I knew for certain that I was going to take the Gemsteps test in public as to prove to everyone, including my parents, that I was the strongest person in my generation.

I hoped that Makya would also take to test publicly so that I could see her thrive as she unleashed her aura, even when she was young she had always kept it under strict control as she always looked scared to discover her true potential.

I remember that she never fought back as the other kid hurt her, she just stared silently in their eyes as they kicked and punched her. 

Her ruby eyes created fear in the others, but what they didn't realize was the passion and the power she kept captive in them, I never go to see her snap or even get angry, but I had heard rumors, rumors about a red wolf, a killer they said, a monster, an abomination.

I knew when I heard the rumors that they were talking about her, after all who else could possess such piercing red eyes, eyes that made their enemy see their downfall, made people whisper her name, her legend transcended the kingdom all the way to the Yual Kingdom where they marveled at the red pearl eyes that one of ours possessed. 

Her lovely ruby eyes disguised as brown eyes burned me as she struggled to try to break free from me, my body tensed as I heard Krul's knife cut through something I could only imagine to be the body of his latest victim, my hand moved on its own as I hid Makya's eyes, although I was pretty sure she had seen dead people before. 

I wasn't going to let her see it if I could prevent it. I could feel her body trying to get away from me as I forced her to stay quiet to prevent Krul from finding us, she might want to try to kill him, but if she wasn't able to win a fight with me, she sure wasn't ready to fight Krul in a life or death situation. 

After all, she probably never killed anyone in her entire life. I knew she hated me but knowing that she wanted to move away from me that badly still hurt me, was I really that disgusting in her eyes?

Was Reain really better than me? 

She never reacted that badly to him and she even smiled to him when they talked. 

I did try to do the same, but she didn't want to talk to me, even so, I knew that I was going to be the one to end up with her, I would do anything, literally anything to make her mine and no one was going to stop me, not even that idiot Reain. 

I tried approaching her despite her obvious tries to ignore me, I tried interacting in a friendly manner but she didn't want to, and so I had no choice but to try to surprise her by telling her I liked her, she seemed not to believe me or just think I was messing with her, but I could see I had gotten her attention, not necessarily in the way I wanted but still it was a start.

 As we stayed still in the shadows, I heard footsteps, probably belonging to Krul, advancing out of the cavern, I knew that if we moved, he would try to kill us, try being the important word here as I would kill him first if he tried to harm either one of us. 

I could feel Makya's arm reach towards her thighs as she had probably heard the footsteps, knowing her she was probably debating between killing him or me, to prevent either one of these options I moved one of my hands to take hers, knowing full well that doing so was taking the chance for her to try to escape from my grip as I only had one of my arm around waist, leaving her a lot of options to get free. 

I leaned toward her and whispered, "I know you want to leave but could you please stand still until he left?"

I could feel her thinking as she responded "Sure but at one condition"

I could feel her smile as she continued to speak "I don't see why you should be the one controlling the situation" before I could move out of the way I felt her pull a knife that had been attached to her thigh just a second ago with the other hand I hadn't taken control of.

She spinned on herself, preventing me from moving as she put on my throat with her knife, during that time, my arm still keeping her close to me participated in accentuating the pressure of the blade on my skin. 

The closer she got, the better the view on her face got, I could see the effects of the herbs that changed the color of her eyes, they made them paler and yet they seemed darker in some spots. 

Her facial structure remained the same as when she was young, her expressions hadn't changed that much, she still frowned when she was angry or stressed and her lips still pinched each other when she got confused and was frustrated by it. 

Just now, I could see her lovely lips pinching each other as she accentuated the pressure, I wasn't going to lie it did hurt, I could almost feel a drop of blood running down my neck, wait, no, I could actually feel it running down my neck, I would have been upset if it wasn't for her gaze that followed the said drop as it followed my neckline and fell down under my shirt. 

