The soldier fidgets in his pocket, taking a small item out and throwing it into the air. It explodes into a yellow cloud and the soldiers near Florence come rushing in. Helen points their way and activates both seals but nothing happens. She tries once more, this time pulling on my aura more intensely. Still nothing, but Helen's breathing becomes heavy and my body falls to its knees. The sounds of chains rattling approach and as Helen looks up, our vision becomes blurred.
Unable to see where they're attacking from, she braces herself when suddenly a wall erupts from the ground, blocking the knives. David runs over and grabs us by the arm, "we need to leave!" He says, "If the smoke bomb was a signal of some kind, there are more likely to come."
Helen snatches my arm away, "I'm going to retrieve my army, then I'm going to retrieve my body. At that point, I'll be out of your hair," she says out of breath.
"Your body?" He asks. "Your body went missing shortly after you performed that spell, no one knows where it is."
"How do you know-"
The soldiers come running around the wall and David grabs my arm once again. This time dragging us along the street and into a nearby alley. Helen looks back to see Florence running over to her father with the waterworks as if she didn't just order his death.
"Damn it, where is it?!" He frantically says looking to the sky. Helen and I slowly begin to regain our vision but she's too weak to move. When we hear the footsteps and chatter of the soldiers running our way, David picks us up and carries us as he runs through more alleyways. Narrowly escaping more Hazel soldiers who are running in the direction in which we came.
After a couple of blocks, we end up in a different part of the city. He takes us into another small alley and sits my body down on the pavement. He paces around, still looking at the sky, and I take this moment to try and gain control of my body. It seems easier when we're low on aura. The same as before, I channel the little energy that I have and this time there's no resistance from Helen. I begin to feel my body parts one by one until I gain full control.
"The army, Alyssa!" Helen faintly whispers as I stand to my feet, I ignore it. And the sign David has been waiting for shoots up into the clouds, it's Elijah's ability.
"West," he says staring at the sky before turning back to me, "Alyssa?" He squints his eyes.
I nod my head, placing my hand against the wall of the building next to me to hold myself up. "How did you all escape?" I ask fighting through the soreness of my body.
"They tried detaining us, but with no dampeners around to stop us, we were able to fight our way out of the colosseum. You may not want to hear this, but the group decided to leave you behind. I decided to go back and told Elijah to give me a signal once they'd found a safe exit. We should get moving. Do you have the strength to walk or run?"
Why am I not surprised that they chose to do that? "No," I shake my head, "but that signal wasn't very discreet. There will probably be Hazel soldiers headed that way."
"Yeah, but the paint is to stick together,"
"No, they're going to run and leave us behind. It's too much of a risk for them to stay and fight."
"So what do you propose?"
"We find somewhere safe, somewhere I can rest and allow my aura to recharge. You can't fight on your own…and even though I may not be much help, me fighting alongside you is better than nothing."
"I'm not sure where that place would be, Alyssa. We know very little of Espin, the spies your family employs rarely make it back home. And when they do, it's with little information."
"There's an abandoned town just a few miles from here," Helen says. "Charles Valentine and Nicholas Hazel used to hold their meetings there to avoid the public finding out about the workings of the treaty."
I'm reluctant to listen to her advice but then I remember William mentioning the meetings that took place.
"I know where to go," I tell David. He picks me up once more and we continue through the city. Helen guides me as David sticks to using alleys as much as possible to avoid civilians noticing us.
After running around in the heat for a while we come across a path that leads to a dirt road, and as Helen said, an abandoned part of the city that's been roadblocked. David steps over the blocks and heads into a nearby bar. Spiderwebs everywhere, dust coating every surface area that's so thick you could probably make a ball out of it. He puts me down and I walk over to one of the tables and take a seat.
"We need to figure out where the others went," David says as he glances out the broken windows.
"Just rest for a moment. You've been carrying me around under that sun for the past hour and a half."
He does so, taking a seat in the chair across from me. The sun directly hits his chest and lights up the burn mark. Even though it looks like the Hazel's were treating him, It's worse than I thought. My first instinct is to ask him if it still hurts but I choose otherwise, apologizing instead. He smiles but I can tell it's fake, one that's just trying to brush it off as if it isn't a big deal.
"It's okay, it'll heal," he says, and things go silent for a moment. Something that almost never happens between us. Besides the guilt I feel, part of me feels like I don't know who sits across from me anymore.
