Darkness The Diary of Samantha Owen (20 page)

“Tell me, why have you come Morgan?”

“I imagine that you will know that the weapons of the Kingdom have disappeared. There are signs of an imminent battle, my lady. What do you want us to do?”

“Prepare for the worse, I fear that this Kingdom will not stand for much time. Now retire.”

“Yes, my lady.”

Venice slumped onto the bed observing the ceiling of her room full of etchings and paintings to protect her. She thought that she didn´t deserve such appreciation. She had taken the Kingdom to its ruin. Every day she cursed having asked the wizard to make her immortal. She didn´t deserve it. The wizard had tricked her and that was the reason of her disgrace.

The night that she gave birth to two precious girls she felt like the most fortunate woman in the world. She was happy and radiant. One girl was dark and the other fair, they were the perfect balance, she had thought. The fatality occurred a few hours later when a fallen one entered into the girl’s room and kidnapped Elizabeth. The guardians surprised him when he returned for the other girl, killing him in the act. But Elizabeth was no longer there, she had disappeared and with her a part of Venice´s life. Samantha cried and cried due to the separation from her sister. That same night, Venice called the most powerful wizard in the Kingdom. She wanted to see him immediately.

“My empress,” he had bowed down in reverence, “how can I serve you?”

“I want them to return my daughter
,” she had said with Samantha in her arms. “I want them to bring her. Search for them, I don´t care how.”

“My lady I am afraid that I cannot do that. But I can do something else for you
,” the greedy wizard said to her.

“Tell me what I can do, do something” she begged of him.

“I can cast a spell my lady, which will make you stronger, more agile, wiser, a spell that will help you to find your daughter. But in exchange you will have to pay a high price.”

“Yes
,” she exclaimed “I will pay what is needed, whatever, only bring me back my child.”

“I agree, my lady.”

The ambitious wizard looked for his utensils, returning he observed the girl that slept placidly in her cot and smiled to himself.

He moved his arms, until he made a floating suitcase appear in the air right in front of his face. He touched it and the magic vanished letting it fall to the floor with a dull thump. He bent over and opened it to start taking out the beakers and more bottles full of colorful liquids. Some were full and others had only a few drops inside of them. He stomped strongly on the floor, making a sound tha
t resounded throughout the room; he made a not too large round table appear and started to put the bottles there. With the rapid movements of his hand he made things appear and disappear on the table.

The empress watched him suspiciously and was unconvinced by his aspect. He wasn´t dressed with a suit and jacket, more of he wore a long tunic that only allowed her to see a small part of his neck and his boney wrists. All of a sudden the wizard mixed some potions which upon collision produced a deafening spark making Venice jump.

“Don´t be afraid my lady, it is almost there,” he said without looking at her.

A potion as red as blood smoked from his old cauldron making him smile, filled with emotion. When he had mixed all the ingredients, he closed his eyes and placed them over the smoke that came from the cauldron. He started to recite some words that nobody could understand, time and time again, until the potion filled with light for an instant and then became as dark and sinister as the wizards own heart. The black liquid bubbled in the cauldron when the empress moved closer.

“Have you finished?” she asked wishing the answer to be <>.

“One last stop, I need your blood
,” the empress extended her hand on top of the cauldron and closed her eyes; a few instants after she noticed how a not too sharp knife scratched the palm of her hand and her blood fell into the cauldron. The wizard gave her a glass with the liquid and Venice took it, not too sure of what would happen afterwards. “Drink,” he ordered her with a smooth voice as he did the same with the glass that he had in his hands.

When she finished, the empress felt strong and able, with her strength renewed. Astonished, she thanked the wizard a thousand times, but he didn´t want gratitude.

“My lady, I would prefer that you paid me first.”

“Of course, how much gold do you wish?”

“I don´t want gold, I want your daughter and I explain to you that you cannot stop me,” he paused to observe the incredulous face of the empress. I have united our bodies in blood, if I die you will too and then nobody will be able to take care of her.”

