Chapter 4

Back at the palace, Scourge looked through the hidden wall to see if anyone was around. When the coast was clear he walked out and started to slowly close the wall.

"Scourge!" Shade said in her normal clothes. She turned down the hallway and saw him next to the wall.

"Oh…Shade." Scourge turned around and let the wall slip through his fingers. Fiona was on the floor walking happily until the door smashed her between the walls.

"Sc-scourge. I'm stuck!" she whispered.

"How may I be of service to you?" he said bowing and pulling his cape out.

"Cut the crap and tell me what's going on." She said stepping up to his face. Scourge had a crush on Shade and everyone knew about it. "The guards just took a boy from the marketplace on your orders."

"You father has told me to keep the peace in Ancient Square. The boy was a criminal." He said using his cocky smirk.

"What was his crime?" she demanded crossing her arms.

"I can't breathe! Scourge!" Fiona whispered tugging on his cape.

"Why... kidnapping the princess, of course."

Fiona was about to talk again until Scourge kicked her back into the stairwell.

"But he DIDN'T kidnap me! I ran away!"

"Oh man..." Scourge walked away from her acting like this was bad. "...this is very bad! If I had known earlier..."

Shade's hands dropped to her sides. She started to get worried. "What do you mean?"

"Sadly, the guy's sentence has already been carried out." He replied stepping up to her.

"What was his sentence?" she asked slowly.

"Death by beheading."

Shade gasped and self-consciously held her throat while backing away. She gazed off and sat down on a cushiony chair. Scourge walked around and put his hands on her shoulders.

"I'm really sorry, Shade." He said.

"How could you?" Shade asked sharply before running out of the room.

Fiona pushed open the wall, breathing heavily, and tiredly flew onto Scourge's shoulder barley hanging on. She then took a deep breath and posed with her head in her hands and elbows on his shoulder. "So, how'd it go?"

"I think she took it...rather well."

It was night time when Shade was crying in the courtyard. She was on the ground crying over the edge of the fountain. She hasn't felt this sad since her mom died and was really close to making a new friend. Maybe even more than that.

Leila walked up and nuzzled Shade. She lifted her head up and turned to her, "It's all my fault Leila... I didn't even know his name..." She hugged Leila while she purred against her sadden by her loss.

Deep within the dungeon, rats with beady eyes were scurrying around the dungeon looking for food. Shadow was handcuffed to the wall still thinking about the events that occurred just hours ago.

"She was the princess." He repeated for the millionth time. "I can't believe it. I must've sounded so STUPID to her!" Soon his ear twitched as he saw Doom higher up through the small bars on the window. "Doom! Down here."

Doom flew down and faced Shadow. "Now help me outta these." But Doom thought otherwise. He started making noises spazzing out about how made he was. To make sure he got the point, he took a piece of fabric from a dead skeleton and wrapped it around his head pretending to be Shade. Doom acting like a girl before throwing his arms in the air like he was saying, "Aw Phooie!"

"Hey, she was in trouble. She was worth it." Doom sat on the hand cuffs and looking through his items for the right pin to put in the lock disinterested in what Shadow was saying.

"Don't worry, Doom. I'll never see her again." Doom rolled his eyes as he picked the lock. "I'm a street rat, remember? There's a law. She's gotta marry a prince."

Doom got Shadow out of the handcuffs and floated in front of him holding the pin up high like it was his greatest possession. But Shadow didn't even notice Doom. He rubbed his wrist together and sighed. "She deserves a prince...I'm a fool."

Suddenly they heard a low, raspy voice in the shadows of the dungeon, "You're only a fool if you give up boy." It said.

Shadow and Doom looked to see an old man with a hunchback and a beard wearing gray, torn clothes looking at them.

"Who are you?"

The man stood up and walked over to him with a cane in his hand. "A lowly prisoner like yourself, but together, perhaps we can be more." He said rubbing fingers together.

"I'm listening." Shadow said with a straight look.

"There is a cave, boy. A Cave of Wonders filled with treasures beyond your wildest dreams." The man took out red rubies from his clothes and showed them to the 2 thieves. But the man put them back and hopped over to the other side of the dungeon, his back turned to them. "Enough to win the heart of your princess, I'd wager."

Fiona poked her head through the back of the clothes sweating, "Scourge, can you hurry it up! I'm dying in here!" she whispered.

Scourge hit his head onto hers making her go back under the clothes.

"But the laws says only a prince can-"

Scourge got into Shadow's face about 2 inches away. "You've heard of the golden rule, haven't you? Whoever has the gold makes the rules?" he smiled. His teeth were crooked and was missing most of them. But he was happy it was part of his costume.

