Dark Hearts

Chapter 3

A/N: One of the most beautiful women on this planet in my opinion, also the wonderful Princess.

The princess remained silent, staring at him for a while before retracting her eyes to skim the vast forest around the two with wonder. Cade did not understand what else intrigued the girl about the dark trees and the ghastly smell; the scene was set with nothing more to add or determine. Even though the setting established itself with familiarity to him, Cade felt a sense of freedom run through his head at the possibilities waiting ahead of them and the lure of the shadows captivated him. Here in this secluded area of the world where rules did not keep him shackled down and people did not latch onto him, Cade felt alive.
"It is much... darker than I imagined," The princess commented, scrunching her nose for a moment like a twitching mouse and then looked at the boy.
Cade coughed up a dry laugh, furrowing his eyebrows at her words. "It's darker than you imagined? What, the name did not give you enough of a clue to its nature." He thought the royals were supposed to be more educated than the commoners, especially when it came to natural instinct.
She rolled her eyes at the tone of his voice but let a smirk slip out on her lips. The lack of light made her features more prominent, as if she were the only source of color against the obscurus palette. "Very funny-" She paused for a moment with a look of confusion on her face, as if pondering how on earth she could have missed valuable information. It cleared quickly by a soft smile that Cade had never seen a person wear before. "I was going to address you by your proper name but then I realized that you never told me it. It's only fair that I know yours since you know mine."
"I would have told you it, but you never asked. Being unknown is better than being known," He commented with a small smirk at the confused look on the girl's face. It gave him great satisfaction to have the girl questioning everything she knew, constantly wondering what his cryptic words meant. Before, the idea of purposefully driving someone to the edge of sanity because of his remarks and actions made him upset yet now he understood the rush of excitement that people gained from it.
"Well now I am asking; what is the name of the quiet bar-boy: thief in the night?"
"Thief in the night? I do like the sound of that. Makes me sound much more exciting than I really am."
Cade felt his cheeks prick slightly at the sound of her soft laugh. "Just answer the question."
A grin captured his face and he rolled his eyes nonchalantly. "Alright alright, princess. You are now acquainted with the one and only: Cade." His chest fell forward to the ground and he made a scene of throwing his left arm into the air behind his head while the other latched onto his upper body. Again she chuckled and when he stood back up, Cade found himself staring at the smile on her lips.
"Well then," The princess moved so she stood right in front of him with her right arm sticking out. "It is my pleasure to meet you, Cade."
For a slight second, he watched her hand, contemplating exactly what he was diving head first into but the moment ended and he found that the skin of her hand was precisely how he imagined; dainty and soft. "Pleasure to meet you, Ivory." The satisfaction she wore put him on ease but did not urge him to regret anything. She had gotten what she desired; no remaining borders to prevent the boy from denying her request and that bothered him. For now, Cade was at her mercy but it would take the depths of below to stop him from flipping the tables eventually.
"I think that's the first time you have called me by my actual name instead of a silly pet name." She unsealed their hands and proceeded to fold them across her chest with a smirk.
"Don't get too comfortable, princess." Cade chuckled at the scowl directed towards him. He never realized how comforting it was to have someone to talk to for more than a simple hello or quick question.
"I guess accepting the fact that you are going to be an absolute pain in my side will be a great quest as well," She joked with a smirk that held more thoughts to it than Cade could decipher in the moment. Interactions with people was something he thought he mastered as easily as a quick hand but clearly the main key escaped his grasp. No matter how much time he thought about it, he doubted the reason behind the fact that the princess accepted a friendship between the two so easily would ever make sense.
"Indeed it will." Turning away from the girl, Cade glanced around the woods with cautious eyes. Their dawdling stuck out as an abnormality and the dangers that followed those unlike the natives did not sound pleasing to him. "Come on, we should start moving. The trees have eyes and ears trained for those they do not know." A breeze brushed his cheeks and he decided to unravel the bundle of cloth in his arms and fasten the cloak around his neck. Some of the poorly stitched fabric roughly hit the skin and tiny bumps erupted around the area in which the metal clasp touched.
"What do you mean the trees have ears? Are they not just trees?" Ivory questioned, standing closer to Cade than he expected with her eyes scanning the surroundings heavily. It must have unsettled her to think that there were more things than just the two of them in the middle of the silent woods. Perhaps the absence of noise crept into her mind quicker than he anticipated.
