Azura and Bamushka would bring her here if this beast resides here.
A deafening roar disrupted her thought and the breath from the beast blew her hair back and then she sensed it approaching her in such a scary way that she had to do the first thing that came to her mind. She started running towards the direction she came in. What kind of life was she living, why does she have to be chased by unknown creatures every single time? As she ran, tears trialed down her cheeks as she finally understood that maybe Azura and Bamushka planned to get rid of her like this by lying about Alador. What if he wasn’t on any death mission? What if he wasn’t in the cave at all? Because if he was, there was no way he wouldn’t have come to her by now.
As she ran, she suddenly stumbled on a piece of rock and fell face flat on the ground; she turned to see the beast approaching. She was close to the cave entrance and with the moonlight sipping through; she was able to catch a glimpse of what was chasing her. It was a gigantic black creature with two big horns; it stood on its hind legs with nails longer than any, visible from what she didn’t know whether to call paw or hands. It was growling as it approached her and Mariah was already sobbing hysterically, maybe she would die before she even save Alador.
The creature now standing before her, roared at her face and then raised its gigantic paw, it nails glinted in the moonlight and it strike at her. Mariah covered her face with her hand and waited for the pain she was sure was coming and would kill her and at that moment, she was glad that she didn’t die from the Hackeries, which means that even if she doesn’t reincarnate, she would exist in the eternal world and would be able to wait for Alador to join her.
But she waited and the pain didn’t come, she slowly put down her hand down to know what happened and when she opened her eyes, she saw silvery white hair hanging too close to her face and then she saw his face, his golden black eyes was staring intently at her and then he smiled and it all happened so fast, he flipped at the speed of lightening and was blocking her with his body and also her view of the creature that almost took her life.
She slowly sat up, neither Alador nor the beast was attacking and she crawled to the side where she could watch both of them and also won’t affect Alador from fighting when he would be trying not to hurt her. She felt the creature’s gaze on her and looked at it, their eyes met and she shivered in fear but the creature didn’t growl at her neither did it try to attack her again, rather it looked Alador once more and then turned and walked deeper into the darkness of the cave.
Mariah glanced at Alador then who hadn’t looked at her again, “what were you doing here, Mariah?” He asked softly.
“I…I…I was looking for you,” she replied in a whisper.
“You should not be here,” he turned to look at her then, “you cannot be here, Mariah, look at you, you almost killed yourself. Faliars does not like their sleep to be disturbed. You disturbed his sleep and if I were not here, Mariah, one strike from him would have killed you.”
Mariah closed her eyes and sighed, “I am sorry, but Bamushka brought me here, she told me you were inside the cave.”
“What?” Alador’s voice thundered and she snapped her eyes open immediately, he looked more dangerous than he did when the Falair beast was about to hurt her, “what did you say?”
“Ba-Bamushka, she was the one that brought me here.”
Alador said nothing but Mariah could sense the anger rising in him, his hair was glowing and so were his eyes. She had seen that glow in them only once, the night he met her for the first time on her balcony. “Alador,” she whispered and approached him to touch him but the next thing that happened shocked her. His face was gradually lose its form and taking the form of an animal, “Al-Alador, wh-what is happening?” She was scared no doubt and watched him as the magnificent creature she had seen once which he had told her was only a dream slowly appeared in front of her: the black dragon with slivery wings. “Ah,” she gasped when he suddenly spread his wings and picked her up as he leapt into the air.
Mariah grabbed tightly onto his claws as she watched everything turned tiny as they flew high up in the air, “Alador,” she whispered in fear that he might drop her and closed her eyes so that she wouldn’t let go, she has never been good with heights. Soon she felt cold arms around her and she shivered and leaned tightly into the wall that she was been pressed against. She felt the cold wall turning warm and she found herself relaxing.
“Open your eyes, Mariah,” she heard him whisper and opened her eyes, he was looking at her, now back in his human form, “I am sorry you had to see that.”
Mariah frowned, what was he talking about? But before she could say anything, she heard, “Alador,” and they looked up to see Azura now standing in front of them.
“Mother, what is Mariah doing here?” Alador asked, she could sense the anger in his voice but she didn’t fail to notice that he still spoke to her in a manner of respect.
“I brought her here,” Azura answered.
“Why?”
“To talk some sense into you, Alador, you had no idea what you were doing.”
“No mother, you had no idea what you have done. You brought her here, you made her know about me,” he closed his eyes then, “you broke the walls, you have broken the spell,” he looked at her, “now Ilayas would have nothing to stop him from calling the Hackeries, how could you do this to me, mother?” he yelled.
“Ilayas would do no such thing,” Azura defended.
“My own father called them, what makes you think Ilayas would not call them for the fifth time?”
“Alador, listen, whatever your mother did was to protect you,” Bamushka suddenly appeared and stood beside Azura.
Alador stared at her and slowly put Mariah down, “you,” he called softly and in a blink of an eye was in front of her. His hand changed, covered in scales with long talons which he used to grab Bamushka by the neck, “you left her in the Falair’s cave, you did it on purpose,” his hair was flying around in invisible wind and his eyes glows brighter than usual.
“Alador, what are you doing?” Azura asked and Mariah sensed the panic in her voice, she too looked at Alador wondering what he was doing but the fear on Bamushka’s face told her he was about to do something terrible.