Her face painted different expressions as she watched it down, happiness, confusion, regret, probably since she could no longer admire the drop run down my neck, and finally the expression I relished seeing on her face, even if it was only for the fraction of a second, desire. 

I could feel the air becoming tense as I advanced towards her, she didn't flinch and didn't move back, though she stubbornly watched the ground.

I whispered as I moved even closer, my arm still around her, "look at me Ruby, if you want to hurt me you should at least own it." as I spoke I felt a release in the pressure that the blade maintained on my neck.

She didn't look up as she whispered "is he gone?". 

Reality came back to me in a flash as I realized what she was talking about, Krul, although I was pretty sure he had left approximately half an hour ago, I didn't want to tell her he had left. 

She would have used that as an excuse to leave immediately and go tell the others about what had just happened. 

She lifter her eyes and said, "I guess that's a yes".

I looked at her dumbfounded, did she just not live the same thing as me, was I really a fool to be hypnotized by her every breath, I didn't hallucinate her reactions, she did feel something didn't she? 

As I didn't move, she took a step back and said as she turned her back on me "I'm going back to the cave to tell the others what just happened." 

The space she had created between us seemed huge.

I could understand that she harbored some hate towards me, but I had hoped she could overcome it, or at least some of it. 

I followed behind her as we went back to the cave, no sound was coming from the cave as we approached it, he couldn't have reached it before us, could he? 

At that thought, I could fell sweat falling in my back as I started walking faster, Makya probably had the same thought as she looked back at me, we both started jogging as the sky started turning yellow, the orange sun created once more a wonderful landscape that could only be painted by the best artist of the capital, it ascension happened slowly, just as slowly as I thought I moved, I could feel my legs move, but couldn't totally control them. 

I knew they could defend themselves especially Byhn, but what about the others? 

I had grown quite close to some of them, Geros for example, had a peculiar sense of humor which made it easy to talk to him and spend time in his company, it was also quite fun to see him trying to flirt with Helaena, she although being quite shy, appeared to be affected by his tries and his not so subtle attempts to spend some time alone with her. 

I wouldn't mind if Krul got to Reain first, but I knew that Makya no matter how independent could be affected by his disappearance, and Ioas knows how much that bothered me, how close could two people become after spending a few months in each others company. 

We arrived to the cave and tried to see if anything seemed out of order, to our relief, Rya and Vreia were still guarding the cave and nothing had happened.

 We entered the cave as everybody started waking up, the sun was now high in the sky, tainting it with its red and orange rays. In the back of the cave was Reain who appeared to be walking in circles, he lifted his head as we entered and frowned upon seeing us together. 

I couldn't stop myself from smirking and looking at Makya while saying "let's do that again another time" she looked at me confused as I walked towards Byhn. 

I swear I could've heard Reain's teeth creak from where I was, how satisfying it was to see him fuming and thinking to try to figure out what had happened to make me say that to Makya. 

Byhn looked at me as I approached him and shook his head as he saw me smile, he sighed as he said "you do know you're behaving like a kid right now, right? He didn't do anything" 

I looked at him and said "What do you mean he hasn't done anything? You know very well what he did and don't pretend like you don't know that what I'm doing right now is the least of what I should actually be doing to him, after what he did to my family the least I can do is make him feel frustrated" he looked hesitant before speaking " and does she know what happened between you two?". 

I looked at him confused " why would she need to know about that? It has nothing to do with her." 

He looked like he was about to respond but as the others seemed to have woken up, he chose not to. I looked around the room only to find Makya speaking with Nila and Masov, they waited until everyone was awake and aware of what was going on to tell them about what had happened last night. 

Apparently they had decided to leave out our little argument out of their resume, or rather Makya had chosen not to tell them, by remorse of what had happened or by the shame her slight slip of hand had caused her to have. 

I couldn't tell, but I would be lying if I said I was totally unhappy about sharing a small secret with her.

____________________________________________________

Hope you enjoyed this little sneak peak into Jax's head!

If you have any comments on the story don't hesitate!