"Weston."
I spoke his name in a rushed breath as he pushed through double doors and pulled me behind him. I could see his jaw tighten, as if he was upset with me.
"Weston." I repeated his name and he whirled around.
"What?" He snapped as his nose brushed against mine. His warm breath shot forward, causing me to stumble back in surprise.
"Why--why are you acting like this?" My voice trembled a little on the ends and I hated how weak I sounded. But Weston made me that way, more than Kieran did.
Almost as if Weston had seen the image of Kieran pass through my mind, he growled and took a step forward, caging me in with the drop of his shoulders so he could be face to face with me.
"I told you to be careful and you run off?" His words so brusque I felt the pins and needles of tears almost erupt from my eyes.
"I didn't run off," I hissed. "I needed fresh air and I can't help that I was attacked and had to protect myself."
"You should have stayed inside my room." He countered and I felt anger bubble in my chest.
"Weston, you don't have a right to tell me what to do!" I stuck my nose deeper into his face. His lips curled into a snarl as his hands gripped me and held me in place. Testing me to see how long I would go along with the challenge I placed forth.
"I'm trying to protect you, Caelia." He whispered my name so softly at the end I almost didn't even catch it.
"I don't need protection." I jerked out of his grasp when I felt his grip loosen.
"You may have not needed it much before, but now you'll need it more than ever." His face was like stone as he took several steps back from me. "And the Reaper can't always come to your rescue after today."
"Kieran didn't come to my rescue." I started off and Weston snorted a deep chuckle.
"Of course he did. The Reaper wouldn't risk his position just to come see you before he's done what his father asked of him." He rolled his eyes.
"What do you mean?" My eyebrows raised as the questions and images of gore and pain flooded my mind. I knew Kieran was a creature of darkness, but then again, this whole realm was. Could he truly be trying to mask that darkness by defying his father in order to still have a chance with me?
You can't trust anyone, especially me. His words rung loud and clear that I was sure Weston caught them in the air when his eyebrows rose as well.
"Reapers kill Grimms and Grimms kill the enemy." Weston explained with a hint of boredom in his tone. "Kieran, as you prefer to call him--"
"That's his name." I interrupted and he waved me off.
"Don't care." He snapped irritability. "He became a Reaper after his father killed his best friend years ago. While it was an accident, Kieran never saw it that way. He searched for a way of revenge and found it through a Wielder."
Wielder.
There was that term again. "What's a Wielder?" I asked before Weston could continue on with his story.
He looked at me oddly. "Multiple things. Just like how there are multiple Seers, there are multiple Wielders. But Henrietta, the witch," he growled again as his eyes did another roll. "She's the one who uses very old magic to bond those with the earth. Kieran went to her with a way to see his father's next betrayal before it happened and she turned him into a Reaper. The Raven is the most respected animal in the Wielder society--so I've been told. But a Reapers job is to protect the old ways as well. Hence, why once he was born a Reaper he was banned from the Crown because we really need as many Grimms as we can get in the wars to come."
"Born?" I asked as I caught onto the one thing that didn't quite make sense to me.
Weston nodded his head. "The witch had to kill him before he could become what he is today."
"Oh." My heart thumped heavy in my chest as I could just imagine what Kieran must have gone through.
After a moment of silence, Weston cleared his throat and I looked up from the ground. "If we keep the Crown waiting any longer, there won't be any way to get you out of what's to come."
_____________
It was set up just like any other mundane court room. And I was surprised by that as Weston led me in and sat me down in front of a small table set before a large stretch of a podium. The only difference was that instead of one judge, there were five.
All five faces looked down at me coldly.
I cut my eyes to Weston and he shook his head so softly that I almost didn't catch the motion. I gulped and sat back in my chair. Realizing I was still dressed in Kieran's coat and naked underneath, I tugged the fabric closer to my body as I awaited for one of the men to talk.
Neither one of them seemed ready to as the daggers they were throwing at me mentally pierced my soul with guilt and fire.
I roamed my eyes to chairs located to the right of the room. There sat Lucian and his son, staring at me with little to no emotion. I knew Weston was doing this as a show, but from the moment I met Lucian, that was the only look he ever gave me. He didn't truly care about upholding my father's promise. He only wanted to appear good in the eyes of the Crown.
What even the hell is the Crown? My subconscious shouted at me and I could almost hear her bang her fists against my skull.
But she made a good point and as I redirected my stares to the five older looking men, I wondered what made them think they had any power. What gave them power. Or what even their status was.
"Caelia Emerson," my name was called out by the third man to the left. His moon shaped glasses looked funny on his strong and almost young appearing face. "You have been called forth by the Crown to give us your statement as to why you believe you belong in our world." His words shocked me and I felt my lips part in shock. Was this meeting not about the murder? Was all my panic and insanity for nothing?
"You will state your reasons," he went on to speak and my brain fizzed off for the moment. "Then after that we will debate and put you through a test. Your answer will determine which test you get."
"And what are the tests?" I asked without thinking.
In unison, all five men turned towards one another and in hushed whispers, started to speak to one another. After a few seconds of deliberating, they parted for one another.
"The tests include of multiple things miss Emerson. Most are to test your loyalty and strength to our cause, but seeing as you've never been through the enemies lines, we have no reason to include that portion of the test. Now, we do know about your father and what has been promised to him. But that promise was not our promise and you're lucky your king persuaded us to give you this hearing."
I gulped. "What would you have done with me if he hadn't?"
The man with the glasses took a hard glance at me before saying, "We would have killed you the moment you passed with the Reaper."
A pang of silence rung through the room and I felt a sweat begin to break on my middle back.
Just then, another's voice came from the podium and a man with sharp blue eyes scooted forward in his seat. His white robe, like the other men, glistened as it caught the light.
