The Paladins of Naretia

Chapter 20

"Whot do ye mean we're no' stoppin' fer lunch?"

The gruff voice rang out in Aria's throbbing head.

"We must wait until the mire is behind us," said a second, wearier voice. "Even now, I fear the Dark Ones are hovering nearby. There are very few places to run in this terrain that would not see us swallowed up by a gawping muddy maw."

Aria tried to open her eyes to see who was talking, but the bright, sunbathed world she saw, spun mercilessly around her instead. It left the figures blurred and unrecognisable. With the sky underneath and a grassy bogland whirling above her head, Aria felt her stomach churn and her eyes roll back into her skull. The voices in the bright world became muffled as they argued about whether dwarfs actually needed more regular feeding then humans, the loudest of them adamant that it was true.

As their disagreement dissolved, she was submerged into the blissful darkness once again. Unlike before, where it was unaccompanied by her consciousness, this time Aria saw images emerge in the dimness. Two figures wearing golden crowns coalesced before her. A man with curly red hair and brown eyes, drifted closer as though he glided on the air itself. Holding the crook of his arm, like she couldn't bear to let go of him, was a beautiful woman with blonde hair, piercing blue eyes and full red lips.

Aria recognised them at once as her parents, the king and queen of Naretia. The sight of them filled her heart with a warmth that felt like a long-lost comfort. Dancing around their legs was a small boy, her seven-year old brother Pearan. His brown eyes twinkled with mischievousness, and his wild, red hair bounced like a deranged cloud as he ducked and weaved beneath the feet of their parents, laughing loudly.

They watched Pearan's antics with adoring smiles, gesturing for Aria to join them. Aria couldn't remember the last time she saw her parent's smile, and her heart did a flip at their invitation. She tried to reach out to them, but her hands refused to obey. Straining to touch her parents, a rope snaked around her wrists and tugged her away. 'Why are my hands tied?' she thought, glancing with alarm toward her parents.

Her mother and father, and even her brother Pearan, seemed oblivious to her plight as they each waved at her to come closer. Aria tried to call out to them, but only heard herself moan.

"Dinnae go blaming me if the hunger overwhelms me," her mother said in a deep voice. "And fer the love of the wee man, dinnae let that dirty fud come too close tae me, or I'll skin her!"

'What? Surely my mother would never say such a thing to me?' In that moment, a name circled at the back of her tumultuous brain, one that she loathed to hear. 'The Blood Queen.' Although she knew that the sound of it raised bile in the back of her throat, Aria couldn't remember why she detested it so much, or what it meant. Her mother, the queen, had never been anything other than a loving and kind ruler, same as her father.

As a bright light invaded her dreams again and melted the vision of her parents, Aria realised that the owner of the loud voice came from the upside-down world. She felt herself being jostled, as if someone was carrying her and needed to redistribute her weight. Her head swayed from side to side as her carrier took long powerful strides. Her hard metal armour dug painfully into her back as he did. She reached out and grabbed onto something to hoist herself up, hampered by her bound hands. Leaning her head onto what she could only imagine was a shoulder, Aria opened her eyes for long enough to see that she had grabbed onto someone's brown tunic. Beneath that tunic was the powerful chest of a man.

"Easy," the man's deep, cool voice whispered in her ear.

Aria tried to look up and see who had spoken to her so softly, but she only caught a glimpse of a strong jaw and shoulder length black hair before the darkness captured her once again.