Elemental Shadowed by Helen Scott
5
Tessa
"Well, I think Tessa has a point, gentlemen." The queen smiled, before pushing up from her chair, and though we all quickly moved to stand, she waved us down. "Enough of that for the night. The prophecy isn't as complicated as we made it out to be. Yes, there are parts that are confusing and parts we won't understand until it's too late, but it's fairly straightforward.
“I needed to be sure you were committed though, as did my advisers, before we revealed it to you. You have demonstrated that not only with your training but with your strength of character, as you’ve just shown us. Not many would stand their ground against my advisers, and even fewer would demand answers from a queen. I am impressed, Tessa." The queen inclined her head as she looked at me, and it was all I could do to swallow the outrage.
"I'm glad I passed your test, Your Majesty," I said, barely keeping the disdain from my voice.
"Come, all of you, we will go to the Room of Prophecy and discuss this further." She turned, her skirts swirling out from around her, and strode off without waiting for any of us to join her.
I knew it was just expected that we follow, but as her advisers rushed to join her, I remained seated. Finn and Dres were already on their feet following the procession, but I stubbornly didn't want to move. Griff and Kai both stared at me expectantly. "Did you know?" I whispered to no one in particular.
"You really think I'd have put up with this bullshit if I had?" Griff asked, while Kai just shook his head. Those dark eyes of his flashed to mine as anger whipped through me, and what I saw there was enough to startle me.
His anger matched my own. His disdain for secret tests and trials was evident by the slight sneer on his face. No one else would notice, but somehow tracking all the minute changes of Kai's face had become a hobby of mine. It was one of the reasons I trusted him completely along with the other guys, even though he barely said a word to me.
All those hours we spent training together had shown me that he would never intentionally hurt me. When he landed a hit too hard, I knew his left eye would twitch, or when I landed too hard on the ground his grip around his weapon would tighten. It was these small things that made me feel like he was a placid lake with currents raging under the surface.
"We should go," Griff said, forcing me to wrench my eyes from Kai's intense gaze.
"Fine, but I'm not happy with how this went down," I grumbled as I pushed up from my chair.
I couldn't help myself and looked over at Kai once more as I started to walk away. His dark eyes were full of hunger as they devoured the sight of my body, which made goosebumps erupt all over my skin.
Before he could catch me staring, I turned my attention back to Griff and found him observing me similarly. Heat pooled low in my belly as the thought of the two of them being with me at the same time popped into my head. I couldn't help the wave of need that blasted through my body, almost making me stumble as I moved toward Griff.
"If you keep looking at me like that then I won't be able to face the queen," I said quietly as I approached him.
Griffin's eyes practically rolled back in his head as my words hit him. "Fuck, you can't say things like that to me, dove. It makes me want to scoop you up and run away with you just so I can do everything you ever dreamed about." He reached out and ran his knuckles down my cheek, and when they got to the bottom, his thumb swiped across my lower lip, pulling it down ever so slightly so my lips were parted and my hot breath danced over his fingers.
I kissed the tip of his thumb before pulling out of his reach and striding past him while his audible groan reached my ears. We walked down a long hallway to what looked like a temple of some kind. Two guards stood outside the doors and bowed deeply to the queen as she entered the room where I assumed the scrolls were held. I was glad that it wasn't just Finn and I following the queen, everyone was along for the ride, which to be honest was probably for the best.
The room was nothing like I expected. Each wall was covered, floor to ceiling, in a mural that depicted a specific scene, but none of it really meant anything to me, though I got the sense from Finn that this was a major deal.
Everyone packed in there, and I felt a wash of guilt come over me at making them wait. I had to stop and remind myself that they had been making me wait for months for this. At that thought anticipation coiled through me, and I was at once both eager and trepidatious.
Finn leveled a knowing look at me as I walked into the room. Of all the guys I'd been the most stubborn with him when it came to training, so he probably had a good idea of what was going through my mind at that point. I wasn't about to let down my guard though, not when I was so close to finding out what this big mystery was all about.
Once the door shut behind us the queen began speaking, her eyes sparkling with an eagerness that was not unlike my own, making me wonder who exactly had wanted to test me because suddenly I didn't think it was her.
“Welcome to the Room of Prophecy." The queen spread her hands wide and turned in a slow circle before continuing. "If you are the key, as this team and I suspect, then this is your first step in a long journey. You will stabilize the four realms, protect the fifth, and none of it will be easy, but that is what you were born and bred to do.”
The queen sighed before she continued, a weight seeming to fall on her shoulders. In that moment she looked older than I had ever seen her before, as though she’d aged before our very eyes. “This is not a grand adventure, not a holiday or vacation as your people say. It will be emotionally, physically, and magically exhausting. People will fight you in every realm, and not just the ones who want to claim the fifth realm for themselves, but the ones who are scared of change, and make no mistake you are a symbol of change.
“These realms have been stuck in the same pattern for so long that change will not be easy or particularly welcomed. Especially since the rulers, such as myself, have never shared the prophecy with anyone outside of each other. You will have to fight, and you must not give up or be dissuaded from your course for your purpose is so much greater than any discomfort you can ever face.
“If you fail, Atlantis will be overrun with water, everyone here will drown, and there will be no escape. The people from Agartha will suffocate and die, those from El Dorado will be cooked under their unforgiving sun, and those from Hyperborea will be frozen. The magic in the four realms is running out, especially as the caretakers die off, and if you can’t stabilize the realms then once the magic runs out the elements and nature will reclaim them in the way that it originally intended.
“Believe it or not, I am sorry this has fallen on your shoulders. Until you arrived we truly believed that the Key was an object. Now so many things need to be reexamined.”
