His Divine Queen

Hallucinations

The Sun was a malevolent force beating into his back, leeching off his energy that had already waned after the last few days he had spent stumbling around the desert. His mouth was parched, sealed shut long ago by the sharp winds that carried even sharper sands. The particles were relentless, biting into his skin if he dared to look up for too long.

He didn’t like to look up. Every time he did, his eyes would play tricks on him. First, it would be only the shimmering sands, shifting in the harsh winds. Then, the next second, he would see something that would make his heart skip a beat. But it was just his imagination, he was certain.

But he still looked up. And every time, the mirage was still there. The shining white buildings, the tall spire of the Palace, the shouts of the merchants selling their wares. It was all a hallucination, the heat and lack of water having finally got to him. He was sure.

Alaric’s throat was dry, too dry, and his lungs burnt from the effort it took to remain standing on his feet. His muscles had long since given up, and it was only his strength of will that forced him to keep going forward now.

He didn’t even know if he was moving in the right direction; he could have been heading further into the Unknown Lands for all he knew. It was a futile mission: he was never going to get back. His escape had been a disaster.

His eyes moved up from the coarse sand beneath his feet again, squinting past the harsh Sun rays that glared down from the endless blue sky above. There it was again: Epineio. His city, his future, his home. Fading in and out from his vision as the heat wave played with the endless horizon.

It wasn’t real.

It wasn’t real.

It wasn’t real.

Maybe he was already dead, and now in his own personal hell. Seeing his end goal, so close, yet still always remaining lost no matter how far he walked.

His legs stumbled beneath him, and he fell once again to the floor. His hands managed to catch him at the last second, his face hovering over the burning sands that cut into his palms like they were purposefully torturing him. What had he done to deserve this?

Well. He knew what he’d done. He knew it now. He deserved everything that had happened to him for what he’d done to Arabella. For how he didn’t stand up to his father even after he’d found out about the experiments.

His time in captivity made him realise how wrong he had been. It was barbaric what he had allowed to happen under his nose. To children no less. But, it was something that he was going to have to live with for the rest of his days, even if his last day was today.

He would be happy with that, he decided. He was so tired, he needed to rest, even if it was just for a little while, he thought. He let his eyes slide shut so that he could not longer see the shimmering white city that tempted him forward.

The darkness it gave him was nice.

- - -

A jostle woke Alaric up again, his mind perking up as he realised he was moving. From the smooth fur beneath him, he assumed he had been thrown across the back of a horse. But who’s horse?

He tried to lift his head, groaning in pain as his brain throbbed with the movement. The sound echoed, a gasp coming from somewhere above him as the person riding the horse pulled back on its reins. The sudden halt forced Alaric’s head to brush against something hard, and he groaned once again to try and voice his displeasure.

Green eyes opened, blinking heavily against the black spots that swam across his vision. He could see little else except the blurry form of a bay horse beneath him, his head hanging somewhere near its flank.

“Hang on,” a smooth voice called out, “he’s awake!”

Alaric tried to lift himself up, but his weak body would not cooperate. Instead, he attempted to lift his head again, only to see nothing but the dark desert and the starry night sky. He felt movement in front of him, the whisper of sand as the rider dismounted and walked around to his side. A smooth caress lightly brushed his cheek, brushing the tangled strands of his hair from his face.

The fingers felt nice, soft, loving as they brushed his cheekbones. Alaric closed his eyes, leaning into the touch. Arabella?

He wasn’t on the horse anymore. He was lying on their shared bed, legs tangled in the sheets that lay forgotten at his waist. To his side, lay the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen: the elegant goddess that he got to spend the rest of his days with. Arabella. His Bella.

“Bella…” he muttered, turning his face to kiss the soft fingers. The caresses stopped, the hand withdrew, and his head swam as the moment ended just like that.

Alaric tried to open his eyes again, tried to call her back to him. He was sorry for what he did. He was sorry. Why couldn’t she forgive him?

Words must have left his parted lips, for the mysterious figure stepped away from him, calling out softly into the darkness, “he’s still out of it. Shall we keep going?”

He didn’t hear a reply, the call of sleep too strong to resist as he felt his mind descending into the peace of his subconsciousness.

Memories flashed across his eyelids, dancing and twirling in and out of his view. They got faster, more haunting. Blood red, dark walls, cold, fire. The flash of white teeth, the pain, the kaleidoscope of insanity.

He was moving again. How long and how far he did not know. Just the rhythmic movement beneath him and the sound of shifting sand. It lulled him away again.

- - -

He awoke again. This time the air was cold; musty and damp like it hadn’t seen a fresh wind for quite some time. His head had cleared slightly now, so he took the opportunity to look around him. It was a fairly unremarkable place – a small round chamber of mud-coloured walls and one exit door off to the side. Whoever had brought him here had left him alone, shivering on a stiff bed that barely rose above the ground with only a stiff blanket to fight off the coolness of the air.

He noticed a glass of water on a table to the side, and shakily stumbled off the bed to clutch it tightly in his trembling hands. The cool water was refreshing, a nice change from the coarseness that his throat had grown used to.

The rest of the room was bare, with no indications to how he would be able to escape. So, he focused his attention onto what he could hear. It was mostly silent, quiet murmurings and footsteps a long way off, but that was soon overshadowed by the drip, drip, dripping of water droplets that fell from the ceiling to the ground. The water collected in small puddles on the muddy floor, indicating to Alaric that he was exactly where he had begun to assume he was.

He was underground.

He frowned at that, mind running circles as he tried to remember anything before he had woken up, how and who had brought him here. It was all a haze, a mixture of memories and dreams. Yet, one thing stuck out at him. The only people he knew that lived underneath the surface were the…

Fuck. He was screwed.

Alaric’s heartrate picked up, a sheen of sweat collecting on his cool body as he realised how much danger he was in. Why had the Witches brought him here?

He couldn’t imagine that this was going to end well. The Witches had always been his family’s sworn enemy, ever since his mother had passed. So why had they taken him? Why had they saved him?

He stopped his pacing, ears perking as he heard footsteps again, this time drawing closer through the echoing hallways that he knew must be on the other side of that door. He may not know why he had been brought here, but he was quite certain that in a few moments he was going to find out.

The footsteps stopped right outside, and the door opened.