It was getting dark quicker here.
She stood by the window, looking out into the darkening orange sky, past the horizon and she rubbed her fore arm with both hands, hugging herself as she did. It was getting dark and it was getting cold and it was about this time of the day that people would be retiring to their homes to rest and sleep, preparing for the next day, but Lyra could not sleep. She could not bring herself to be calm either, and she could not sit in one place.
She turned away from the window and paced a little in the room. The only thought in her head was the thing that that man had told her about; the year of Osyron. What did he mean when he had told her to find her truth? She let out a breath and looked to the ceiling, walking back and forth in front of the extremely large window. The curtains swayed in the breeze, reaching out to her like they wanted to wrap her up and cuddle her in their soft silkiness.
She paused. To find her truth she would first
It had been a month.A month and counting since she last saw her mother and father, a month and counting since the last time she was in Dragonsbane. A month and counting since she had gotten here. They said she was important to the kingdom of Astaroth but they had not told her anything more than that, not the reason she was here or how and why she was important, just that she was.At least now she had the freedom to move about with the castle grounds, maybe because they knew she would not escape, or that she could not escape. The castle was not fully guarded when ever Ryder was around, that was something she had observed, he was probable capable of protecting himself and the people in the castle, and just like Tezani had told her, he had killed three soldiers with a wave of his hand instantly, chopping them into large pieces. Lyra had listened to her for the sake of her company, not that she believed it.“I’m telling you that it happened.” Teza
The ride was anything but boring.Tezani was happy that her Lady had allowed her go on the ride with her as she could not remember the last time she had been able to leave the castle’s grounds, she was excited, but clearly not as excited as Lyra. Lyra could not sit still in the carriage and she kept looking from one window to the other, asking Tezani what this was and what that was. She liked Kilead, it was a busy village once they had gotten far away from the castle and unlike what she had imagined the people to be like; frustrated and abused and malnourished and hungered, it turned out that the opposite was the case.The people here were living in affluence and prosperity and she wondered how having a cold ruler such as Ryder, could not affect the people. Or did he treat them differently? Could not be so, but still, she felt like she had come to a totally different place.“Isn’t it strange?” She asked the question to Tezani but kept her
She ran.The forest was dense, and thick with darkness, and although she could see no light ahead or could not tell why she was running, still she could not stop, so she kept on running. Her feet were bare and her cloak was heavier, it restricted her and she felt like someone was constantly pulling on it, causing it to choke her whenever it was pulled. She should unclasp it, yes, but she didn’t. all she wanted to do was run.“It comes for you, Lyra of Dragonsbane.”Someone pulled at it again and she choked. She gasped and panted.“Your destruction calls for you, Lyra.”Another pull, and then she felt something pierce into her foot. She screamed in absolute pain and tumbled to the ground. Her foot was stuck and she could not move, but the urge to keep going was too great to ignore and so she started crawling, but her foot would not move.“Osyron calls for you.”And she screamed.She bolt
She gasped and screamed in pain.The pain she felt was immense as the blade tore through her abdomen, going in and coming out the other end. Her eyes were wide, she looked down to her abdomen where the blade had gone into her and her hands came down to hold on to the blade, she looked up at Ryder’s face and saw that he had a surprise look on his face. Surprise, shock and regret. She groaned and leaned forward into him, causing him to snap back and he quickly pulled the blade out of her and then dissolving it into the dark mist it was formed from. He caught her in his arms.Eris gasped and yelled as she fell into Ryder’s arms, both of them slowly falling to the ground. Anger welled up in him and he reached out for Lyra, pulling her away from Ryder but he snapped, his eyes turning black as he pushed him away with so much force that he sent the man flying halfway across the yard.Lyra trembled in his arms, one hand pressed against the wound and the othe
Xanth watched him.He stood in front of the man that had snuck into the castle and tried to seat Lyra away from them, he had found the man tied up and held by one of the guards, and together they had brought him here, to the lowest parts of the castle where the dungeon was. The man was tied up in a chair and unconscious, stripped of his armor and leaving nothing on him save for the very thin shirt he had underneath, which was now stained with blood resulting from his bruises which was caused by Ryder when he had flung the man across the yard with one hand.Xanth could imagine that the man suffered from a few broken ribs, broken or cracked or grazed, whatever, but the pain could not be denied. He had a bucket of cold water and a towel beside him where he stood, he knew that he would need to wake the man up before Ryder got here, because he would definitely come, and he would be expecting to know some answers, answers he was supposed to get from the unconscious man.
He needed to calm down.That much he knew, that he needed to calm down but then everything was irritating him and causing him to be restless, even the simple task of climbing up the stairs annoyed him and rather than just walk up the stairs, he could not help but stomp his way up. He paused and sighed when he got to the last stairs, rubbing his temple with this thumb and index finger. Everything was a mess, he was used to chaos as he was always the bringer of it, but this was something else, it started with Lyra and ended with Lyra. Ever since she got here, ever since the burden of the year of Osyron came, it was all a mess.Hopefully, this would be the last. He would have to do as his uncle had suggested; for him to go look for another Khione and not put all his eggs into one basket. He walked down the hallway, making his way to his room where Lyra was, as soon as everything here was settled, they would go out across the kingdoms in search of another Khione, he didn&r
She gasped when she woke.It was pitch black dark when she first opened her eyes so she laid there a bit so her eyes could adjust to the darkness. The moon was high up, throwing its bright light into the room through the open windows. She had dreamt of that lady again and this time, it had been more disturbing than the last time and she had been having the dream repeatedly for eight days after the incident with Ryder and Eris.Eris, she wondered what might have happened to him, since then she had not heard a word about him.She threw the covers off her body and got out of bed, wincing slightly from the pain in her abdomen. She had to be stitched up, and thankfully they had done that when she was unconscious because she would never be able to bear with the pain. Xanth and the physician had told her not to stress so much so that she does not stretch the stitches, and Ryder had told her that is she did, they would have to stitch her back up. And this time she would
The morning came quickly.Lyra was up early, and so was Xanth who was already used to waking up early. He was with Lyra in the front yard, teaching her and helping her master her new found magic art because Ryder had said he was best suited to being her teacher than anyone else. Maybe it was for the fact that he was half Khione and half Axeris; the spawn of the former ruler of Axeris, Lord Dixon d’Croix, Ryder’s father, and his Khione mother who he only knew as Naphtalia, the Khione female sacrificed in the previous year of Osyron.Or maybe it was because Ryder could not bare to have Lyra out of his sight and with someone not on his list of trusted people. Whatever the case, he had appointed Xanth to be in charge of her training.She giggled loudly, her pleasant voice rang out across the front yard and anyone could tell that see was having herself some fun training with Xanth as her teacher. She was summoning balls of white energy at random and