Dark Prince Rising

Sixteen

"I don't understand," Daevyn muttered, half to himself. He was kneeling on the sandy shore, sifting the loose grains through his fingers. "This can't be right."

"What's the matter?" Aelon was still too busy ogling the beautiful hidden garden of birds and vines to pay much attention to his traveling companion. 

Daevyn stood up and brushed the sand from his hands. "She just... disappears. There's no trace of her."

This caught Aelon's attention. "What? That's not possible! Are you sure?"

"Yes, my lord. Her trail goes cold out there." He gestured out to the clear water with a nod of his head. 

Aelon froze, the ground falling out from underneath him. "So that means... That means she's..." He couldn't force the words from his lips.

Daevyn shook his head. "No, no. She can't be dead. If she was, the trail wouldn't be so hot. Trails of dead things are always cold." He stroked his jawline, deep in thought. "No. She's still alive. But I fear that she's no longer on this plane of existence."

"What does that even mean?" Ennex asked, snapping his attention away from the colorful birds along the walls. 

"It means," Aelon said, his voice drained of all emotion. "That wherever she is, she has found something real this time. This isn't a wild goose chase anymore."

"No, it's not," said Daevyn with a heavy sigh. "She's beyond our reach now, my lord. Either she will come back to us, or you will never see her again. There is nothing more you can do."

Aelon set his jaw. He hadn't come this far, been this close behind her, to give up so easily. "We can wait. We will wait."

***

Cira was falling.

It wasn't like the falls that she had in her dreams, when she would wake up sweating and shaking with fear. This falling was slow and controlled. It was more like drifting, actually. She was drifting.

When her feet touched the ground, she blinked her eyes. She could hear people grunting, the sounds of metal on metal and the sickeningly wet sounds of blades piercing flesh. Then she heard a low cry, the cry that one utters when there is no hope left of living. But her eyes were useless. Everything was black.

Someone seized her arm and pulled her to the side, and she was suddenly pressed between a warm body and a cold stone wall. A gloved hand went over her mouth so that she couldn't scream. On reflex, she bit down hard on his hand and tried to get her arm high enough to elbow him in the gut. But her body was pressed so tightly to the wall that she was trapped, not able to move either her arms or her legs enough to deal any damage. She began to panic, desperately struggling to escape his clutches.

"It's me, Cira," a voice hissed in her ear. Zael. "Don't make a sound. And gods, stop trying to bite my hand!"

She let his hand go, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. At least he had been wearing gloves.

"Follow me." He guided her through the dark, one hand on her back. She assumed that he was holding his dagger in the other.

Cira couldn't bring herself to draw her blade. She needed both hands to grope blindly along the cold wall, even with Zael's guidance. She felt so exposed, her eyes wide open and unseeing. There could be an enemy standing right beside her, and she wouldn't even notice them until it was too late. The air began to whip her hair around her face, growing faster and stronger the more agitated she became.

Suddenly, a bright flash of light flared through the cave, and Cira could make out her surroundings. She was holding onto a flat wall made of a shiny black stone that seemed to glisten in the firelight. Zael stood beside her, his dagger brandished before them.