Author's Note: Wow! Another speedy update. =) And oh my goodness! So many reviews! Made my day. Yup, yup. Had fun writing this. So intense! I'll need to write something happy . . . probably in a different fanfiction I'm working on.

Reviewers Shoutout! Goes to liliesandroses, PrincessofSea, Hooked on Stories, GracefulWolvesInTheNight, kms5665, ZuliaGirl, dannyboy0077, Energizer Bunny, Amy, RoseColoredSoul, Sarah Goodwill, forbiddenluv, RisingPheonix6589, HikaruAmethyst, darkraven5665, and Dolphinfootballover95

Slight Warning. This may be violent. I've never really written something like this before. I refrained from blood and guts cause - I don't write stuff like that. =/ I tried to keep it as tactful as possible.

Disclaimer: Don't own the Aladdin characters. I only own my OCs. Now, on with the show!

Chapter 14

The desert flew by beneath the group. They travelled in silence. Genie and Abbu cast worried glances at the girl who starred with wide blue eyes into the distance. Her lips were pressed tightly together and ever so often, she would bite her lower lip and blink rapidly - as if to stem off tears.

Aladdin did not pay her any mind. His objective was to get back to Aggrabah as fast as Carpet could fly. He felt as if something were not right, but shook the doubt aside as being nothing more than his imagination.

Once the palace's gold roof winked into sight, Carpet sped up in eager anticipation of returning home. Aladdin smiled triumphantly as they swooped over the city streets and he waved in greeting to people he knew. He called down to the guards standing at the tall, blue gates but Carpet continued on toward the white-washed palace.

They finally landed on the marble floors of the throne room where Jasmine awaited them. Aladdin jumped off of Carpet and opened his arms for his fiancée. "We're back!" he announced. "And we rescued Inaya." He turned slightly so Jasmine could see over his broad shoulders.

Genie was just coaxing Inaya to stand from Carpet when Jasmine broke away from Aladdin to place a comforting hand on the other girl's shoulder. "Don't worry, you're safe now." Jasmine smiled into the expressionless face staring dazedly back at her. "I'm Jasmine."

Inaya blinked several times and when she spoke, her voice was harsh from suppressed sobs. "Inaya."

"I know who you are." Jasmine led Inaya over to a pile of cushions and helped the girl, who appeared to be about her age, to sit among them. "Your father came to us for help."

Confusion etched Inaya's face. "My father?"

Aladdin, who had followed the pair of young women, turned to Genie. "You should probably go get him and let him know she's here." Genie nodded and disappeared with a pop.

Inaya shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts but failing. "My father wouldn't be looking for me." Her voice sounded small and bewildered as she said, "He left my mother and me when I was a little girl. Why would he be looking for me? Mother died. If he came looking for us, people would say I had died." She chuckled darkly. "Or tell him he was better off without me. Tell him they'd sold me to the slave traders."

"Slave traders?" Jasmine repeated in shock and looked up at Aladdin is a worried frown. "What slave traders?"

"Friends!" Everyone in the room turned to see Mahir standing with arms crossed and a wicked grin on his face. "I thank you for your services."

Inaya flinched away. Aladdin moved to stand protectively in front of the girls and frowned at Mahir. "Who are you really?"

Arms opening wide, the man exclaimed, "Why, I'm Mahir! Nomad and father to that poor girl behind you. Thank you again for rescuing my daughter." Taking a step forward, Mahir said, "I will take her back to her people now. Her mother is so worried."

Inaya's eyes narrowed as she stood slowly to her feet. "My mother is dead and you are not my father." Pushing her way around a shocked to silence Aladdin, Inaya continued in a chilling voice, "You. You are the reason for this? YOU are the reason Mozenrath is -" She choked on her words. Her steps toward the vile man stopped and she began to tremble. "He can't." Inaya whispered. "He can't be. No, he can't be!" Sobs racked her body as the realization of what those dull eyes meant.

Without another moment of hesitation, Mahir took a few steps forward and grabbed Inaya's upper arm. Wrenching her arm behind her back until she cried out from the physical pain, he held her in front of himself as a shield when Aladdin snapped out of his shock and pulled his sword. "Stay where you are." Mahir growled at the young man.

"You won't get away with her." Aladdin retorted. "There's no way you'll get out of this palace." The boy hero looked to the throne room's entrance, wondering briefly where his blue friend was. "Genie!"