The empress, not able to understand what was happening saw how the wizard went to the cot and took the girl with great chestnut eyes in his arms. The glass that was still in her hands slipped and fell onto the hard floor where it shattered into pieces.

“Do not be sad, this spell with make you immortal, you will be able to see your daughters again someday,” he paused, “if the pain doesn´t consume you first, of course, then you will live but your face, all of you will age, and you will be like this until the end of times.”

The evil wizard smile
d triumphantly for having tricked her and left, leaving behind a defeated empress. She cried for the loss of two daughters in the same night. She could not believe how she had allowed it to happen, but the wizard was right. She saw before her own eyes how the wizard lifted the knife with which he had cut her and tore the sleeve of his tunic, leaving his forearm exposed; without pity he thrust the knife into the inner part of his forearm with a big smile in his face, in the same moment Venice felt a profound pain in her right arm. She slid her sleeve up and saw how her blood flowed from the new wound inflicted by the wizard. She felt destroyed and cried to comfort her inconsolable pain. She had been tricked and she had lost both of her daughters.

Days later she announced to the Kingdom the disappearance of her only heir, Samantha. She would not permit the kingdom to know of her mistake of not protecting the palace from the Wanderers, which was a burden that only she should bear. Or so she believed. When her husband heard of the birth he ran to the great city, leaving the war, but when he arrived there was nothing, just desolation and anguish. The warriors looked for her without finding anything. When he arrived he couldn´t listen to the words that came from the lips of his beloved.

“My dear, you do not know how much I have missed you.”

Venice´s face was of desperation; Patrick knew that something wasn´t right. His
joy vanished when he saw his wife and she told him how his daughter had disappeared and his face filled with rage when he heard of how she had been tricked into losing his other daughter that way.

“How could you do something like that? You didn´t even wait for me to arrive, I haven´t even seen my daughter´s faces
,” he said sadly.

“Forgive me Patrick, I was desperate, I didn´t know what to do, I just wanted to find her and I made things worse, I am sorry.”

“I am sorry, Venice. I am leaving; I cannot stay with a woman who cannot even wait for me for something as serious as this. I am leaving; I will search for them on my own. I will search for them until I die,” he started to leave and turned one last time to see how the tears flooded the face of his wife once again. He felt no shame or pain; he just turned and continued on his way.

Venice didn´t see him again, after so many years she assumed that he had died, but what she didn´t know was that he was closer than she thought. The same as her daughter Samantha
, he had been various days in The Light and nobody had told her, not even Morgan. Venice knew that he was an ally of a Fallen One and she didn´t care. She had succumbed to the charms of one of them. All to be able to find her daughters, what she didn´t know was that that same being had one of them. She just wanted to die and rest in peace as she would have done many centuries ago.

Thinking about her death she smiled, the pain consumed her every second. She knew that she would not die and that in a few years she would not be able to live by herself from being so old, that was for her a long time away, but she didn´t want to continue this way. Suddenly a Machiavellian idea came to her mind, it was so obvious that she didn´t know how she hadn´t thought of it before. At that moment she started, she cleared the tears from her face and stood up strengthened. She was prepared to die. Without doubting she called Morgan shouting.

“Prepare me a bag with clothes and food. And get my combat outfit out.”

“You are getting ready to fight my lady?”

“No my dear, I fear that I am leaving.”

“My lady, you cannot leave, soon we w
ill be in the midst of a war, and we should go with the people. The Council…”

“Morgan
,” she blurted out coldly, “I am leaving. Early tomorrow I will leave, I don´t want anyone to find out about my leaving, do you understand?”

“Yes, my lady
,” he said lowering his voice and his head in a move of reverence. “Do you desire something else my lady?”

“Retire and do as I have told you.”

Morgan left the room trying to hide his smile, Ian was going to love the news that the empress had gone crazy and that she was going to abandon the Kingdom. He was euphoric, he ran to prepare the things that Venice had requested of him, anxious for the day to pass to be able to tell his master when night fell.

