A Small Spark

Amaris

Dimitri stayed for dinner that evening. Matthias had invited him stay as long as he would like while he was in Jasper City. Marinus took that to heart. That night, he voiced an idea that startled everyone. “I think we should form an alliance,” he told Matthias. Matthias, irritatingly, raised his eyebrows. Last time Marinus had proposed this idea; it had not ended well. Amaris was surprised at the sheer audacity Marinus had to actually suggest that. But Matthias considered him.

“I suppose you are more serious now?” Matthias said as he buttered a piece of bread. Amaris stared at Matthias, appalled he was seriously considering an alliance with the Lykoi. “Please, continue.”

“The enemy of your enemy is your friend. I think if we form an alliance we could do more good for Atlantis. Help the people here.”

“Since when do you care!” Amaris shouted, knowing the irony of her statement, but still, she was outraged. Matthias gave her a warning glance. “Matthias, are you insane? Why are you even considering this?”

“I consider everything, Amaris. That’s how I survive in this world,” he replied calmly. He motioned for Dimitri to continue. And he did. He presented a complete plan for the restitution of Atlantis and Matthias sat there, absorbing it all like he was planning to say, “yes.” That killed her. Surely, he knew what would happen if he tried. Amaris’s anger built upon itself with every word that passed Marinus’ lips. When Dimitri finished, she looked at Matthias. There was a hint of a smile on his face. And Amaris knew.

And it really ticked her off.

Angrily, she stood up and left the table. She ran up the stairs to John’s room. It had been three days and he was still unconscious. She was beginning to worry that he might never wake up. Audrey was there when she entered. Immediately, when she saw them, her anger melted. “Go eat,” she said to Audrey tiredly. “I’ll sit with him for a while.”

Amaris sat down in the chair.

Damon came into the room a few minutes later. He pulled an extra seat to where she was and sat down in it. “I miss the forest.” He was right, life as easier there, and she wanted to return home. The forest as the only home in the world to her, perhaps it was time to go home. But, like she told Damon, she could not leave until John awoke. “He may never wake up, Mare,” he said. But Amaris refused to believe this was it. He had to wake up.

He just had to.

Damon left and Matthias took his place sometime later. Amaris had known Matthias for a long time, so when he entered the room, she immediately muttered something about not wanting to listen to the lecture he had been preparing in his mind for her. He sighed and sat down beside her. Amaris warned him not to, but he began talking anyway. “You know, I think you should join the Rising, Amaris. I know you keep saying you don’t want to, but I think you need to. I think Atlantis needs you to. We want you to have an active role, Amaris. Whether or not you think we are going to win in the end, you matter. I’m going to take Dimitri’s offer. He has the manpower we don’t and he’s right. We have to stick together; Atlantis needs us all to be united. Mare, stop being so selfish! There are more important things in this country than you. Like the people who are starving on the streets because they don’t have enough to eat. I won’t stop you from leaving, but I think that optimistic ten-year-old I met in the forest all those years ago would have cared about those people. When are you going to stop watching life and actually live it? Mare, our little lives don’t matter. We are working for a greater good. We’re working for Atlantis.” He sighed and stood up. “And you know John would agree with me.”

He left the room then. “Yeah, same,” Amaris heard a familiar voice straining to say. She glanced at John to see him smiling and she returned it immediately. “So, you’re alive,” he commented.

“That depends on how you look at it,” Amaris mumbled to herself. He did not seem to hear it anyway. Tiredness creeped up his face, but he looked better than he had in a long time, he was not as pale and the bruises that had plagued his skin were slowly disappearing. “Well, Mare, you going to help them or what?” She stared at his blue eyes. There was level of hope there.

“The thing is I’ve been selfish for so long, I don’t know how to care about other people anymore,” she stated.

“That depends on how you look at it,” he said with a wink.

Amaris opened her mouth to reply, but before she could reply, a commotion ignited form down stairs. Frowning, she crept down the hall to the top of the stairs to see what the matter was. Matthias was standing at the door, arguing with someone.

“What’s going on?” Damon whispered in her ear. Amaris shrugged and took a step forward, eager to hear the discussion. The man at the door invited himself in and looked around. Instinctively, she stepped backwards, hiding herself from view. The man standing with the Keepers was someone she knew. In fact, all of Atlantis knew who he was. He was unmistakable, looking similar to both his mother and his father. His dirty blond hair and smallish stature resounded in the nightmares of the people.

For the man standing there was none other than Alstor, Crown Prince of Atlantis.

