Killian cracked his neck, his hand resting on the base of his neck as he cleared his throat. Nadri rested her hand on his arm, her eyes bleary and fretful. Killian ran his hand through his dark locks, straightening himself. He gave his lover a forced reassuring smile, not wanting to her to worry even more than she was right now. They weren't in the Underworld anymore, they weren't invisible like they used to be.
All it took was one wrong move now.
"Ruveyzen, are you okay?"
"Aye. Bloody fantastic. Other than that, even in this hellish land, the bloody Crocodile manages to get in my way." Killian muttered, his voice fed up and angry. Killian just wanted to be home. He wanted to be with Nadri in his ship, planning on sailing the seas with her and trying to move on with his life. But yet again, there was always something. He couldn't go anywhere peacefully.
"You and me both, raaviir." Nadri commented, sighing. She still looked gaunt, the colour still peaky in her cheeks. He hoped that it was just from the bumpy ride getting here and not from any lasting effects from the King's crown that she brought into the Blanchard apartment. All he felt was dread in that moment when Nadri had come storming through the door, he was thankful that Emma was there to disintegrate the situation as quickly as possible. "Stop looking at me like that, Killy."
"Like what?"
"Like you need to make sure I'm still breathing." Nadri put her hands on her curved hips, standing before him with a raised eyebrow. Her face was serious but her features were too soft, there wasn't a single frown line even though she would always scrunch up her face at words she didn't understand or when she was angry she would have such a powerful fury to her that hadn't imprinted on her face yet. "Clearly this body wasn't made for the land of the living. Hades saw to that."
"Don't say that, Nadri." Killian reprimanded and David hushed them both, hearing the door rattling again. David looked around the crated floor of the cell searching for something that could help them before his eyes snapped to a poorly put together wooden box in the corner. He rushed over to it, putting his boot through it forcefully and the wood cracked underneath his muscular weight. He grabbed a shard of wood, the point sharp enough that it could easily cause some damage.
They waited with anticipation, David's stake at his side ready to jar it into the first person who came to the cage. The doors unlocked and opened the man that they had met in the front gardens of the main building, the group relaxed only momentarily still full of weariness towards the gardener.
"Faas gein, what are you doing here?" Nadri questioned first, stepping forward as she closely monitored the man approaching the cage. Killian went to reach out for her, not wanting her to approach the cage after what had happened to him.
"What does it look like? I'm here to help you." The nervous man got closer, jumping over his shoulder every now and then out of pure paranoia.
"Help us? Last time, you wouldn't even talk to us." David narrowed his eyes, his tone disappointed.
"David, the jul is clearly frightened." Nadri placed a hand on David's arm, hoping that he would see sense that the fragile man was shaking in his boots. Her head turned to Killian who was also suspicious of the man. "He told us to go, Ruveyzen. What does that remind you of?" Killian looked down, guilt washing over his face as he remembered every word that Nadri had spoken to him when they had first met. "I understand your fear, believe me. I know more than most and from that experience I know what will happen but there is many of us. We can help." Nadri promised the man in front of her.
"I can't. His orderly, Poole, keeps the key with him at all times. I might be able to get the magic you need... if you'll make a promise to me first."
"Tell us, please. We want to help." Nadri immediately responded to his bargain.
"When you leave this place, promise you'll take me with you back to your home." He nervously said, picking at the sleeves of his coat and pushed the small round glasses back up against his nose. "I wasn't always the gardener here. I-I-I was a doctor, b-before the Warden took control and ruined everything. He... he made me a prisoner." Nadri felt her heart clench at his words, feeling for the man who had another terrible tale that was similar to her own. Tears pricked at her eyes, looking down at the ground as she tried so desperately not to let them leave her eyes. It could have all been a lie however but Nadri didn't want to jump to that conclusion straight away. She didn't want to feel that someone could lie about something so horrific.
"We have to take him back with us." Nadri confidently decided as she looked back up with a determined expression to the group. "If he's telling the truth then can't leave him here, he doesn't deserve this punishment."
"Look, we need magic so I can fix this wand before we do any sort of rescuing." Zelena quipped reminding them of the two wand pieces in her hands that she showed off.
I-I know exactly where to go. The hospital lab, but... I can't take anything without the Warden knowing that it's missing. You'll have to give the pieces to me so I can fix it there. Then I'll bring them back." He went to reach for the wand and Zelena narrowed her emerald green eyes, pulling the wand away from his reach. "What makes you think I am going to trust you with this, hm?"
"You've met the Warden. Trust me, I want to get away from him as much as you do." He told them again and Nadri could hear the quivering fear in his voice. Nadri moved forward closer to the bars so that she could be face to face with him, amethyst eyes looking him up and down. She could hear Killian's quiet protests but she shrugged them off, placing her hand on the cage.
