The Fall to Power

Chapter Two

The pounding in my head becomes clearer as my pulse slows down. I cup my hands in the river and address my reflection. No obvious signs of blood. Nothing that will tell Aidon that I had been in a fight when he couldn't help. You can't hurt someone with what they don't know.

As I walk amongst the trees, a feeling of not-quite-rightness spindles through my stomach and mind. I know that someone is watching me. There is no other explanation. Whoever it is are good at this; This stalking, this tailing. Yet, in all there littler actions, their breathing and pausing, it's like they're trying to give themselves away, screaming at me to turn around, attack, and kill them. But I won't, I can't. Their exact position remains unknown to me, and turning around would let them know they were detected. Could it be the Followers? How were they still here? I killed them. But what if that was what they wanted? For me to feel safe enough to be be followed and not notice? After all, a few moments ago I wouldn't have been able to see the back my hands if I needed to, let alone someone at a distance, merging into the background.

Lost in my contemplation, I don't realise until to late that I had dropped all my external senses, and am taken completely unawares when two hands clap over my ears, preventing me from regaining any semblance of control in this fight. Annoyed and helpless, I bend over to ease the ringing in my ears, trying to remain as alert as possible for the next onslaught. I think I would have preferred it to what I do hear.

"Your naivety is endearing," chuckles Blake "but it won't save you out here." His tone turns sombre as he says, "Seriously, If I can catch you, they can too, and they won't be as merciful."

It's then that I notice the ringing is gone, and has been for some time. Evidently, I wasn't in as much danger as I had presumed. It's also then that he catches a glimpse of my hysteria, mistaking it for disappointment in my inability to defend myself.

"Look, I'm sorry. You didn't do too badly. It's just that it's difficult for me to leave you alone knowing that anything can happen to you." He puts on a seriously annoying smirk,"and I guess you can't be blamed for losing to me. I'm just that good. Though, thanks to my training, I think you come a close second."

"Well, I don't need you worrying about me all the time. Maybe one day you'll finally see that and trust me to take care of myself" I reply, jumping onto the the chance to divert my mind from my scare.

"Well I look forward to that day. It'll come right after the day you beat me in a fight, in fact." He grins as he says this, knowing I'll never beat him.

"Yeah, okay, and pigs will fly. I get it, you are so well trained even an army of a hundred men couldn't put a scratch on you, whereas I am a damsel in distress, needing you to save me from every God damn shadow."

"Aw, there's no need to be so hard on yourself, you're not quite that bad." He mocks, as if oblivious to my sarcasm.

I growl, trying to grasp the tiny shred of my remaining dignity as I stalk back to camp. Even though he's joking, what Aidon said hurts, because it is technically true. I was weak and helpless when he first found me. Pathetic. He trained me to what I am today, and I still make these stupid mistakes. Not paying attention when walking, letting my emotions take over and cloud my judgement. I was still out of control.

I couldn't let it happen again. Not when my very life depended on it. After all, it was my callous and clumsiness that got me here. Not that I can complain when I should be grateful for escaping with my life. Even that wasn't due to me. I couldn't even save myself, so how did My saviours expect Me to save everyone else? The very idea was absurd!

"Hey, come on I was joking, mostly" It seems my companion is even annoying when apologising. Instead of showing forgiveness by slowing down, I speed up so that I'm now between not-quite-running and not-quite-walking producing an uncomfortable outcome for me, but not for the ass behind me as he effortlessly switches to powerful strides that close the distance between us.

"I can do this for as long as it takes" he says as if he can force me to forgive him the same way he fights battles; with sheer force of will. Just as I consider breaking into a run, I find myself flying forward and landing in a thump on the ground. "I may have lied about the 'whole day' thing to throw you off" He laughs from behind me as my mouth finds itself trying to begin the process of digesting clumps of earth like a fine dessert.

"MUMPH MUMPH MUMGPH!" Is all I can get out around my clump trying to swat behind me at the nuisance on the centre of my back.

"Sorry what was that? 'You forgive my harsh words and could never stay mad at me?' of course I accept your apology, and forgive you for being so sensitive. We can't all be as perfect as me." He cries, simultaneously getting up an lifting me up. "Let's hug it out." And as he turns around and reaches around me I look him in the eye and spit on him, splattering him with my very own special blend of mud.

"Now we're even." And, giving him just the right amount of stink-eye, I turn around. Then, having seen the look of pure rage on his face, I replace my glare with one of pure terror as I race back to camp.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Of course, having the upper hand in agility, I get there first, giving Aidon some time to himself to return to his usual calm self. You may think me a heartless b¡tch for doing so, but it was what I was used to, and therefore what I knew how to deal with. In the five years I've known Aidon, It took two before he trusted me enough to actually let me know. Before that it was just silence, occasionally broken by necessitated words like eat, drink, sleep and fight. For the first year, I was too terrified to question it, fearful he would turn on me the moment I complained, such as many of my peers did on my tiniest slip-up.

I started losing it around the end of that year. I even treated Aidon like my own hallucination, refusing to believe that he was real. After all, there was no one else around to convince me he was actually there. It didn't help that he refused to really speak to me until a good few weeks into my madness, at which I begged him to leave me alone, as if he finally believed my breakdown to be real and not some pathetic ploy to get him to speak to me.

That was when he first took me hunting. It's not like I did anything, how crazy would I have looked helping my imaginary friend catch and kill an animal, right? In all fairness to me I didn't think I already was crazy, maybe just lonely?

Anyway, he started dragging me along with him one day and I didn't resist thinking my subconscious was guiding me. Then I followed his orders and crouched in a corner as he waited. He'd already set a few traps, but they were all empty, so we waited, and waited, and waited.

Then, without warning, he pounced. It was so graceful, and executed with such precision, that I finally realised how much he'd been holding back. It was one of the first things I'd ever learnt about Aidon: he was made for this life.

In the end his victim only turned out to be a bunny rabbit. Cute, right? Not so much when skinned and gutted. He decided that I would cook in return for the privilege of watching him kill a living being. It was in fact my cooking that convinced him of my value here, even if I did not belong like he did, and so he decided I was actually worth his time. And so, here I am: trying not to screw up my second (and final) chance at life.