We take Adrienne back to Reine and Dimitri's village, where we place her in a holding cell that temporarily eliminates abilities far away from the village area itself in a small prison beyond the courtyard. Adrienne narrows her eyes and crosses her arms as she stands on the other side of the bars.
"What?" Adrienne snaps, "are you just gonna keep me here pretty and waiting for Coralyinn?"
"No," Dimitri scowls and crosses his arms against his chest, "we want to know what your plans are."
"One of you already knows my plans," Adrienne's lips curve up into a smirk as her eyes lock on me and I shudder.
"What is she talking about?" Dimitri asks, narrowing his eyes at me.
"She tried to kidnap me before, okay," I hold my hands up in defense, "no need to accuse me of anything."
"No games," Dimitri scowls, walking up to the cage and placing his hands on the bars, "we aren't afraid to kill you if we have to. Tell us Coralyinn's plans."
"You really think I'm just going to hand over everything?" Adrienne scoffs, "Coralyinn is going to kill me either way, so why would I help you?"
"Has Coralyinn gathered any links?" Reine asks.
"What don't you people get about the fact that I'm not going to help you," Adrienne sighs in frustration.
"We can protect you from Coralyinn," Reine continues, "if you tell us--"
"Look," Adrienne seethes, "you need to back off--"
"Fight me," I blurt out and the entire area goes silent, all eyes darting to me.
"What?" Reine's eyes widen.
"Fight me," I say once more, raising my head high, "if you win, you get to walk free. If I win, you tell us everything you know."
"Are you crazy?" Dimitri scoffs, "that's going to get you killed."
"I know," I take a deep breath, "but I'll do it."
"Gabriel, don't--" Reine starts.
"You have an agreement," Adrienne purrs.
My eyes stay locked on to Adrienne's as Reine sighs and reluctantly unlocks the cage as Dimitri and Renee grab on to Adrienne's arms. Adrienne's lips curve up into a smirk once more and she chuckles as she gets escorted passed me. You see, the thing is, if I carry energy in the chain, wouldn't that make me valuable? I know Adrienne wanted me before, so there's no way she'd actually kill me. At least, that's what I'm hoping. I don't know why she agreed to fight, but it's my last ditch effort. Maybe she thinks she can run off, but somehow I don't see that happening and she knows it.
The thirteen of us end up in the courtyard where Dimitri and Renee keep hold on Adrienne as the others get situated at a safe distance and Reine closes her eyes and holds out a hand, forming a wall of silver energy that arcs slightly over them and protects them.
"You can let go of me now," Adrienne says once I'm standing across from her and Dimitri rolls his eyes before letting go and making his way over to Reine and the others.
Adrienne raises a brow at Renee, who wearily releases her other arm and jogs over to the others.
"Now," Adrienne smiles lethally as she summons two sai and stares me down, "let's fight."
I inhale sharply, taking a deep breath as I summon my katana with closed eyes before letting them flutter open again.
"You got this, Gabriel!" Melantha cheers from the sidelines.
"I don't feel like I do," I mutter.
Adrienne puts her right foot out and turns sharply, pulling her arm in towards her chest as she does so before swinging it out, releasing a sai and sending it flying towards me. I whirl to the side, avoiding the sai that goes flying by as she throws a second one and I spin back to the other side. Adrienne summons another pair of sai and holds one up so that the center blade is perfectly centered in front of her nose and her red eyes light up with bright red flames. The sai that she's holding up bursts into red, black, grey, and silver flames and she quickly lowers the blade and flips it around so that the blade is facing towards her. She does the same with the other one as she runs towards me and she raises the flaming sai, slashing at me as I meet her halfway.
After a few more blocked slashes, Adrienne twirls around and throws her flaming sai up into the air, followed by her regular silver sai. The silver sai's handle connects to the beginning of the other sai's handle and it glows bright red, a flash of energy going off as the two merge into a double-sided spear. She catches the spear as it lands and the entire thing lights up in black and silver flames. I swallow thickly as she continues lunging at me elegantly and quickly, almost like a cobra.
Adrienne manages to grab on to my right arm and I gasp, my eyes widening as her vice-like grip on my arm only grows tighter and her cherry painted nails dig into my skin, drops of blood splattering on to the ground. Adrienne narrows her eyes at me before she smirks, as I gasp for air and claw at her arm. It feels like the life is slowly draining my body and the air is leaving my lungs, like a flame that's deprived of oxygen. The world around me flashes in and out of focus and I swear I could see younger Reine running through that same field of goldenrods that she always does in my dreams, laughing happily and looking over her shoulder at me.
