Come Love A Stranger

Forty five

“No,” Azura shouted immediately and quickly teleported out of the place, followed by Bamushka who knew what she was thinking. They met in a nicely decorated room, befitting a queen, “what are you doing here?” she asked, seeing Bamushka.
Bamushka glanced around the lovely room and sighed, “I knew this is where you would be coming so I followed you.”
“Shush, somebody is coming,” Azura said as the door was pushed opened and a tired Mariah entered the room. She didn’t notice the two women in her room and just rushed to her bed and fell on it. It was silent for a while until they started hearing it, a soft sobbing. Bamushka and Azura glanced at each other in surprise, each wondering why she would be crying. Not able to take it anymore, Azura asked, “why cry, have you not gotten what you want?”
Mariah turned sharply and seeing the two women, she sat up from the bed and wiping away her tears, she asked coldly, “what do you want?”
“I asked a question, why cry when you have gotten everything you want?” Azura repeated.
“And I ask, what are you doing here?” she replied coldly.
Sighing, Azura approached softly, “to take you away from here.”
“And why should I leave with you?”
“There is no time to explain, you must come with us…”
“For what? So that you can use me as bait again to force out your son wherever he is hiding?” She chuckled and shook her head, “I’m sorry, even if you throw me into the den of the most fearsome beast in your kingdom, he will not come out, he would even be happy to have gotten rid of me and sadly, I do not blame him, and I will not blame him. I have ended things between us, so I do not see why he should care about me or even bother to save me. So you can see, your visit here is of no use, you can leave now and leave me to my life.”
Azura didn’t bother explaining anymore and just grabbed her hand and Bamushka joined them and they teleported to a small cave that Mariah didn’t know where, “where is this place, why did you bring me here?” She asked immediately.
“Easy with your tone, I do not want to bring you here more than you want to be here,” Azura replied. Sighing, she walked to the small opening of the cave, “there was a reason a god was forbidden to fall for a human. I know Alador never told you this, but I figured you should now. Any god that falls for a human and the love was not reciprocated, is punished bitterly.”
Mariah frowned, “that can’t be, Alador said that when the love was not reciprocated, the god would have no choice but to let the human go since love cannot be forced upon a person.”
“Aye,” Azura replied, turning to look at her, “but only if he or she has not confessed to the human.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I know you do not,” she concurred, “but the mark on your neck proves that he has confessed to you.”
“Yes, he did two nights before my wedding,” she whispered, involuntarily touching the mark on her neck that have not cleared even though she had pushed Alador away.
“When a god confesses to a human and the mating mark appears, if the human rejects the god, he is punished bitterly,” she closed her eyes, “he is cursed to become a beast, yes he would have flesh and look like he have always done but their heart would stop beating and their soul would be a prisoner. The real god would be trapped inside the body with not an atom of control. That means, they would be alive, they would see what they are doing but they cannot stop themselves, they cannot stop whatever ill doings they might be performing. No matter how hard they try, they cannot stop until…”
“Until what?”
“Until they kill the human that turned them into that.”
Mariah gasped and covered her mouth with her hands, “what?”
“Yes, Mariah,” Azura confirmed to her thought, “Alador has become that and he would try to kill you.”
“No,” she shook her head, “he won’t, he promised he would never hurt me.”
“Aye, but he made that promise when he was madly in love with you, he made that promise out of his affection for you, but things has changed now, he is not the god that fell in love with you and he is certainly not the one that made that promise. He doesn’t like what he has become and he would love to take care back control of himself and the only way to do that is by killing you, wiping you out of the face of the earth. But that is not the only reason I am here, nor the only reason I am trying to save you. I know my son, and I know how much he really loves you, he would never forgive himself if anything happens to you.
Alador wanted to fight the hackeries for you, despite knowing that no god has ever done that and lived to tell the tale, so how do you think he would react when he realize that the one person he has tried everything to protect is finally gone and she died by his own hands. He will never forgive himself and I fear I might lose him and I do not want that. I just found out that my beloved did not actually die, leaving me alone but he was killed and he was killed by his own brother and now, that same god is sending Alador after you.
Now, I am left to ask, why do that? You were ready to do anything for him the last time we met, why reject him, why push him away?”
Mariah could not stop herself as she burst into tears, she slumped on the floor immediately, “I had no idea. The truth is…I was afraid of losing him,” she finally said out the words she had kept bottled up inside her.
“What?” Azura asked.
Sniffling, Mariah tried to control herself then she glanced at Bamushka who was trying to hide her face, “you didn’t tell me this would happen, you only told me he would be hurt for a few days and that is all, you didn’t tell me he would be changed.”
Azura was at lost, she glanced from Mariah to Bamushka and then back at Mariah, “what are you talking about.”
Mariah sighed and recalled the night it happened, “two days after I was taken to the palace, her and Ilayas appeared in my room. They told me that Alador was trying to give himself to the hackeries and that if that should happen, you would be broken and might kill me yourself, thereby bringing a war between you and Alador. I was not afraid of dying, I was just afraid of seeing him die before me. I cannot understand the pain he went through watching me die over and over but I was certain of one thing, I don’t want to lose him, I don’t want him to sacrifice himself for me. They told me there was a way to end it all, and that nobody has to die. They told me that the next time he comes to me, that I should push him away and claim not to love him. They said that that way, he would leave and would only be broken for a few days and I believed them because Alador had told me the same.
Ilayas made me understand that I only have to live without him in this lifetime and that when I finally die this time, I would wait for him in the eternal world where we would be together. I wasn’t thinking straight, all I know was that I want to save him. So when Alador came, I was so lost with the memories that I forgot to do as agreed and when he told me he loves me, I was shocked, and then, the burning pain had come and when he told me what it means, that was when I remembered I have to end things with him. I only did it to protect him, I have no idea this would happen, I swear. I will never intentionally hurt him,” she started sobbing again.
Azura was at shock on what she heard, she turned to Bamushka who was afraid to look at her, “how could you, how could you do this to me!” She shouted and soon, the cave started dropping in degrees.