Cade followed her eyes, scanning the dark wood for any sign of the many creatures he had read about in the browned pages of the journal, yet the knowledge that their conversation was not between two people seemed plainly obvious. "You really have not seemed to grasp the fact that we are no longer in our world. Nothing is as it seems and even then it is best not to trust your suspicions." Something rustled quietly in the brush to his left and he could see Ivory tense with a jaw clenched in fear. They both starred in the general direction of the noise for longer than they cared to admit, mostly out of angst at the prospect of a dangerous intruder they were unprepared for.
"What was that? Cade, what was that?" She whispered harshly, never removing her eyes from the shrubs. The disguised fear pooling out of her feet began to drown Cade and he needed to find a raft quickly before he doomed them both.
"How am I supposed to know? I'm sure it's nothing," He drew his eyes away from the abyss of rotted vegetation, grabbing her upper arm lightly in an urge to pull her away as well. "Come on, we have to keep moving." Another chill drifted through the air as if warning the pair not to venture further or face a premonition worthy of the darkness surrounding them.
Ivory did not respond to his words, most likely taking in the knowledge that they were not alone in the dark woods and trying to accept the fact that this world would not be the same as the one she grew up in. She remained quiet as he scanned the rotting vegetation again but stood closer to the boy than he was used to, close enough that he could feel the emission of terror-fueled heat from her body. Before he began to walk further down the path he watched the princess carefully stare into the distance as she slowly pulled the hood up and over the cap of her head. Cade wanted to irritate her by saying that the action was unnecessary but quickly realized that the sight of the isolated figure would draw more attention than they desired. It surprised him that she had enough sense to create that deduction but it also troubled him that her decision held truth.
Cade motioned with a jerk of his head down the path for them to begin their walk through foreign territory, unprepared and unarmed. As they walked Ivory kept her head focused mostly on the untreated walkway where leaves would scuff against her shoes then crumble to dust beneath her weight. At times Cade watched as she bobbed slightly as if she were walking on the tips of her toes so not to crush the last bits of life. The boy did the opposite of his partner, constantly peering into the surroundings and to their backs so that nothing would surprise him or so that he could get a head start and prevent his death for as long as possible. Whenever an occasional rustle would fill the air, Ivory would become alert and perk, flickering to every soot-colored tree with curious eyes. Cade continued to assure her that nothing would step foot into their line of sight, at least not until nightfall dipped the remaining color in darkness, but as the noises continued to increase the words began to sound less truthful.
The scattered light from the nonexistent sun cast eerie shadows of the dying vegetation and created pictures of moving creatures that melted back and forth from the darkness to the visibility. An atmosphere of fear seemed to have taken over the woods and it made sense that people were so terrified of the forest simply because they were stuck in a pit of the unknown with no light of knowledge. For the period of time that the two found themselves stranded in the untraveled, nothing bothered them in the slightest, save for their growing fear of what could or what would. Breezes of chilled wind jumped between the branches of the trees and performed an orchestra of noise that had no correlation to what lay waiting the brush.
Cade found himself lost in his thoughts quickly with nothing else to keep him distracted but would attempt to grasp the stable ground of reality every time he heard Ivory suck in a breath or a scuffle of leaves registered in his ears. He wondered for a brief moment in the silence how this forest made its reputation if people barely dared to go past its entrance. If this was the constant attitude he could not understand why people frowned upon it so heavily.
But the ponderings of a boy who hardly scratched the surface of the world meant little to a whole and the thoughts slipped away. It was then he realized the pair's lack of preparation for this trip and decided that supplies would be their first stop.
"Ivory, what do you have on you right now?" He asked in a low voice, still careful not to attract ears of those that would be too eager to engage in conversation with the two. The girl frowned slightly before checking the pockets on both sides of her cloak and the hidden crevices on her outfit. A small clang of coins and the shuffling of paper made itself present to him.
She returned from her examination with a somber look and pursed lips. "All I have is a couple silvers, some useless paper, and maybe one or two pocket-knives. The rest of my stuff is back at the inn and I was not really expecting to be leaving in such a rush." Her words were pointed like a spear blade at Cade which made him smirk lightly when she rose an eyebrow at him. The grin was brief until he realized that their situation was worse than he previously imagined.