Mahir laughed. "It's not use boy. Your genie and guards have all been - incapacitated." Lifting his free hand, Mahir snapped his fingers. From behind the curtains stepped his band of men. One ruffian held a glowing glass bottle with a very perturbed Genie while a few other rough men - Fatih being one of them - dragged rope bound and gagged group of guards.

Mahir laughed again at the shocked and enraged faces of the people before him. "And the rest of the guards are in a similar state somewhere about the castle. As for your father, Princess, he and his advisers are locked in their meeting." He shrugged. "I'm nothing if I'm not efficient. I have to be if I want to remain the top slave trader in the deserts." Glancing over his shoulder at the slowly approaching henchmen, Mahir spoke to the sobbing and frantic girl he was restraining. "Inaya, there's someone here who has been waiting to see you again."

With another cruel laugh, Mahir shoved her behind him into the large hands of Fatih. Inaya shrieked into the man's face and struggled to be free of him. Fatih bent slightly so his face was level with hers. "See what you did to my arm, Witch? Well - I assure you - my scars will look like a mere blemish compared to what I'm going to do to you."

"Let her go!" Jasmine jumped to her feet and made to march toward the men but Aladdin quickly restrained her.

Mahir turned to smile indulgently at the princess. "I am afraid you are in no position to be making demands, Princess." Looking her up and down, the leader said over his shoulder to his men, "It would be a shame to pass up an opportunity like this. Don't you think men? We could fetch a great sum of money for a princess."

Aladdin hissed through his teeth, "Touch Jasmine and I'll run you through!"

"Threats and orders!" Mahir guffawed. "You obviously do not realize that you have no leverage on the situation. Your genie is captured by a bottle a medicine man made for me. Your guards are all bound and gagged. What do you have, boy?"

While the men were throwing back and forth their insults, Fatih had pulled out a knife and was running the edge along Inaya's cheek. He chuckled darkly at the fear in her blue eyes mixed in with her tears. "When I'm done with you, you won't be worth anything to anybody. You will be begging to be returned to that sorcerer and his," here Fatih laughed again, "devices." Frowning the man sighed his putrid breath into her face that was scrunching up in disgust and a slowly growing anger. "I had hoped to have you to myself. First timers are always so - fun."

"You will never touch me." Inaya growled, her anger speeding up into rage.

Mahir raised an eyebrow and turned, ignoring Aladdin's deadly glares, to laugh at Inaya. "Still trying to decide your own fate? I thought I told you that it would be better for everyone if you just rolled over like a dog. After this you will be lower than a dog."

Clenching her fists and hiding them in her skirts, Inaya summoned a long, thin crystal that was narrowed into a point and as sharp as a dagger. "I am no longer helpless. I will never return to being someone's dog." Her blue eyes snapped as if they were Mozenrath's blue magic. "I am the apprentice of the Ruler of Black Sands!" On the last word, she thrust her hand up and buried the crystal into Fatih's chest. He shouted in pain and released his hold on her. He stumbled backwards as his hands hovered above the wound. Inaya whirled away from the hands of her captors and ignored Fatih as he fell.

"You. All of you! You will pay!" She shouted thrusting her hands out and with them a wave of white energy erupted from her fingertips. Some men ducked in time, others were sent sailing through the air to hit a wall. Aladdin used his body to shield Jasmine while Iago and Abbu ran to hide. Inaya targeted one man at a time - whoever fell into her sights. "You go through villages and cities, bargaining with heartless men and kidnapping innocent families!" She muttered spells under her breath to torment one group while she thought the words to another to torment another. Inaya was suddenly grateful for all of those lessons and theory books Mozenrath had made her read.

"You hurt and abuse your victims. Some as young as small children!" She paused to stare down at Fatih who was gasping and groaning in the last stretches of his miserable life. Her eyes narrowed. "To you the pain of others is a sport! You are nothing more than monsters!" With a wave of her hand, she sent Fatih flying against the wall. The force that he hit the wall with caused something inside him to crack - but he did not die yet. He screamed in agony as he fell to the ground.

"You deserve every cruelty to be done to you that you have dealt!" Inaya shouted and sobbed at the men running toward the door. Raising her hand, she shouted a spell that raised an invisible barrier. The men attempting to flee collided with the barrier and pounded frantically - caged in the throne room with the raging sorceress.

