Gold.
I open my eyes to gold.
It takes several seconds of me blinking, to take in the sight of Saint's long hair, tossed casually around me as she lays in the bed with me.
I watch her for a few seconds, before raising my arm.
I shift through the feeling of emotion that runs through me at the sight of no hand- and instead a bandaged wrap.
"Thank you."
I look up to meet the pale blue stare of the King, as he sits within the corner, his body slumped against the wall.
It's only then that I'm able to properly take in our surroundings.
We were in the room where I had been held.
I sit up, so fast that Saint rolls the other way.
She doesn't wake up though and instead pushes herself deeper into the covers.
The King holds up his hands, "Arishia, please listen to me."
I pause, staring at those pale blue eyes, before I slowly sink back down, my body still tense and weary.
"You did what you had to do," he said.
I nod.
We sit in awkward silence before I speak, "Jonaus..."
He shakes his head, "I can't describe it well. But it's like...I was in a different place and time. I don't feel like a different person came together with me. It just feels like I'm....whole."
His sentence dies away as his eyes look down.
"Do you feel remorseful?"
He looks up at that, "You have no....idea...."
He swallows thickly, before speaking, "why did you not do it sooner?"
I laugh and raise my incomplete arm in the air, "Why did I not merge your souls sooner?"
He winces at the sight but presses on, "Yes. Why?"
"I didn't know," I admit, my whisper confession filling the room, "I didn't know...how to bring your soul back. I knew there was a separation of dark and light but...I had no idea...None..."
He watches my inner struggle silently before asking, "How did Saint know?"
I shrug, "I told her."
"Told her what?"
"I told her that the way to defeat you was by stabbing Jonaus. I told her that should there ever come a time when all hope was lost- to not go for you. To attack him instead."
"When you say 'when all hope was lost...'"
"I meant when you had killed me."
The King stares at me a few seconds more, before shaking his head.
"Maddox."
I whisper the name, leaving him to flinch from it.
"It's why no one knows the King's name. It's why no one says King Maddox. Because you made sure no one knew what your real name was."
I look up to meet his twisted smile, "Isn't that right Jonaus?"
He laughs and shakes his head, "Ah, Arishia. You win. I thought I had won but..."
I look away from him, concentrating instead on the golden color of Saint's hair.
"I'm sorry...about Oc-,"
"No."
I don't turn to look at his face. All the air seems to have left my lungs. I twist my eyes shut.
Don't think about it. Don't think about it. I sit there, pushing and repressing back unwanted thoughts and memories that I didn't want to resurface in my mind.
"Let me apologize for...for how I...when we..."
A humorless laugh leaves me, "It would have happened anyway."
I turn to meet his confused stare and explain with a grim smile, "I didn't know how to...bring light to you. So I knew eventually I would have to...The closest connection- the closest contact you could get to the light- it's the only solution I could think of. But it...didn't work..."
My sentence finishes lamely as a depression enters me. A sudden weight. I felt tired. So tired in that moment.
"No..it didn't work." He pauses, his gaze suddenly intense, "I don't think Maddox," he stops short and frowns, "it's strange....to think of the split personalities... but I don't think Maddox was joking when he asked you to be his Queen."
He looks up at me then, those blue eyes so similar to Jonaus', "Will you be my Queen?"
I feel a smile rise on my own lips as I shake my head, "Never."
Two more updates!
Happy New Year my loves!