"I don't know what else to say so I'm just going to ask…" I blurt out. "I want you to tell me who you really are, your story, and how you came to be here. I've finally wrapped my head around magic and The Coven being real. Why are you after Helen?"
"So, she still hasn't explained?" He smiles.
"She's explained a little but I'm missing a lot."
"It's not going to be something you want to hear…but, you have the right to know."
A glowing circle appears above his head, looking like a halo at first before it expands and slowly descends down his body. As it does, his face changes, and ages into a man in his early forties. The shock nearly causes me to jump out of my seat. Although he looks similar, there are some differences in his appearance. His cheekbones are a bit higher, his mouth is a bit fuller, and his jawline is more defined. I wouldn't recognize him if I didn't know his eyes so well, which stay the same. He's also grown a beard with little grey hairs spread about.
"The magic we use for disguising is a mixture of aging and transformation spells," he says. "I'm sorry for deceiving you, princess. Try not to look so shocked, huh."
"I'm sorry…it's just…I've known you since I was six years old, I've seen you age, I've seen you go through the ranks in the Valentine army. Is David even your real name…?"
"Of course, it is, which my Elder disapproved. I've seen spies in my situation get lost in the persona they take on. I wasn't giving my name up. But as it turns out, getting lost in your new persona is easier than I thought. I fell into this role of being a knight and your designated knight so easily. It was comfortable. Part of me wished that Helen would have never shown her presence just to keep this life going. But at the end of the day, I'm still the David you know."
Oh, God. I've had a crush on him for as long as I can remember, and he's an old man!
"Hm," Helen remarks.
"You've been quiet for a while now, do you recognize him?" I ask her with a thought.
"Just like you, I'm recharging, and …there's a faint recognization. You shouldn't listen what he has to say. I didn't mention the later part of my story for a reason."
I shift focus back to David, "okay, just tell me everything please."
"Alright then, my history isn't all that interesting. My family fled from Torrine, which is now District Five, and we ended up finding a home in The Coven. Spies weren't even a thing back then, I was simply a student of magic. I first became aware of Helen as a young boy as she would always visit. Her mother was a beloved member, almost like family to everyone. Her father didn't care for us all that much, and never saw The Coven as their true home so they would often come back and forth. And although I never interacted with her, back then, I could tell she was a kind spirit. I feel everything changed once her parents died. Her mother first, from an illness. And her father at the hands of Charles Valentine. When we heard she'd been kidnapped by your family, the Elder of the time wanted to go after her, but ultimately there was nothing we could do."
"They never cared about me, really. They hold so much power and potential but choose to sit on it."
"Can you hear her right now?" David suddenly asks. "I assume she's saying we could've rescued her. And that may be true, but we risked exposing The Coven to the world. As well as the pointless bloodshed. People don't come to The Coven to become stronger, or a soldier. They come seeking peace. Helen went on to become a crucial part of why your family rose to power. They killed thousands in order to further expand Athys into what it is today."
"Two years had gone by when Helen suddenly returned to The Coven and news of King Charles' death spread throughout Athys. A new war had started because of her and she wanted our help in retaliating for what they'd done to her and made her do. I remember that day vividly, the pouring rain, and noticing that the once kind spirit was no longer residing in her. She'd been blackened by war and death. We were also surprised by her appearance as she hadn't aged. But that wasn't the strangest part, she now possessed a seal that we'd never seen before, a shadow seal."
"Shadow…?"
David nods his head. "We're not sure where she gained this power, but we suspected it's what gave her the edge to kill Charles. If she was kept in a prison with seal dampeners, suddenly gaining a seal that's not written into the dampener's spell would allow her to escape. I'm not surprised she hasn't mentioned it to you. It's probably the reason she's so eager to find her body. The seal allowed her to manipulate shadow and darkness as you might've guessed. This seal is not mentioned in any of our ancient texts and to this day, only Helen seems to possess it. But, back on track…when The Coven chose to stand against her, she chose violence, running through our entire defenses, our best witches and warlocks. No one stood a chance.
He pauses, taking a deep breath in. "Not even our Elder." Pain is written all over his face, in his eyes. Even with this new look, I've never seen him like that.
