Brightening White Flowers

19. Roze

"We don't have much time." After her whispered words she spins around and pushes a couple of crates around. All of them are being pushed away from the middle of the shack. "They'll know you're here soon and look inside." The three of us continue to stand there and watch her. She huffs and gestures to the one crate left in front of her, "Some help please?"

Davian nods mutely and pushes that last crate as close to the wall opposing us as he can. I look at the area between the two of them and gasp as I see what she was slowly revealing. Carved into the packed earth floor is fire running up what appears to be a hill. To everybody else it would look just like a simple picture from a bored child, but to members with Kinza blood running through their veins it is an opening to an underground tunnel.

She's there rushing us forward though, "Hurry, come onto this side of me, sire." She points to right behind herself and he does so, without a single disgruntled look from the barely disguised order. Right as his feet touch the ground behind her she pricks her finger with a needle and squeezes a drop of blood out. It carries a faint smell of my blood. "From the blood and earth from once we came, protect me now in my hour of need."

Hana and I both look at her sharply.

"How could-" Hana is interrupted before she can finish.

"I'll tell you after we're far enough away," but Roze is seemingly prepared as she shoots out a blasé response.

Hana's mouth drops open. Her mind is in too much of a whirlwind to make any sense out of why ... but so is my own. Mine is swirling with past memories that I had tried so hard to forget.

She was the girl... she was the girl I brought back from the brink using my blood. I remember now. I remember the screams, the fire, the blood. They were all so very faint while I had lost control to the Hunger. Then suddenly, it was so very real. They were right there in front of me, unavoidable. The blood was all over my body, my clothes, under my nails, and in my hair. I was soaked in blood. Then... there was Roze. A little girl, about the same age as I was, under me. She was bleeding from a gaping wound in her neck. Her heartbeat was getting slower and weaker. And... it was all my fault. When I looked into her doeful eyes and saw the acceptance in them I finally understood what kind of a monster I really was.

I had killed so many.

Vaguely I am aware as suddenly the earth splits when that one droplet of her blood finally falls to the ground. There is no shaking or rumbling to accompany the split; only a portion of the earth splitting from the rest as if it was always a cellar door from the beginning of time. The hidden entrance is dark and smells of stale air. Hana stiffens next to me but she does not have a choice. Already I can hear the men from outside coming closer to our nondescript shack.

"Hurry!" Roze hisses.

It is the encouragement I need to push Hana forward closer to that dark abyss. She stumbles closer but before she can take the first step in Davian moves past her and into the darkness. His first step in he opens his hand, palm up, at chest height. In his open palm a bright flame sputters to life and continues to hover there perfectly, as if it is an egg resting in a nest. The flame ranges from white to a bright yellow. The light seems to calm Hana some as she descends the stairs with him as they hold hands. I take a moment to watch them because he appears like the Lightbearer with one hand out producing light and the other holding the hand of a loved one. Then, I follow after them. After my moment's pause Roze is quick to follow on my heels. The slab of earth closes behind Roze just as silently as it opened, just like we were told it would.

By the time we reach the bottom of the stairs the earth has sealed itself back into one again and the sounds from above are completely absent. Down here there is only the sounds of our jogging footsteps, Davian's and I sword sheathes slapping against our legs, and our breaths. We continue like that for a while but then Hana stops and turns around letting go of Davian's hand in the process.