He sighed heavily, checking his pockets for any object that he might have missed in his mental check. "Well, collectively, we have four knives, about sixty gold pieces, some silver, a broken compass, paper, and this notebook. I would say we are set for disaster, would you?" There was another item stuffed in the bottom of the bag that Cade made sure not to tell Ivory, and shoved it further into the crevices so she wouldn't find it. It was difficult to pull the joke from his lips at a moment like this but he figured it would be best rather than scream out in frustration like he was doing internally.
"This is not my fault in any way, just so you know. I wasn't the imbecile that thought it would be smart to steal from a drunk in the middle of the night." Again Ivory chastised him with her eyebrows but kept her voice hushed so that the wind caught the echos and never let them escape. Her hands were both hidden beneath the loose fabric of her cloak, hanging closely to her side where Cade imagined one of her weapons sat in wait.
"I am well aware this is not your fault, princess, but you can not blame me when I live in a town sinking to hell with people far worse than me. It may seem petty but I do what I need to survive and if you can not accept that then we are going to have some issues." His tone was harsh with a bit that latched its teeth into her mind and did not let go until marks were left, fresh and deep. Surprisingly the anger did not reflect in his volume but rathered simmered in his face and words.
"Your way of life is your own, Cade, make no mistake in that. But don't dig your grave and then refuse to lay in it. You picked that fight and if you don't want to accept it, that's an issue you need to address with yourself." Every word that spilt from her lips had a tick in his head growing viciously so that the anger he felt was magnified so that not even their predicament could steal his attention away. The way she looked at him made him twitch his lips into a frown; it was so nonchalant yet left a tiny crack so that a flash of concern caught his eyes.
"Must you continue to speak as if I am completely unaware of the mistakes I've made." He stopped in his tracks to glare at the girl for her arrogance. Never before had he felt an infuriating dislike for another person. "I know what I have done and I do not need your title getting your head to the point where you think you can tell me what to do. 'Cause out here you're not princess Ivory, out here you're just another girl with dreams waiting to meet the depressing ending of reality." The sharp bite in his words was evident and the trees most definitely had their branches drooping to hear as much of the argument as they could.
Cade knew what he said was inappropriate and that Ivory did not deserve all of his anger but she was the closest outlet and some of the guilt lay with her as well. He expected her to burst like a flame against oil but instead the anger remained on her face in a deep scowl, one that was too slow to shield the hurt she felt. Yet he did not remove his own glare; his pride demanded some form of an apology and he would not budge until he received it. If there was one thing an orphan with nothing to offer could hold dear it would be that he would not bend like grass in the breeze.
"There are many things I wish to say to you at this moment but for the sake of our lives and your pride, I am choosing to remain silent."
"My pride? My pride?! You have got to be joking." He did not want to admit to her, not even in the slightest, that she was correct. "You think this is about my pride? I could care less about my appearance to others nor the fact that you insulted me."
"I beg to differ. The fact that you are so desperately trying to refute the fact that your pride is not an issue right now poses the fact that it is." She looked at him with a smug grin, reveling in the knowledge that Cade was irked beyond belief at the moment. He hated the way that she smirked at him, the way that she knew his pride had been affected yet poked at the fact.
"You- you are infuriating!" He hissed, not being able to come up with any other response that would save his skin from the growing embarrassment.
"Oh trust me, you are just the same," She retorted with a look of disinterest on her face, not even bothered by the fact that she had insulted herself as well as her companion. It only confused him more by the way she was acting and he was unsure whether or not to feel anger at the girl.
Before he could do something that he would regret, Cade scowled at the girl and walked off down the path to put some distance between his impulses and his rationale. The gap wasn't much but it was enough to where Ivory could talk at a normal level and Cade could hear, and that if one were to face danger the other could assist them quickly. He was able to distinguish the sounds of her footsteps against the crumbling leaves and made sure that any other slight change in the constant would be his top concern. The scuffling of his own boots against the ground would reel his mind away from the current priority but a brief distraction eventually shoved him back into focus.
For the first few minutes after his reaction the only feeling pulsing throughout his body was hostility at Ivory's words, not because she had spoken them but because she was aware of the truth behind them yet chose to push anyways. He had given himself too much credit for being aware of the rules of the reckless life and ignored the possibility that she could have been aware as well. Originally he wanted to apologize, he wanted to mend the mistake he created with the first person he could have considered a friend. But once she continued to establish a reputation between the two, that was when Cade decided that she did not deserve a fuel to her ego.