“Maybe he’s here for a drink?” murmured Damon optimistically. Amaris rolled her eyes. She wanted to hear Alstor’s and Matthias’s conversation, but she also knew Alstor might ask her for identification. And if she was right, he had tracked them there.

Amaris glanced around. Above them were thin wooden beams that held the building together. They were made from Karnoi, an Atlantean wood. Knowing it would hold her weight, she stepped on the side of the stair railing and pulled herself up onto the beam. Damon followed, easily jumping and grabbing the beam. From there, they crept quietly across until she stood above the intruders.

“I’m here to see the criminals you are harboring, Matthias,” muttered Alstor.

“I assure you, Your Majesty,” Matthias replied with the utmost respect. “I am not harboring any criminals. Look around if you like.” Alstor motioned to his men but refused to move. “Can I interest you in something to drink, Your Highness?”

“Yes, please.”

Matthias glanced up and upon seeing them, took a deep breath. Amaris’s thoughts immediately leapt to John, laying in his bed. He had been labeled a criminal. What were they going to do when they found him? The Keepers walked up the stairs and separated when they reached the hall. They knocked on each and every door, investigating what they could.

“Why do you assume there are criminals here, Your Highness?” Matthias asked from below.

“The owner of the bakery across the street tipped us off. This is why you never trust anyone.”

The Keepers knocked on Lyla’s door. As if sensing the trouble his fiancé was in, Matthias glanced up at them, a silent plea in his eyes. For a moment, Amaris wanted to reassure Matthias everything was going to turn out alright. That nothing bad was going to happen. Lyla appeared at the door, smiling at the Keepers.

It took only a moment for the Keepers to recognize her from the wanted posters they had seen. Immediately, they drew their bellums at her, ready to attack. Suddenly, Lyla’s eyes flashed a pinkish purple in the face of the Keepers. “You never saw me,” she told them.

“We never saw you,” they repeated back to her.

“You are going to walk back down the stairs and tell the prince you never saw me.”

“We are going to walk back down the stairs and tell the prince we never saw you,” they chorused.

“Then, you are going to leave Jasper City.”

“We are going to leave Jasper City.”

The Keepers, one by one, marched down the stairs and reported to the prince they had not found any criminals. From there, they walked out of the pub, leaving Jasper City as they were ordered to do.

When the prince and his Keepers had left, Lyla’s eyes returned to their natural brown color. Damon and Amaris jumped down from the rafters just in time to see Lyla fall to the ground. Without saying a word, Damon bent down and picked up the girl, carrying her back into her room. Matthias raced up the stairs to her.

“I don’ understand,” Damon muttered quietly. “What happened?”

“She used theMelovusi, stupid woman.”

“But why did she pass out?” Damon inquired.

“The abilities aren’t natural, Damon. They take a price with them. They weaken her.”

“We should let her be,” Amaris muttered, leaving the room. Damon and Matthias followed her out. By the look on Matthias’s face, she could see he was genuinely worried about Lyla.

“I actually have a job for you two, if you are willing?”

“How much?” Amaris asked.

“20 yars,” he replied.

“You have my attention.”

Damon and Amaris left the next morning, but not for the forest. Matthias needed to travel to Brutum City. Brutus, from which the city was named, was one of the original kings of Atlantis. He was the one who issued the attack against Athens before Atlantis submerged. We lost many men and women in that attack. Atlantis was never one for militia.

Brutum City was one of the poorer regions in Atlantis. Everywhere you turned, there were people on the streets begging for food and money that would never be granted to them. There was much that could be done to help these people, but Ahab refused to improve their lives. It is easier to rule when the people are indebted and dependent on you, I guess.

Matthias loaned them two horses for the trip. They dismounted the horses and tied them to posts outside of a pub known as the Little Duck. As they walked towards the pub, an elderly man sauntered over to them. He held out his old, torn hand and said, “Please.” Amaris looked him in the eyes and acknowledged him. Already, this had an effect on him.

“We don’t’ have any money,” Amaris replied, ready to enter the pub.

“Wait for a moment,” Damon muttered. He walked back over to the horses and searched through the bags. Amaris always kept some sort of food there, just in case. Damon awarded the man with an apple. He gave them a toothless, grateful smile before limping away.

Damon did not say anything but walked passed Amaris into the pub. “We are here to see Cassius,” she told the bartender.

“Yeah, get in line, Sweets,” he replied, not looking at them.

