The Necklace: The Trial Realm

Chapter Thirty Seven: Believe In Us

"I need order in this room!" Raysmith calls over the masses. They are not receptive. "No one will begin speaking until this room is quiet!" She shouts and her stone at her head glows brightly. She crosses her arms and stands her ground, refusing to speak another word until the others in the room settle down and show her the respect she clearly demands.

It takes a long few minutes of us just standing here, her with her head held high, mine a little more down and wishing to be anywhere but on this stage, and Tonyedda somewhere between the two of us. The roar in the room slowly settles to a murmur until finally after a while of probably all being tired of standing around, nowhere near enough seats for the magnitude of people gathered here, the room goes quiet.

"Thank you." Raysmith nods her head and takes a deep breath. "As many of you are aware, the traitor has returned." The room sways with emotion that you can feel and almost even see floating over every one. "He brings us news of the most sensitive nature and we will all need to adjust our thinking to this reality as it is."

"We don't want to hear from you!" The man from earlier wiggles his way through the crowd to get back in the front. "You all are fine with lying to us," He says and I don't show on my face how true his statement actually is. "We want to hear it from her." He points one long finger in my direction. "Unless one of our own tells us we don't want to hear it."

The crowd murmurs in agreement and I go still in my spot on stage as Rasymith slowly turns towards me. "By all means," She extends her hand to me. "Let her tell you then."

I swallow hard as the room stills again, so many expectant eyes on me.

"I don't really know where to begin." I say first, voice sounding stuck in the back of my throat.

"Why is the traitor here?" Someone shouts.

"Yeah, why would we let him back in to our building after what he's done?"

I take a step forward and focus on a spot at the back of the room. "He's returned because he was one of the few people who could shed the light on who our real enemies are." I say, side glancing to Tonyedda and Raysmith to be sure they aren't going to freak out over me calling the Gods enemies. When neither of them turns red or looks pissed I slowly ease into it. "Let me ask you all a question," I start. "Who would want to see this realm and our mission here fail?" When no one can really answer, I take a deep breath and barrel into the truth. There isn't any avoiding it, and though the commotion builds, I just continue to speak over the top of them all, needing to get all of the insanity out and face the music that is the absolute chaos that ensues afterwards.

"The gods?"

"I want to leave!"

"We can't go against the god's wishes!"

"This is a suicide mission!"

"I know," I shout. "I know it sounds bad, and trust me, I know it's not ideal, but we've got to stick together through this."

"Stick together?" The man up front, my new personal number one enemy. "We don't even know if the person standing next to us is a true Custode or if they were randomly selected."

"Or worse," A woman chimes in. "They could be a mindless zombie working for the gods to lure us into a dark corner and murder us!"

"We all need to just pack it up and go home."

"This is my home." I snap. "I can't speak for the rest of you, obviously, but this is what I'm choosing to stand up and fight for. I won't back down just because it's harder now. I won't let an entire realm of humans, vampire, werewolves, demons, faes, angels, and witches all die just because I'm scared." I shout over the yelling. "I'm afraid, just like the rest of you are, but without us, then what happens here? Many of you have been lucky enough to be here for years, you've been out on missions and seen these people we are here to protect, and you'd still turn your back on them all?"