My mouth opened and closed and I had no idea how to reply without offending the queen.
Thankfully she continued before I could formulate a response, “We have been going over the scrolls again since the attack, keeping the fact that you are who you are in mind, but haven't found any further insights. My advisors will continue to investigate, but in the meantime, I need you to continue to train, to learn everything you can for the coming fights, because they are coming whether you like it or not.
"Now as for the prophecy itself, it's not only in the writing but in the murals as well. Over the years when the people of Hyperborea were especially powerful, when the prophecy first came to light, the four realms had already been connected for quite some time. It was only after the initial prophecy was told that there were four other instances of it spoken and the murals were painted, each one reflecting the doom of that realm."
The queen fell silent and moved to stand in front of the mural of Atlantis. The skyline was almost the same as though I was standing outside the temple, but instead of only seeing the inner rings, I could see the outer ocean as well. "We know that the two major signs for our realm will be the ocean changing color, and the large beings, the ones that so many of our people worship as though they were gods, dying. Their corpses floating as the tide brings them ever closer to our small island."
When I first arrived and everything had calmed down, Finn had told me a little of Atlantis' history. It truly was a realm made up primarily of water.
A long time ago a crew had succeeded in circumnavigating around the whole realm, and it was only because of the flow of magic within the realm that they survived. As space had run out on land, the Atlantean people had used magic to help them build down, slowly carving out rocks and building different areas up so that people could live under the surface.
Many believed that it was because of this and the use of magic to build, that some of the people, like Finn, had developed gills. If they wanted to, they could survive underwater for as long as they had food and water. While they might be able to breathe naturally, they still needed the crops that were grown on the surface and using some of the magic lights under the surface as well.
Food was rationed for everyone except the queen and her advisers. Even our little group had restrictions on what we could and couldn't eat, along with the quantity of rations, at least when we weren't dining with the queen.
"We believe that the most important part of the mural is this section," the queen said, interrupting my thoughts as she gestured to the small figure standing on the shore of the outer ring. It was clear that he or she was holding something in his or her hand, but the figure was mostly hidden by the cloak that fell to their mid-thigh. Everything about it was a mystery. Once we had all examined it to her standards, the queen continued. "I believe that the figure depicted is you, Tessa. For a long time, we thought it was someone who would wield the key, and that has created contention between Atlantis and some of the other realms. Now that I have passed on the knowledge that I believe the key is a person, the murals make more sense, and thankfully some of the contention has lessened."
My gaze drifted away from the figure that could, in reality, be anyone and alighted on the massive beings that were floating, dead in the water. I knew that outside the water was a crystalline blue. On the painting, however, it had changed to a deep brown with an almost purple tint to it, and I didn’t think it had anything to do with the age of the mural. The idea of these ancient beings dying made me sad but also pissed me off more than anything else. The queen raised her arm as though to touch the mural, before dropping it back to her side, which was enough to make me think that she might feel the same way.
"The bulk of the prophecy is a list of numbered things," Mr. Grumpy-beard said, as though he wanted to move things along.
"Right," the queen replied, pulling herself out of whatever trance she'd fallen into. "The dictated prophecy is as follows," she said, pausing and clearing her throat before beginning in a more ominous tone.
"Five hearts beating as one,
four realms slowly dying,
three secrets left untold,
two souls in need of guidance,
one key to save them all,
one key that's marked by all,
two bloodthirsty reigns ending,
three strange voices drifting,
four memories altered or missing,
five caretakers bless their savior."
I stared at her for a moment, expecting something more, something with some direction to it, with some clue as to what I was supposed to do. She remained silent though, and her shoulders drooped as though reciting it had taken a lot out of her. As I turned toward the guys, I found the three advisers staring at me.
"Do you understand?" the stoic one asked.
"Am I supposed to?" I countered.
"We were hoping that being from the origin realm, and supposedly being the key, would give you some insight into the meaning of the prophecy," Mr. Grumpy-beard added.
"Sorry to disappoint, gentlemen, but I'm just as in the dark as you are." I sighed.
"Sharing the whole prophecy was not what we had agreed on, Your Majesty, and now I'm afraid what this will mean. Five civilians know the whole thing. I propose we confine them to the inner palace until we are certain they are not spies."
"How the hell could I be a spy? I was completely oblivious to this, to the existence of these so-called four realms, to the existence of any of this before the Caspar team educated me. I gave up everything in my life to come here and help.
“But you three treat me as though I'm dirt, not even worthy of talking to, let alone acting as though I'm in the same room as you. I'm not a spy, neither are any of my teammates. You're such a dickhead!" I exploded.
I knew it was bad form, but after everything over the last few months, I had had enough. Before any of them could do any more than gape at me I turned and said, "Please excuse me, Your Majesty. I'm not feeling well."
She nodded, that annoying little smirk on her face, and that was all I needed before I flew from the room. My name was called over and over again by my guys, but I didn't care.
All I knew was I needed to be away from all of them. I needed time to process what had been said and to decide if I wanted to stay and see this through or not. As I ran to my room I didn't care that a boob might pop out of my dress, and I didn't care that the skirt was flapping around my legs, probably giving everyone a clear shot of my lady parts. All I wanted to do was get out of the outfit and into some shorts and go run, or hit something, whichever came first.
I felt like a tool, in more ways than one, that was about to be used. I wasn't necessarily upset about that if it meant that I could save all the realms. But there had to be more to go on than what I'd just seen and been told, because if this was the majority of what they had then I had no idea what to do. And if they didn't either then we were all screwed.
All I knew as I ran was that it was up to me to figure this shit show out. I knew trying to figure the whole thing out was too much, so I just had to focus on the next step. What could I do to make this all start to make sense?
