Chapter 7: The Chasm Is Deep

Amelia jostled along, trying to hold onto the saddle of her horse with her hands tied in front of her. It was difficult, to put it mildly and her body ached where she bounced with more force than usual.

"Are we heading to the witches?" Amelia asked sarcastically. She bounced along with the horse's pace, trying to stay steady on her back with her hands tied together.

"We're heading to your mate," Rikkard replied darkly. "He's been looking for you."

"I'll bet he has," Amelia replied sarcastically.

They went another few hours in almost complete silence before they stopped for a break, Rikkard reaching up to swing her from her horse, holding onto her waist as they swung down to the ground. She saw wearing the remnants of her clothing, tied over the important bits since the rest of the fabric had torn while she had shifted. It was enough to cover her, but it was short of the modest dress she normally wore.

"I need to pee," Amelia said as she held her hands out to Rikkard to undo.

"Oh no," he said with a smirk. "You can pee with your hands bound."

He took the lead from the horse and tied it to the rope on her hands before gesturing for her to go ahead and take care of her business.

She glared at him, but she had to pee so badly, she didn't even care if he saw. She dropped her pants and peed right in front of him, glaring at him as she did.

He smirked in amusement as he watched her, looking her up and down with a salacious look in his eye.

"You think Cliff would share?" he asked as he stepped closer to her. "You think he would let me have you?"

"I think Cliff would beat you to a pulp if you took what was his," Amelia said with a bitter laugh.

"He shares the blond and he likes her more than he likes you," Rikkard replied. 

"The blond?" Amelia asked, trying to keep the fear from her voice.

"He has her, you know? Right now, he and Zephyr, and Mikael have her. They're bringing her with them, we'll meet all four of them soon and you'll find out just how well Cliff can share," he said with a deep voice as he ran his fingers down her face toward her torso.

He let his fingers linger at her breast and she felt a shudder of disgust course through her.

"You'll learn to love it," he said softly as he leaned down to kiss her jaw, running his tongue toward her earlobe. He bit down on her ear gently and she felt her stomach flutter with desire. It was a move Cliff made, he must have told them. He must have shared it with them. The damn bastard.

"You won't get away with this," Amelia said with distaste. "Some day, when your guard is down and when you think you're safe, then we will pounce and we will take you down."

"Good luck with that, princess," Rikkard said as he stepped back with a smirk and reached into his pack to pull out jerky. He threw a piece toward Amelia and she caught it with both hands. "Eat up, don't want you looking sickly when we find Cliff. He'll have a good workout waiting for you."

Amelia shot him a nasty look as he helped her get back on her mare, still holding onto the rope attached to her hands as he mounted his own stallion and they took off down the trail toward a life that Amelia had thought she was free from.

Her thoughts were running wild. Cliff had Izzy. She felt her chest well with desperation. If Cliff had Izzy, then where was Nate? She desperately hoped he wasn't dead. But her chest filled with despair when she realized the only real way that Cliff would have gotten to Izzy once more was if Nate wasn't able to follow. He wouldn't be dead, not if Izzy still lived, but he wasn't well either.

Rikkard kept the pace at a gallop, pulling Amelia's horse along behind his. She held on as they raced down the path north.

They rode for hours before Amelia could see a village up ahead.

"Rikkard, I can't show up half-dressed like this," Amelia said. 

Rikkard ignored her as he rode forward.

"They know me as the ambassador's wife. If they see me like this, they will report it. You'll have an army on your tail before we even reach the next village," Amelia said, trying to reason with him.

His eyes flashed as he glanced at her, looking her up and down with an assessing eye. He leaned forward and pulled out a cloak, tossing it toward her.

"I can't put that on with my hands tied," she said in exasperation as she held her wrists out.

"You'll have to figure it out," he growled as he turned back forward.

"This will look suspicious," Amelia said as she gestured widely to their situation. "You can't show up in a village on the border of Sephathilian with the ambassador's wife tied to her horse behind you."

Rikkard let out a huff, but he seemed to agree with her as he slowed their horses to a stop and turned to look at her. He untied her hands but kept the horse's lead rope in his grasp.

