Burning Lion

Chapter Sixteen

The doors swung open with a loud bang. Gwen lifted her head and sleepily shook the tiredness from her mind. The waste King smiled and leaned back in his seat.

Karyn was kicking wildly, screaming profanities at the burly guard who held her over his shoulder. A beautiful woman who Gwen had never seen before was on the other shoulder of the man, she too was screaming, but her screams were directed towards Karyn.

"Calm down! We'll find her!" She yelled.

Following behind them was another guard that looked exactly like the first. He carried Dyfar under one arm, ignoring the bites and scratches the werewolf was giving him. And under the other arm was the limp body of a dark-skinned woman whom, again; Gwen had never laid eyes on in her life.

"Well, look who decided to join the party." Gwen smirked.

The heads of the three conscious companions snapped up to look in Gwen's general direction. All except Karyn, of course. Although she did try to look but it was hard because of the way she was being carried. She had been slung over the guard's shoulder with her round bottom right next to his face, the only thing to make it worse was that she had a very short skirt on.

"And she's alive!" The woman with the silver hair cheered.

Gwen raised her brow. It was easy to identify her as Brachem now, due to her voice and the manner in which she acted. That would mean that the unconscious woman was Pride, or at least that's what Gwen hoped to be the case.

Without warning. Karyn was dropped to the ground. She coughed and groaned touching her back tenderly where it had struck the marble floor of the throne room. Brachem had landed heavily on her ribcage, she gasped in pain, thinking a rib or two was broken. Dyfar was tossed towards Brachem, who was writhing around in pain a little way in front of him.

He whined and shifted into wolf form. Skidding on the hard floor with the chain that was attached to him jingling as he moved and his claws leaving marks on the smooth floor. Pride was tossed onto the ground with no care, she roughly landed on her side and rolled until her back hit Karyn.

She grunted when she collided with the younger girl. Pride groggily woke up and bit her tongue so she did not cry out in pain, she gripped her ribcage and tenderly sat up, being careful so she didn't damage her broken tail further.

"Now that you are all here, I can finally talk to you." the waste King grinned. Showing off the horrible teeth he had.

Karyn sat up on her knees and death-stared the evil King. Brachem sat beside her with her legs folded underneath her, Dyfar growled and sat on his haunches on the opposite side of Karyn. While, Pride crawled painfully to Brachem's other side and leaned against her friend.

The King chuckled.

"Haha! I never expected the little fighters that my brother sent would be a group of damsels and a mutt!" He cackled.

Gwen growled. "Your brother is dead, the King that rules Dralgia now is King Henry the Second. The grandson of your brother; King Fredrick!" Gwen explained to him in the most furious tone she could muster. It was a pretty terrifying voice and even made the King tremble slightly under her authority.

He raised a brow, "So my grandnephew is the King of Dralgia?" The waste King snorted.

Gwen nodded, "He rules under the ever watchful eyes of the Dragon Empress."

"There is no such person!" The King bellowed.

Gwen held back a chuckle. He was behaving like a child, "Actually there is, and she was the one who sent us here."

The King opened his mouth to speak but Karyn cut him off, obviously annoyed. "Look; just fight each of us individually and then you can fight Gwen after defeating us, and if you win all the fights you can have Dralgia, deal?" She said in a rush.

The King stared at her speechless, before an evil smile spread across his face. "You won't mind if I make one tiny adjustment?" He asked icily.

Karyn huffed and lifted her chin.

"The four of you will fight my seven children one at a time, if you survive, then all five of you can fight me." he grinned as if he was pleased.

Karyn nodded solemnly.

Gwen gritted her teeth and clenched her fist. The darkness was swirling around and around, it wasn't advancing further into her body. It just roamed the area it had already taken over, swimming around in confusion and chaos. It brought her great pain, her arm was completely numb and she fought the urge to cry out in agony.

The King smiled again.

"Water, Fire, Shadow, Earth, Air, Time, Lightning." He said clearly.

At first it sounded like he was just listing seven random elements for an unknown reason. But the reason became clear when seven small tornadoes of black smoke swirled in front of Karyn and the others as they huddled together on the floor. Gwen's breath caught in her throat; she remembered reading something from a history book, 'The King's seven children are all named after a particular element because that is the element they control'.

The smoke dispersed to reveal people. Strange people.

The seven children of the Waste King had come to do their father's dirty work, but Gwen wasn't going to let them succeed.