Chapter 7

He wiped his smile quickly off his face and looked at Cordelia with sadness in his eyes, as he dropped the sword down to the ground and lifted his hands in a defensive form.

Confused and lost, Cordelia stood, observing the bewildering events before her. “Are you alright?” She asked cautiously, without dropping her guard down. She won’t fall for the same trick again.

Avoiding eye contact, he admitted, “I’m confused, don’t know what’s happening.” Sometimes, it feels like my body is being controlled. “Do you know what I mean?”

“No, I don’t. I have perfect control over my body.” This was just getting weirder and weirder by the second. She stepped closer to him, dagger still in her hand, and watched him carefully. At times, I sense a force seizing my body, momentarily sidelining my consciousness, as I observe my unintended actions.

“I am human. That is true. To avoid odd looks, I had to masquerade as a hybrid with concealed traits. I really need your help. Skindik was helping me figure out what was happening to me. And now with him gone…I don’t know what to do.” He stepped closer a step and Cordelia mimicked it by stepping back.

Her trust in him diminished further, given the presence of something inside him capable of assuming control at any moment. “Please, help me find Skindik and the others. Without them, I have no hope of finding out what is wrong with me. They can fix it! They can fix me!” He screamed the last parts as emotions were taking a hold of him.

Cordelia relaxed her stance and lowered the dagger that pointed at him just a moment before. Something sincere and honest was in his eyes that she believed how broken he must feel. “It feels like there is something missing inside of me!” He exclaimed and Cordelia knew how it felt way too well.

“Let’s say I believe you and that I agree to go with you on this grand adventure.” The last part said with a bit of sarcasm in her voice, which Zeak didn’t seem to hear as he got excited and made a few quick strains towards her. This caused her to back away. She might have believed him, but he was still dangerous.

Who knew what was hiding inside of him and at what moment it would spring up? Imagine if, in the middle of the night while we were camping in the woods, he suddenly got up and sliced my throat. What if we were fighting with monsters and suddenly he turned around and attacked me? What if betrayed her to the Zurea King to be his next experiment?

Those questions with a few more were running through her mind as she was deciding what she would do next. He was standing there looking at her like a lost puppy. Cordelia turned to look at the burned down cottage and thought.

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What’s the worst that can happen? If he attacks me, I will just kill him on the spot. I have done it before and I will do it again if needed. She decided and looked back at him.

“What is the worst that you have done while you were under this mysterious influence?” She wanted some information before she told him her decision, even though deep down she knew what she had already decided. This could be an interesting and entertaining addition to the journey she knew she would take, as Fernicus was in some great danger.

“Well, the worst thing I think just happened when I picked up that sword and pointed it at you.” It usually just lasts like a second or two. In the past, I would just make a step in a different direction to where I was going and blurred a word I didn’t mean to. Nothing as powerful as what happened today.

Very interesting. Cordelia listened carefully and found it truly intriguing. This adventure, as he calls it, seemed to look more interesting with every second.

“Please, I can’t do it without you.” His begging was the final straw. Cordelia liked it when someone begged her.

“Alright, I will come with you.” Zeak’s face was an instance bright like a summer day. “But first we need to go to Stompton village. There is someone that I need to talk to.”

“Alright, but make it snappy,” Zeak replied, irritated by the delay.

Prepping Kropka didn’t take long as she had little now and she packed most of it last night. Shortly, they began their journey to the enchanting village of Stompton.

They were making their way through woods, “I don’t remember this path when I was going to the village earlier.” Indeed, it was a different path, a path that led to a territory that belonged to a certain shifter. A shifter that in Cordelia’s mind would make the perfect addition to the team.

Someone who knew a lot and would share the night watches, as there was no way that Cordelia would sleep peacefully next to him. The trick was to make him agree to this whole endeavor, Jaycen barely left the village and she was just about to ask him to go on a hunt.

A hunt that might take them all over the world, if they don’t find Lundic in the Mantinus village, which already was a great of a journey, she wasn’t too sure where they would go next. One thing she knew was that she needed him and she would make him go with force if that was what it took.

Though on the second hand the possibility of visiting the Towers of Knowledge and a mysterious thing living in this human might just do the trick. A mystery was just the thing that might get him out of the comfort zone which was this place.

Firstly they had to find him, which is easier said than done.

The cave systems that Zeak lived in went for miles with multiple entries, with some of them leading into dead ends or into a nest of Zelisk spiders. At the thought of these spiders Cordelia shivered lightly.

“Are you alright?” Cordelia nodded and walked on with more purpose in her stride, they had a job to do and they needed Jaycen to finish it.

Cordelia and Zeak didn’t know just what sort of adventure they had signed up for. One that would lead them into very dangerous and curious obstacles that they can’t even begin to imagine.