Mortal Decoy

Chapter 9 - Samara

I ran through the open grassland, sweat dripping down my face from my exertion. Brietta had come to my room shortly after I had fled there. I knew she must be angry for my recklessness and the damage it caused, but she was gentle with me. Asking me if I was ok and saying that things would be alright. I don't know why, but her forgiveness of my mistake made me feel worse than if she'd just yelled at me. Punishment is what I understood. Mercy? Not so much.

Brietta seemed to quickly catch on that I didn't want to talk about the fire incident and had left me alone in my room. After about five minutes of pacing I couldn't take it anymore. I fled outside. Fortunately for me the region had been declared demon free a few days prior so the mana barrier had been taken down so as to not waste precious mana. I ran right out of town and kept running.

I paused to catch my breath, annoyed once again by the limitations of the human body. I felt an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia. I felt stuck in this body, in this situation. I glanced around at the rolling sunlit fields. There wasn't a soul in sight.

It couldn't hurt to transform back to my true form for just a little while. Maybe that would help clear my head. I gathered my mana and let it flow over me, washing away my humanity. I stretched out my wings happily. It was good to have them back. I ran my fingers over my horns, relieved to be back to normal. I knew I couldn't stay like this for long or the Cluniacs might detect my presence, but it was nice to be back.

I itched to fly around, but while I was reckless, I wasn't that reckless. That would just be asking for someone to spot me. And knowing my luck it would probably be Kivani who would see me and come to finish me off with his holy fire.

I might as well walk around for a bit before I go...

Samara! Where have you been! Get back here at once!

Icy fear doused my senses. How could he contact me here? I was in a completely different realm!

If you come back now I may be generous enough to reduce the severity of your punishment. A deep velvety voice growled in my head.

Answer me! If...

Before he could finish I transformed back into my human form. My head remained silent and I gasped in relief. And then the magnitude of what I'd just done sunk in. I'd just directly disobeyed Cifer's command.

I had just gone against the wishes of Lucifer. The King of Demons.

I stood frozen for a few minutes dreading the return of his voice in my mind. Fortunately, there wasn't a sound besides the violent crashing of my thoughts. It seemed like he couldn't contact me while I was in human form. Why? I wasn't exactly sure. I didn't even think it would be possible for him to contact me at all when we were in different realms.

This was bad. While I had wanted to be rebellious, I had always imagined I would go back to the Demon Realm and Cifer eventually. Of course I hadn't exactly considered what kind of punishment Cifer would have waiting for me. But now. Now I could bet that whatever punishment he had chosen for me was about to get some dangerously drastic revisions. My mind swirled as I contemplated transforming back into my demonic form and then begging Cifer for forgiveness. Promising him I would find the next tear and come back immediately. Or better yet I would just go to the dead zone so I wouldn't have to gamble on when the next tear would occur.

But Cifer detested begging. At this point the damage was done. He was already furious. Maybe if I stayed away long enough his anger would fade. I knew that was a foolish hope, but it was technically possible even if it was severely unlikely.

I didn't think he knew exactly where I was even if he had been able to reach me telepathically. Plus there was no way he would be able to fit through just any tear. It would have to be a huge breach between the dimensions, otherwise his extreme mana levels would interfere with the transition between realms.