Inaya watched with rage crackling eyes as the men ran for the balconies, only to be stopped at the thresholds by her barriers. Her hands glowed with white light. She stretched her hands far apart then with a swift motion swung them together and clasped her hands into a tight grip. All the slave traders who were scattered in their attempts to find an escape, suddenly moved - forced by a stronger will - to collect into a mass of squirming men.

Aladdin watched in wide eyed fear. This girl was almost as good as Mozenrath! His eyes darted over to where Abbu and Iago were, and then over to the glass bottle that Genie was still beating his fists against in order to get out. "Abbu! Iago!" The bird and the monkey looked at the young man. Aladdin pointed frantically at Genie. "Get him out of there!"

She chanted another spell and from her words, a bolt of white lightning shot through the air to strike her captives. The men fell - unconscious. Inaya stepped determinedly toward Fatih - still laying on the ground and crying out in agony and terror. "Mercy!" he moaned. "Mercy!"

"Mercy?" Inaya hissed as she stood above the man. "Show mercy to a man who has shown none? Show mercy to a man who slanders the name of a dead man I love?" Holding her hand up to form dagger crystals a foot above Fatih's body, Inaya shook her head. "Never." Her back turned as the crystals fell from their suspended position. Fatih cried out then all was silent.

From a curtain by the door, one man stepped out with dagger drawn. Inaya's back was too him. Mahir stalked quietly up to her and raised the dagger above his head. With cobra speed, Inaya twirled and swept Mahir's legs out from beneath him. He fell backwards, hitting his head on the marble floor with a crack. Intense heat burned his hand and the dagger spun away from him.

Inaya's foot stamped down hard on his wrist and she glared down at him as he glared up at her. "One more dog to do away with." she said. Mahir used his brute strength to pull his hand from beneath her foot and momentarily caught her off balance. Inaya stumbled back but held her glowing hands up in defense as Mahir sprang to his feet. "And how shall I deal with you?" Inaya questioned.

Mahir pulled a concealed dagger from the folds of his robes and threw it at Inaya's head. A white shield of light flashed and stopped the dagger in its tracks. It fell harmlessly to the floor and was followed by a blast of magic from Inaya's hands, melting it. "A quick death is too good for you." she said in a dark monotone. Pointing at an oozing scratch on Mahir's arm she continued, "You know, when I was studying underneath Mozenrath, I learned a great many things. How to reanimate a corpse, how to levitate objects, how to conjure objects out of thin air. But here's something I hoped I would never have to use that I learned. I never wanted to use the spells I learned to kill someone." Spreading her arms wide she motioned toward the still form of Fatih. "Yet you can see what has happened." Pointing at him yet again, Inaya said, "This particular spell is rather painful."

Mahir suddenly gripped his arm and began trembling. Inaya felt a smirk twitch at her lips and she imagined Mozenrath's own smirk. She crossed her arms in front of her and let herself explain what was happening as it happened. "You see, I learned how to change one matter into another. Liquid into solids for example. You are filled with a liquid - blood. And in a rather painful process, you are turning into a solid - a very ugly rock." Mahir's knees buckled and he screamed.

During this whole exchange, Abbu and Iago had retrieved the glass bottle and returned it to Aladdin. Aladdin freed Genie and looked frantically over at Inaya. "Genie, do something!"

"On it, Al." The blue man flew toward Inaya and Mahir and tried to grab the young woman. Her white shield zapped his hands and Genie recoiled with a yelp.

Inaya ignored the genie's attempts and continued watching with a cold expression as Mahir began to stiffen. Aladdin left Jasmine's side and ran to help Genie stop the young woman. "Inaya! Release him!"

"Why should I?" She demanded. "He deserves every bit of his suffering."

"It's not right!" Aladdin countered.

"Not right?" Inaya turned sideways so she could glare at Aladdin. "Not right! What do you know of right and wrong? You who killed a man not too long ago under false pretenses!" Her attention was diverted back to Mahir when a gurgling sound left the man's lips. She grinned menacingly at her victim. "Of course, this isn't a permanent change. It can be reversed. Mahir - before his eyes were solidified in their sockets - cast a pleading glance in Aladdin's and Genie's direction. Suddenly his terror stricken face was frozen solid - Mahir was all stone. Inaya raised her hand. "But I won't give you the opportunity for a second chance. For you took away mine."

Aladdin shouted, "No!" but his order fell on deaf ears. Searing, white magic shot from Inaya's hands and Mahir exploded into dust.

