The Knight of Settadel

Chapter 33

I can feel heat emanating closely to my left. Maybe it's a little too close, but it was not causing me any discomfort as I can still feel my body shaking from the cold as my wet clothes clung to my body like a second skin.

I felt like something was pressing on my chest which is making me hard to breathe, so I urged myself to open my eyes and, though blurry, I could see enough to see that nothing was on top of me. But one thing that caught my eye was the crackling fire to my right, though it was to my left that I am feeling the heat so, with much effort required, I turned to the other side and I could feel the heat expand throughout my whole body when I saw Elyse so close to me, but she was also unconscious.

"Oh how easily can fate be manipulated"

I heard a voice from a distance, and it even sounded like it was in my head, but I couldn't turn around to look for the source of the voice.

"But it is so much easier to make people believe that everything happens because of fate"

Then the owner of the voice came to stand in front of me, obviously noticing that I had slowly regained consciousness. I couldn't say the same from Elyse, though.

Still, despite standing in front of me, I couldn't distinguish who the person was. Not even when they had knelt down so that they could level with me, but I could see the smug smirk on their face, though, and I wanted nothing more but to wipe it off.

"Ferdinand was a man who, though had little hope, did not give up. With everything that had happened to him, it was easy for everyone to just think that he committing suicide was inevitable. I mean, who would not do it after losing their family, right?"

They stood up again and began to roam the room. I averted my eyes back to Elyse and prayed for her to wake up; the pain in my head still hindering me from seeing clearly.

"But Ferdinand is also a man who had put his nose where he shouldn't"

I have no idea who this Ferdinand man that this person is talking about, but I did hear my parents talking about someone from Elyse's town committing suicide after the tragedy had hit the kingdom, so I am assuming that that is the Ferdinand man that they are talking about.

"It's fun, really, how you can manipulate people whether from behind or directly in front of them and they would never know" there was malice in their voice and, the more that they speak, the more that their voice sounds familiar and I was itching to rub my eyes even though I'm pretty sure that it won't make me see clearer - I was desperate, though.

"It is most especially easy to manipulate people who is mentally weak"

They laughed, and their laugh was laced with so much malice and hatred that you could almost feel it on your skin.

I suddenly felt the need to cry - cry in desperation as I quickly lose hope that we would ever get out of here. Whoever this person is obviously planned this quite well for us to end up here, wherever we are, and with Else unconscious and no way of knowing when she would wake up, our chance of escaping is slimmer.

"Well, it's getting boring talking to you so I'll return when you're both awake"

Just like that, they left, which left me confused as I'm not feeling any ropes on my arms and legs which means I'm not bound to anything, Elyse is the same.

Maybe there is hope.

I gathered all the energy that I can to push myself up the floor and I was able to do so that I was on my knees and carefully crawled over to Elyse, calling out to her weakly.

"Please, wake up"

I sat next to her and cradled her on my lap as I check her face and body for any signs of wounds or bruises. Fortunately, there was not, but that's probably thanks to her ability. While I only began to feel the ache in my body again and I'm not sure if that's because of how forceful I swam or because I got slammed into the boat and rocks by the waves. But I didn't want to focus on that for now.