Dragon Prince: The Storm's Courage

Chapter Four: The Trapped Moon

Shira yawned in bed and gotten ready for the day. She's gotten dressed a linen dark blue tunic with a tan-colored shirt underneath it and around her neck is her leather corded silver dragon pendant necklace. She has a pair of brown pants, along with dark brown combat boots and kept her hair in a pulled back braid.
She was cautiously eating breakfast, making sure it wasn't made by dark magic from Claudia. Shira soon jumped in place when she heard a knock on the door and gotten up defiantly.
"Who is it?" called out Shira.
"It's Claudia." She warily watched as the dark-haired girl opened the door and came into room. "You look worried." Claudia looked at her with a sympathetic smile. "Do you know what that mirror does?"
Shira snorted, knowing what games Viren and Claudia are playing. They're both trending on dangerous, dark paths that gotten humans exiled from Xadia in the first place. "Heck if I know. It looks an average, everyday mirror to me."
Claudia seemed to have bought the little fib that Shira had made up as Claudia said, "Oh okay. Sorry for bothering you." Claudia was about to leave when she snapped her fingers and remembered something. "By the way, you might have a elf in one of the dungeons."
Shira raised an eyebrow. "An elf?"
"Yeah, maybe you can convince him to eat or drink," offered Claudia.
"We'll see." Shira was unsure about this issue, but she decided to help him anyways.
After a while, Shira had felt sorry for the elf and reluctantly agreed to look after the elf, thinking she could get him out of the castle. She carried a golden tray full of Xadian and Katolian delicacies towards small dungeon with the captured elf.
She placed her hand onto the door and looked down as she exhaled her breath, trying to keep her storm of thoughts at bay. Shira pushed opened the door to a smaller dungeon cell, where the leader of the elven assassins sat on the stony ground, his head bowed, his wrists in chains. She carefully opened the door and crouched down in front of the Moonshadow elf.
Shira frowned sympathetically at the sight of the once intimidating elf being trapped inside of the dungeon. His body dangled from the stone wall where his wrists had been locked with iron chains, his muscular shoulders straining at the weight. He kept his head down and his eyes were closed in some sort of perpetual meditation.
She was curious about the elf's blue markings on his face, arms, and the left side of his chest. But she frowned at the sight of his injuries: The upper half of his left horn seems to have broken off during the assassination of King Harrow. She could see the faint outlines of his ribs underneath his skin clearly showed his hunger.
Her sympathy has taken a toll, but Shira pushed down her pity for him and sat down in front of him. She's still and silent, but she kept her gaze on him and she finally decided to break the silence.
"Umm... hi?" Shira watched as the elf opened his blue eyes and looked up to gaze at her, with both interest and contempt. "I've brought you some food and water if you want."
The elf grimaced when he saw the knife in Shira's hand and she quickly said, "Don't worry. I'm just cutting the apple." She made sure that she kept the knife in the elf's line of sight as she continued cutting the apple and placing the slices into a bowl. She fought herself from flinching when they caught each other's blue eyes.
The elf let out a soft chuckle when he caught sight of it."Don't worry. I can't hurt you. I couldn't even if I wanted to. I'm chained remember?" The elf then moved both his arms allowing the chains the rattle.
Once she realized that she's in fact safe, Shira slowly moved in once more. "Right, sorry. I've heard what that elf girl can do as she guards the princes, so I might be a little w—"
The elf leaned forward the best he could. "Did you say an elf girl?"
"Uh? Yeah?" Shira looked at the elf curiously.
"Was she young?" The elf looked at Shira desperately. "Short white hair and marks on the corner of her eyes?"
Shira nodded. The elf sighed before leaning back against the wall, "It must have been Rayla." He grumbled the last part.
"I think so," said Shira. "She's keeping guard over the princes day in and day out. At least that's what General Amaya had told me."
But the elf wasn't listening to her. "He was right. She's not cut out to be an assassin."
Shira didn't really like anything that came out of the elf's mouth, so she quickly changed the subject. "She makes a better protector than an assassin. I guess... But you should really eat."
Shira once again lifted the apple slice, but unfortunately she picked up the one that fell onto the ground. She immediately retracted, "Oh brother. Not that one, how about let's avoid the apples for now and try a jelly tart. They are a delicacy here."
Shira picked up the tart and moved it towards the male's mouth. The elf eyed the pastry before eyeing the human before him. The empathy in her eyes made the elf groan softly and rolled his eyes. He sniffed the treat before taking the smallest bite.
After chewing the piece and swallowing, his eyes couldn't help, but widened. Not only because the pastry was not poisoned, but it was actually quite good.
Shira waited with bated breath until the elf took another bite, this one bigger then the last.
