Erivale: The Lost Princess

Chapter 15: Part 1

I landed a particularly heavy blow of the sword onto Ulric's side, signaling the end of our sparring match. I had won. My sword fighting skill had improved rapidly within the two weeks since the Winter Solstice Festival. This improvement is mostly due to my new found hatred of Ulric. It's a lot easier to fight with him when I was mad at him.

My danger awareness was also growing stronger. And I now could now sense things even if they weren't threatening. It wasn't all the time. But if someone walked up behind me, I would know they were there before they made any other indication otherwise.

For sparring lessons, like today, it made Ulric work even harder to try and fight me. We split our matches about half the time now. Ulric also wasn't pleased with being bested often. Moral of the story was our friendship was almost nonexistent now. We were both upset with one another, we hardly talked, even during our lessons. And let me tell you, having someone try to teach you something without actually saying anything is very difficult.

I left the practice facility cursing Ulric out in my mind as I marched back up to the palace. I had my eyes set on a nice long bath before my literature lesson.

As I walked through the hallways back to my room, I couldn't keep my mind from mulling over Ulric, again. I was tired of thinking about him, but I just couldn't. The insufferable man has the audacity to flirt with me and then push me away and say he doesn't like me. Nice to know I was just a toy to him while he just got money for teaching me.

Most of my anger was the sting of rejection and the realization that all this time, I truly meant nothing to him. To feel that you are insignificant in the eyes of someone you liked was one of the worst feelings I had ever experienced. And okay, yes, I'll admit it. I like Ulric, a lot, but I'll quickly have to crush those feelings now. They were stupid anyway.

I stumbled in my thoughts of Ulric when a piercing alarm sounded throughout the palace. I was horribly confused; I never even know such an alarm system existed within this building.

A young servant ran by me and I tried to ask him what was going on, but he just screamed, "Rebels!" and disappeared around the corner.

Pressure began building in my gut, the pressure of my danger intuition and that's when I knew. Rebels were attacking the palace.

I scanned my surroundings and tried to listen to any sounds, but it appeared as if I was alone. I was unarmed, but I could rely on my intuition and hand to hand combat skills if need be.

I had never been in a situation like this, but I knew standing in the middle of the hallways like a lame-duck was the worst option. I figured my safest bet would be to make it back to my room where Fenrir and Gerard were.

Beginning to creep through the hall quietly I stayed on high alert for any sign of trouble. But I didn't really need my eyes; my intuition would tell me before they could.

About halfway back to my room, the pressure blossomed quickly along my back, and I whirled around surprised to see four individuals. Three of whom wore leather armor with the rebel insignia. One had a sword, one had a pickaxe, and another had a dagger in their hand. I noticed blood on the edge of the pickaxe and cringed, wondering who it had come ; I. The fourth person was someone I recognized—the dark-skinned woman with the violet eyes from Nealon's hanging.

She was a rebel, they were all rebels, and the shadow show of the rebels slaughtering all of the guards and harming Luciana and myself was still fresh in my mind. The individual holding the pickaxe came at me first. He was an Elf, maybe in his mid 30's, and he was strong.

I moved to duck out of the way of the point of the pickaxe. As I did, I used the momentum to kick at the back of the knee causing his leg to buckle and for him to stumble.