Flooded Flames

Part One of Six

As the shadows of her nightmare wrapped around her slowly loosened their grip, Talia's senses sharpened to the sensation of something solid and cold against her neck. With a start, her eyes flew open, focusing on the wide-eyed red-haired man straddling her. Whatever he was holding against her throat stung.

She called upon the icy power flowing through her veins and a patch of ice formed on her neck, preventing the object from cutting further into her skin.

“Damn it!” the man exclaimed. His breathing stopped as fear filled his jade-colored eyes.

She wasn’t sure if the panicking heartbeat she heard was his or her own. The only other sound in the room was the trickle of the water in the small moat around her bed.

Feeling the weight of the man on top of her, she gasped as her power reached out to the water around her. She felt it stand at attention at her order and strike.

A spear of water stuck the man on top of her, sending him flying into the wall. He slid down the wall, unconscious. She turned her attention to the clank of metal hitting the ground.

A knife? The bastard had a knife to her throat. While she was sleeping!

She threw the blankets over her to the side and jumped out of bed. The adrenaline pulsing through her body focused her vision in the moonlit room. She could see the red-haired man was young, maybe even younger than the twenty-three years she appeared to be.

Did the Fire Kingdom send someone so young to kill her?

She stepped towards the fallen man slowly. He made it all the way to her bedroom, so he must be skilled. His red hair meant he had some of the royal family’s blood in him. They’d never send an important member of the royal family into the Water Kingdom, though. They were too important. If he had royal blood in him, that meant that he…

Almost in reply to her thought, the man’s eyes shot open, and a blast of heat erupted from him. The blast threw Talia back onto her bed. She quickly pulled down her midnight blue nightdress to cover herself as she sat up. As the man charged at her, she let out a load scream to alert the guards, calling on the water again. This time, it wrapped around his legs and arms. Once it pulled him to the ground, it froze him into place.

The man’s light green eyes glowed as the freckles on his cheeks faded into his reddening face. The drips of water from his icy restraints confirmed what she feared—he was heating and melting the ice.

There was the sound of footsteps in the distance, but they wouldn't be there in time. The man was already on his feet, readying a fireball in his hands.

“Your Highness!” a dark blue, short-haired woman, clad in a twilight purple-colored nightdress, ran in from an adjoining bedroom. Her bright silver eyes wide in terror.

“Wisp, assassin!” Talia called out in warning to her lady-in-waiting.

The man turned and hurled the fireball at Wisp. His attention locked on the dark blue haired woman as she quickly called the moat water to protect herself. Readying another attack, the man didn’t notice the water behind him being controlled by Talia. The water formed into an enormous bubble and enveloped him. A thick sheet of ice encased the aquatic bubble, sealing him in.

Realizing the bubble of water dosed his fire power and every beat of his heart was another moment without air, fear filled his face. The water around him boiled, but it did nothing to the thick ice that encased him. It only boiled away enough water inside to give him air to breathe.

As the footsteps of the guards drew closer to her bedroom door, Talia focused all her power into keeping the ice from melting.

The doors to the room shot open and several guards poured in. They surrounded the bubble just as darkness started to fill Talia’s vision. She let go of her power, causing the bubble to burst. As she fell back onto the bed, the water returned to the moat.

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“Your Highness!!” Wisp screamed as she ran to Talia’s side.

Talia, fighting the exhaustion demanding her to sleep, felt Wisp’s arm wrap around her.

“I’m fine…” Talia breathed as she turned her attention to the man that had been holding a knife to her throat only moments before. The guards quickly held him. His jade eyes rolled back, and he fell forward as a guard smashed the hilt of his sword into the back of his head. Wisp’s hold on her tightened as they dragged the man out of the room.

“Take him to the dungeons and st-stand guard at the door,” Talia stammered.

