The Eclipse Empire (Might rewrite this someday. It's terrible.)

Chapter 14 (Samuel's Perspective)

The throne room of the palace was huge. Most of the room was empty space, but that was probably for gatherings. A humongous throne say against the back wall, with a long carpet rolled out from underneath it. Tapestries of eclipses were hung on every wall. The room was nearly as dazzling as the outer walls of the castle, so I had to squint to keep myself from losing my vision.
Ipanel, Omma and I were standing before the almighty giant cat thing that apparently everyone had to obey, including those who weren't even part of the Exquisite Empire or whatever it was called. The beast was covered in pink and purple stripes, with the two unnatural-looking scars running down their sides like a brook and seeming to radiate power.
"About time," one of the heads, the one who I assumed to be Solar, rumbled. He gazed down at us with a wicked smile on his face.
"Okay, quit it with the creepy smiling and just tell them what you wanted so desperately to tell them," Lunar, the other head, growled.
"Can you at least be the slightest bit patient? I'm trying to strike fear into these petty excuses for creatures!" Solar whispered to his twin loudly. He sighed and turned his focus back to us. "Now, I'm sure you've heard of the new arena I built by now-" he started.
"Uh, sir, you didn't build it. We did," a guard with a deep voice interrupted, gesturing to the two other guards next to him, who nodded in agreement.
Solar growled deeply. "You three are going to be severely punished after I'm done with these prisoners."
"S-sorry, sir," the guard apologized quietly, taking a few steps backwards.
Solar sighed again, rubbing the space between his eyes. "These guards give me serious headaches. Anyway," he said, looking down at us again. "Where were we?" Before anyone could reply, he continued. "Ah, yes, the arena that I built. Well, do you little guys know what we're going to use that arena for?"
"Uh...fighting?" Ipanel guessed.
"Correct! Aren't you a little smarty-paws? Do you want to know the prize for guessing right on the first try?" Solar asked enthusiastically, smiling menacingly again.
"Not really," Ipanel replied.
"Well, too bad! The prize for guessing correctly is- drumroll, please," he said, and the guards began drumming their paws aggressively. Eventually, Solar said, "Okay, stop the drumming. The prize for guessing correctly is a free pass to be the first fighter in the arena! Isn't that exciting?"
"That's the exact opposite of what I would call exciting," Ipanel muttered, but Solar ignored them.
"The fights start tomorrow! Oh, and you two," the emperor boomed, his voice echoing across the grand room. He gestured his paw towards me and Omma. "You two get a front row seat of the wonderfully bloody battle!"
"Um, excuse me, sires," a new, small voice broke in. I looked in the direction of the voice. 1, one of the beings that had kidnapped me, was standing behind us. He was clearly trembling.
"Ugh, what do you want, you terrible excuse for a servant?" Solar snapped.
1 flinched at the emperor's tone, then stood up straight. "Why do the prisoners have to fight? Some of them might not have any experience in battling, and that's quite the unfair disadvantage."
"Listen, idiot, we've been over this before," Solar growled. "It's for my entertainment. Now, quit bothering me and go back to your cell."
The servant sighed sadly and walked out of the room. I started to feel bad for the creature. Maybe not everyone in this empire was insane. I turned my head back to the two headed beast.
"I'm done with these prisoners. Take them back to the dungeon," Solar was saying in a rather bored voice. The guards surrounded the three of us and led us back to the cell.
"Don't you dare think of escaping," one guard snarled at me while slamming the door shut. I heard the sound of keys clanging together and the click of the lock.
Once the guards were gone, Ipanel walked up to the locked door, studying it.
"Staring at the door isn't going to help us get out of here," Omma commented.
Ipanel looked back at Omma with a frustrated expression, then stared at the door again. We heard another click of the lock and Ipanel practically jumped out of their skin. The door opened slowly, and to our surprise, 1 was standing in the doorway instead of the haughty guards.
"I'm getting you guys out of here," he whispered.
Omma hesitated. "I don't trust you," she remarked bitterly, scrunching up her snout.
"Omma, this is our chance to escape," I told her. She seemed to disregard me.
"Guys, please," 1 said desperately. "I can't stand seeing helpless prisoners die under the Emperors' paws."
"We aren't helpless, idiot," Omma snarled. "Sam- WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"
I began to walk out of the small cell with Ipanel following. I turned back to Omma. "Stay here if you want, but I'm going with 1. I trust him."
She paused for a moment, looking wildly around the room. She huffed and followed 1 out of the cell.
We walked past other cells and cages, occasionally hearing the screeches and mumbles of prisoners who had gone mad. Luckily, all the noise had hidden the sound of our footsteps. Strangely, there were no guards around.
"Where are all the guards?" I asked quietly.
"At a meeting," 1 answered. "I figured that the gathering would be enough of a distraction to be able to get you out of the palace safely."
I nodded and our group continued on in silence. Ipanel was inspecting the walls of the castle, probably trying to figure out the material they were made of. Omma was growling softly and keeping a good distance between her and 1.
Eventually, we came to a small hidden doorway that was most likely used by escaping hostages. Omma took a few steps closer to me, as if wanting to defend me in case anything dangerous jumped through the door. Fortunately, nothing came lunging at us when we stepped outside.
I expected Ipanel to run off into the trees the moment the cold earth was under their feet, but they stayed right next to me, to my surprise. 1 kept walking and checking back at us to see if we were still following, which was pretty odd. I began to have my doubts about the strange creature. Where was he leading us? Was Omma right not to trust him?
Despite my worries, I kept following him since he knew the forest better than anyone else in the little group.
"Where are you taking us?" Omma asked suspiciously.
"I'm taking you to someone who can get you back to the prairies way faster than I ever could," 1 answered. He stopped beside a huge, sparkling lake. The water was clearer than a brand new mirror. Something about the lake radiated a certain wrongness.
1 tapped the surface of the lake, sending ripples across a wide extent of the water. After a moment, the ripples came straight back to the edge of the pool. I noticed that the source of the disturbance was coming from the center of the reservoir. Was 1 really planning on taking us to the prairies by using a water creature? I didn't remember seeing a water source around the place where I fell into this dimension.
A muffled, bubbly roar sounded from underneath the surface of the lake, sending shivers down my spine. A huge silhouette was rising up from under the water, getting bigger and bigger by the second. Whatever 1 brought us to, it was gigantic. Oh, and, also, it didn't sound very friendly. More like a, "I'll kill anyone I see," type of creature.
After the unbearable suspense, the beast rose out of the water with a loud, booming roar, shaking the earth and trees.