Linarra stared at Sahimul after he finished his story. She hadn't interrupted him once. She didn't ask a question. Now, she didn't know what to say. Her chest ached and her muscles were sore for sitting so stone-still. She didn't even want to twitch.
"I don't hate you," she said softly, suddenly. It was the only thing that made his story hurt less. "I didn't hate you before you told me," she confessed. She wanted to go to him. Linarra believed him. If he were lying, to deceive her? So be it. She couldn't imagine what motivation a demigod would have in tricking her. It seemed preposterous, absurd.
She started to go to him.
"Don't," he said, his tone poison. She could feel him hurt, through their bond. They might have been old wounds, but they were fresh to him. He'd been asleep all this time. For him, it was yesterday. "I don't want your sad, soft feelings," he said bitterly.
But she didn't know what to do with those feelings. He loved Ishahn and she used him. Betrayed him. Liriel wasn't chosen by the Mother to lead the people, she'd stolen it. Used it to enslave them in a different way. Linarra felt she might be sick.
These were the little permissions, she thought, that she needed. To what? To what end? Love the Usurper? Did she? She stared at him, his face a mask of hurt and betrayal. He bled his heartache through the bond. It sizzled along the bond, making her suffer.
"I'm not her," she said, wiping at her face. She didn't want to cry, but she could barely process her own grief, let alone his too. "I'm not Ishahn. I didn't want to be a Priestess. I still don't. I'm not," she stumbled over her words, her lips numb. "I'm just. Me. Nothing special."
He glowered at her, but he didn't say anything.
"What?" she cried. "What do you -want- from me! You want me to love you? Is that it?" Linarra stood, feeling half mad. "I don't know! I feel...things. But what are they? Love? I've never been in love!"
"You -love- Veshier," he sneered, being mean.
"No. I don't know. I just don't know anything," she said, utterly dismayed.
"At least you're being honest now. You don't know anything! You are the most PROFOUNDLY ignorant creature I've ever met!" He said, shouting at her.
"Yes, go ahead, Sahimul. Kick me because you can. Everyone else does!" She stared at him, feeling boxed in, feeling the walls press in at all sides. Slowly, so slowly she didn't notice at first. Now, she was being squeezed to death. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't think.
Linarra just walked away. She didn't answer Sahimul's shouts. She didn't answer his eventual apologies and pleading. She had to leave. Just go. She didn't know where or how. It didn't matter. Linarra wanted to walk until she could breathe and until the walls retreated. She couldn't think with the bond clogging and clouding her mind and emotions.
She could feel him following. He wasn't close enough to see or hear, but she could feel him dogging her footsteps. She didn't mind, if she were being honest. And she wasn't angry. How could she fault him for things said in hurt and anger? No, it wasn't that. She just needed the space to breathe.
Linarra trudged through the dense, verdant forest, marveling at how -alive- everything was. Even before she'd gone to the Temple, the world had seemed dismal and gray. It rained too much. Or not enough. Her father always complained about crop yield. Too much wind. Too many insects. But here, everything seemed in balance. Perfect. Was that how the world used to be, she wondered, before Liriel ruined it?
She wasn't even sure if it was fair to blame Liriel entirely. Not that it made much difference. Maybe this -was- the will of the Mother and the Mother was just cruel, bored with all of her creations like she tired of Sahimul. Or, as some of the scripture said, they were all meant to suffer. It made them 'better'.
Finally exhausted from walking, Linarra sat in a small clearing. She just wanted to rest a moment. She felt Sahimul still, perhaps even closer. Now, she wished to talk to him, but she'd let him have his space too. A little doubt twisted in her stomach. Maybe he never wanted to see her again. She wouldn't blame him. She knew she represented all the things that had hurt him.
I will live here, Linarra thought. In this forest. No one will find me. It made her smile, the thought. Like fantasies of running away she'd made when she was a child. She knew, deep down, it wasn't practical. She couldn't live there. She had no idea how to work the land. She'd be found. Either by the Elves or by the Temple. Neither would be friendly to her.
Tugging her hair loose from its braid, Linarra didn't want to face things just yet. The sun was setting and the air was cool, pleasant. She thought of what Sahimul said, how her hair looked better down. It brought a blush to her cheeks. What if they could just go back to his temple? Why couldn't they? Who would look for them there? They could just wait there until the world ended. Together.