Shadow stood up but he was too close, "But why would you share all this treasure with me?"

"I need a young pair of legs and a strong back to go after it." he replied patting Shadow's back.

Shadow took his arm off of him. "Uh, one problem. It's out there-we're in here."

Scourge hobbled over to a part of the wall and pushed out bricks making a hole leading to a set of stairs. "Not everything is what it seems."

Shadow took a step forward with Doom on his shoulder.

"Well...do we have a deal?" Scourge asked holding out his hand. Shadow looked at Doom, but all he did was shrug.

Shadow was pulling a horse through the desert winds that were out of control that night. Scourge was on the horse covering his face from the sand while Doom was hiding in the back of Shadow's vest.

Once they got to the cave, Shadow was amazed that it could talk.

"Who dares disturbs my slumber?" it asked.

Shadow was still distracted until Doom nudged him. "Oh, uh, it is I...Shadow."

"...Proceed. Touch NOTHING but the Emerald." The cave said. It opened its mouth for Shadow to see golden sets of stairs.

"Remember, boy!" Scourge yelled. "First, fetch me the lamp! And then you shall have your reward."

Shadow looked forward before entering the cave. "Come on, Doom." He whispered. Doom stayed in Shadow vest afraid as they walked down the steps.

Inside the steps were long and winding. Below them was a chasm of rock, and with no railing to support them, it took them 45 minutes to get down the stairs.

Finally, there was a doorway filed with light. When Shadow walked in, he couldn't believe what he saw. Mountains of gold, jewels, and other riches were all in that one room.

"Would ya look at that..." he said breathlessly. "Just a handful of this stuff would make me richer than he sultan."

Once Doom saw the gold, he flew straight towards it at a fast pace. "DOOM STOP!" Shadow yelled. Doom froze just as he was about to touch the gold. "Don't. Touch. Anything!" Shadow said walking over to him. "We gotta find that lamp."

Shadow walked ahead of Doom as he floated close to the ground. He passed by an ivory carpet with gold and turquoise designs with gold tassels. The carpet seemed to sit up and stare at the 2 in wonder. The carpet flew closer to them and hovered over Doom.

Doom felt like someone was watching him and when he turned around, the carpet flattened itself to the ground. Doom shrugged it off and kept flying. But when he felt like someone was watching him again, he turned around to see the carpet rolled up against the piles of gold. He was getting creeped out and flew over to Shadow tugging on his pants.

"Doom, will you knock it off." He said and turned around.

Doom made a frustrated look as he kept following Shadow. The carpet unrolled itself and flew back over to Doom. First, it poked him using its tassels as hands making Doom turn around wondering what it was. Then it pulled his arm and Doom waved his arms and froze in a karate position looking for whatever touched him. Doom put one of his arms on his chin (if he even has one) and rubbed it wondering what was going on.

He looked to the side to see the carpet standing there inches away from his face. Doom freaked out and they both hid from each other; one behind a pile of gold, the other behind Shadow. Doom flew all around Shadow making him trip and fall to the floor.

"Doom! What are you crazy?!" he asked. Doom turned Shadow's head towards the carpet in annoyance. The carpet stood there staring at them scared while Shadow stood up, making Doom float above the ground. "A magic carpet..." he whispered.

Shadow put his hand out and called it forward in a soft tone. "Come on. We're not gonna hurt you."

The carpet walked out from behind the pile and pointed at himself with one of his tassels. He took a step forward before floated over to them. The carpet stooped down to Doom's level and held it's tassel out to shake, but Doom flew around Shadow and stayed behind him.

"Take it easy, Doom. He won't bite." Shadow said as he shook hands with him. But Doom yelled at the carpet making him sad and slowly walk away, his head(?) drooping as he left.

Shadow stopped him. "Hey, wait a minute." The carpet looked back. "Maybe...you could help us out." The carpet flew around the 2 of them turning them in a circle. "Whoa. See, we're trying to find this emerald..." The carpet looked excited and started flying to the door. "I think he knows where it is." Shadow said sarcastically.

After 35 minutes of walking through caves of stalactites and stalagmites threatening to stab them, they came to a small opening. The carpet pointed towards a 30 ft. tall pile of rocks surrounded by a pool of water from where they stood. On top, it had a glowing green emerald the size of an alarm clock. It seemed to float in the air as the small stream of light from above shined down on it.

Shadow hung himself over the edge of the rock opening. As Doom floated over to him, and because Shadow didn't trust him about the jewel, he harshly whispered, "Wait. Here." and jumped down onto the first rock in the water.

