Välikirja: The Wyvern's Pact

Chapter Twenty-Two - A Reinforcement Arrives

I'm updating because my friend told me to. I actually didn't know she was still reading my stories. XD So, this is for her. :)

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Chapter Twenty-Two - S

          "Well, well, well...Our 'golden girl' finally decided to take the spotlight."

          "It's you!" I screamed. "It's all because of you!"

          She nodded, glaring at me with eyes so intense they could almost bear holes into me. "Yes, it's all because of me, because you wanted to kill me, to destroy this castle, our home. You monsters thrived to destroy the whole community so no one will pose a threat to you!"

          Tell that to yourself, Magister Elfreda. That was all you ever think about—getting rid of threats, even when they only threaten you in your head. We were living peacefully before you started everything.

          She was the one who started all this chaos, the one who persisted on killing off our kind. She wanted to get rid of everyone who psed a threat to her castle, to her position as the head magister. But we wouldn't be trying to put her out of her position if she hadn't been the cruel leader she was. This was all because of her, because of her selfish and twisted beliefs.

          "Get her ready for branding!" Magister Mitena commanded the three men standing in front of the magisters, prepared to do anything they ask of them.

          They bowed their heads. "Yes, Magister Mitena."

          All I could do was watch Magister Xamira's eyes as the men dragged me on the ground, their rough palms rubbing against my skin, towards the pillory which stood at the other end of the stadium several meters across Master Cato's corpse. I didn't scream, nor thrash around like a rabid animal. For the first time since I got here, I refused to fight. What was the use? Most of the people who sided with me had been hurt one way or another; the rest were dead. I understood why Magister Xamira couldn't defend me. It was because she was afraid to die. She was afraid to lose her position. She was afraid to take a risk.

          But what was the point of playing safe if you were in the wrong side? Was merely living more important than doing the right thing?

          "Look at her! Look at the malefactor that we have saved from the cruelty of the humans, that we have trusted and taken care of!" Magister Elfreda yelled to the audience, pointing her dirty finger at me like I was nothing more than a pig caught running away from the pigsty. "For many years, she had been living among us, learning with us, eating with us, sleeping in the same castle we sleep in, gathering knowledge about us, so that when the time comes for their assault comes, bam!" She quickly balled her hand into a fist. "She is well-prepared to destroy us all! They will all be!" Her ear-shattering voice echoed in the stadium, along with the audience's loud roar as the head magister continued convincing everyone that I had been plotting to destroy Aethelgard since the beginning.

          "Kill her!"

          "Brand her!"

          "Monster! Bash her head against the pillory!"

          "This cursed woman is the fruit of Master Cato's teaching! The fruit of disloyalty and deception!" she screamed, denouncing me and Master Cato to the people of Aethelgard for something we were not guilty of. "They attempted to bring Sumner"—she points a finger to the spot where Sumner and I had been hiding—"to their side, but Sumner has proven his loyalty..."

          Her words vanished to thin air as a stupefying realization took my attention. Sumner was on their side all along. Why had I been blind to that fact? It was all laid out to me. Mordred's wife was his grandmother, which was why Master Cato wanted him to become a great magister someday, something he would never be. Yet he wanted to show, beyond doubt, to everyone that he could do it, that he was strong and skilled enough to protect Aethelgard as its one and only magister. He wanted to prove it so bad that he became a puppet to the magisters, to the evil head magister Elfreda.