Tales of Tears and Embers

☜︎ t h r e e ☞︎

I feel like I'm out of my mind

A l e x

It feel like my life ain't mine

For some reason, Alex followed Celaena. She tapped into her Meyarin abilities for the first time-well second, after catching the man named Alexsander, as Celaena had told her. Alex could only assume by the slender point of Celaena's ears that she was indeed Fae, but she hadn't told Alex anything apart from her name and Alexsander's. What Alex wanted to know was why Celaena wanted her to follow, and maybe, why Alex had decided to follow her. An assassin.                                       

Celaena seemed impatient, scurrying ahead of Alexsander who panted with the effort. With the sun at its highest point, the heat was beating down on them mercilessly, and Alex's legs were burning inside her black leggings. Her sneakers, once white, were gray with green streaks from the grass.

Soon enough, they managed to come to a smoothly paved road. Alex's brown eyes noticed how Celaena occasionally tipped her head back and stared at a hawk trailing them. Her day was getting stranger and stranger, but for once she embraced this change. Because this place didn't reek of death. Celaena started up the slight incline, to what seemed like a heavily guarded gate.

Sardothein took one look behind at a very sweaty Alexsander, grimaced and stalked towards him haughtily, and in one fluid movement, threw him over her shoulder. The man seemed startled at first, his whole world upside down, but soon began thumping at the assassin's back in a feeble attempt to escape.

"Let. Me. Go." He whined, kicking his legs while his face slowly turned red. Alex, amused, was entertained by his hysterics which Celaena easily ignored as they passed through the first gate, then another guard house. Alex noted that all the guards snapped to a salute when Celaena passed them and sniggered at Alexsander's clammy face, his fishy smell only enhanced by the heat.

They were making their way through a large front garden, split into half by another stone pathway. Celaena deliberately ignored the do not walk on the grass sign and readjusted the sweat-drenched man on her shoulders whilst trampling over the neatly trimmed grass to a side door. Alex stopped for a moment in awe, her eyes flicking up to see what she could only assume was a palace. Smooth white curved walls, painstakingly bright in the light, with large window sills and lace curtains, servants flitting in and out of view. It had turrets and towers, the picture of elegant that, dare she say, could rival the immortal beauty of Meya. Then again, all she had seen of this world was mountains, grass, this palace and a prespiring man.

Celaena pushed open a side door and walked into another, smaller garden near the back. It was a pretty little thing, with tall hedges trimmed and a glorious green, trees casting the perfect amount of shade and a wicker chair set for four. Celaena let Alexsander thump to the floor, her blue eyes cold and hard. She gestured a lightly tanned hand at a seat and Alex collapsed in it. She'd had a tough day, and she closed her eyes for just a second, but wrenched them open, the images still fading in the innocent side garden.

Pools of blood-so, so much blood. And they looked so lifeless, because they were dead. All of them. And Aven was crouched over a pile of dead Academy students, his hands dripping with crimson red blood as his teeth tore-

The vision faded and Alex forced a smile as Celaena cocked her head in curiosity. A hawk soared into the garden and in a flash, standing in its place was a tall Fae male, with a mop of white hair and a spiral of tattoos down one side of his face and neck. His eyes were a startling green and he looked like he was about to kill someone. He somehow had a longsword in his hands, the metal glinting in the sunlight, and he was striding over to Alex.