Chapter 10

 

 

 

Chapter 10

 

RIFAENOTIS returned with a refreshed countenance by the time Yuki finished breakfast. He thanked her dramatically and told her to come with him. She followed him into the inner room she visited last night. Rifae pulled out a chair for her and had her sit before taking the chair across from her.

“You reconciled,” Yuki grinned.

“Yes. Thank you, Yuki,” Rifae responded with an exquisite smile and turned around to grab a crystal sitting on a platform on the shelf behind him. He moved the crystal and the platform it rested on to the table between him and Yuki. “All right, why don’t I look for the person you’re searching for as thanks?”

The crystal was a mysterious combination of colors, changing from blue to green to yellow depending on the angle. A liquid weaved its way throughout the crystal like a snake. Tendrils of light slithered through it.

“…What a strange crystal. It’s beautiful.”

“Thank you. Mother gave it to me.”

“So pretty,” Yuki sighed, half-enamored by the dancing tendrils of light.

“It’s very useful for searching for people.” Yuki moved from side to side to watch the lights flicker across the crystal’s surface. Rifae smiled fondly at her. “Give me your hand, Yuki.”

“Pardon?” Yuki looked up from where she squatted to watch the crystal from below. Rifae held his left hand out for her.

“Take my hand.” She got back in her seat and sat up straight before placing her hand on top of his palm. “Close your eyes.”

“Okay…” He didn’t explain what he was doing, but Yuki shut her eyes as he commanded.

“Think of the person you are looking for. Yes, like that,” Rifae said in his gentle tenor.

“Think of him? How exactly should I do that?”

“Anything that comes to mind will work. You can think back to the time you spent together or remember their facial features.”

His face…

Luca’s astoundingly handsome face appeared in the darkness of her closed eyes. The memory of the night sky they gazed at together and his warm back as she rode behind him on the horse played through her mind. She couldn’t forget his reliable, broad back. The memory of him kneeling before her in his ceremonial white and gold armor was quickly followed by the memory of him soaked and half-dressed after jumping into the spring near the castle to save her. His trademark intrepid and annoyed smile colored every memory. It all started from the day he saved her from the spring and flashed a bothered smile at her.

“…That’s good enough. You can open your eyes.” Yuki opened her eyes to his soft, but demanding voice. “This crystal listens to people’s wishes, you see?”

“Wishes?”

“Yes, wishes. There is a limit to its power, and being a Witch’s tool, it throws fits sometimes.”

The crystal throws fits? Sounds like a person.

“You are making a wish to know something; oftentimes people’s desires for what they want to hear over the truth slip in while they try to use the crystal directly, corrupting the information they receive. Hence why I am having you convey your wish to the crystal through me.”

“But it’s a wish, right? I don’t know where Luca is.”

Rifae smiled handsomely. “I’m a Mage, you know? Do you know what a Mage’s predominant ability is?”

Using a crystal to contact anyone they have the power to connect to. What a useful ability in a world without cell phones. It might actually be more useful than the phone. This might be as useful as having a tracking device on someone.

Luca appeared inside the crystal. His image wavered in the tendrils of light—he wouldn’t have looked like Prince Luca to anyone who didn’t know him well enough. The image flickered unstably, threatening to give Yuki motion sickness if she stared too long.

“Prince Lucat is inside Adolunde Castle.” Rifae smiled meaningfully in response to her shock over his knowledge it was Luca in the crystal. He returned his attention to the crystal. “I’m certain this is Adolunde Castle, but…this can’t be his room. I wonder if it’s underground. He is in a dark and chilly place. Probably a prison cell.”

A prison cell… He was imprisoned after all.

“Adolunde Castle’s prison is underground,” Rifae stated, not from what was shown in the crystal, but from his own knowledge.

Luca…

Luca’s shadowy figure wavered inside the crystal. Unable to stand it any longer, Yuki jumped from her chair.

“I’m going.”

“What are you going to do when you get there?”

“I don’t know, but I have to go!”

“Honestly, I doubt anything can be done by you going there.” Rifae wouldn’t let go of her hand; he clenched it tightly. “What kind of relationship do you have with Prince Lucat, Yuki?”

What kind of relationship?

“Do you just like him? Or is he your boyfriend? Fiancé? Lover?”

“None of those.”

Est asked her the same thing. Luca was neither lover nor family. He fell under neither category, but everything started in the spring on the day they first met.

“I was found and picked up too.” Rifaenotis looked up at Yuki, silently urging her to continue. “Luca took me in when I found myself somewhere I didn’t know my left from right, and he created a place for me. He told me I could be here. He said I could come with him! So I want to save him this time. Is that so wrong?” Hot tears filled her eyes.

I can’t…cry.

Yuki trembled as she endured the tears. Abruptly, her hand was yanked with incredible force. She lost her balance and fell onto Rifae’s chest. Shock dried her tears.

“I made you say something hurtful, didn’t I? Sorry for saying means things, sweetie.” He patted her head to comfort her. The calming scent of herbs wafted from his chest. Yuki sniffled as he rubbed her back.

“I didn’t say these things because I wanted to bully you, Yuki. It’s just that Prince Lucat is enchantingly handsome. Girls who fall for his looks do reckless things when they see him in public. So I tested you.” His soft voice comforted her from where he spoke near her ear.

“But to think you were…” Rifae trailed off, hinting at something more, but Yuki couldn’t see his face.

Yuki and Rifae pulled away from each other at the same time after she calmed down. He took both of her hands in his and spoke to her as if he were speaking to a child, “My friend—he’s a doctor—is supposed to come soon with some medicinal herbs and a new artificial leg for me. I heard they will be traveling all over on their way to Adolunde after they drop by here. Why don’t you go with them, Yuki?”

“What?” Yuki blinked several times at his abrupt suggestion.

“You might end up taking a long detour along the way, but I think it’s a much better option than going alone.”

“I can…go?”

“It’s not like you had to get my permission in the first place, honey. But I can’t approve of a girl wandering the continent on her own.”

“Thank you!” Yuki happily wrapped her arms around Rifae. He sighed ostentatiously.

“…I’m happy you trust me, but you shouldn’t be so quick to trust others.”

Yuki stepped back and looked down at Rifae—there was something funny about the troubled look on his face.

Rifae is telling me not to be quick to trust? After he picked up a complete stranger, let them into his house without questioning them about who they are, and then left them alone with his stuff? And not just one time either. Yuki was the one baffled by his carelessness. You’re the one who didn’t give me the chance to be wary of you since the moment we met.

She wanted to believe that was because he trusted her from the moment he picked her up. Laughter shook her small frame.

“You had better listen to the complaints and wisdom of your elders!” Rifae remarked, further digging his own hole. Yuki’s laughter grew stronger. “What? Is my face that amusing to you?”

His frighteningly beautiful face twisted with confusion at her laughter.