As Venice sat decidedly at her dressing table, she briskly
swept off the make-up letting it fall on the floor and took out a piece of paper from a small box and pick up her old pen, she opened the ink jar and started to write an elaborate letter to her daughters. She couldn´t leave without saying goodbye even though she didn´t know them. They should know the truth someday. When she finished, she sealed it with wax and remained there pensive before the glimmering mirror. She had to write a last letter to Patrick, during years she had written letters imploring for her beloveds forgiveness. She had never stopped loving him, but for as many as she wrote, she never got any reply. However, this last letter was special, it was the letter that contained a little of the essence of life that still remained in her, it was her last love letter. She didn´t care if he read it or not, she just need to write it to be able to die with her conscience at peace.

“Samantha, be careful with your powers, I think you are not yet ready to control them.” Francis looked at her astutely.

“Don´t worry, I am not going to hurt you, it is just that it impresses me to see how high the water goes thanks to me.”

“That quantity of water could drown us in seconds if you let it fall.”

Kenneth looked at him with his brow frowning and turned again to continue explaining things to Samantha.

Francis and Gabriel looked at each other without knowing what to say or what to do. The girl who they had before them was their future, she meant living or dying.

Gabriel, frustrated, sighed from the anguish of not being able to see his beloved.

“What is eating at you, young man?” Francis said with a neutral voice.

“I cannot stop thinking about Elizabeth when I see her
,” he said signaling towards Samantha with his head.

“In that case I cannot help you, my boy. Look, I have had many loves over my lifetime and I have learnt many things from each of them, but that sigh and that face are not that of a passing love. Do you believe that Elizabeth is the love of your life?”

Gabriel looked at him with his deep violet eyes, in a way that left Francis speechless.

“I think it is more than that Francis.”

Chapter 15

“Kenneth
,” I spoke insecurely, “don´t you think that I have been practicing my powers too short a time to be able to confront in battle?”

“Sam, you are prepared; what is more, let me tell you that you are more than ready.
It may be that you do not know very well what the extent of your powers is, but if you know what you want to happen, it will happen, they will accompany you wherever you go. You should not fear that which has not happened and in fact, this morning I had a vision and you were not losing Sam, you were triumphing.”

“You saw me?”

“Yes.”

“Was Eric there?” I asked with butterflies in my stomach remembering last night.

“It was only a few seconds, I couldn´t describe anything in concrete, I only saw you.”

“Thanks for the clarification, the support and the help. You are a great person.”

“Thanks to you for teaching me that I can still be of help.”

“Lots, I would say
,” we laughed together as we walked by the banks of the lake.

Soon a question that I hadn´t asked yet came to mind.

“Does my mother know that I am here?”

“No
,” he answered cautiously.

“Why?”

“You see, after meeting the Council and them verifying that you are the real princess…”

“One of them
,” I corrected him.

“Right, one of them, I spoke with them before you came to see me at my house that same night. I spent many years with her and I saw how they stole you from within her hands. I think that it would be too much of a shock for you to appear like that, all of a sudden, it is better that she doesn´t find our until after the battle. We agreed that nobody would tell her about you, for her mental wellbeing.”

“Don´t you think it will be more shocking for her when she sees me fighting?”

“She will not see you.”

“What do you mean?” I didn´t understand what he was saying.

“The empress does not fight in battle, since the day you disappeared she has locked herself away in the palace and has never left, not even for meetings of vital importance, nor to fight against the Fallen Ones.
”

“Never?”

“Never,” he determined looking how my bewildered face formed.

“I don´t understand
,” I said, “she wants to see us, we are her daughters. Why cannot I appear in the palace and meet her?”

“She…” he took a long pause
, “she has the hope of finding you but at the same time she imagines that you are dead and the passing of the years has made her believe it more.”

I looked at him not knowing what to say. A second later I blinked and didn´t see him again. I noticed how my body fell to the gr
ound without anything hurting myself; my mind was in another place. I knew what had happened but I didn´t know why. Elizabeth had got into my mind. I opened my eyes strongly trying to return to my body, but even though it responded, my mind continued to float.

