Chapter 36: Chapter 36

“Promise me you won’t die,” Shia remarked. “You can’t die unless I allow it.”

Langrion couldn’t help but laugh out loud. He was not sure if it was her childish way of putting it upfront or the contents of what she had just said, but either way, it was so funny that Langrion could not help but laugh.

Shia pushed him away from her shoulder, forcing him to look down at her. “What’s so funny? You don’t believe I could do it?”

“Do what?”

“Break away from my destiny. Break your curse.”

He smiled. “I do. I believe you.”

She snorted, but she started to burrow her own head in his available shoulder. “Yeah, right...”

Now fully relaxed, Shia was finally able to tell Langrion about the rather eventful day when she had met the king, Edelfina, and someone who looked like Langrey in the woods.

“It must have been surprising to see all of them in one table last night,” Langrion remarked.

“Indeed...” After a while, Shia began to say something again, “That Lady Edelfina, she was your original betrothed, right?”

Langrion blinked twice before avoiding Shia’s stares. “It’s not something you should worry about,” he replied curtly.

‘Ah, it’s a question I can’t ask him yet...’ Shia thought in her head. She remembered the ring and the crumpled note that she tried so hard to decipher when she tended his majesty’s wounds during their first meeting. It definitely bore the initials of Edelfina’s name. Shia wanted to know what sort of relationship she had with him, but the dejected look in his eyes said it was something he was not ready to talk about with her yet.

“How about we come up with codes whenever we talk or write about secret information? I think we can definitely use them when we talk in front of Mage Silas,” Shia said, trying to stir away the mood to another direction.

“Codes? What kind of codes?”

“Umm, for instance, if I talk about the weather out of the blue, it means you must trust me at all cost,” Shia suggested.

“Hmm, alright,” Langrion said, thinking deeply, “Then, if I start saying something about horse riding lessons, that means we have a plan.”

“Okay. That’s a nice idea as well. Then how about if someone is forcing us to lie or act in a certain way, how should we communicate that?”

“Maybe we ought to use ‘red laces’ for that,” Langrion replied

“Red laces, as in the one people use during wedding ceremonies? How do we weave that into a normal conversation?”

“I don’t really know,” the prince said, laughing at his own, silly idea, “but until we come up with a better code, let’s use that.”

A few more hours passed by, and soon, they reached the Littman Manor.

“We want to stay, Shia, but there are matters we must take care of at the manor,” Langrion said apologetically. “Let me walk you back in.”

“No, it’s alright. I can walk back in myself. Gavil here might get scolded for taking a long detour. I’ll tell the baroness and grandma that you have some urgent business. I needed some rest too after all that had happened.”

Shia turned to Gavil, “Thank you for giving me a ride.”

“Your most welcome, Lady Shia. See you at the ball!” he said.

Before Shia could react at what Gavil said, he had already maneuvered the cart to the end of the dirt road.

Shia walked towards the large, open oak doors of the Littman Manor. It was unusually empty, to Shia’s relief. However, she knew she had her hopes up too soon when she saw who was waiting for her at the far end of the receiving area.

As she walked further into the entrance, she caught sight of the upturned back of the golden-haired guest that had graced the manor that day.

“Strolling around the town with your new trophy prince, I see.” Lady Edelfina said as she turned to face her, casting Shia a look of disgust with her beautiful green irises. “Did you like the present I gave thru his majesty this morning?”

Shia sighed. By now, she had developed a throbbing headache, and the last thing on her list is a full-on dramatic encounter.

“Quite frankly, where I go with the prince is none of your business. You have your own little wedding to plan, right, so why don’t you just mind that for now? As for the ring, I was the one who made a transaction with you, but seeing how dishonourable you have behaved by giving it back to Prince Langrion, I’d do my end of my bargain by refusing to pay for your dress and shoes.”

Shia began to turn around and take her leave, but Edelfina latched a hand at her left arm.

“I don’t care about your filthy coins, but take your hands away from Langrey!” She narrowed her gaze at Shia, trying to stab her with her ferocious but wildly attractive eyes. “Langrey is mine!”

Shia yanked her arms violently away from the maiden’s malicious grasp.

“Langrion is not yours! He is not a toy that you can throw around and play with whenever you want to! If you want him so badly, why did you come after me today? I guess it was because he had already refused your advances, right?”

Edelfina’s eyes glinted of murderous fury as she raised her hands to slap her. However, Shia had no time for tolerating such foolish acts. She caught hold of her raised palm and twisted it away as excruciatingly as she could.

“Ah, you child of the devil! Let me go!”

“That’s right! I can act like a devil if I want to, so quit messing around with me! I have no time for your stupid, childish games!” Shia said, throwing her down violently on the floor as she released her hand. Almost immediately, she began to strut away leaving the lovely Edelfina with a painful arm and worse, a scared pride.