It wasn't long before the male finished the cookie. The elf licked the crumb on his face as he watched the human, pour him a glass of water.
"Here." The human lifted the cup towards the elf's mouth. This time the elf did it without putting up some hesitation, regarding the human and filled Shira with relief.
"I hope you enjoyed your meal sir," said Shira as she started to pick up the tray.
"I did." A small smile came across the elf. "My name is Runaan."
"I'm called Shira," said the human girl. "Though, there's something up with Viren. So, General Amaya have encouraged me to stay here till further notice."
Runaan's eyes widened as he started understanding the situation. When Shira arrived, this General Amaya wanted the late king's ward to be a spy for her and make sure the dark mage doesn't try anything with the human princes missing and the kingdom is without a leader. Before he could say anything, Shira left the dungeon with the tray.
By that afternoon, she came back to feed the prisoner.
She soon opened the door to Runaan's dungeon and found him in the same position as earlier. She gently placed her hand on his, waking him up and grimaced at the human being so close. Shira placed the tray on the ground and gave him a slight smile at him. It wasn't long till Shira has managed to give Runaan his lunch and decided to talk to each other.
"Even though I'm a little wary of you," Shira said to the elf. "You're pretty bold coming here."
Runaan shook his head. "Even I'm surprised I gave away my name like that. I guess it's because you reminded me of that elf girl I mentioned before, Rayla." He leaned his head back. "Although she failed at her role as an assassin, she always put her heart into everything she ever did. My husband would constantly praise her for all she did."
Shira's ears perked up and looked at him in slight amusement. "Husband? You have a husband?"
Runaan couldn't help, but slightly blushed at his mentioned partner. "Ethari. You know before I left for the mission I told him I would return his heart to him." His flustered expression turned into one of sadness and his eyes glistened with unshed tears. "I guess I'll never be able to do that."
Shira's heart ached at not only the words, but at the face of the captured elf. He has a loving husband waiting for him back at home, but Runaan is trapped in this dungeon with those painful chains tied onto him.
"Maybe I could help," Shira said hesitantly.
"How can you?" Runaan looked at her warily, but Shira looked back at him defiantly. "You'll be betraying your people."
"Maybe so." Shira sighed sadly and her eyes met his empathically. "But I'm willing to help you just as well." Runaan looked up slightly in confusion when she mentioned that. But she quickly changed the subject as she looked at his arm in concern. "Is your arm okay?" Shira looked at at the assassin's left arm, which was still bound by the white binding and his hand was almost becoming black.
Runaan lifted his head to glance at his binding. "It's the band around my arm. During the start of our mission, we wrapped these around our arms to vow that we will complete the mission. We had two attached, one for the king and one for the prince. The Dragon King is dead, but the Dragon Prince isn't. So, the binding will continue to tighten until the mission is a success." Runaan lowered his head in defeat. "Which may never happen."
Shira have reared back from the ribbon as if it was poisonous, her eyes wide in horrified shock. Not only did that sound extremely painful, but he could lose his arm due to the binding's squeezing.
With swift thinking, Shira grabbed the knife and rushed over to Runaan who recoiled at the human coming towards him with a knife. He flinched as he closed his eyes, waiting for the human to stab him somewhere. But instead, he evinced at the sudden contact he felt on his left arm.
When Runaan opened his eyes, he could see Shira trying to cut the binding off. He couldn't help, but chuckled softly at the girl's desperate attempts. "That isn't going to do anything."
She kept trying, but Shira felt something happening. Shira felt something wash over her and was surprised to feel that she never had felt before. Shira muttered cryptic words that were unknowingly from an elf spell, and her eyes began to glow with some electricity. Runaan was amazed and shocked at the sight of the human girl's magic that's not the dark magic. She could feel the magic taking root within her. Shira felt something deep within her soul set something aflame and felt its warmth spread throughout her body. She felt something deep and powerful going through her and lifted her knife that has a hum of electricity crackling in her blade. She couldn't see it, but she felt unknown magic running through her and it surprised her to no end.
But as she tugged on the assassin's binding, something incredible has happened. She tugged at it a few times, then grabbed it hard and pulled with all of her strength. The binding snapped off in a blinding flash of light and Shira was sent flying to her side from the impact. Runaan looked at her in concern when he saw her landed her side roughly and didn't immediately wake up from her incident.
"Ugh." Shira shook her head as she slowly sat up and both of them looked at each other's eyes, full of shock. "What happened? Where's the binding?"
"You took it off." The two of them both looked down to see a slightly severed binding on the floor.
"Thank you Shira." Runaan smiled at the confused human girl. "Thank you."
"You're welcome." Both of them smiled at each other, despite their shock from earlier. How it happened, it goes to show that Shira has gained the rare gift of magic.