Passion (Book 1 of "The Fantasy of Life" Series)

Chapter 44

Ashanaya

She tackled me to the ground, then stared down at me, smiling devillishly. She had long straight black hair, her eyes were menacing and red, her teeth sharp and her features just as sharp and a bit jagged. Her fingers were long and sharp, her arms thin and her body petite like normal elven girls. She was actually pretty short, only about 5'2 or 5'3, only about Kel's height, but she had a lot of strength despite her size. She had brown skin that was very light at the same time, similar to a lightly coloured tea. A darker skin colour such as this was actually pretty rare among elves, we were known for being pale, some of us having a slightly yellowed skin colour like wood nymphs.

"'Donashe, no killing the elven girl, I have plans for her.'" She rolled her eyes as she repeated something, something that she very obviously thought was stupid and unnecessary. I could almost see a tinge of jealousy to her tone and in her eyes. "Master never said anything about roughing ya up a bit before dragging your arse back to him by the ears."

I glared at her. "Tilthovaan." I whispered and she began to rise. She was struggling against invisible hands ever so slowly raising her up into the air. She struggled but it wasn't doing anything for her. I smiled at my success, I didn't often practice magic that didn't involve runes.

"You stupid garven, what are you doing to me?" She rose her voice to almost a scream. I began walking toward her, with a face full of feigned pity. I wiped the dirt off my clothes as I approached.

"Oh you poor thing. Never learn about elven magic, did you? You'd think there'd be something in your indoctrinary about it." I rolled my eyes and she fell the the ground, landing hard on her face but not seeming to break anything. "I'd suggest you start running back to your master. Tell him you failed, I'm sure he's worried about his pet anyway."

She pulled herself out of the dirt slowly, glaring at me as she did. She pulled a dagger from a belt she had and began running toward me with a loud yell, and furious look. I looked at her bored and began to open my mouth so I could restrain her again, but before I could the earth rose below her and launched her into the air.

She flailed her arms about as she rose into the air. I looked ahead of me and I saw York just standing watching as she rose. He walked toward me and made it in front of me as she landed back on the ground with a loud crack.

"Kalvakoth." He said and her arms began to move to her back against her will, then a solid pink energy bound them together. He turned around to face her. "That crack was your leg. I don't expect you'll make it very far with the bone in your leg broken."

"What the hell?" She practically spat on him.

"York, what are you-"

"I'm not fighting am I?" He didn't look at me, he kept his gaze firmly set on the elven girl.

"No but I thought you weren't supposed to use magic ei-"

"Look, we can't let her get away. What if the indoctrination can be reversed? If not on all of the Ashen then maybe of people like Shirajiin, this girl, even Valerie. Look at them, they certainly aren't as badly infected, there has to be something." He interupted me, knowing what I was saying, (which I guess at that point it was kind of obvious) and gestured to her as she laid weakly on the ground, staring at us angered and confused.

I froze. I hadn't considered it. "Do you really think-"

"Cullen could probably do it, we have to at least try." He did look at me this time, his eyes seemed to almost be pleading. He must've been thinking about this when he was in my tent waiting.

"Okay. But we have to be careful." I nodded.

"Alright." He smiled. He looked back down at Donashe. "If you hurt anyone in our camp, by any means possible, I will personally rip out your indoctrinary and shove it down your throat. It wouldn't be the first one I've ripped out."

She rolled her eyes just before he stepped up to her and heaved her up to her feet, she winced as she had to put weight on her foot, then she held on to York a little tighter and stood on one foot.

"No more eye-rolling either, I won't have any sass." He added.

She let out a long annoyed (slightly pained) sigh. "Why can't you just kill me? It'd be a charity compared to whatever the hell this is."

York ignored her.

I caught up to them, and stood next to York. "We can't do it now, when we go after Valerie we'll just have to leave her at the camp or something and do it after, if we can. We don't have the time to spend on it, we've had like 3 run-ins with Ashen over the past day alone."

"If we try before then maybe it won't be a fight, we could just turn Valerie back to normal." He looked over at me, having to look down slightly.

"No." I looked forward. "She needs to die."

"Well, okay. But we do need to at least try it on.." He looked to the girl expectantly.

She rolled her eyes again. "Donashe."

"Donashe." He finished. "See, is it so hard to cooperate?"

She glared at him. "I'll rip your eyes out."

"I encourage you to try." He smiled at her, which seemed to make her even more mad.

"We can try it on her, it'd be a relief to know if we can change them back." I answered.

"I don't know what you two are on about, nothing's changed about me, I just know who's going to win." She stuck her nose up.

"You really think nothing's changed?" York raised his eyebrow at her.

"I think I'd know if something about me changed." She rolled her eyes. She seems to do that a lot.

"Wow, she's delusional." I laughed.