The Dark World

Chapter Two: Falling Bodies

Falling was the easy part. It was the landing that always got her. This time was no different.

Gasping, her lungs struggled to pull air, as if they had forgotten how to be lungs. Rolling over on her side proved even more painful. Searing electric currents shot through her right shoulder and sparked across her back until all she could feel was an intense burn, like a wild fire raging  down her spine. And, she swore she had just slid into an elbow. Not her elbow. Another person's elbow. Which didn't seem right.

"Ma'am?" a small voice tugged at her between labored breaths.

Sluggishly, she tried to push herself up onto her hands. But, the task was made somewhat difficult by all the extra appendages.

Mina squinted at the additional pair of arms and legs. Had the fall really been that bad? she wondered.  She shouldn't be seeing double.

"Ma'am!" this time the voice snapped at her, hitting her like a lash of a whip to the cheek.

Mina started, blinking away the blackness edging her vision.

"Are you alright, ma'am?"

Mina squeezed her eyes shut and opened them wide.

Only when her vision cleared did she realize that, no, she had not magically acquired an extra set of arms and legs. She had fallen on a boy. A blond boy, who was probably a few years younger than she was.

"Sorry!" she cried.

Scrambling to her feet, Mina tried her best to ignore the aching throb vining down her shoulder. To her relief, clenching and relaxing her right hand did not trigger any electric shocks of pain. The ensuing agony of trying to lift her arm, however, nearly blinded her. Every fiber in her shoulder howled in anguish, unceasing, burning anguish.

Dammit, she grimaced as she tried to shake the pain away. She couldn't afford a break right now. Her friends' lives were like sands flowing through an hour glass, and there were only a few grains left. And, as an added bonus, she now had the Commander of the First Order to contend with.

Could things possibly get worse? 

Mina had a sinking feeling that they could.

"I'm alive," the boy said, clearly oblivious to her distress.

"So sorry about that. I didn't mean to fall on you." She bent down and offered the boy her left hand.

At least her dominant arm wasn't injured, she noted with relief, when he took hold of her and began steadying his weight against her.

The boy chuckled lightly. "I imagine not. No one ever intends to fall on someone else."

He clambered to his feet, the leather soles of his slippers scuffing against the gravel path. "How did you fall out of the window," he lifted his head, eyes searching for the open window among the rows of windows overlooking the courtyard, "of what appears to be the Queen's quarters?"

Mina dusted off the dried leaves and pine straw from the fall of her skirt. "I stumbled into some bad lighting while cleaning."

The boy grinned slightly at this. Mischief danced in his green eyes.

"Why are you out here?" Mina shot back, feeling slightly defensive. "It's freezing and you're dressed in," she stopped short, not realizing until right then that the boy was wearing only a silk lavender robe and a pair of slippers with the King's crest sewn into the fabric of the toe cap. His blond mop of curls was wild, his lips bruised, and his cheeks flushed.

The boy's grin lengthened. "How about you don't mention you saw me in the King's bedclothes, and I won't mention that?" he said, nodding at the sapphire necklace laying at Mina's feet.