‘So much for the lack of drama,’ Shia thought. She walked straight upstairs to her bedroom, and slammed the door. By now, her headache felt so terrible, she felt her skull might positively split in two.

“Care for some medicine, goddess?”

She spun around and flinched. Mage Silas, in his disarrayed robe, was sitting prettily on her bed, acting as if he knew she would come there at that specific hour.

“What are you doing here?”

“Time is of the essence, goddess, so I took the liberty of inviting myself in.”

“This is probably for the best. I do have something to talk about with you, but there’s one thing you need to do first.”

The mage’s eyebrows went up in the air in utter amazement. “What will that be?”

“You have to swear your allegiance to me,” Shia began to say. The mage’s eyes began popping wider as she continued. “You have to make a vow that no matter what happens, you will abide by my wishes.”

“No matter what happens,” he said, becoming a tad suspicious. “That’s of far too much risk, Goddess Freya...”

“Then, I’ll further that risk by showing you out, Mage Silas...” she held her the door of her room open. “Good bye.”

“No, wait -” he said, planting himself firmly on the door frame. They eyed each other for a few minutes before the mage sighed.

“Okay, I will do as you please...”

“Glad to hear that,” Shia said, grinning widely.

Shia closed her bedroom door and began rummaging around her things. Suspiciously, the mage had readily agreed to her demands, and she would not let him back out easily from it lest he changes his mind someday. “Words alone won’t be enough. Let’s have something to swear on...” Shia said, looking frantically around for some pen and paper.

“How about on this?” the mage reply. With a flourish of his hands, a magical quill hovered out of thin air in front of the mage. Mage Silas began to hold it on his right hand while he exposed the skin on his left wrist. “There’s no better way to seal a deal than to write in on your body permanently.”

It was Shia’s turn to become utterly amazed. “Uh, no thanks... I have enough marks on my body, as it is,” she replied, pointing to the inked mark that was supposedly left by the Ancient Evil on her last night.

“We can arrange that. Allow me,” the mage said. He walked closer to Shia and asked for her wrist. “The Ancient Evil’s mark is a power made of darkness, but you can overcome it with light.”

The mage started to swish his hand and began to weave strings of light into thin air. He drew the tip of his quill closer into one end of the strings of light.

“Here. You can use this to write over the mark. It will also serve as a protection against the Ancient Evil’s call.”

“Are you sure it will work?” she frowned.

“Yes. I spent lifetimes and decades perfecting that magic.”

Shia eyed the mage doubtfully. Beneath his shabby, somewhat dirty, bushy moustache, it looked to Shia as if he was just a little more than twenty years older than her, yet he spoke as if he was much older than that.

‘Decades?’ Shia thought suspiciously, and sighed. “Well, it’s worth a try, but you should go first,” she said, handing back the quill with a string of magical light at its tip.

“Alright, what do I swear on?”

“Swear that you will abide by my wishes, no matter how questionable they are. You will protect those that I choose to protect, and follow the path I choose to follow.”

“I swear, Goddess Freya.”

“No, that won’t do. You have to swear it in my name – Shia Hyanessa Andry. Swear these words in my name, not in the goddesses’ name.”

“But -”

“Please. I need you to swear fealty to me, in this form. Not in the form of a goddess...”

The mage looked at her sternly for what seemed like an eternity before he finally spoke. “I swear, Shia Andry. I swear it.” He proceeded to sign with the quill, and although Shia could see nothing etched on his arm, she felt a jolt of electricity run through her as he finished.

Shia heaved a sigh of relief. She took the magical quill in her own hand and exposed the tattooed part of her arm.

“Then, I’ll swear too. I swear that I will consider the safety and protection of the greater good in every decision I make from now on. I swear not to endanger anyone, if I could help it. I swear to trust and protect you, if everything else comes to that choice in the end.”

“No, leave the last part out,” the mage began to say. “Leave the last part out about protecting me. Rather, I want you to swear that no matter what you discover about me and my past, you’ll trust me.”

That last bit of words did not sound right in Shia’s ears... It sounded to her like he had so many secrets that would endanger them, but she had no choice. She was the one who demanded him to swear fealty on her first.

“Very well... I swear it, Mage Silas.” Shia scribbled on top of the mark that had appeared after her disturbing dream.

Suddenly, the inked swirls on her wrist lit up, filling the entire room with light, which lasted only for about a second. After that, the marks had started to slowly fade away until only Shia’s unblemished skin remained.

“Now, that all of that was finished, let’s begin preparing for the day you’ll have to kill the Ancient Evil...”

“Sorry to cut your hopes, Mage Silas, but that is never going to happen...”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Exactly as I said, I won’t be killing the Ancient Evil,” Shia replied, “I won’t get his blood in my hands because if all goes well, he’ll be killing himself.”