“Matthias Xerxes sent us,” she emphasized, annoyed at the barkeep. He glanced up at her and sighed.

“Take a seat in the back,” he murmured.

Damon and Amaris made their way to the back and sat down at a table to wait for the infamous Cassius.

Cassius kept them waiting a long time. He was like that, you waited for him, not the other way around. Finally, he entered the room and walked steadfastly to them. He was a tall man with a malicious look in his eyes. Th most distinguishable thing about Cassius was his magnificently large forehead. The rest of his face seemed to scrunch together after that. Sitting down, he glared at them. It seemed to them that the temperature plummeted suddenly. “You’re not Mr. Xerxes.”

“Well, at least we know your eyes are working properly,” Amaris muttered under her breath, but he heard her and obviously did not care for her comment.

“You can tell him that I will not give him what he asks for unless I speak to him alone.” He stood up, ready to walk away. His rudeness bothered her, but it was Damon who spoke out.

“She’s the daughter of King Jonathan,” he said. Amaris’s face twitched, longing to form into a surprised glance. Thankfully, she remained emotionless. Cassius stopped in his tracks and returned to his seat, suddenly interested.

“You’re dead,” he told Amaris with a sick smile on his face. She did not like or trust this man.

“You’re not,” she answered sarcastically, her annoyance seeping through her words.

“You’re next in line for the throne.”

“Okay,” she said, leaning forward on the table, “look, we are only here because Matthias asked us to be. So, what you’re going to do is walk back into your room or wherever you keep your things and you are going to give us the blueprints that Matthias requested, got it?”

“You don’t scare me,” he stated. Amaris just stared at him, he chuckled maliciously. “He didn’t tell you what those blueprints are, did he?”

By the look on her face, he knew the truth. Damon and Amaris were sent on a mission that they understood very little of. But Matthias had told them to return with those blueprints and she was determined to get them. His eyes glanced down her neck. “What an interesting locket,” he said. “Wherever did you get it?”

“This is none of your business,” Amaris snapped. He chuckled a little more before finally consenting. He walked up the stairs to his office, time to get what they came for. Amaris glanced back at Damon. He looked around uneasily. A brief assessment answered her suspicions.

Understandably, the pub was crowded. It was nighttime, in a poor region of Atlantis, after a long day at work. They were no uneasy because of the crowd.. They were uneasy because of who was in the crowd. Periodically, there would be those sitting alone in the room. This again was understandable, and she would not have cared if the many singles were not looking at Damon and herself. She could not see their faces perfectly, but it was evident that they were glancing at them. Amaris looked at Damon.

Damon quickly understood and nodded in agreement. We needed to get out of here as soon as possible. Amaris wondered who these men were. Certainly, they worked for Ahab, but who were they? Just Keepers? Palace guards? Stratos?

Cassius returned with the papers Matthias had tasked them to retrieve. There was an unnerving look in his eyes and she did not trust him. Amaris glanced at Damon, the only person in the world she knew she could trust. They stood up and thanked Cassius for his cooperation. Deliberately, they walked to the door and left without a backwards glance.

They grabbed the horses and swung themselves onto their backs. Immediately, Damon headed for the edge of town, towards the mountains. He was trying to run from those men, but she knew something was wrong, so she told him to stop. Instead, Amaris told him to follow her, much to his annoyance. When she turned around, a man stood before her in a beggar’s clothing. She tried to gallop beside him, but he called out to her.

And she knew who he was.

He threw off the garbs and stared at her like he knew her. Her eyes met his ruthless browns.

How did he know to come here?

Amaris dismounted and walked towards him, knife in her hand, poise and ready for anything. “Alstor,” she greeted him.

“Prince Alstor,” he corrected, as though she was breaking the law by calling his by his first name alone.

He drew his sword and held it out to her, as one would before a sword fight. Amaris asked him what he wanted. “I’m just wondering why you thought it was wise to walk into a very pub when you were the one who broke into Kirio and freed the criminals.” Her eyes flitted around the town while he was talking. In truth, she was only half-listening to him as she took in every object her eyes could reach. A woman grabbed a child and forced him inside. She saw the people of the village hide inside their houses and close the shutters. There was one teenage boy sitting on the roof of his house, watching the events that were transpiring below.

And she got an idea.

“On the contrary, Alstor,” she said as they began to circle one another. “John and Lyla were anything but criminals. And I know that you are not the next in line to the throne.” He looked surprised. Ahab was keeping things from him.

“You’re spreading lies,” he spat at her. “Go back and hide in your stupid forest.”

