Garthia: The Forgotten King

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two

I can't help but keep checking behind me constantly on my way to the entrance that I came through.

I shove my hands in my jacket pockets and focus my thoughts on the mysterious mark rather than if there's someone lurking in the shadows.

I think back to the first time I saw it on the man's shoulder. Obviously he was purposefully showing it to be. At the time I hadn't really given much thought to the words he emphasized and their meaning.

If you put the words together in the order he said them, it spells:

Join. The. Rebellion.

I catch movement in the shadows on the opposite side of the road but when I look over there, I don't see anything. I convince myself to keep moving.

I turn onto the alley and walk towards the exit, but someone blocks my way.

It appears to be a human man at first glance, but once my eyes adjust it looks more like an overgrown lizard complete with a long tail covered with green scales like the rest of its body. Its eyes are green slits and it's naked except a pair of torn jeans. Still it's twice my size and incredibly muscular.

It steps forward walking on two legs. Its tongue flicks out as it talks in a low gravely voice. "Missss Blakely, you're coming with us."

Us? Just then I hear someone else come up behind me. It's footsteps sound sticky and wet. I turn to see another animal hybrid, this one like a frog with black horizontal pupils in bulging eyes , webbed feet, and slimy green speckled skin.

Its wet tongue shoots out and coils around me. I switch into what I like to call battle mode.

I close my eyes and everything turns to negative, the colors inverted. Now I can see my surroundings as if I was seeing them in daylight. But it leaves me incredibly vulnerable and weak, so as soon as I assess the situation, which only takes a second, I open my eyes again.

A square pillar of stone shoots up and knocks the frog man square in the jaw, knocking him back and releasing me from the grip of his tongue but leaving me covered in sticky saliva.

The lizard guy drops on all fours and charges faster than I expected. At the last second I open a gaping hole in the ground and he tumbles into it.

Thinking I've won I sink against the wall to catch my breath. But out of nowhere the frog man's tongue wraps around me, this time from my ankles up to beneath my nose. Out of the corner of my eye I see him step forward and he speaks, his voice coming out with a lisp because of his tongue.

"Be thure to thank me later, Mith Blakely."

When he reaches me he turns my head so that I'm looking straight at him. Then he punches me in the side of the head.

>>>

I wake up groggily in the center of a pitch dark room with a single light shining directly on me, tied to a chair, my temple still throbbing.

I close my eyes and look around the room the same way I did in the alley.

The room is standard sized and completely stone with one metal door with no windows or knob about ten feet in front of me. I can tell I'm underground not far from where I was knocked out, so I must still be in Garthia. I'm guessing I'm somewhere in the castle dungeons. Why? I don't know. Whose responsible? My guess is someone who has access to the dungeons and is close to Salem. It could be any guard or maid. Or-

The door opens and Salem himself steps through.

He steps around the room with his hands clasped behind his back like he's sizing me, his pale eyes narrowed in curiosity.

He doesn't say anything. He must think I'm still knocked out. Why on Earth would he do this to me? And how did he get those creatures to do his bidding?

He reaches the front of my chair, careful to stay in the shadows. Even in negative he looks magnificent and beautiful. I see why he makes a great king. He practically radiates power and hope.

It must be his aura. Apparently he posses light magic in its purest form while his cousin Maleki posses dark magic in its purest form, both inherited from their fathers. No wonder they're enemies.

"I can feel your eyes on me," Salem says. "Even in that state."

I open my eyes and my vision returns to normal.

Salem smiles but it's not kind and warm like it usually is. It's cold and deceptive. He cocks his head.

"Don't worry, Miss Blakely," he soothes, his voice sweet and seductive. "I won't hurt you. I just want to talk."

"That's what they all say," I shoot back, my voice void of emotion.

He frowns and locks eyes with me. For the first time I see past his kind, light-giving leader facade and peer straight into his dark and cruel soul.

I finally see him for who he really is.

"I'm sure you are going to be interested in what I have to say," He snaps and a chair appears out of nowhere. He turns the back of the chair to me and sits in it, his arms draping over the back of it, and studies me with expectant blue eyes.

"What?" I snap at him.

He rolls his eyes. "Do you want me to tell you or not?"

I shrug and meet his gaze. "Sure. I'm always in the mood for a good story."

He scoffs. "It's not a story child. It's the truth," he leans closer. "So do you want to hear it or not?"

"Fine," I say through gritted teeth. He's really starting to piss me off.

He leans back and smiles sweetly, but I know now that that smile is just a front. "Good. First and for most, you should know that your friends are lying to you." I search his expression to see if he's lying.

He's not.

"Ok. If my friends are really lying to me, prove it." As I'm talking I silently attempt to raise the ground into a jagged spike to cut the rope on, but it doesn't obey. There must be something in this room that's blocking my magic.

Salem gets up and crosses the room into a shadowy corner. He returns with the staff with the dark substance in the glass orb at the top. The same one that he had the first time I visited the throne room with Fera.

"Do you know what this is?" he asks, gesturing at the staff.

"No." I answer truthfully. I would normally have answered with "It's a stick with a crystal ball at the top," but I can tell that Salem's not in the mood for sarcasm.

"Fera didn't tell you?" He smiles slightly. Probably at the fact that he's right.

"No. She didn't. Now can we please move on?" I recall the look on Fera's face when she saw the staff. She obviously knew exactly what it was.

Salem continues, obviously not ready to move on. "So she didn't tell you that what is in this," he taps the orb. "Could help you solve the mystery of the Forgotten King?"

I had almost forgotten about the entire mystery. But now I want nothing more than to know what this staff has to do with it.

"I'm guessing she didn't tell you then," He sits back in his chair holding the staff up beside him. "So would you like to know?"

I hesitate. Now that I've seen this darker side of Salem I don't know whether or not I can trust him or anything he says. But I nod anyway. He should at least think that I trust him.

"This," he says, pointing to the dark mass inside of the glass ball. "Is the magic of the Forgotten King himself."

Hey guys!! I know I haven't updated in a while. I just didn't feel like anyone was reading my stories anyway so I gave up for a while. I'm working my other stories too but I would love to continue this one. It would really mean a lot to me if you would tell me what you think!!