Amara of Xeris

Chapter 42

2nd floor, room 212.

It's been a few years but Victor remembers his birthplace very well. Even if he hasn't stepped into the castle since he was eight years old, save for that one time he visited it a week before his coronation. The purpose of that visit was to reconnect with his roots. It's been two years now, why was he here again? Because Amara wanted to see the Tower. He was getting way too soft, wasn't he?

Love, no this isn't love. He doesn't love Amara, they barely know each other. What is it, then? Friendship? Camaraderie? Affection? A desperate break from loneliness? Whatever it is, isn't it a strange thing? The sweet poison that rots you from the inside yet you need more. It's impossible to reason with the human heart.

Now where were we? Oh yes, the Tower. His childhood home.

"I think we should be heading back right now.", Amara suggested worriedly, "It's pretty late already."

"People might start to notice our absence by now.", Victor agreed, "Here, I know a shortcut. I just hope that you're not claustrophobic or afraid of the dark."

"Is it a secret passageway through a fireplace?", Amara joked, "I hope it's not too sooty. That would be hard to explain."

"No, it isn't. It's a suit of armour.", he headed towards the stairs, "Let's hurry." Amara followed him downstairs to the third floor, admiring the mixed aesthetic of the whole place. The third floor felt very different from the fourth floor where the tapestry was kept.

Maybe it was the knowledge that most of the prisoners were kept on the first three floors, but something about the third floor felt lived in. She ran after Victor, following him through the chipped wood on the balcony railings, the worn-out green carpets; a sign of the Lixor Wing of the second floor; the discoloured detailing on the walls and countless rusty suits of armour. She ran to the end of the hallway till they reached a dead-end guarded by another rusty suit of armour.

It was nothing special compared to the rest, with its standard rusted silver armour, a long sword and a blue feather on its helmet. Victor put his hand on the handle of the longsword, then he closed his eyes and cast what seemed to be an unlock spell. The wall behind the knight opened up and the knight stepped away, ushering the two inside.

"Be careful, it's easy to get lost inside this passage.", he warned, stepping inside the path behind the walls. A floating ball of light; most likely a product of Victor's spell-casting; hovered above them. Amara couldn't make out much of the passage except the stone walls that enclosed it and the spiralling set of stairs that took up most of the space.

For some reason, Amara felt a strange presence vaguely far away. It didn't have a normal, spiritual magic aura but there was no doubt that there was magic involved.

"Do you feel it?", Amara asked Victor, hoping that she was just paranoid.

"Feel what?", he asked in return.

"Oh, nothing.", Amara lied, "I think it was just my nerves." Suddenly, she felt a huge surge of that magic again, coming from that door. She ran straight to the door, casting the same spell Victor had cast.

"That's not the way, Amara.", Victor called out but Amara had already gotten in. She had stepped into the corner of the hallway. It was almost like the one upstairs, except for a few crucial details, the light blue walls, a blue carpet and a portrait of a boy in his coronation clothes.

The boy king had red eyes and blue hair and didn't look more than ten years old. Even then, his age wasn't the most striking part of the painting, that title belonged to the embroidered rabbits on his coronation cape.

"Amara, is there anything wrong?", Victor called out from the doorway, "Amara?"

Amara didn't respond, the source of energy came back and just being near it made her feel exhausted.

"There is a traitor among you.", was what she heard before falling over.