“Who says I was ever in the forest?” she replied. “That would be treason.”

Amaris glanced at Damon. He was still on his horse, ready to flee at a moment’s notice. She knew what she had to do, and she supposed a part of her was finally understanding there was more to the world than the forest. What she did next was for the Rising. For the foreigners that were coming. For the king that died in front of her. And for an old friend still lying in a bed in Jasper City. She straightened.

“I denounce King Ahab’s rule. The offspring of King Jonathan still lives,” she shouted. “Hidden somewhere is the true heir to the Atlantean throne.” She saw in the corners of her eyes, the shutters slowly creak open as the locals wondered if it were true. She smiled inwardly.

Then, Alstor lunged at her.

She had to wait for the perfect moment.

Not yet.

Not yet.

Suddenly, she ducked down as Damon let an arrow fly to Alstor from his bow. She did not hesitate. Amaris threw herself on the horse and they rode in the opposite direction towards Burl, a small village not far away.

Amaris knew Alstor would soon be after them. He was a determined little man, and Damon had only shot him in the shoulder. Alstor was incompetent in many aspects of life, but he was the greatest tracker under the sea.

They needed to ditch the horses.

When they reached Burl, Amaris found a stable owner and sold him the horses. With the money given in return for the horses, they immediately used to hold a room in the only inn for them. Alstor’s men would be waiting for them to return to the room, giving them time to escape. As they held the room, Damon and Amaris headed towards the carriage depots.

As travel between villages can take days, most villages offer a sort of carriage service. They needed to return to Brutum City. They paid for the rid an sat in the carriage as it headed off to the familiar land.

Amaris turned to Damon. “Why did you tell him I was the daughter of King Jonathan?” She asked, wondering if he had somehow learned the truth she had never told him.

“It was the only way for him to give you the blueprints,” he muttered, not meeting her eyes. He did not know how close to the truth he was.

It was at this time that Amaris decided to look at the blueprints they had been sent after. She opened it slowly, but she knew they were deceived before her eyes grazed the page. It was just a blue paper with these words written on it: Not even for you, Princess.

Amaris’s anger spiked within her. He apparently did not know her at all, what she was capable of. Haughtily, she threw the paper at Damon. Sighing, he asked her what they were going to do. “We’re going back and taking the blueprints ourselves. We can’t return to Jasper without those documents.”

Amaris took a deep breath, trying to control her anger. Nothing good ever comes from losing control.

They discussed exactly what Matthias had told them about the blueprints. In truth, they both knew very little about the object they were sent after. Matthias had told them that blueprints were important and vital to his plan. Not that he had shed any light on what that plan might be. He said they could not return without the correct blueprints. And that it might take serious coaxing before they could return successful.

They would have to find it themselves. Cassius seemed to Amaris to be the sort of man that would keep his personal, important items with him. As he had walked away from them earlier, she had detected a brief limp in his left leg. Why was that? Perhaps this was related to what they were trying to accomplish.

“What are you going to do?” he asked Amaris suddenly.

“I told you, we have to get those blueprints,” she replied.

“Do we?” he answered. “Let’s get out of here, Amaris. Let’s go back to the forest. For Poseidon’s sake, we don’t really need to 20 yars.” Something about Damon seemed wrong. While they both loved the forest, Damon was usually the one trying to venture off into the unknown. The entire time she had known him, he was always trying to coax her into leaving the forest and helping the people of Atlantis. She was startled that he wanted to return the forest instead of fighting for Atlantis. She wondered if this transformation involved Lyla in any way.

“We gave them our word,” Amaris stated. “Besides, I refuse to let Cassius win.” Amaris looked out the window and watched the plains pass by. There are very few things she loved in the world, but Atlantis was one of them. Not the people but the land. No matter how many times she traveled around the country, she loved it all the more. It was a unique kind of beautiful. Amaris wondered how much better it would have been if its vegetation was real. In the distance, the sun began to set.

They arrived as planned to Brutum when the sun fell down over the mountains and the moon stole its place in the sky. They crept cautiously in the shadows. As she had suspected, the amount of Keepers had diminished since the afternoon. They were all looking for Damon and her in far off places. They slipped through the back door to Cassius’ pub.

As Cassius owned the pub, it was expected that he would make periodic appearances among his guests. At the moment, he was walking happily around, speaking at random to the men and women there. One moderately sized woman wearing black leather walked into the pub. Her black hair cascaded down her shoulders, slightly imprisoning her green eyes. She whispered something in Cassius’ ear. Amaris was unsure what she had said, but he motioned up the stairs.