"What is your relationship with the Reaper?" He asked bluntly and quickly murmurs rumbled through the courtroom. I looked back over my shoulder to see that the glamour around the audience was gone. I shot a glance at Weston and he nodded his head. He had removed the vail from my eyes and ears so I would have a fair hearing. The Crown had wanted me to be judged by the whole Crown, not just the five men sitting in front of me. My fate rested in hundreds of hands and that was far more to worry about then just five.
I turned my nervous gaze back onto the five men. "He saved my life." I said simply and chuckles erupted from behind me. Only then did I see the guard standing off to the side of podium raise his hand to silence the crowd. They had tried to deceive me and Weston had helped. But why was he helping me? Does he not trust his own government?
"Reapers don't save lives." One of the other five men rung out. His strong and almost broken looking nose distracting even from this far away.
"I know that. I've heard the villages whispers and I know of their tales. But he did, I swear to it." My heart almost dropped at the memory of my first encounter with Kieran. I almost wished he was here right now, but I knew that what Weston was trying to tell me earlier meant that his coming home early would get him killed.
"How did he save you?" Moon glasses asked with a strong and brooding voice.
I almost stumbled for my words as the vision of him at first sight tightened my throat. "I--my mother had just died. She'd been sick for months and I'd been trying to heal her on my own since we couldn't afford a doctor. My uncle came, Silas, two weeks before she died to help me take care of her. She seemed to be getting better with him in the house... But then she died. And he, my uncle, kicked me out of my house." Anger rose into my chest and clipped my words. "He stole everything from me and told me I was banished from my own home and was to never come back. He had a bag packed for me with little of what I'd actually need to survive with. So while I waited for the bastard to sleep, I snuck around the back and stole what was mine right back from him.
"The Reaper appeared then. I'd heard his warning cry but excused it for I was desperate for what was mine. He frightened me and I made a lot of noise. Then, inside in the house, Silas started to move and I knew that if he saw me, he would kill me and bury me with my mother."
"Who?" Moon glasses interrupted. "Who would have killed you?"
"Oh--sorry." I rambled quickly. "I meant that Silas, my uncle, would kill me. He'd threatened he'd feed me to the Reaper who came to take my mother's body."
"Did he now?" Interest peeked in the man's eyes as he leaned back. But something else was written in his face and the way the crowd behind me tensed told me that Silas had done something wrong. Very wrong. And I had just ratted him out for it. "So your uncle called Kieran for help in getting rid of your mother's body?"
"I don't know if it was Kieran he called for sure, but he told me a Reaper was coming and Kieran--" suddenly my voice stopped and I almost choked on the air I was breathing. They didn't have any interest in my uncle. The question was for Kieran. What was Kieran doing that was wrong? And what was I saying! "He saved my life though!" I blurted out suddenly with passion. "I'd been hurt, Silas had shoved me out the door and I was wounded. It could have been my blood that drew him to my home. Who really knows why he came?" And the moment I said it, I knew who would know why he had come. Kieran was the only one who could explain his own actions and in that moment I felt like I just condemned him. Tears welted in my eyes as I glared up at the Crown. Each man wore a smug smile as they exchanged glances.
"Enough on the Reaper," moon shaped glasses cooed with a slight chuckle to his tone as he looked down at me with amusement in his eyes. "Your father broke his accords in sleeping with a female outside of his lineage. He was lucky that when he actually produced a child that his court was forgiving and let him live. While he was forced to never see you or your mother again, do you know if he ever made contact with her?"
The question seemed so absurd. I gawked at them all and swiveled my head to see if I would find help anywhere. But even Weston looked stunned, that when my gaze fell on his, he had to look away. "Of course not." I said suddenly. "My mother was heart broken and couldn't believe he'd abandoned her. But she moved on and lived without him. She never loved another man because she knew that her love for anyone else left when he did. He'd taken everything from us and she always despised that. But, like I said, she moved on."
The Crown and the crowd were eerily silent for a moment before moon glasses stood up. He looked at me sternly and then at the crowd. "As we all decided before the hearing, Caelia Emerson has no right to be with our Crown. She shows signs of empathy and excuses too many wrong doings for the sake of being kind." His words boomed and echoed in every fiber of my being as they loomed heavy like a rain cloud over the crowd behind me. Their appalled gasps and moans making my heart shatter. The Crown never wanted to help me. "Not to mention," he went on to add and all I could do was watch for my condemnation to come. "Her father is the enemy and she has given no proof that her father never once made contact with her mother after he was said to never see her--or them--again." His cold eyes landed on me and I didn't even stop the tears from falling. "Caelia Emerson will be put to the Crown of Faeries test!" Shouts and screams of protest erupted all around and I looked in shock at the angered faces that made up the people of the Crown.
The doors I had entered through opened and guards came in with all their dignity and glory vibrating and lapsing all around the room. All the shouts and screams faded away as the boot prints and stomps of the guards became the only noise.
In a panic, I stood up from my chair and swiveled around to face Weston. Lucian stood up as I did and looked at me gravely. The Crown of Faeries test sounded and looked like something I wasn't going to live through and I so desperately in this moment wanted to live. Why wasn't the king--the Crown's King-- fighting for me? Why were they doing this to me? Segregating me with cruelty and vicious force where I would have to fight to my death. There was no way I was entering, or exiting, this alive.
And that fact dawned on me as Weston turned his back from me just as the guards picked me up and started to carry me away. There was no mercy and I was to die.
Thank you for reading! Shorter chapters will be coming up more, so you can have a break haha. But don't worry, Caelia's adventures in the Crown of Faeries test will be the longer chapters. :)
Hope you all enjoyed this chapter and will continue to read on. Please vote/comment!
WC75
(Unedited)