SAGE (under edit)

Chapter Sixteen

Sage wasn't sure how long she had been awake, lying in another strange bed in another unfamiliar room. The image of Calin falling to Blain's sword was burning against the back of her mind, refusing to fade, and it made her heart heavy. She felt weighted to the bed, her limbs filled with lead.

But was it grief?

Or guilt?

Of course Sage grieved. She grieved for Calin, for her friends, but she grieved for another loss too.

A part of her had begun to hope that there was something more to Raidan, and something more to her brother's death. That there had been meaning to everything that had happened, and the feelings which had started stirring inside her had been... justifiable.

Sage had been utterly wrong; Raidan had proved that. She had made a mistake and Calin paid the price for it.

Eventually Sage dragged herself up, her eyes listlessly scanning the bedroom but taking no details. Beneath the blanket she was dressed in the same clothes she had been in during the fight, wrinkled from sleep, and through her veins she felt her Kyra still coursing.

Rising out of bed, Sage went to the window and found the ocean stretching out before her. The sun was already beginning to set, hanging low toward the horizon amid a sky of orange and gold. The water shimmered, and small rock formations protruded from the surface in different places just off the sandy shore. The beach was small, closed in between rocky outcrops, littered with seashells, and the house Sage had been brought to seemed to back right onto it amidst shrubbery and wide-brimmed trees.

There was no doubt they were in Sunlight Falls, far on the west coast of Zone. And further away from Lion Crest.

Sage turned to the bedroom door, her eyes skimming over a fresh set of clothing left folded on the ground beside it. She went to the door and turned the handle, only to find it locked.

That's a first, she thought. After all this time, her fights with Raidan and her attempts to escape, now they lock the door?

With her Kyra intact Sage could attempt break it open, but of course that would draw the Shadow Soldiers' attention.

Sage didn't have the desire to escape, though. She didn't want to stay either, but she was torn between the anger she felt at Raidan and the shame of facing her friends if she made it back to Lion Crest.

So Sage moved away, scooping up the spare clothing instead. She changed into a warm, fleece-lined sweater in slate grey and black linen pants that cinched at the ankles and sat loosely around her legs.

The change of clothes didn't inspire her to any action though. Sage stood in the middle of the room, facing the window with her back to the door, idle in both her movements and her thoughts. Her mind didn't churn with questions or possibilities of escape like it usually did, but when she finally made the decision to go back to sleep she heard someone knock on the bedroom door.

Sage turned, and although she didn't respond she sent out her Kyra to feel for who was on the other side. But there was nothing, which meant the Shadow Soldiers were masking their Kyra again.

The door unlocked with a quiet click, and as it opened slightly Sage saw Dante cautiously peer into the bedroom. His brow lifted with surprise when he saw her, and so he pushed the door open completely to let himself over the threshold.

'I wasn't sure if you'd be awake,' he said in greeting, hesitant.

Sage regarded Dante in silence, trying to connect the meek, disarming young man in front of her with the one who had dragged her away from her friends. She tried to place blame on him too for what happened, and yet she couldn't; the blame only fell on her. It wasn't Dante's fault, after all. He had done exactly what was expected of a Shadow Soldier to do; he hadn't fooled her.