Deliverance [malexmale]

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty

I didn't tell Atlan I knew about Joxeia at dinner.

He didn't need to know I knew. All he needed to know was that I was closer to my decision, and he just smiled at me.

"That's excellent. Whatever it is you choose, I will back you in it. We will continue your training and soon, you can return home." I'm sure when he said home, he thought of this castle. I said nothing to that, however, just nodded and offered him a smile before I took another sip of tea.

"If you'd like, you may sleep in here again," Atlan offered after I'd stood up to leave. I shook my head at him, making him raise an eyebrow.

"It's alright. I'd like to do some reading before I head to bed and don't want to keep you up," I replied, and Atlan seemed to accept that as he remained seated and poured himself more tea. I excused myself from the room and went down the hallway, passing by the kitchen to see Diana was cleaning up her mess from dinner. I waited until I was positive she was heading in the opposite direction before I left for the part of the castle I had seen Atlan leave.

It was still storming outside.

The air was humid, and it was difficult to breath. The pressure was immense. Quite a bit of foliage and busted pieces of wood from the torn forest would blow in through the open areas of the castle, and the wind howled something awful.

When I'd asked Atlan about it, he'd simply passed it off as it's healthy to have a storm once in awhile. To which I had just responded with something casual to throw him off my scent of suspicion long enough for me to confirm that Joxeia was indeed in the castle.

Atlan was smart. He was eventually going to find out that I knew of Joxeia's being in the castle. While I was sure he wouldn't kill me over it, or even punish me, it would make him more suspicious of me and make it harder for me to gather information during my stay. Atlan had already hung over me long enough, and he'd given me plenty of bribes and reasons to stay here with him. To be honest, I was more desperate for a reason not to be here, because so far the only thing keeping me from jumping on his offers was the fact that none of it was borne from a real place. It was all an act to get my power to help him. That was it. He didn't genuinely enjoy my company or care about me at all.

This was all about him fulfilling an ancient prophecy.

I continued through the hallways until I'd found myself in the older parts of the castle. Older meaning the stone work was sloppier, parts of it falling apart. A few walls were even caved in and leading to nothing, but empty holes or just more rocks further in. The air was colder here too, still humid, just frigid. But even more telling was the static electricity of an ancient power here. It was older than Atlan.

I passed a few old wooden doors with very small peep windows with iron bars over them, but a quick look through revealed nothing, but empty, mildewy rooms. Most of the wood in this part of the castle was rotted out and eaten away from centuries of neglect. How strange that Atlan would keep Joxeia in this part of the castle when it appeared no one was here to uphold the facilities, but I suppose he didn't care enough about Joxeia to make him comfortable.

I followed the epic power charge that I was sure came from Joxeia. I wondered briefly why Joxeia hadn't simply escaped on his own. Surely he would, since he seemed to have such an incredible amount of power. If he could control Zeus no problem, why was he having difficulties escaping from such a run down part of the castle?

I approached another wooden door, peered in and started to head off when I caught movement from inside and I froze. The room was dark, and there was only a single candle in the room, but it was quickly dwindling to nothing. It barely provided light, which was why I had almost left, but upon closer inspection, I realized someone was inside, but not just one person.