Inaya lowered her arm and some of the fire within her began to dim. As if he sense the change and the let down of her guard, Aladdin charged her from behind and tackled her. Inaya cried out in shocked surprise and anger. Twisting beneath Aladdin, she let her rage flickering eyes to fasten him in their gaze. Her magic began to glow all over her body then released with such force, that Aladdin was thrown from on top of her. Inaya stood slowly and eyed the young man rising to his feet with the help of Genie. "Do not think," she said in a calculated tone, "that I am like Mozenrath and that all I can do is fight at a distance with magic." Taking some steps toward Aladdin, she continued, "I fight with my fists just as well if not better."

Jasmine rose from her hiding place. "There's no need to fight! We are not your enemies, Inaya!"

"Aren't you?" Inaya shouted at them, her hands glowing white again. "You took me from my home!"

"We rescued you!" Aladdin shouted back.

"I did not need rescuing!" Inaya's hair began to float about her face like a gust of wind was blowing it - but there was no wind. "Mozenrath rescued me! He saved me from the desert. He saved me from the slaves. He gave me purpose! He gave me a home! He loved me!" She punched the air and sent a blast of magic at Aladdin, hitting him straight in the chest. Tears coursed down her face from eyes that had turned a glowing white from magic. "And I loved him!" She kept ever approaching Aladdin. Her shield stopped Genie's attempts at stopping her. She kept a steady barrage of hits trained on Aladdin's movements. He dodged some, but even his reflexes were not as fast as her strikes all the time.

Inaya trembled with rage, sorrow, and hate. "You believed the lies of a monster. Mozenrath was right. You are a fool, Aladdin! You told me that killing a monster was not right? Yet you killed a man! A man only trying to protect me!"

"He had you locked in the tower!" Iago interjected from the sidelines.

She whirled to face the cowering bird. "Locked there to protect me from the likes of you! He knew there would be a fight and he did not want me hurt!"

"Did he really rescue you?" Aladdin challenged, drawing her attention back to him. "Or was he keeping you there to use your powers against others?"

Inaya sent a double fisted blast at him. "Of course he rescued me! I stayed to repay that debt. Then - then I stayed because I wanted to. Because I loved him." She sobbed. "I loved him. You killed the only person who ever loved me! I hate you!" Inaya gathered her magic into her hands until it was a ball of white light then sent it spiraling at Aladdin. He tried to run out of its path but it curved into his path and Aladdin flew off his feet.

"Aladdin!" Jasmine, Genie, and Abbu chorused in pained shock.

Inaya speedily approached Aladdin as he struggled to prop himself up onto his elbows. "I hate you." she hissed. "Tell me now what is right." She raised her hand to form her crystal daggers. Before she could commit to bringing her hand down as she had with Fatih, an image flashed in her mind as well as a voice. He. Is. A. Monster. Destane's voice, it sent a shudder through her. Then her voice spoke in her mind. He'll never be a monster like you. Inaya blinked. "No." she whispered the words. The crystals vanished and she backed away from Aladdin.

Jasmine's sobs reached Inaya's ears and the young woman cringed inside herself. She had done this. Whether deserved or not. In her mind she saw Mozenrath's dull eyes again. Her heart seemed to split within her. Her own broken expression hardened when her gaze flicked over to Aladdin. Genie was helping his friend up, watching Inaya warily.

Taking a steadying breath, Inaya took several more steps back. "I still hate you. Do not think that I will ever forgive you." With a wave of her hand, a circle of white light formed in the air - like a door. "If I ever see you again - I will not be so kind." Inaya stepped through the portal, her eyes watching to make sure no one tried to stop her.

Inaya stepped out of the portal and looked around at the dim room - lit by the setting sunlight that was pressing its way through tattered rags over holes in the wall and crumbling windows. She looked around sadly at the broken clay jars and the torn pillows. "This was home - once."

She sat down among the ruins. Inaya had not returned to the tower. What was the point? Mozenrath was dead and the Mamluks were either still there or they had fallen when their master had. The idea of living among memories and death did not appeal to her. Inaya wondered briefly whether she should return to find Xerxes and Rahi.

Suddenly, she felt a wave of exhaustion sweep over her. Her rage was gone and replaced with energy draining depression. Inaya curled into a fetal position where she had sat and let herself cry herself to sleep.

Author's Note: As for Mozenrath, there will be more in the future chapters. Getting closer to the end folks! =)

Now as for this chapter, what did you all think? Overkill or just fine? Review! =D