Finding Eden (28 page)

The edge of my bed sags
as I sit down, trying to fend off the butterflies that are rumbling
around nervously in my body. With so many things going on right now,
why did this stupid thing have to roll around right in the middle of
my attempted assassination and a war?

A soft knock sounds at my
door and Kal walks in. He can tell that I'm nervous and that I'm
about ready to freak out on someone or something.

“
Your Highness,”
he says. “Breathe. Calm down. If you don't then the whole
castle is going to erupt into a nervous frenzy.”

I do as instructed and
take a couple deep breaths. It works enough to the point where I
don't feel like ripping my own hair out. It also works enough to the
point where I know the emotion isn't going to spring away from me
like a bagged cat and attack the closest person.

“
Why are you so,”
he waves his hand at me, my appearance significant enough to define
my mood.

“
You know what's
happening next week, right?”

He looks at the ceiling
in thought and then after a few moments he remembers.

“
Oh,” he
says. “Is that what has you all nervous?”

“
Yeah.”

“
It's not that
bad.”

I raise an eyebrow at him
and he looks back at me guiltily.

“
Okay,” he
says. “If you ignore everyone else in the room it's not so
bad.”

“
That still doesn't
help.”

He sighs and walks over
to me and sits on the bed next to me, offering his friendship to try
and soothe me.

“
Is Sahariel going
to be there?”

I shrug and shake my
head. I didn't know, but the probability that he'd show up would be
very low.

“
Well, who knows,”
he gets up and pats my leg, “you may find your soul mate.”

I roll my eyes and he
walks out the door, none of the things he said making me feel any
better. I sit and fidget for a few minutes before I decide to pace
again, feeling like that's the only way to actually calm myself down.
It feels like hours go by and all I'm doing is pacing around, but
only a few minutes pass before Sahariel is knocking on my door.

“
You alright?”

“
No,” I say.

“
It's not that
bad,” He says.

“
That's not what
you said before.” I groan.

“
Are you going to
be okay?”

“
I'm going to have
to be.” I say, flopping back down on my bed, “Considering
what all is happening right now.”

I rub my face vigorously
and try to figure out how I'm going to get all of this stuff taken
care of. Out of all the problems facing me right now, Illidan is the
only one that I'm remotely close to being able to deal with. The only
issue is getting Sahariel to leave long enough for me to leave
without him knowing, and being able to leave before he tries to take
care of it.

A yawn breaks through me
and I stretch, the beginnings of my plan trying to come together in
my mind. Sahariel, having moved to the chair in the corner and picked
up a book to read, looks over at me as I rub my temples.

“
Headache?”

“
Yeah,” I
say. “A little bit.”

“
Would you like
some tea?”

I sit up and blink at
Sahariel. Did he just give me a way of getting rid of him? I thank
whatever gods there are for my good luck.

“
That would be
amazing.”

“
Alright,” He
says. “I'll just call one of the servants and have them get
it.”

“
No!” I
almost scream the word. Sahariel looks startles at my outburst. “No.
It always tastes better when you make it.”

I smile at him, partly
because it wasn't entirely untrue. His tea is infinitely better than
anyone else. His book closes with a thud and he walks over to me.

“
Not a problem,”
he says. “I will be back in about fifteen minutes with the tea,
alright?”

“
That sounds
amazing.” We smile at each other and he gets up, ruffles my
hair and leaves my room.

I jump up from my chair
and scramble everything together. I practically tear my dress off and
rush around my room, trying to tug on a pair of pants and yank my
head through a shirt. I crawl under my desk and rip the page from the
front of the desk and the support beam.

Looking around, I try and
decide what to do next. I can't go out the door; Sahariel is bound to
feel that I've left. My eyes scan the room and fall upon the window.
Can I make it? I throw the window open and peer over the edge. For
being in a castle I'm sure not up high. Shrugging, I pull myself
halfway through the window and maneuver myself to move all the way
outside.

“
I forgot to ask,”
I hear on the other side of the door.

In a panic, I practically
fall out of the window as the door opens and Sahariel's head is
poking in, asking what type of tea I want. I hold my breath, and
though I'm not sure why I do it, I close my eyes as I hear Sahariel
walk into the room.

“
Eden?”

He calls my name as he
walks toward the closed door to my bathroom. I bite my lip and hope
that the magic in the walls works the other way around and that he
can't feel me outside of the room if he's in it. Before I do anything
stupid, I pull myself away from the window, shimmy down one floor,
and race across the castle courtyard barefoot. My footfalls are
silent against the cobblestone and my shadow races behind me in the
dark of the night.

The abandoned section of
town looks bad during the day, but in the night it looks ten times
creepier. Buildings barely stand against their own weight and half of
the roofs are missing. Empty windows stare back at me as I walk down
the old road, the weeds growing between the cobblestones adding
little comfort to the bottoms of my bare feet.

The further away from the
castle I get, the worse the buildings look. So far all of the
buildings I see are either too small for anyone to really hide in
well, or don't have any walls. Either way, it's not remotely
structural to be considered safe for any type of inhabitants. Human
or not.

