Forget Me Not

XIV

I was seated around the banquet table with the rest of the group—excluding Phoenix who was staying with his family for a little while—Erik sitting on one side of me, and Verity on the other. The quiet from almost everyone was deafening, but the silence Erik was giving me since the night he had entered my room and poured his feelings out to me was even worse. We were sparring every day on the training grounds, but even that seemed different. I tried to chalk it up to Flyn's funeral having only been a few days prior.

"I've had enough!" Maleah finally stood up and slammed her fist down against the table, making everything around her bounce and clatter, breaking the silence. "Qlephians are entering our lands and killing our people—our friends! When will enough be enough? We can't just keep sitting idly by! We have to do something!

"Any one of us could be next," Tristian, despite his constant altercations with Maleah, agreed with a flat voice. "War is a horrible option, but that's exactly what King Torryn wants. And we should give it to him. Eradicate all the Qlephian's before they can do any more harm."

I felt sick to my stomach listening to his words. Torryn and his closest guards were the enemies. The people living under his rule were being scared into submission. They didn't deserve to be hurt and to be put through even worse than what they already were. Most Qlephian's were actually kind, hardworking people!

And I was a Qlephian.

"Guys, stop! They aren't all bad people!" Erik yelled, abruptly standing up from his chair, shoving it backwards in the process. It was almost as if he had read my mind.

"Erik... please seat yourself. You too, Maleah." Xander politely demanded. They silently sat down, but I noticed the look of pain on Erik's face. He highly disagreed with Tristian and Maleah, and was upset Xander shot him down because he might also agree with them. Xander turned to the other two then and addressed them. "Erik is right. We need to get rid of the problem—King Torryn. His people are his slaves, useless things to him. We need to help them, not harm them because of their misfortune of being stuck under the leadership of a monster."

"I don't care! How are we to know which ones aren't brainwashed to believe his evil ideas?" Tristian's violet eyes flicked in Geneth's direction. "How many more people could—and will—they hurt? I can not, and will not, sit here while they hurt the ones we love."

Lucian and Verity had their heads down, with solemn faces. They didn't speak up for, or against, the matter. But I had a hard time believing they were willing to agree to something like that. At least I hoped.

Geneth was the only one that looked ready to say something, but even she stayed quiet, looking confused and torn. I knew Geneth enough that she didn't want to side with Maleah, but she loved Maleah and looked up to her.

The nausea in my stomach intensified all of a sudden and I abruptly stood up, a pain splitting through my head. I staggered away from the table, a hand to my forehead. Everyone stopped their heated discussion and turned to me, their eyes wide in worry.

"Misty!" Erik stood up and reached out to me as I collapsed to the floor, memories flooding my brain, so many included Gil. I remembered us fleeing from the guards and Gil getting stabbed as I watched, useless. I remembered countless nights around the dinner table with his mom—the kind woman that took me in and became a mother to me too.

I remembered Gil talking to me following my parents deaths of starvation and the cold during a harsh winter. I would have died too if it had not been for Gil's mother taking me in, although she was barely putting enough food on the table for herself and her son.

"Hey," The ten year old boy said to an eight year old me as he gently sat down beside me on the bed that would be the new place I would sleep. He raised his hand, which held some bread, and offered it to me. "You didn't come out to eat... This was mine, but you can have it. You must be hungry."

I stared only at the bread, unable to push myself to make eye contact with the boy. I was so, so hungry... and this boy willingly gave up his food for me. My parents gave up food for me too. Now they were dead.

"Please. Take it," The boy insisted. "I'm not that hungry, I promise."

He moved the bread closer to me, and I almost snatched it from him before biting into it hungrily. The boy smiled happily as he watched me eat. I stopped, feeling embarrassed, but the look he gave me made me feel as if I should be anything but that.

"I'm Gil," He held out his hand to me and smiled a wide, bright smile, his blue-grey eyes alight with excitement he probably hadn't felt in a while. "What's your name?"

I screamed as I was brought back to reality. And then the tears started pouring down my face. One of the people I loved the most was dead. The only hope I was holding onto was gone.

"Good heavens!" Verity said in complete panic, a hand to her mouth as she rushed to my side in that quick, graceful way of hers. She brushed some of my hair back gently from my face, so she could look at me.

"Misty!" Erik had already been huddled over me, his hands resting on my back, distressed. His voice didn't hide a shred of how scared he was for me. "Misty tell me what's wrong!"

"Not Misty..." I managed to gasp out as grief tore through me. 

I saw everyone else standing, huddled together a few feet away, watching anxiously. I knew they had heard me. That they were listening intently.

"My name is... Alyce Dare."