"If you try to run, I won't be so kind," he said darkly. He looked down at her breasts and his eyes gleamed. Amelia knew what he was implying and she shuddered but nodded in agreement.

She had no intention of running, not now that she knew Cliff had Izzy. Her errand could wait, she needed to find her friend and get her free. She knew she was no match against her mate and the dark trio, but she would figure something out. She would find help somehow, somewhere. Izzy needed to be kept safe, no matter the cost.

She pulled the cloak over her head and adjusted it so it covered her half-naked body completely. She looked appropriate for the trek into a town that she had visited frequently with Cliff. They usually traveled to the far East, then north to avoid Daikon and reach Sephathilian and the capital city nestled in the mountains on the border of Daikon and Westerquiem. This was an area she knew. And she knew it well. They were out of Daikon now and they were in the land of the fairies.

Amelia knew Rikkard didn't plan to stay long in Sephathilian, they wouldn't be kind to the dark trio, but it was a necessary stop before reaching Wisterquiem.

"Are they here?" Amelia asked, her voice a whisper and they rode through the city gates toward the center of the town. Rikkard moved with purpose.

"They're meeting us here," Rikkard said his voice low.

"Are you sure this is what you want to do, Rik?" Amelia asked. She rested her hand on his arm, her eyes beseeching. 

"My choices have long left, Amelia. This is my path now. It's all of our paths," Rikkard said in a rare moment of honesty.

"It doesn't have to be. You could find a mate, you could fight this," she said, pleading with him, her eyes desperate.

"There is no fighting this," Rikkard said with finality as he stopped their horses at an inn and tied the reins to the post out front. 

"The vampires fought this, we can too," Amelia said, her voice desperate as she grasped his arm tighty.

"STOP IT, Amelia!" Rikkard said with force. Several eyes glanced their way as he brushed off her arm. "We know what will fix this, and we have it in our grasp. We don't need to fight anything!"

His voice was harsh and he grabbed her arm, jerking her forward toward the inn. She followed her breath shallow, her heart beating wildly.

Rikkard got a room and food and shoved Amelia up the stairs ahead of him. 

"Rikkard, I need clothes," Amelia said softly, looking back at him defiantly as she walked into the room he had reserved for the next two weeks.

"You shouldn't have run," he said with a shrug of his shoulders. 

"You're going to make me stay in a cloak for the next two weeks?" Amelia asked. She glared at him incredulously.

"You're more than welcome to take it off, Amelia," Rikkard said with a smirk. 

Amelia took a deep breath and turned her body away from his, folding her arms across her chest in a protective gesture. She could hear him dropping his pack into the room.

"I'll bring your pack up later. I'm going down for food. You can stay here or you can come with me. Your choice," he said with a shrug of his shoulders.

"You would leave me alone?" Amelia asked tartly then immediately regretted it. If he left her alone, she could get free, or at the very least get help. But then, she couldn't do that, she had to find Izzy first. She had to stay here until she found her friend.

"If you try to run, you know the consequences," Rikkard said. "I will find you, just like this time."

Amelia's eyes welled with emotion, she blinked them back, her back still facing Rikkard.

"I'll be here," she said softly.

Rikkard let out a huff of humor. "I know." He opened the door and left, closing it softly behind him. 

Amelia heard the lock click behind him. She felt a shudder rack her body as she sat on the edge of the bed.

Even if she wanted to, she couldn't leave. She grasped the vials of blood still resting on a string between her breasts. They were still safe. Rikkard either didn't know what they were or didn't care because he hardly spared them a glance when he had captured her. She let her hand grasp the vials tightly as she looked out the window to the people milling by below. She was three stories up, not as high as the inn in Lethlian, but high enough that jumping was unwise.

Not that she would jump. She could still see Izzy's terrified face after Cliff attacked her at The Hunt. She could see her body shaking. She could see her soft, muted smile when Nate had finally worked his way into her heart. 

She was with Cliff again and Nate was in trouble. She could feel it. She needed to find help. She couldn't leave without Izzy but she needed to find someone to help her.

Her thoughts went to Brutus. He would be in Sephathilian by now. He would be waiting for word from her, she was sure of it. 