"How does it feel to dance with death, Gabriel?" Adrienne taunts as she digs her nails in deeper and I can feel my knees starting to buckle as I gasp, my eyes burning wildly into her malicious ones.
"Gabriel!" Reine shouts and in my haze I manage to look over to find Dimitri's arm around her waist, holding her back as she watches with a frantic and worried expression and Dimitri frowns.
More images of younger Reine flash through my mind and as I stare into those wonderful lavender eyes of hers, I know that I can't...I can't just...I can't die. Not like this. Not now. I turn my gaze back to Adrienne and feel anger welling up in me. Anger for all the things I don't know. Anger for all the things I missed out on. Anger for being ripped from my family. Anger for not remembering who I was or who I used to be. Anger for having my loved ones threatened. Anger at the thought of malicious people who rip away happiness from others because they do not understand it.
I grab on to Adrienne's wrist with my left hand and her eyes widen as my hand lights up with black and silver flames similar to her own. The flames in Adrienne's eyes slowly begin to burn out and I'm able to see fear in them as the flames trail up my entire left arm and the katana in my right hand explodes in a column of flames as well.
"Holy shit," Dimitri laughs, "would you look at that?"
I pry Adrienne's hand off of my left arm and I look between my two hands before touching my left to my right, making that arm ignite in flames as well. I throw my katana up in the air before jumping and whirling in the air, kicking Adrienne back and grabbing my katana, slashing in a wide sweep as I land. I watch as Adrienne looks down at the slash I made across her midsection and her eyes widen. She lifts her head back up just in time to see me pull my fist back and punch her, sending her flying several feet. The flames ignite around her with my punch and seem to damage her greatly.
"I may not be great, I may not be invincible," I say as I walk over to where Adrienne is lying, watching as she stares up at me dazedly with cuts and dirt littered across her face and legs, her clothes torn and tattered in multiple areas, "but I will take my weakest and break your strongest."
"Gabriel!" Reine runs over to me and I have just enough time to look over in her direction before she pulls me into a hug.
"Reine..." I breathe out in surprise before looking down at her and smiling softly, wrapping my arms around her waist and dropping my katana to the ground.
"Nice job, kid," Dimitri says and claps a hand on my shoulder after he walks up to us.
My breath hitches and I look up into Dimitri's eyes to see that he still doesn't entirely like me, but he seems less cold than he once was.
"You were able to drain her power and use it for yourself!" Ciana shouts as she runs over, "man, Energy users are so cool!"
"Ember is cool too," I smile sincerely at Ciana and she smiles back at me.
"Damn right it is," Ciana nods, placing her hands on her hips, "I make things go 'BOOM'!"
"That was amazing!" Melantha yells as she piles on to my hug with Reine.
"I honestly thought you were dead, bro," Nathan laughs nervously.
"We should take her back to the holding cell," Renji suggests as he glances over at Adrienne, "that way she doesn't escape."
"Good thinking, Renji," Renee grins as she walks over to Adrienne and hoists her up, holding her arms behind her back, "let's go, bitch."
Adrienne scoffs as Renee nudges her forwards and Renji sighs at her choice of words but follows behind them as support with Aislinn.
"I was...worried," Shitau says, fidgeting with his bracelets as his eyes flicker between the ground and my eyes, "I'm glad you're okay..."
"Me too," I chuckle.
Kaltrina smiles and nods at me as she ruffles Shitau's hair and leads him away towards Renji, Renee, and Aislinn.
"How did you know?" Reine breathes out as she pulls back.
"Huh?" I ask, furrowing my eyebrows in confusion as I stare into her beautiful lavender eyes.
"How did you know you could do that?" Reine asks.
"I didn't..." I rub the back of my neck nervously, "I just kinda...did it. I was thinking about how I didn't want to die, or anyone else to ever die, for that matter. And...I was also thinking about how I didn't want to lose you, not again."
"Gabriel..." Reine's breath hitches and she smiles sadly, "thank you."
"For what?" I blink as she takes a few steps backwards.
"For being you," Reine continues to smile for a few moments before it falls and she turns around and heads towards the others.
"Hurt her again and I'll kill you, got it?" Dimitri says, narrowing his eyes at me and lifting his chin.
"Got it," I swallow harshly as he walks away.
I don't even know what I did in the first place because my memories are all jacked up. Maybe that's exactly what it is-- the fact that my memory's messed up. I know that I can't help that, but I know that I'll do my best to make sure I always stay there for Reine, no matter what.