“Don´t try to escape
,” I heard in the most profound corner of my being, “that will just make things worse.”

“Make what worse?”

All of a sudden I saw Kenneth calling in anguish as my body twisted in pain. I heard some of Kenneth´s words but could not concentrate, my body was suffering a charge that I couldn´t alleviate. I took my hand to my neck but I had forgotten to put the necklace on that Francis had given me. Without warning, my mind was floating again, nothing hurt and I saw her. I saw the face of my twin sister again. Her blue eyes looked at me apologetically and I didn´t understand what she wanted from me.”

“I am very sorry, I am so sorry…”

“Why do you want to keep making me suffer? Didn´t you have enough the last time?” I silenced my inner voice to remember the words of Eric about Elizabeth the night before “Eric told me that you were helping. He wouldn´t lie to me…”

“And he doesn´t, it is not I that wants to make you suffer, it is Ian.”

“Ian, who is Ian?”

I saw how a tear fell down her face and I felt pain again in my extremities. I couldn´t move myself and my head was about to explode. As I doubled up and cried in pain, Kenneth, Francis and Gabriel looked at me, not knowing what to do. I looked at Gabriel and showed with all my force wanting to make him know that it was his girlfriend that was torturing me. It ceased again and everything went black again.”

“I am sorry, I am very sorry...”

“Respond to my question.”

“He is the one who brought me up and looked after me, he kidnapped me. He is a Fallen One who wants to kill us all. He makes you suffer for pleasure and he does it through me.”

I didn´t know whether or not to believe her words. I was confused.

“I am the one who is going to kill you my beautiful Samantha,” I heard his throaty cold voice running through my spine. I felt that I had to polish him off.

“Is he connected to you?” I asked all of a sudden with a cold voice, before the pain started again.

“Connected how?”

“Is he touching you?”

“Yes.”

“I am sorry
,” I muttered.

I opened my eyes receiving a new wave of pain and canalized all my energy toward him. If they were physically joined, Elizabeth would serve as a channel for him to stop. My thought was not wrong. For my pain stopped as I made his increase. I closed my eyes and saw
within the depths of my soul, what seemed like a fire raging inside of me. I was not scared of failing on this occasion. I simply allowed myself to be led by my senses making that his head harbor all the pain possible, until I lost the connection with Elizabeth. I imagined that she had hurt but not as much as him.

Then I opened my eyes confused, they lifted me up carefully and helped me to sit down. When my mind was clearer I looked at Kenneth in sign of approval.

“Was it her?” he asked knowing the answer. I nodded lightly.

“How are you?” Francis asked
without allowing her boyfriend speak anymore.

“I could be better
,” I answered with a smile. I looked at Gabriel and knew that he was worried.

“It hasn´t been her exactly” I looked him in the eyes “The
re is someone that controls her, a Fallen One. I have felt his contaminated energy. I hope that I have left him a scar so that he remembers me.”

They all looked at me confused but I knew who I was up against. I would not rest until I finished him off. Francis moved towards the house to look for water, when I turned my head I saw something moving between the trees until disappearing. I got up without thinking and ran as fast as I could. I crossed the line of trees and followed the trace of the red cape that I had seen. I kept running until I tripped and fell hard against the ground. I couldn´t believe that I had fallen. I looked forward in search of some sign of what I had seen but nothing happened. Then I looked at my
feet and my face of frustration was erased seeing something shiny amongst the leaves. The boys were getting close to the trees when I took the daggers in my hands. They were precious daggers with engravings that I didn´t understand and precious stones that I did not know the names of. They were very brilliant sais. I sustained them in my hand as if they were made of crystal. I didn´t want to damage them at all.

I was looking behind me when they all arrived to where I was. I wanted to meet the person who had left them there, because I knew beyond doubt that nobody would let such beautiful weapons fall, they were something that would have been well stored.

“What happened? You have scared us to death,” Francis sighed with his funny voice.

I smiled at them without knowing what to say or do.

Kenneth looked carefully at the daggers and then looked at me.