She wouldn't tire of him or grow bored, her fantasy told her. Who could be so cruel? Not her. She would listen to his stories in the filmy haze of twilight, and they could make love until dawn. Even thinking it, she felt foolish. Reality wouldn't stop seeping in, staining and ruining all of her pink, candy colored imaginings.
A twig snapped and she startled. She expected to see Sahimul, even felt a little relieved until she met eyes with someone who wasn't the Usurper, but an Elf. He was, like Liriel, golden haired and beautiful. He didn't seem surprised to see her, and he certainly didn't look pleased. The man wore primitive clothing and upon closer inspection, he had gilded skin when the sun hit it. His eyes were gold too, and wild. His face only beautiful with a passing glance. It looked too sharp, rat-like, feral. Mean. He leveled a crude spear at her.
Linarra froze, eyes wide. She could feel Sahimul close. He seemed alarmed too. Did he fell her sudden fear and alarm in the bond? Scrambling to her feet, Linarra took several steps back, holding up her hands, though certainly not surrendering.
"I'm just passing through," she said, trying to keep her voice from shaking. "I am a Priestess. Under High Priestess Liriel."
If she'd thought those were the words to help her, she was wrong. The man's face went from guarded to enraged. He shouted something at her in a language she'd never heard.
Turning to run, she merely stumbled into another man, another Elf in the same stitched leather clothing, shirtless, golden skinned with a knife made of bone. He snatched her by the hair and put the knife to her throat. Linarra went still with fear, the blade nicking her skin.
The men spoke to each other in a language she would have found beautiful, musical like birdsong, if she weren't terrified. They were elves, she noted, but not like Liriel after all. They had sharp teeth and pointed faces. Their golden hair was long, braided and intertwined with feathers and leaves. The man that had her by the hair started to drag her away.
Linarra didn't fight, not with the knife to her neck. She didn't know what to do. Before, she might have prayed to the Mother for aid, but she had doubted even then that the Mother answered prayers. Now, she knew She didn't, or rather She wouldn't answer Linarra's prayers. Not after she'd freed the Usurper. She let the man pull her along to some unknown fate, trying to make some sort of plan along the way. To wherever they were going.
The man never once let loose of her hair. She regretted taking it down. Linarra, feeling sorry for herself and afraid, thought it was like some kind of cosmic joke. They took her through the forest, over game trails and finally to some sort of large, grassy mound in the center of a clearing. The other man waved his hand over the mound and chanted something. There was a little flash and it was like the entire front face of the mound shimmered and waved and rippled like water. When whatever he'd done had dissipated, a crude entrance was revealed.
Dragged by her hair, the men took her into the mound, down a dark, earthen tunnel. It was hard not to trip over loose rock and soil and her own stumbling feet. She quietly begged the man not to pull so hard, her scalp singing in pain, but he either didn't understand or didn't care. He didn't relent.
Once at the bottom of the tunnel, she was finally released, shoved forward and made to stand in an open chamber with a fire pit in the center. Sitting atop a rickety throne made of antler and bramble and branches was an older Elf, his skin burnished gold, his white blonde hair long. He wore finer clothes, but they were still stitched leather. He smiled at her, his teeth sharp. He wore a crown of leaves.
"Human," he said to her. "Why are you here? In my forest?"
Linarra rubbed her sore scalp and swallowed thickly. The fire made it hazy and smoky in the chamber. She knew the men who had brought her there were somewhere in the shadows, but she didn't know where, or she'd make a run for it. Back up the tunnel, back into the forest.
"I'm lost," she lied. She couldn't think of a reasonable excuse. "I became separated from my Guardian and found myself here."
The Elf narrowed his eyes. "It is forbidden."
She felt her pulse race again. Her stomach curdled and she felt ill. Where was Sahimul? She could barely feel him now. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. I will leave at once."
His smile broadened. Linarra decided it didn't look very friendly.
"How brazen of you. To lie to my face," he said, tone cold, the smile remaining. "You consort with the Usurper. The enemy. The Destroyer."
She heard soft gasps from the alcoves of the chamber. Many of them. No, she couldn't run. She was surrounded. She just couldn't see them.
She shook her head. "I don't...no. I don't know what you mean. I am alone."
The King, and that's what he must be, sucked on his teeth and shook his head too. "We have been watching. We know. You brought him here to finish the work of your ancestors. Your lies are amusing, but we won't hear them. They are poison." He looked into the shadows and nodded.
"Take her. We will burn this witch at dawn," he said with dark pleasure.