It was a longer into his cool-down the Cade realized that maybe Ivory did not need an apology but they were both in the wrong and it was useless to act like children if they were to work together. However his mind remained split down the middle between reeling in the courage to turn around and walk by her side, and continuing onward at his pace until he reached his desired destination. He wondered if Ivory regretted say those things to him, if the statements were said in the moment or she had them previously thought out to use against him in the exact situation she did. It came across him to question where she had learned to counter like she did in a place where everyone bowed at her feet and kissed the floor as she commanded.
The questions fell away at the sight of a particular tree down the path ahead, one with a gaping hole in the trunk that gave a glimpse at the dark roots of the forest. It happened to be the tree he had set out for and nearing it meant shortening the time he had to earn the courage and sort out their argument, because passing that tree meant sealing their fate in the forest and no turning back. He had to do it now or it would never happen.
Just as he was about to turn to face her, he heard the sound of running feet and felt something brush his arm. When he looked beside him Cade found the girl walking at his pace with her eyes focused on the ground in front of them with her lips pursed and eyebrows furrowed. Apparently he would not have to be the one gathering the courage to address their argument; he felt smug at that fact but decided it best to keep it to himself.
Ivory sighed lightly, a noise that would have gone unnoticed had they been outside the forest. "Listen, I am sorry for what I said to you. It was uncalled for and impolite," She spoke quietly almost in a mutter and Cade smirked to himself to know how much of a pain it was for her to be the one to apologize. But the look quickly vanished from his face when Ivory glanced up at him to gauge his reaction. He hoped she had not seen it.
"I accept your apology, princess." A thought came running into his brain with a devious smirk while screaming trouble; he decided to do it anyways. "I'm just glad you finally saw reason and decided to apologize." He grinned down at her when her head snapped up to meet his with an open mouth and wide eyes.
Thankfully she understood the joking tone in his voice and a grin overtook her face, after she slapped his arm of course. "You are such an ass," She chuckled while shaking her head at him. Cade laughed in response and kept a grin on his lips, standing slightly taller as he walked.
"No need to be so rude, princess. An ass has his purposes."
"Oh yes how could I be so forgetful. An ass must fulfill his duties as the stupidest of beings and abide to everyone else's biddings."
"You know, you aren't so bad, princess. When you're not acting like one, that is. Otherwise you can be kind of funny, and I mean only slightly." He glanced down at her out of the corner of his eye, pretending to be nonchalant when he complimented her. It was not usual for him to be so frank, or polite, when speaking to people.
"When I'm not acting like a princess?" She questioned, looking up at him with a raised brow and tiny grin.
"Yeah, when you're not acting like you don't know anything about this part of the world or when you act like nothing can cut you down from that pedestal your parents built for you." They made eye contact and Cade knew he had the girl in the palm of his hands. "But don't worry, I'll get that out of your head in no time."
She scoffed and she her head again. It would be difficult to crack the stone surrounding her thoughts but for once Cade was determined to do something and this would be it. He couldn't explain his desire to get through to her but it stuck. There had to be some correlation between his desire to broaden her mind and the coincidence that they ended up forced together by fate. People always spoke of fate's jests and his fascination with tampering with people but Cade never believed them until now.
"How exciting that will be. I get to have a tavern-boy inflict his ways upon my thoughts until he is satisfied that I won't return to my castle the same." He could tell she was trying to joke by the small simper on her ruby lips.
He hummed in agreement, choosing not get offended by the slight jab at his origins. "Got that right, princess. You'll never want to go back when I'm done with you, trust me on that."
The pair had reached the tree with the gaping hole in the middle and Cade stopped in front of the trunk without saying a word to Ivory. He bent down at the knees until most of his cloak brushed against the soft ground and leaves stuck to the uneven stitches. Shuffling a pile of dead leaves, Cade dug out a large knapsack from beneath the dead vegetation and stood up again. Some of the tree appendages managed to slip inside the folded leather and rested atop the bundle of items within the sack. When Cade was satisfied that nothing had mysteriously gone missing since he planted the reassurance pack, he hauled it over his shoulder and turned back to his companion.
Ivory had her small nose scrunched on her face and lines etched themselves into his skin around the area. "Explain, please."
Cade began to walk once more on the trail but at a slower pace than before. One where he could multitask but not become too tired at the efforts. "Well when I first arrived to that hellhole, the forest was the most interesting thing I could find. Now I was much younger and I did not understand the ways of life nor the dangers of this forest but I filled up a sack of stolen things and headed out without a glance backwards. At first everything seemed to be going well, that is until I got to that tree back there. That was where I had my first encounter with a volhound and the bastard made sure I turned around and never looked back." A slight discomfort raced down his arm from the connecting bone when he brought up the brutal encounter with the devil-wolf.
