19. AURELIA

Chapter nineteen

AURELIA

B eing alerted awake, I sat straight up to Damian yelping. What was going on? I looked at him, and large blood-red fire ants were crawling up his body, clicking with each movement. Their beetle bodies were as big as my hands, pinching off pieces of his skin with their rigid red claws and carrying the fragments on their backs, then retreating to wherever they came from.

The ants were a fierce red, with antennas largely protruding from the tops of their heads. Their bodies seemed almost slimy, with an ooze dripping off them.

He was aggressively clawing at them to get them away. I jumped up, looking for something I could use to flick them off without touching them myself, wanting to help him. The large pinchers worked to grab more at his skin and then mine as I tried to help him shoo them off. There were about twenty wandering around his body, finding more skin to take with them to feed their queen.

After brushing them all off, he shivered in disgust. "OW!" He yelped again, holding his hands over his wounds. There were small chunks of skin ripped out along his neck, arms, and legs. They were pretty shallow and not bleeding profusely, but the bare skin was still pink and raw. "What were they doing? What were those?" His questions came fast, a hint of urgency in his tone. I responded with a simple shake of my head.

"I have no idea. I had never read about those." I looked over to where we shooed them off, and they were trudging away, carrying the clumps of skin as prizes on their backs. The nasty sound of their pincers echoed in the quiet night's wind.

I felt embarrassed that I had never heard of them before, as I was the one who studied about the Forbidden Forest my entire life. I was starting to wonder why I wanted to travel throughout the forest so badly and why it was a dream I had ever since I was young. Was I prepared for this journey?

My mind wandered back to the ants. If they were as big as my hands, then how big was their queen? Glancing toward Damian, his wounds were pink and freckled with fresh splotches of blood.

"Stay here," I told him. He needed something to stop the blood from his wounds. Or at least for them to not get infected. Who knew what else we were going to find in the forest, and the last thing that we both would want was for him to get an infection. "If you get an infection, you will lose your mind. I have read too many stories about certain poisons seeping into wounds in the Forbidden Forest, making people mad."

"Where are you going?" he asked, sheathing his silver knife and placing it back into his boot. Why was it out in the first place? I didn't recall him using it against the ants, either.

"Trust me!" I called out as I went through the trees encircled around us. I knew that I saw some sage leaves around here, which were familiar from the literature I had read. The light of the moon ricocheted off the old trees. The onyx bark seemed to seep black goop down the sides of the trunks, the shine of the moon found in the thick liquid. However, it was bright enough for me to look through each plant to find what I was looking for.

I found the landmark of a jagged, weathered rock that we passed. The bluish rock glistened like a thousand diamonds from the dim light. Looking along the sides, I found a small verdant leafy plant nestled into the side of it. The leaves were in the shape of a heart and were cupped, holding small droplets of dew in between, the wetness gleaming. I memorized almost every plant in the books I had in my tower and knew that my knowledge would be useful out here.

Kneeling before the vibrant green plant, I plucked a handful of leaves, holding them up to make sure they were the ones I thought of. Each leaf felt damp, hinting at recent rainfall or lingering moisture. As I observed the stem, I noticed it beginning to almost wilt instantly, its vitality draining away as I stole the foliage. Making my way back to Damian, I needed to place the heart-shaped leaves on each of his wounds.

Glancing around the dimmed fire, and the logs of wood we put together for seating, he was nowhere to be found. My eyes glanced to my right where twigs snapped, showing that he was gathering large pieces of timber.

"I said to stay right where you were! This place is dangerous!" He waved his hand at me, waving off my comment. "Come here. I have something to help with the pain."

He dropped the warm-toned wood he held in his hands and returned to the crackling fire that was growing dim. Seated beside me on the log, I tenderly positioned each leaf over the swollen, reddened patches where the large ants had inflicted their painful bites.

I couldn't help but glance at the different onyx-inked tattoos trailing around his chest, arms, and back. Different images displayed across his body, too many to keep track of.

He winced as I placed the cupped leaves on his warm skin, but I could feel his body sigh with relief as the leaf clasped to the wound beneath it. The pain was diminishing.

After placing each leaf on the wounds, I slowly rubbed them into his skin. They started to attach to it, acting as if they were a bandaid to the wound, covering it whole. Even if he wanted to take them off, he couldn't because now they were merged into his skin, as if they were a part of him all along.

