Maven's Redemption [Red Queen]

Chapter 3

I wake up, realizing I am shivering... and soaked. Sometime while I was asleep, rain had picked up and now it was pouring and dripping down from the tree above me.

"Of course..." I grumbled as I got up and tried to squeeze the water out of my clothes. Suddenly I hear some twigs breaking and I jump in surprise, summoning lightning. Of course, I was at the edge of a forest. There would be animals nearby... I took a deep breath. But all the animals would be tucked away by now, away from this rain. I looked around, trying to find whatever or whoever made the sound, never letting go of the lightning at my fingertips.

"Hello?" I call out, when I see a person, hidden by shadow. The figure steps forward, coming into the light. His eyes appear first, glowing icy blue, and eerily familiar. Then the rest of the person comes into view and I suppress a gasp. Suddenly all my fears and nightmares were coming true, for the second time. Lightning lit up around me.

"Hello, Mare." Maven stepped forward again, illuminating all his horribly beautiful features.

"Stay the hell away from me." I backed away, until my back was against the trunk of the tree I was just asleep under. Had he been watching me sleep?

"I don't mean any harm." Maven's hand flew up and I stared at his flame bracelets fit perfectly to his wrist.

"What do you want? I won't go back with you." I asked, keeping an eye on his every move, watching for any hint of spark that would grant me permission to send my lightning after him, to char his flesh and stop his black heart.

"I came to apologize. I would've gone to your base but I am smart enough to know I would get killed as soon as anyone seen me." He explained. I never took my eyes off the bracelets.

"How did you find me?"

"It's not that hard to figure out the Lightning Girl's every move. I still have some skilled people on my side you know. I wanted to talk to you without all those guards getting in the way. You will understand." He moved to grab my hands but stopped himself when my lightning flared.

"I get it. You don't trust me..." his expression went dark "who would ever trust someone like me after what I did to you."

"What do you want Maven?" My heart was pounding in my chest. The guards never gave me a way to communicate back to the base. I could very well die out here, in the middle of nowhere. Maven could incinerate me here and no one would know for days.

"I don't want to bend to my mother's wishes anymore. She may not physically be here but she still lives in my head, her voice controls everything I do... she created my darkness and now I want it to stop. I want to be better." He could have been lying just to get me back as his prisoner, his pet, but somehow I saw sincerity in his eyes. But just as the moment started, it ended and I went back to studying his wrists. I heard him sigh and then start to unclip them, piece by piece.

"Keep them." He simply said as he held them out to me. When they were in my hands, they seemed so pathetic. Like useless scraps of metal.

"So you want me to just trust you and take you into the base where you could possibly gain access to classified information?" I held on to the bracelets tight. Maven flinched at my words as if they physically hurt him.

"Don't trust me with that yet. I don't even trust myself with that yet. Let me go on this mission with you. I can help you, I am still the King of Norta no matter what. My face might be more convincing than just a random girl showing up." I rolled my eyes.

"This mission is to convince Newbloods to go against you and commit treason. I don't think having you there will help." I crossed my arms over my chest defiantly but still felt a pang of guilt as Maven's face fell.

"Let me help you get there at least, please. You shouldn't be alone in these woods, it can be dangerous. When we find the village, I can leave, go back to the Whitefire even. Then I will find a way to contact you again."

"Fine then let's go. You have already wasted too much of my time."