He looked down at Ivory to see her staring up at him with concern, and to mask the discomfort he felt not only in his arm but his mind he smirked lightly. "You were attacked by a volhound? And you lived?" She asked in shock.
"I wouldn't be telling you right now if I had died would I?" Cade was confused by the concern she was showing, he didn't know how to counter it. Was it normal for someone to be that worried about another's well-being.
"Cade that's not an easy thing to do, especially since you survived and summed up enough courage to come back in here." There was something hidden beneath the words she spoke, a lace of emotion that stuck out to him in a way that had him curious. It was in moments similar to these that Cade found it difficult to relate to the natural reactions between a pair of people, times where he wished that he had been able to create those bonds with others.
"Maybe you should start calling me a knight or something noble, since I clearly have the courage of one. Wouldn't that be a title to make all the lowlifes jealous: Sir Cade, Knight and Courageous man," He boasted out to her, mimicking a stance close to what he imagined newly inaugurated soldiers did when they stood in front of their leaders. Yet he made sure that the enjoyment he was receiving did not accentuate the two, their recklessness was beginning to take over.
Ivory grinned with humor. "What a name indeed. And maybe one day I will become just another humble town-woman who lives in her small stone house with her farmer husband." Cade enjoyed her smile; he liked making the pull of her lips appear after he spoke but he also found pleasure in the way that she would make herself smile.
"I think our dreams are too far-fetched for us to believe they will ever come true," He tried not to sound as somber as the words truly were but failed when the sadness of his reality peeked through.
"Wishes are never too extensive that they will never happen. If you believe it enough, one day it will come true."
"I don't think there will be many things that we can agree one, I hope you know that and chose to pick your battles carefully."
"That may or may not be my biggest issue. I can never chose which battles to fight and which to sit back and watch the outcome occur. Call it a never-ending desire for excitement."
"Or a death wish."
Ivory frowned at his words, keeping her mouth closed in what Cade hoped was her attempt at seeing the reason behind what he said. While the girl pondered over the fine line between life and death, Cade opened up the sack to check and make sure everything was the same as he left it all those years ago. Thankfully he had not been stupid enough to pack perishable items that would have been left for the ravagers the second the bag left his possession. A folded piece of parchment paper that was thicker than what people considered their normal stack and Cade recalled that the loony traveler he had stolen it from called it a map of the otherside.
He pulled it out and unfolded it so that he could gaze upon the entirety of the forest. Small blotches of ink stained the paper where he assumed towns had been built full of a miscellaneous bunch of creatures, while thin tendrils of black stretched across the pages in a desperate attempt to coat it in the darkness it represented. Few different drawings covered the paper in what he guessed were different terrains or sections of the land with a heavy significance. Words had been scribbled beneath the splotches of ink but some had withered away from lack of use. A wavy line of messy x's lined the bottom of the page and Cade realized it represented the border between the two pieces of the same land, and the closest dot of ink caught his eye; Hollow.
"What is that?" Ivory whispered, leaning over his arm to get a glimpse at the faded paper. He hadn't realized that they stopped walking.
"It's the Dark Forest. Every town that one of the only travelers managed to see," He answered back, never removing his eyes from the map, trying to memorize every detail he could in the little time it spent out in the open. The largest stain of ink caught his eye and he knew instantly that it stood for the castle of the damned. He pointed to it but refrained from touching the page. "Here is where we are headed. That is where you'll find the answers to all your questions. But it's also one of the most dangerous places in this land, so I'll ask once more: are you absolutely sure you want to do this?"
Cade turned away from the map and stared at Ivory until she too tore her eyes away from the ink and gazed at him with the captivating green of her irises. She did not even have to speak the words for him to know exactly what she was thinking and she knew it too. "There's no turning back, not now." Her eyes returned to the map and locked onto the large kingdom, the center of all. "That's where we're going and only the damned will stop us. We're headed to her kingdom, the Evil Queen. Poisana."

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A/N: If anyone was looking for a few more chapters they're coming but the next one following the last that I update won't come out for a while cause I want to get ahead with my writing. The reason I'm posting three chapters tonight is because I'm entering this in a contest to get some feedback and possibly recognition and I need five chapters up to post so if anyone's reading, here you go. Until next time. ;)