"The only person who could fight Helen was her childhood friend. The one she grew up and studied magic with all those years ago. Their rivalry was a known one when they were younger, both of them wanting to become Elder one day. Her name was Elaina, and after defeating Helen that day, she banished her. Everyone thought the fight would continue, and that Helen wouldn't stop but…she did, and she left that day. Elaina went on to form the spy initiative. Some of us were ordered to keep tabs on Helen, and the others, the Valentine family."
"Of course, it would be her," Helen chuckles. "Even after all these years, she's still finding ways to block me."
"I was chosen for the group to watch Helen, and In the beginning, there were only six of us. Years flew by and she remained silent, choosing to return to her home in District Three. She simply studied magic, and the only time she left her home was to go sit in a bar much like this one. She'd order one drink and wouldn't speak to anyone. Even those who seem to have known her family. It remained that way until your father came knocking."
"My Father?" I ask. "What does he have to do with this?"
He takes another deep breath, "when I said this isn't something you'd want to hear, this is the part of the story I meant. Apparently, as a teenager, your father witnessed the murder of King Charles. And Harris was known to hate his father, he was after the throne long before Helen came along. He was sixteen, and whatever he saw Helen do to your father made him fall in love."
"Where are you going with this, David…?"
"You know the rest, Charles' death causes the Iron Crown War, and your father with the help of General Thomas fights off the invading families. Helen loses her battle with Elaina and moves back to District Three, becoming a shell of herself. Years go by and Harris ages while Helen does not. Harris eventually marries Sophia, and along came Elijah and Brianna.
"By 1874, a year before you were born. We got word that Harris had begun a search for Helen. And assuming she'd be an old woman by this time, the search went cold for a very long time until a Valentine soldier spotted whom he thought to be Helen's daughter. Not knowing that he'd actually found Helen herself. By the time my team received this information, Harris had already gotten to her and moved her to a safe home in Uboni. I have no clue what compelled her to leave with him, or if she was forced. Only she can say, but, I assume she was lonely. And of course, we couldn't interfere. Uboni was gated off and well-protected."
Tears begin rolling down my face even though I don't know why. In my stomach, there's a pit.
"Months go by and a member of my team spots her in District Three," David continues. "His report: Helen is pregnant."
"No," I shake my head. "You're not saying what I think you're saying. She has a child elsewhere and that's not me. Sophia Valentine is my mother. She died giving birth to me, and that's it. Your information is wrong."
"I told you this isn't what you'd want to hear…denial is natural. Just let me finish, She gave birth on October 17th, 1875. Elaina had become Elder by this point, and once she found out, she joined me and my team in District Three. We feared not only what two light seals would create, but feared what the offspring of the most powerful witch and the king would create. As for the two light seals, they seemed to have granted you the ability to absorb magic. There are things we still don't understand about seals and where they come from."
I try to catch my breath as my nose fills with fluid, I can't stop the tears anymore.
"Our mission was either to retrieve you or convince Helen to return The Coven where we can safely keep eyes on her. She refused and a fight ensued, if she wasn't so rusty on her magic, we wouldn't have survived. Elaina was able to get the upper hand on Helen once again and Harris eventually showed up but the fight had ended by then. With no other choice and her back against a wall, Helen performed yet another forbidden spell: transferring one's consciousness into another body, your infant body as she held you in her arms.
Believing her to be dead, Harris picked you up and threatened to kill every single one of us there if we harmed you. He surprisingly let us live, he was more concerned about you. Elaina chose to let you go, not wanting to stir any potential trouble with the Valentine but she had one stipulation. One she never mentioned to Harris, I was to remain in disguise and watch over you as a guardian."
"Just breathe, darling," Helen says as I feel like I'm going to pass out. "I was working towards this. How could I just come out and say it?" Deep down I knew something was off, my entire life I've known something was off, and the woman I looked to as my mother isn't even mine. The one I've dreamed of meeting my entire life, it was just a lie.
After a moment, I compose myself and wipe the tears from my face. "I'm sorry," I say to David. "I don't mean to make this all about me….seventeen years of your life is a long time. You shouldn't have been expected to do such a thing."
"It's my job," he smiles. "Besides, it hasn't been so bad. I've gained a little sister out of it."
We hear a commotion coming from outside and duck down behind the tables. "Clear!" We hear men say multiple times as they approach the building we're in. The circle above David's head appears again and he transforms into his younger self just as someone walks in. David inches closer to the door before fully popping up. "General Thomas?!"