Heart desired

//Chapter 33//

It has been a week since the council.

I was doing squats in the training area, along with the other soldiers. Kahlee was next to me. Kylan and Zone were not here. They were going to Rawen today with Resh.

I was anxious for them, which made it hard to concentrate on training. My legs ached from doing leg strengthening and lightening exercises whole day. I was also pushing a tendril of my power steadily to all the one hundred and sixteen soldiers present in the training grounds for five hours now.

So I was not surprised when I fell to the ground on the seventy ninth squat.

I gritted my teeth so the illusion would not break. This was the lowest amount of my power, so it didn't hurt anyone else's mind. Still, lowest amount multiplied by hundreds were taking a chunk of power out of me, draining me steadily.

Savin rushed to me. Nobody else didn't even noticed my fall.

"Continue your squats." The elf loomed over him. His pointed ears and sharp big eyes added a non human beauty to it. I continued as it said, bending my legs, again and again.

It was such a simple illusion. Even though it had been five days now, nobody had broken free from it. The need for insfi stones were becoming necessary.

"You are pushing yourself again." Savin said, moving his hands under me and pushing me up. I had been ignoring him for as often as I can. I didn't even have the strength to resist against him, so I let him push me up.

"How did you do it?" I asked.

"Do what?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Got your immune against our magic?" I asked. "I can't figure that out. Did you eat something weird?"

He tipped his head back and laughed. The laughter rolled off his chest, sending vibrations through me. Something snapped inside me and I lost all my focus, almost stopping the illusion. I decided it was enough with squats. I turned the illusion to command them to rest, and in seconds, everyone was sitting. I clicked my toungue. Nobody was resisting the command.

"I didn't eat anything weird." Savin spoke after he had his fair share of laughter. "You may not remember me, but I grew up with you guys when I was little."

I stared at him. "What?"

"Yeah." He closed his eyes, as if trying to remember that time. "It was when we discovered Resh outside the borders. We needed an undercover agent to invade Rawen, to find out what happened to my aunt. I had just turned to four. From my grandfather, Sadisen, I had inherited the maze. Father asked me if I could use that to get through borders. I had agreed. It was my first mission, after all. I wanted to make him proud."

"Wait." I said. "That maze belongs to you?"

"Yeah. I can command it to expand and shrink. Remember all those rock portals you came through here?" I nodded. "They weren't there originally. I willed the maze to appear, along with an entrance. It's like a vehicle mortals use. I'm sorry I lied to you about three dots in a pattern. I couldn't risk telling you everything back then."

Oh well. He didn't know anything about me either. So it went both ways. I still didn't trust him. I smiled at him to cover up my emotions.

"That's so cool!" I forgot the fact that I was still leaning on his chest. "You can travel anywhere you want!"

He grinned. "After we solve this war, I will take you to my favourite place."

I stared at him. It felt like a promise. He offered to show me a piece of his life. He knew my worries about the future, where the people I love were fated to die. But these words spoke about a life more than that.

Hope was truly a dangerous thing.

"Okay." I said. "So what happened?" I asked, choosing to ignore the soft smile came to his face. Those lips were distracting me more than I liked to admit. He was like a dangerous drug, made just for me.

"So after three or four months of training escape plans, I came to the Rawen and sneaked in to the palace somehow. I don't remember how, exactly. But your mother found me and knew I was the prince from the moment she saw me. My resemblance to my mother is too much. I look like a replica of Queen Requina."

He watched the resting people for a moment before continuing. "I was disguised as a servant's son after that. You were just born, back then. I used to watch you, cradle your cot and sometimes take you out of the palace. You were so chubby. You didn't have that much hair back then. They looked like little white sticks." He started laughing again.

I stared at him in disbelief. I had seen enough family portraits to know I looked like a potato with ruby eyes. It seemed like he was telling the truth.

"So.. you were sort of my nanny." I said. No wonder he felt familiar back then. Or maybe he was lying. He had also seeing my portal and was describing it. I didn't remember him at all. Honestly, the second option seemed more realistic to me.

"Yeah." he grinned. "Anyways, your mom was afraid of me being discovered by some Elf. She grinded small amounts of insfi stone into liquids and injected them in to my body through cuts." He shifted and showed me the side of his belly. There was an old scar with a luminous purple in it. "There are other places like this. It was agonizing, but somehow it worked."

I could not say a word. My mom had totured a four year old boy. And she had done the same to Resh. I blinked back tears. She was like an angel to me. How could she be so cruel to someone else, I had no idea.

Savin seemed to notice my change. He curled his arms, so I was trapped in them. "Don't think about it too much. I'm actually glad she did that."

"Still, you were so young. How could she.." I could not finish that sentence.

"You know, your mother had the gift to release and cause great pressure, physically and mentally. I think it may have affected her too. She was in a foreign land, her best friend was dead, and then I came to her world. She did the best thing to protect my mind. I don't blame her.".

I remembered her smile, how it always felt like home when she was with me. I wanted to see her again.

Someone stirred. I whipped my head back, looking at the ground. Someone was standing up, fighting against my illusion.

I stood up and Savin followed me in a smooth motion. I felt like I have seen this soldier before. His eyes were still unfocused, but he was standing, little by little. I felt the thread pulling back to me.

After a minute, he collasped back to the floor, resting.

This was impossible. Someone who wasn't an Elf had just resisted an illusion of mine. I couldn't believe it. After five days, there was finally progress.

Then I looked closely at him. I recognised him and at the same time, I heard Savin click his toungue.

It was that young scholar from the library.

I sighed, relieving everyone from the illusion. This was going to be a long, long training.