They followed them at a safe and unseen distance.

Cassius led her to the last room down the hallway on the right. Inside, there was a desk and chairs on both sides. Cassius walked around to the opposite side while the woman closed the door behind her. She wanted deeply to listen to that conversation.

Damon had an idea. He entered the room to the left, a janitor’s closet. Amaris closed and locked the door behind her. As he suspected, there was a vent connecting the two rooms in the top right corner. She grabbed a chair and tried to reach for the vent, but she was too short. Laughing softly, Damon pulled her down from the chair.

Once he had replaced her spot, he opened the vent and threw a small microphone into the vent, tossing her the extra earbuds he owned. They could hear everything they were saying.

“You’re lucky,” they heard Cassius say. “Two of Xerxes’ people were here asking for the same thing.”

“There is no such thing as luck, Mr. Felton,” the lady replied, emotionless. Her voice was heavy and sophisticated. Amaris wondered who she was and who she was working for. “I always get what I want in the end.”

“Well, here are the blueprints.” There was a brief pause before Cassius continued. “May I ask what you intend to do with them?”

“No, you may not,” she stated. “The man I work for has a special use for these. And that does not include you. Here is your money, as discussed. Thank you for your business, Mr. Felton. We shan’t be seeing each other again.” They heard the door open. The footsteps grew further away, Amaris opened the door slightly to see where she was going. As she walked, she swung her arms around.

And on her right forearm, Amaris saw a tattoo of three rings, circling around the room.

Marinus.

Tracking down Dimitri Marinus was not as easy as it sounded. They would have called the Little Turtle, but neither of them wanted to tell Matthias they had lost the blueprints. So, they did the only thing they could think of to capture Marinus’ attention.

Damon and Amaris climbed the highest tree they could find. As soon as they were as high up as they could be comfortably, Damon looked at the moon and drew back the string on his bow and sent three arrows into the moon. The fake moon teetered. Damon sent three more before it fell from the sky into the land beneath. Hiding instantly, they could see the civilians racing out to look at the fallen moon. A part of her wished they had the time to retrieve the arrows.

Damon and Amaris purchased a room at the nearest inn. She was going to pay with the compensation Matthias offered them from their last job, but Damon told her to save it. Instead, he sold an engagement ring for the room. Amaris knew it pained him to hand over the ring, but it was time to start letting go, she supposed.

The room itself was stuffy and bland. The walls and bed spread were a grotesque pinkish color that made her sick to her stomach. The room contained a desk and a few chairs.

And they waited.

And they waited.

And then, bored of waiting, Amaris slept as Damon waited.

And then, they switched again a few hours later.

Around four in the morning, there came a knock on the door, awakening Damon from his dreams. Amaris walked over and pulled open the door. Marinus stormed in rudely and sat the desk, looking at her expectantly. “The only reason you would draw attention to yourself like that would be if you wanted something. What do you want, Amaris? I was in the middle of something.” Apparently, he understood her better than she had thought.

“Where are the blueprints, Marinus?” Amaris asked.

“What blueprints?” The tone of his voice changed, then, from annoyance to genuine intrigue. Amaris studied him, wondering if his intrigue was disguising his deception.

Even so, Amaris relayed the situation to him, explicating that the Lykoi would lose their standing with the Rising if they had stolen the blueprints. Watching his face caused her to believe he had no association with the stolen objects. She described the woman to him.

“You’re talking about Sierra. I knew she was a risk,” he said, a pondering look appeared on his face. “She disappeared a few weeks back. I think she’s working with someone else.” That much was obvious to Amaris. She asked him what they could do to find her. He frowned. “Why should I help you? You aren’t going to give many of that 20 yars.”

“You’ll help us. Otherwise, I’ll tell Matthias.” He was irritated, but knew she was telling the truth and that scared him. She was not sure why het, but he desperately needed the association with the Rising. She was determined to figure it out, but that was for later. Now, they needed to find those blueprints.

Luckily, Marinus had an idea where she might have gone.

In the mountains of Atlantis, there was a small colony of dragons. No one in their right minds would dare go near those vicious creatures. Living with them was easy. They stayed away from you, if you stayed away from them. Dimitri believed Sierra went that direction. She had a strange connection with the beasts, and they treated her as one of their own.

In truth, Amaris hated dragons and for good reason.

Those blueprints had better be worth it.