Zayen

The guard that was holding Alara took one look around the room and dashed out. I shouldn't have let him go—because it's likely he will come back with more guards.

My fists are already going numb and I don't know how many more I can take on.

"Why do you look so . . ." Alara's eyes travel over my face and body. "Like you're going to destroy everything that gets close to you."

Because I am. Because the anger that is burning inside me is nearly blinding.

I promised to protect Alara and I couldn't. Seeing her in that guards hands, being handled like a doll made me—

And Nawaz is nowhere to be seen. He could be dead or being tortured for information.

And without him, I lose those kids. If Alara and I get out of here safely, it won't matter, because the only two people I live for would be gone.

I step forward and hold onto Alara. She lets me. "Are you okay?" I ask. It's a stupid question, with everything that is going on, but I need to know.

She nods, her eyes wide with surprise and something else. "Thank you."

Hearing those words from her lips hits all the right spots of my ego. The corner of my lip lifts. If we were friends, if the situation was different, I might have leaned down and kissed her.

She shifts closer, her eyes dropping to my lips for barely a second. Oh, how I really wish the situation was different.

My grip on her tightens as my body fights my mind. "We—" My voice comes out rough and breathless. "We should get out of here. Should we look for Nawaz?"

"Yeah, we have to." Unfortunately.

She hesitantly steps back, her arms wrapping around herself. "I really need to learn how to fight. I'm sorry."

"You did well. Using your body as a weapon is a great start." Her smile is slow and shy. She tries to turn away to hide it from me. "Are you blushing?" I tease.

Her smile falls and she meets my gaze again. There's a fierce defiance in her eyes, like she'd rather be doing absolutely anything other than hearing my compliments. "We have to go."

I step closer, the back of my hand brushing against her cheek. Even in the dim lighting of this prison-style hallway, I see the look in her eyes shift from fear to confusion to . . . something.

Stop. My hand slowly slides down her arm. She doesn't move, allowing me to reach all the way to her hand. My fingers linger over hers for a moment before I drop my hand to my side.

"Why did you let me do that?" I ask. She should have stepped away, should have done something.

"Why did you do it?" she retorts.

Because of that look in her eyes. Because my ego is hurt after all of the fights I have lost, but when I feel the softness of her skin beneath my touch it reminds me that there are other ways to win, besides fighting. "I . . . I don't know."

She nods and takes a step towards the exit, but I stop her.

"We should try going that way." I nod my chin down the passage, in the opposite direction of where she wants to go. "In the opposite direction of where all the guards came from, yeah?"

Her face scrunches and I can see she knows it's a better idea. She won't admit it though.

I start walking and know she'll follow. Although there's no way to know what we are walking towards, or if there is any way out of this mess.

My footsteps echo and I don't dare to look anywhere but forward. There are cages that line the right side of the wall and I don't want to see who is trapped inside or what they look like.

This passage is endless and seems to curve around whatever building we are in.

"There," Alara whispers, breaking the haunting silence. She rushes forward to a heavy wooden door, but I grab her arm.

She jerks back and her head whips to me, frowning. "What are you doing?"

"Let me go first, to be safe." I did promise to protect her, although I'm not doing a great job of it based on the situation.

The door has a black, metallic knob that is frozen to the touch. I twist it and it takes a lot of force before it caves and opens, the sound indicating that it has not been used in a long time. A good sign for us.

It opens to stairway that, four steps in, becomes pitch black. It has a dry, dusty smell.

I reach my arm back and open my palm. The thief understands and slips her fingers into mine.

The journey down is tedious. With every step, I remember Saad and Aya. Their innocent smiles, the way the would wait in the darkness until I arrived. They were always so good, so patient, and they deserve so much better.

I wanted to give them a life better than the one that was served to them. But now . . . My heart squeezes in my chest until it's hard to breathe, not only because of the lack of fresh air around us.

The stairs come to an end and light outlines the shape of a door. Alara's hand quickly slips out of mine when I stop.

I take two deep breaths. Whatever happens once we cross that door is going to change everything. Because we're going in blind, against an unknown number of people, and we have nothing to offer or negotiate with.