"These will help with the pain. They should only last a day or two, and your wounds should completely heal." I wanted to ask him about his tattoos but couldn't.

"You must be magic, my Queen," he said. His dark eyes made my heart stop for just a beat. "I can already feel them working." I smiled, looking away from him.

***

Sleep overtook us as we laid down by the fire. Rustling, I was unable to get comfortable when Damian startled me with a question, "How long did we sleep? What time is it?" He sat up, looking upward at the sky. It was still obscure, the moon radiating with the hum of movement from the forest. I questioned the amount of sleep I got as well.

"Not tired?" I asked.

He glanced at me and then back to the fire. "It's not that I am not tired," he started, "but the fear of what I see when I sleep." I took a few moments just to process what he had said.

"I also fear sleeping, wondering if I am just going to wake up in my tower day after day, never being able to leave," I stated, leaning closer to him.

He looked at me, glancing kindly, listening intently. "How'd you leave?" he questioned, not minding my closeness.

"My father said I could become heir if I leave on this quest. It wasn't easy being invisible, not allowed to be seen."

"What quest are you supposed to complete then, my Queen?"

"The lands of my kingdom are becoming plagued by creatures called Deathlies. I'm the only one that can save it. There's a dragon relic that can only be seen by Scalekind that can grant one wish. I need to use that wish to stop the Deathlies and to save my kingdom. If I do it in ten days, then I am granted the position of being heir to the throne–my rightful position."

"How cute. So I just need to help you get to the little island?"

My lips curled into a snarl. "Yes. I was only given ten days."

"Great. It would be even better if we could make it sooner. Let's get this over with so neither of us has to suffer," he scoffed.

"What's your problem with me?" I demanded.

"My problem is that you're used to being unable to do things independently." Anger peered out of his eyes as he moved away from me. I was frustrated with the burn of his comment.

"You don't even know me," I stated as I furrowed my eyebrows and glared at him.

"I know you enough to know that you need approval from every living thing for you to feel better about yourself. I know that you are weak. You have never held a knife, at least not with a strong malicious intent. And I know that you are not here to save your kingdom but to prove to your father that you can do something he doesn't think you're capable of. Which goes back to the approval that you're so desperately in need of."

I immediately closed my gaping mouth. What did he just say? My cheeks were warm, and my hands clammy. I wanted to swear at him, tell him to go to Haxnau 1 . But I couldn't. "Whatever you think you know is just a figment of your messed up brain, Damian," I called out. However, there was a truth in his words that stung deeper–not just a blade cutting my skin, but a charred, burnt, rusted, dull knife sinking into my flesh.

He smiled at my remarks. His stupid dimple showing. "The real question is, my Queen, do you want to change? Do you want to be strong?" I didn't respond. I just stared at him. We maintained eye contact, and he waited for my response. He broke our gaze and reached into his boot, pulling out the sharp blade of his knife that he had earlier held up against my throat. "Stab me," he said.

"What?!"

"I said. Stab. Me."

"I… I can't," I stuttered. My hands shook as he enclosed the hilt of his knife in between my fingers.

"Do it." I flinched. My mind raced. I couldn't get my arm to work even if I wanted to. Why was I such a baby? He was right. I was weak. But his words made me want to prove him wrong. Maybe he didn't have a messed up mind. But a dark, twisted one all in the right and brilliant ways.

Without thinking, I did it. I stuck the knife through his leg. My fist attached to his thigh, allowing the blade to sink into the fleshy part of his leg, straight clean through the material of his pants. He didn't even flinch. A curl of his lips lifted into a cruel and reckless snarl. "Do it again, my Queen. But harder."

I couldn't move. Think. Speak.

I released my fingers from the hilt of it, moving backward, my fingers white from clenching it so tightly. The blood in my veins drained, nothing circulating correctly. Did I just stab him?

He quickly put one hand against his thigh and made a low shrieking sound as he pulled the dagger from his leg, tearing the fabric of the black material of his pants further. His face finally winced, but turned back into a smile. The pain only being shown for a slight moment.

I was still frozen, unable to speak or move or do anything. Fear engulfed me. He reached behind him to find the leaves that I brought him before. There were extras I set off to the side. He placed them on his skin, the leaf quickly sewing itself into his flesh.

"Pain is nothing but a mental game. It's only for the weak."

1. Haxnau (Hah-nah-woo): Hell