As the door closed, Wisp’s arms tightened even more around her. Talia didn’t know how long Wisp held her before she pulled back to look at her. Wisp’s silver eyes opened wide, her hand shaking as her fingers reached for Talia’s throat. Her finger softly swiped against her skin.

Wisp gasped, looking at the blood on her fingers as she pulled her hand away. “Oh gods, what did he do to you!?”

“It doesn’t hurt. That might be the power surging through me, blocking me from feeling it though.” Talia chuckled a little as she sat up.

Worry twisted Wisp’s lips into a frown. “You should lay back until an Earth healer comes.”

“I should be over seeing the bastard’s execution right now,” Talia muttered, laying back.

The worry furrowed Wisp’s brow and filled her light blue eyes. She asked the question that Talia didn’t want to ask. “How did he get as far as your bedroom?”

“Not just my bedroom. He was on top of me with a knife to my throat when I woke up.” Talia shivered as a cool breeze blew in from her bedroom tower’s balcony.

“On top of… h-he didn’t…” Wisp couldn’t bring herself to ask the question in full.

“No, he didn’t,” Talia assured her.

At that moment, a young woman from the Earth Kingdom hurried through the bedroom doors. Gods, she was young. She must have replaced her predecessor, who was killed recently.

“Y-your Highness. I’m—”

“I only need your powers, not your name,” Talia shot at the scared blonde creature, who only cowered more.

“Forgive Her Highness’s crassness. She does not like to get attached,” Wisp said, chuckling when Talia glared at her. She then added, “Her bark is worse than her bite.”

The blonde woman’s body relaxed a little as her lips fluttered into a smile for a second. She lowered her head. “Your Highness, if I may.”

Talia sat up and hung her legs off the side of the bed. The cowering young woman took that as a sign to approach her. She kept her head down, only lifting her eyes enough to look at Talia’s neck. Talia could feel the fear radiating from her.

“How old are you?” Talia asked.

The woman lifted her shaking hand towards Talia’s throat. “N-nine-” a breath forced itself on the girl. “I have seen nineteen years.”

Talia exhaled and closed her eyes as the warmth from the woman’s hand flowed into her body. Gods, she really was young. The girl had no idea how young she was compared to the woman she was healing. It looked like only four years separated them, but her nineteen years were nothing to the hundreds Talia had lived. That was a secret that only Wisp, and her ancestors before her, knew.

Feeling the warmth fade before the woman pulled her hands away, Talia opened her eyes. She was met with a kind smile on the young woman’s face.

Talia looked away from her with a huff. “Your job is finished. You may leave.”

The woman bowed, backing to the door before turning and walking out of the room.

Wisp let out a sigh. “Poor thing. Her first summons-”

“And she should learn her place,” Talia spat, cutting her off.

Wisp rolled her eyes before nodding. Her face softened and worry took over again.

“Do you want me to stay with you so you could sleep again?” Wisp asked, picking up a robe from a chair.

Another cool breeze entered from the balcony. Talia took the cloak from Wisp as she held it out for her. She wrapped it around her thin nightdress and stepped out onto the balcony.

When Wisp followed her, Talia looked out from her tower at her kingdom, lit by the moon and stars above. Tonight, the waterways that ran through the palace and the nearby town reflected the cosmic glow above.

Talia turned to the only person she’d dare call a friend. “Even without the attack, I wouldn’t be sleeping,” she admitted.

“You had another—”

There was a knock on the bedroom door. A guard was already in the room by the time they walked in from the balcony. He bowed and drew his fist to his chest.

“Your Highness, we contained the man. Should we proceed with execution?” he asked.

Talia pulled her robe tighter as she walked over to the guard. “Not yet. I want to talk to him first when he regains consciousness.”

“As you command,” the guard said, lowering his head even more.

Wisp walked over to her as the guard left the room. “Are you sure you want to keep him alive?”

Talia nodded. “I want to know who sent him. If the Fire Kingdom sent him, then they will get the war they’ve been after.”