"Stay behind me," I say, my throat dry with unease.

"Zayen."

I turn to her. I can hear the fear in her voice. The question—will we survive this?

"You're going to be okay, Sariq." It's dark, but I can see her silhouette and the soft curls brushed back behind her ears.

Her hand lifts to my cheek. Her touch is gentle and warm. I lean into it, my gaze falling closed for a moment. It gives me a strange feeling of stillness.

I haven't felt this way since . . .

The thought nearly makes me pull away, until her other hand comes to my left cheek. She leans up on her toes.

I smile, biting my lip. She's too short to reach my face.

Kneeling down, I slip my hands behind her thighs and lift her up, pulling her against me.

A soft gasp leaves her lips. Her legs close around me, her arms wrapping behind my neck. She has probably never done anything like this before.

Energy fills me, making my pulse race. I press her back against the wall beside the door, my head lowering to her neck. She dips her head to the side, giving herself to me.

It makes me breathless for a moment—and then I get to work trying to make her just as breathless. It works fast. Soft, un-contained moans leave her lips, her legs wrap tighter around me. "Please," she whispers. Damn.

I want to give her everything.

I want to make her toes curl. I pause for a moment, needing to catch my breath, but she starts placing kisses against my jaw until she is at the corner of my mouth.

Her lips align with mine but she doesn't kiss me. Her chest presses against mine every time she inhales. She waits for me to move in, and I can't stop myself. I have to kiss her. She's mine.

I pull back, the fear and shock over that thought creating an uncomfortable pressure in my chest.

I can't be thinking that. Not now, and not with the game that Nawaz had been playing with her. If I kiss her I will definitely become possessive of her. I can't allow that. There is too much at risk.

"We should go," I say, lowering her back to the ground.

"But—"

"Nawaz could be dead. We need to go."

A hard wall of defiance closes around my chest, leaving me feeling frustrated and angry. The perfect emotions for what we are about to walk into. 

I twist the handle and it barely budges. Worry slices through me, that I wasted our time by coming this route. Twisting again, it budges a bit more. It clearly hasn't been used in a long time.

On the third try, it twists enough that the door clicks open. Light floods in. I resist the urge to look back at Alara, to find out if her cheeks are tinted red. I wonder if her eyes would trail to my lips at the idea of what might have happened.

There is a brightly lit hallway. It's white walls contain blue, delicately painted patterns that swirl and sway like depictions of the ocean and everything it contains. It's beautiful and the exact opposite to the cages we woke up in.

"How are we going to him them? This place is hu—" I press my index finger to her lips. They're so soft that I nearly push her back into the darkness to finish what we had started.

Her voice was echoing off the walls. I had to shut her up. Shaking my head, I say, "Shh. We'll find him." We don't have any other choice.

She finally looks around. Her eyes shine in the light streaming through the tall windows that line the right side of the wall. "This place is . . ." She frowns. "What is it?"

"I don't know, but it's bigger than the palace which means that they're not nobody."

"Great," she huffs under her breath, stalking forward

I told her to stay behind me.

Alara freezes when two guards run past the archway at the other end of the hall. She glances back at me and then launches into a sprint.

I follow after her, keeping my feet light to avoid any unnecessary extra noise. When we reach the archway, we curve in the direction that the guards ran and stop.

Okay, to be fair we were making bad decisions and this was likely to happen.

There is only one door on this side of the passageway, and it is guarded by six or seven guards. From what I can assume, there are more guards inside and putting up a fight will only get us in more trouble.

Three guards rush towards us and seize us. I grunt as one roughly grabs my arms and pushes me forward, towards the room. It's not that it is painful, but it's just frustrating to constantly feel like I am losing.

The gigantic room that we are pushed into makes me forget about everything else. It's not like anything I've seen before, even as a guard for the royal family.

The walls of the unbelievably beautiful room are made of a deep blue tinted glass. The glass undulates and curves so that with each movement, the lights from the intricate lanterns dance over the walls the way the light of the sun would dance over the waves of the ocean.

At the other end of the room, there is a golden throne and beside it is a plain wooden chair.

And in that chair, Nawaz sits.

~~*~~

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