The Rise of The Powers vol. 1

Chapter 18: The Good Shae

Chapter 18: The Good Shae

The outside of the tent looked so pathetic compared to the inside of the tent. A dozen or so tents, cabins, and huts were scattered around. A few fires sputtered contentedly. A misty haze settled slightly above it all. The amount of people out here was so few compared to the thousands inside the tent.

I turned toward Vega and Peak. "Who decides who lives inside Lord Scy's tent and who lives out here? Is it by choice?"

Peak answered. "No, it's by rank. The wealthy and the important live inside the tent with all the luxury. The lower class live out here. Those who are not as important to the well being of our nature. They can still visit inside the tent, of course. They just can not live inside it. Besides, it would look quite suspicious to outsiders, like Racayanne and the humans from the North Camp if there was only a single tent. Also, we need some sort of link to the outside world. We can not live only in a made up fantasy."

We continued walking, in a pleasant silence. We walked for miles, way beyond the border of the camp.

"Okay, this is the far as we will lead you." Vega said, looking each of us in the eye. "Don't come back, it is not your business to be here. Shae and humans are natural enemies, you are lucky we housed you at all."

"You were the one who came to Racayanne's cave and burned it down! It's not our fault we didn't have any other place to go after that! And to my understanding you took us there, we didn't go there voluntarily! You yanked me up like a weed just because I'm special!"

Vega looked at me strangely. "You know, all those rumors about humans, they aren't all true. You're not that different from us. You're not as bad as they make you out to be. I have no doubt that some of you would love to burn us to the ground-" Vega glared at Lilith. "But, you, Duke, you don't seem bad at all. I rather like you. I rather like you a lot, but never the less. Maybe I will see you in another life."

Vega hugged me goodbye, and Peak gave me an awkward pat on the back. Peak ignored Lilith, while Vega gave her an icy glare. With that they flew off into the distance. I watched them until they were only a tiny pinpoint in the horizon.

"All the rumors about Shae aren't all true either. Vega and Peak are quite nice if you ask me. I would like to see them again, but I doubt the Mountain Shae will be glad to see me back."

Lilith looked at me frostily. "No, Duke, you're wrong. Shae aren't good, none of them are. Peak and Vega only want to manipulate you into liking them. They are deceitful those Shae. They are wicked and the only thing they want is our downfall."

I stared at her. How was she so impossible naïve? Maybe it was best not to know so much, after all, because then you couldn't base things off 'facts' but how you personally felt about it.

"How can you say that Lilith? Do you not remember the story I told you? The Shae kept one race alive, humans. And it's not because we're better than them. Werewolves, necromancers, faeries, vampires: they're all much more magically able than us, but the Shaw kept us alive. I don't know why. I can't even try to guess, but they did it; the reason doesn't matter."

Lilith sucked in her breath, but I continued. "Shae and humans may not have been the best of friends in the past. Currently most humans don't even know Shae exist. And the ones that do haven't even met them. You, Lilith, hadn't seen a Shae until we ventured out here. You thought they were extinct! It doesn't have to always be like this, in fact, it shouldn't be like this. The Shae and humans should be friends. We're the only intelligent species left, it does us no good to be enemies."

I started walking down the mountain pass, forcing her to follow me. "So where would you like to go now?" I asked, not allowing her to speak. "I assume you don't want to go hang out with any other Shae. We could galavant around The Mountains some more, but that's no fun. I don't fancy, going back to visit your family in the Empire. And that only leaves us to go visit the North Camp, it sounds rather interesting, I think. I like the idea of there being more humans out there, the fact that there were none didn't sit well with me."

Lilith glared at me. "We're not going to the North Camp." She said continuing down the mountain pass saying nothing more. She raced on ahead of me.

"Well, then where do you want to go?" I asked, half screaming, while following Lilith down the mountain pass, and at the same time trying not to fall off a cliff to a certain death. "I'm out of ideas."

Lilith continued to say nothing more. "So that's it then?" I asked. "You're just going to ignore me? Personally that sounds no fun. I rather like you, Lilith, and you don't have to take what Scy said so seriously. They're just Shae right?"

Lilith whipped around. "Just Shae? Just Shae, Duke? They are anything but. They are the most powerful things this world has ever seen. We will never be like them. Never no matter how hard we try."

I gaped. "So that's what's bothering you? You wish you were like the Shae? I thought you hated them, but oh well. I can assure you Lilith that you are perfect just the way you are." I called out to her. She was more than 100 yards down the mountain. "I can't say much more, Lilith. I'm sorry if I'm special. I don't want to be. I was always just a Partial. I special Partial apparently. I don't want to be special though, I would rather just be a Whitings, but you can't change fate, Lilith, it's written in stone."

Lilith finally stopped and turned around. She waited impatiently for me to catch up for her. "You want to go somewhere, Duke?" She snapped, her eyes boring into mine.

I shrugged. "Well, kind of."

"Then grab on to my hand." She held her hand out to me.

"Where are we going?" I asked, we hadn't decided on a place. Had we?

"Just dream one up and we'll go there." Lilith said.

I grabbed onto her hand and dreamed of The Forest.

We were thrown into the darkness.