A Mess of a World: the Etched Stone

2.5) Damen

"Happy now?" He asked, rubbing his forehead. "Go figure that you go after a cuckoo."

"And I thought that Steeb was crazy." Zaki'a said. "Do you think that really happened to her?"

"Either it did or she's crazy." Damen said.

Then the two said the same thing at the same time, "Why would a mage go out of her way to take her memories?"

Damen bit back a smile while Zaki'a furrowed her brow, deep in thought. "Why would she? If it's true..."

"What do you think we should do, Zak?"

She coughed. "Well, we can't let them go to Spirit's Wood."

"I wasn't considering that." He sighed in frustration.

Zaki'a's eyes lit up, the way they always did when she had an idea. "We'll take them with us then."

"What?"

She lowered her voice. "We cannot let them into Spirit's Wood, so we will pretend that we're going to help them get into the forest, but we have to report to Raxis in Ebin first. We finish up there and drop the girls off at a Krerlon orphanage on our way back to Wairem."

"An orphanage? Is that really necessary?"

"Do you have any better ideas? Should we send them off to their deaths?" Zaki'a asked, pursing her lips. "Or let us get the guards they said were chasing them! I'm sure they'll be very lenient."

But deceiving them? And then deserting them? Damen thought guiltily.

Neither of the two were ones for deceit, so this must have been a last resort plan she'd thought of.

Zaki'a opened the door and Sama scrambled away from the window while Jade stood staring defiantly at them. "You said you'd let us go." She said slowly, curling her hands into fists.

"Would you calm down? We want to help you." Zaki'a said, holding her hands up as a gesture of peace.

"We believe you two, but you have a lot riding on voices in your head. No offense," Damen looked at Jade. "But lost memories or not, the Unworthy- Ethereals are no joke. They will attack anyone who enters the woods."

"Damen, what if...?" Zaki'a said trailing off. She caught his eye and seemed to try to send a message across with just her eyes.

"I just thought... emmories." She mumbled.

Jade and Sama exchanged confused glances.

Damen's blood went cold. Emmories? The Witchas. But if that was true... "You don't know that."

"The King's Court," Zaki'a said.

"We'll talk about that at a more reasonable time." He told her. "The main reason we're here is to tell you two-" He looked at each of the girls in turn. "- that you will be coming with us. We want to help, and we're much more experienced. We'll take you to Spirit's Wood... but we have some business in a neighboring kingdom first. You'll come with us and when we're done we'll help you."

He felt an emptiness in his stomach as he carefully worded his proposition.

The girls exchanged another look, but it was evident that they knew they had no better solution.

Jade took a few steps forward, looking directly into his eyes.

"No."

What? "No?"

"I don't believe you." She said firmly.

"His wording's too fancy, innit? Like something's up." Sama added, narrowing her eyes. "And what about you?" She looked at Zaki'a.

"We truly want to help you. I promise." Zaki'a said, looking at Damen expectantly.

"I promise too."

Jade eyed them warily. "Fine. For now."

"We'll be back in the morning. Sleep." Zaki'a said.

There was nothing more that Damen wanted than a clean conscience, but sleep would have to come first.