Doom crossed his arms, but saw behind him a golden statue of a chao grinning widely holding out a humongous ruby the size of him. His eye turned into the ruby as he stared at it in awe.

Shadow jumped across from rock to rock onto the rock pile. The front of it turned into stairs that he could walk up to the Emerald.

The carpet was waiting for Shadow patiently until he looked down to see Doom not there. He looked around to see him floating slowly towards the ruby in a hypnotic trance.

When Shadow reached the top of the rock pile, he walked towards the Emerald with caution. He didn't know what it was for, but couldn't risk any chance of getting hurt. Shadow picked up the Emerald from the air and held it in his hands.

"This is it? All this for an emerald? What's so great abou..." he turned to see the carpet trying to pull Doom back but with no luck. "DOOM NO!" The carpet's hands/tassels slipped and Doom raced toward the ruby, picking it up.

"INFIDELS!" The Cave boomed. Doom put the ruby back in place acting innocent. "You have touched the forbidden treasure! Now you will never again see the light of DAY!" The ruby turned gold and melted hardening to a burnt orange color. The Chao statue did the same, its smile melting into a frown before it became a puddle of lava.

The stand from where the Emerald was floating exploded shooting up fire making Shadow jump. Doom flew past the carpet making it flip in the air as he tried to reach his friend.

Shadow tried to land, but the stairs turned into a slide flipping him up into the air. He almost hit the water, now turned lava, but the carpet caught him. He hung on as the carpet made a U-turn towards Doom.

The stalactites above Doom started to fall, each one getting closer by the second to skewering him. Shadow reached out his hand and grabbed Doom before the rock crushed them. Doom stuck to Shadow back as they looked to see a wave of lava coming towards them.

"Whoa! Carpet, let's move!" Shadow said holding the front of the carpet. The carpet flew through the opening where it was dark, but the lava that was on their tails lit up the cave instantly. As they flew through different turns and cracks in the cave, a boulder came crashing down on them. They dodged it but Doom was covering Shadow's face scared for his life.

Shadow tried to pry him off. "Doom! Doom, this is no time to panic!" Once he got him off he saw a wall right in front of them; they seemed to sit still. "Start panicking."

The carpet flew through a crack upside down flying to the room filled with gold. The lava spewed out into the room rapidly and exploded, shooting fire and lava into the air. Shadow dodged each one and just barely came through the next obstacle. The lava came up in the form of hands and clapped down on them as if to squash a bug.

Outside, the thunder and lightning boomed and the wind picked up again. Scourge covered his face with his arm and walked up to the Cave of Wonders. The Cave itself was roaring in pain from the lava it created to kill the thieves.

The 3 of them flew towards the mouth of the cave as fast as they could. The staircase they first entered through cracked and crumbled from the lava. When they were a few yards away, a boulder came down on the carpet flipping Doom and Shadow off of it. The carpet hit the ground stuck under the boulder. Doom flew outside the cave while Shadow hit what was left of the staircase. He held onto the rock to keep from falling and saw Scourge holding out his hand.

"Help me out!" Shadow yelled over the wind.

"Throw me the Emerald!"

"I can't hold on! Give me your hand!" he reached up.

"First, give me the Emerald!"

Shadow groaned as he took the Emerald from his quills and reached to Scourge. Both strained to keep themselves from falling into the lava. But once Scourge grabbed the Emerald, he stood up and clutched the Emerald to his chest howling in the air. He actually found the Emerald of his desires.

As Scourge put it away in his clothing, he looked down to see Doom helping Shadow up from the cave. He kicked him away grabbing Shadow's arm before he could fall.

"What the hell are you doing?!" he yelled angrily.

"Giving you your reward! You're eternal reward..." Scourge said with a crazed look in his eyes. He took out a dagger and raised it high above his head. Doom flew up and bit down on Scourge's arm. He screamed as he let go of Shadow, making him fall to his death. Scourge threw Doom in as well laughing crazily as he did.

Doom grabbed Shadow's arm and tried to pull him up but he was too weak to try. The carpet wedged itself out from under the boulder and flew towards the 2. Doom's arms slipped dropping Shadow to the ground. He hit rocks on his way down rendering him unconscious. The carpet caught him and Doom as they were buried under rock.

The Cave of Wonders gave one last roar before disappearing into sand again. Scourge fell back from the wind and started to smile as it died down. As he took off his fake beard, he started to chuckle with an evil glint in his eye. "It's mine. It's all mine! I-!" Scourge was about to take it out of his clothing when he noticed it wasn't there. He felt around but couldn't find it.

"No!" he dropped to his knees and screamed out into the desolate area. "NOOOO!"