They hadn't made a definitive plan, but she knew where he would be. She knew because they had talked of it often. She just needed to get a message to him. He would be able to find Nate. He would be able to help.

--

Neil was just about to his breaking point. No one told you when you became King that you would have to sacrifice those you love for the good of your people. But, that's what he kept doing. First Fiona. Now Amelia.

He had felt physical pain when he had looked back to see her in the window of the castle as he rode away. The pain reverberated through his chest. He knew she would run. He knew she would leave the first chance she got. 

He looked down at the two shifters sitting in front of him and the news they brought was no surprise. 

"She left," he said with a dull voice.

Kate nodded, clutching her side with her hand, a grimace on her face.

"We had planned to go with her, but she left without us," Kate said softly.

"She thinks there's something about Izzy that is causing the attacks. She took her blood north, to Sephathilian," Seth added, staring intently at Neil.

"You think I know what's going on?" Neil asked, correctly assuming what Seth was thinking.

"You've seen this before. Haven't you?" Seth asked, reading the expressions on Neil's face.

Neil rubbed his face with his hands as he recalled another dragon dying a brutal death as he watched from afar. It had been necessary, it was the only way to end the terror but the memories plagued Neil as poignantly as the regret.

He nodded in reply as he glanced to the side where Theo was watching, his eyes equally as dark with the memories of another time. 

"We had to take care of our problem a few years back," Neil said as he looked up at Theo. They shared a look.

"What are we dealing with here?" Seth asked as he glanced uneasily between Neil and Theo.

"We don't know, but it was bad. We had to kill some of our own to end the terror," Neil replied.

"Without Amelia in Daikon, Saerus has no reason to attack," Theo said softly.

"We need proof that Amelia left. They won't believe us if we tell them she's gone," Neil said as he leaned forward to lean against his knees and ponder what was to be done.

"I had a letter," Kate began. "But, it was with my horse and she spooked when the rockslide started."

"We can go find the horses," Logan chimed in from behind Seth and Kate. "Susanna and I can look for them. They can't be far."

"They will have gone toward water," Theo said. "There's a river on the far side of the mountain running in the valley. They likely would have gone that way."

"We'll find them. We'll bring them back," Logan said. Susanna nodded behind him, standing to his side in solidarity. 

"The letter," Kate said, wincing in the effort to talk. "It's in the saddle pack. I tucked it in the side of the pack. It has Amelia's seal on it."

"She has a seal?" Susanna asked, her face impressed.

Kate nodded. "Oh yeah, ambassador's wife and all that. Plus, she's the daughter of the Alpha of the Pressian tribe. He will know the seal when he sees it."

Neil's eyes darkened at the words "wife" and his nostrils flared.

"I'll leave you to get to it, then," Neil said as he rose and walked to leave the tent where Kate, Seth, Logan, and Susanna had been talking quietly. 

"I'll let you know as soon as we have news," Logan said, nodding to the king as he left.

Theo was close on his heels. He kept his voice low as he spoke.

"You can't kill him," Theo whispered softly. 

"Why not?" Neil growled, looking at Theo out of the side of his eye.

"Omegas are tied by the mate bond to death," Theo said. "Our bond works differently but if you kill Cliff, you kill Amelia."

Neil stopped walking and turned to look at Theo, his eyes angry.

"Tell me you're fucking lying," Neil said with fury.

Theo shook his head. "They're tied until death."

"But she's MY MATE!" Neil said, slamming his fist into a wooden post near him. The post shattered under the force of his punch.

"We've never really studied the bond between species, we only know about the bond between shifters and the bond between dragons," Theo said softly. "Shifters are tied more tightly to their mates. Probably because they descended from a different diety."

Neil let out a yell of frustration. He seemed to constantly be thwarted, no matter how close he was to happiness. It was always ripped from his grasp.

"When these fucking shifters are done threatening my people, we are going to find the oracle and he will tell us how to FIX THIS!" Neil burst out in anger as he stormed forward toward the tent where he was meeting his mate's father and brother in just a few minutes. He had a lot to say to the man that gave his mate away.