“They are yours
,” he said to me very seriously.

“How do you know?” blurted Gabriel.

“These daggers and forged by hand. They have engravings and encrustations. By their shine I would say that they have magic dust. They are only the second pair I have seen in my life. The other ones belonged to someone very powerful. Turn them over,” he said.

Turning them over I saw my name engraved on them. There was something else I couldn´t understand.

“They are yours Sam. They have been made for you.”

I couldn´t believe what I was hearing.

“Why for me?” I asked in a whisper.             

“You are to be the next empress
,” Kenneth announced very seriously, “They have put their hope in you. You will be who guides the new Kingdom.”

Until that moment I hadn´t considered what the position of the daughter of the empress entailed. I didn´t want to lead anybody, I definitely didn´t want to.

“Does my mother have daggers like these?”

“No, nor much less
,” responded Kenneth in a paused tone. “The other daggers I saw many years ago belonged to a man, a powerful man, with great courage and strength, a man with such power that he control the masses without problems. There were not fights not wars with him, nobody confronted him. He was a great man.”

“And who was he? And… What happened to him?” Gabriel asked out of curiosity.

“Nobody knows. His history is in the scriptures. Our library…” Kenneth told me seeing my confused face. “There you can find the oldest stories of all time, from any culture or generation. There I knew the story of this man, many years after seeing the dagger.”

“When did you see the dagger?” Francis asked as we all looked at him expectantly.

“I remember that I was five or six years old. I was in a small village that today has become the Kingdom of Fire. We lived there, until one day that man appeared in the town. Nobody knew him but he was accepted out of good manners. At that time there were no wars, so my fathers worked the only tavern that there was. I always played alone and on the third day that that man had been in town he came into the tavern. My mother cleaned the floor and my father was cooking as I ran all around the room playing, until I bumped into him. I looked up and he smiled at me, he sat down at a table and I sat beside him trying to convince him to play with me. I don´t remember how it happened, but his shirt moved and I could see how two daggers, almost identical to these ones, hung from his belt. He saw me; I was astounded by the shine of the stones. He took them out and showed them too me closely, but didn’t let me touch them. He said that only the owner could touch them or there would be grave consequences for whoever dared to pick them up.

I looked marveled by the beauty of the daggers as he finished his story. At that moment
I was filled with desire to run to see the writings. I wanted to know more about the daggers and that man that had ones the same as mine. They must be very special for them to have been made especially for me. I got up with great impetus with the intention of entering into the forest and to the city, but Kenneth grabbed my wrist.

“You cannot go now to investigate, we are training.”

I looked at him and knew that I wasn´t going to convince him, so we left again into the trees and stopped in the middle of the prairie.

“I have an idea
,” said Gabriel with a shine in his eyes, “Today Samantha couldn´t practice at all with the weapons and now she has her own ones, we could try to see how she does with them.”

“I agree
,” I accepted in good will.

The midday sun rested brilliantly above us when we
got ready to fight. We had been a while arguing because I didn´t want to throw the daggers and leave them in the wood, furthermore, I believed that the body to body fight would serve as a great help for the battle and I wasn´t wrong.

Gabriel was right in front of me in fighting position. He had a great sword in his right hand and I had a dagger in each hand. Without warning he swiped his sword over my
head with all his might. I dodged it quickly as he had taught me. It was a fight between teacher and student and I didn´t want to lose. I moved the daggers with smooth movements of my wrist, it came naturally to me, I didn´t have to think about how to do it. They moved with me. He continued to try to hit me with the sword until I saw how he started to get tired. At that moment I lifted my daggers and with a rapid turn I got close enough to him, trapping his wrist between the two daggers. If he moved he would cut himself.

“Very astute
,” he said with pride in his eyes.

“I had a great teacher
,” I smiled at him.

I let him go, b
ut this time I started to attack with the daggers, I didn´t want to hurt him, but I noticed how the material of his combat suit ripped. When I was too confident he threw me to the floor without me being able to do anything, leaving my daggers to slip from my hands.