Invisible, I creep
through the shadows and try to figure out where exactly Illidan might
be. If I were him, where would I be? I decide to take some clues from
some movies and look for the most out of the way bad guy hang out.

I move between shadows,
shifting between bouts of sprinting and walking. I don't know why I'm
attempting to move so stealthy since no one is around, but I'm not
going to chance it. Turning the corner, the perfect bad guy hiding
place is staring back at me.

At some time, a person
with a little more money must have lived here. Although only one
story high, the house is pretty big with what must have once been
large French doors and a couple of bay windows. But now the stone is
weathered and dirty, the French doors decaying and the bay windows
broken and abandoned.

The door falls off its
hinge as I push it open and walk into the empty house. For some
reason I just know Illidan is in here. It's like a tingly spidey
sense. I slowly creep through the old house, trying my best to hear
above the sound of my bare feet whispering against the old stone.

“
Illidan.” I
whisper his name and listen as it echoes against the walls and
somehow I know he can hear me. Why isn't he coming out?

I clutch the book page in
my hand, the paper crinkling and beginning to moisten as my hand
sweats. The hall in the old house seems to go on for forever, and
even though I haven't turned a single corner, I already feel lost.
The hall ends and opens up into a large room, some sort of dining
room or dance room. My feet carry me into the room and I feel
something swoop down behind me, blocking my exit.

“
Pity. I thought
you were dead.”

I whirl around and
Illidan is standing there watching me with his yellow eyes, the low
light in the room making the puckered scar across his face look more
gruesome. He clutches the hilt of his sword for a few moments before
unsheathing it.

“
You don't have to
do this. I came here to try and talk you out of doing these crazy
things.”

I feel like trying to
talk some sense into him, but all I can think about is my stupidity
in leaving Sahariel in the dark.

“
Hmm,” he
looks at the blade of his sword, “you call them crazy, but all
I'm trying to do is restore my family. Do you understand what I
mean?”

“
You're talking
about your family not being shown in the records.”

“
I see you've done
your homework. I also know that you know what it feels like to have
your family dirtied, and I also know the things you would do to keep
them from being tarnished any more than they have been.”

“
What are you
talking about?”

“
Remember,”
he asks, twirling he sword about, “It wasn't so long ago that
you robbed your great uncle of all his emotions.”

“
But you're killing
people!”

“
Are you trying to
tell me you wouldn't?”

Shaking my head, I glare
at him.

“
For something as
petty as honor? No,” I say. “Nothing is worth the cost of
another person’s life.”

Something hard connects
with my face and I'm thrown to the floor. Warmth trickles down my
face and without touching I know its blood. The scarlet liquid rolls
down my face and off my chin, pooling on the cold, stone floor
beneath me. I shake my head and don't bother to get up.

“
Family means
everything to me.” He says bitterly. “My family is all
I've ever had, and now they're gone. Everything is gone.”

I laugh with sorrow
quietly to the floor. He doesn't realize what he's said and who he's
said it to. But he probably won't let me have time to explain anyway.
I look over at him just in time for my eyes to look up into his with
pity seconds before his foot connects with my stomach.

My eyes clamp closed as I
try not to scream out in pain. My arms wrap around my stomach but
it's no use. I can't breathe and it hurts. My arms serve no
protection as he continues to kick me in the side, spots black out my
vision and a coppery taste starts to fill my mouth.

“
What,” he
stops kicking me for a second. “You're not going to beg for
mercy, not going to pray that I stop, hope the pain ends?”

“
Will doing so make
you listen to me and understand me?”

Surprisingly, he actually
thinks about it for a few seconds. Either that or he puts on a show
of thinking about it.

“
Probably not.”

“
Then no,” I
say. “If my death will stop the deaths of others than I am
willing to make that sacrifice. But if you do kill me, I know you
will regret it.”

“
I have yet to
regret anything I've done so far.”

“
Not yet, but you
will.”

He screams then, and I
wince as the sound enters my ears. He hauls me up by the back of my
shirt and throws me forward into a mirror I didn't even know was in
the room.

“
Don't pretend like
you know me,” He snaps, shoving me into the broken face of the
mirror, grinding my exposed flesh into the shards of glass.

“
I don't know you,”
I admit. “But I know you're angry, and hurt. I can tell just by
looking at you. You're also confused. You're wondering if what you're
doing is right because you know deep down that killing is wrong, but
you also feel wronged.”

Screaming, he presses me
against the mirror with such force I feel like my ribs may break then
pulls me away and throws me across the room. A stone bench is there
to break my fall, and I land awkwardly across my left arm. I hear a
snap and a rush of agonizing pain courses through my arm and up my
shoulder. I whimper in pain, and I don't know why I try now to
escape, but I begin to pull myself away from Illidan.

I manage to make it to
the opposite wall and slowly stand, cradling my arm in my hand. I
look up and Illidan is already halfway across the room, anger rolling
off him, his sword poised to strike. I lift my arms, one last
pitiable defense against him. One I know won't work. And then he's
upon me, his sword hefted high above him.