"I have been imprisoned for a very long time and I did not trust strange souls that had wandered into my realm." Nadri began, her voice icy cool as she spoke unlike her usually gentle voice. It sounded dark, like the way she spoke when she was furious or when she was talking back to Hades. Her voice resonated a dark undertone, lowly speaking as she stared into the doctor's eyes from her height. She may have been small but her words held a ground breaking force. "But if it turns out that you are one to turn…if you destroy any chance of us going back to that land, do not make me regret feeling sorry for you because it will be the last time you do." Nadri warned him seriously, letting him reel back from the cage and stepping down to keep his distance. "I've had enough of putting my savhot in the wrong souls."
"I'll be back. I-I promise." The man scuttled off like a scolded child and Nadri felt a hand touch the lower of her back, snapping her head up to see Killian staring down at her. Nadri blew out a breath, running a hand over her face and she turned around to rest against the cage.
"I don't know how much longer I can be in this cage Killian." Nadri acknowledged, pinching the bridge of her nose. "After everything we have just been through." She exhaled and Killian wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into tight comforting hug. He kissed her forehead and her cheek lovingly, cradling her.
"We will get out. We got out last time and we'll do it again. I promise you. Have I ever broken my promise once?" Killian enquired with a smile, just wanting to hold her tight. He felt the mountain of curly hair move as she shook her head in his chest. Zelena watched them and scoffed as if she was about to be sick at the sight in front of her. Nadri moved her head out of Killian's chest and glared down the redhead on the opposite side of the cage.
"Have you got something to say sahqo?" Nadri quipped to Zelena, crossing her arms over her heavy chest and pursued her lips together.
"Oh just that I am sick of seeing and hearing about your strops, baby dragon. You're worse than my newborn daughter." Zelena spat and Nadri pulled herself away from Killian completely and he felt the energy completely switch inside Nadri. He went to reach out for her, trying to pull her back from the sorceress, Zelena towering her by at least 5 inches. "Oh what, you're going to fight me now little girl? You seem to forget who you're messing with."
"I have been in this universe a lot longer than you have, Zelena by almost a thousand years." Nadri jeered. The woman that slept in Hades bed dared to speak to her about how she decided to react to a situation that she had been in before. Nadri was still processing the trauma and torment she had been through, she had only ever just accepted it. Like it was a part of her daily life that happened so regularly that she was used to it. No one had the right to say anything. "How dare you speak to me as if I am some lowly jul? I could have turned you into dust, swept you off the floor and incinerated you so there was not a single speck left. How dare you even speak to me at all after what happened?!" Nadri raised her voice, even without the magic of the Dovah, her voice was still just as powerful and strong to hear.
"News flash sweetheart, you are one of them now." Zelena gestured at David and Killian. "All of these threats mean nothing to me so if you continue I can arrange a trip straight back down into the Underworld without your precious pirate with you." Nadri stood her ground as Zelena hissed in her face harshly, just looking in Zelena's direction she wanted to throttle the woman with her bare hands. Nadri laughed manically at Zelena's words before she lunched herself forward to attack the witch, David having to catch her by the waist as she struggled and Killian also trying to pull her back from pulling Zelena's eyes from her head.
"You just had to bring him back to the living, didn't you? You just thought he would change! After everything he did you were so pathetically mindless that you genuinely thought a man who had raped and tortured would have changed!" Nadri vented heatedly, at this point screeching like a mad woman trying to flap her limbs around for any one of them to come into contact with Zelena's face. She kicked out viciously, trying to rip herself out from between both men that were holding her back. Zelena's teasing laughter only made Nadri more furious.
"Nadri!" David boomed still trying to control the small woman with an almighty strength to her. He Nadri away more forcefully than he should of, knocking Nadri back and she stumbled down to her butt. Nadri eyes went back up at the shepherd, her face was flushed from struggling so hard against the two men and tears were streaming down her face as she panted. The room fell into silence, guilt flooded David the moment he felt her at the end of his hand. David went to reach down to help her up only for Nadri to flinch from the hand contact that was near her face, recoiling away in a panic. "Nadri I wasn't..." Killian scowled at David with a stone face that he would even put a hand on Nadri the way he just did, coming between them with his teeth grit so hard he might as well have been grinding them.
"J-Just don't touch me. Leave me alone." Nadri swallowed the lump that formed in her throat, nerves pulsing through her as she wearily pulled herself up from the floor. "If she speaks to me again, I'll kill her. And if you touch me again you will have no hands." Nadri snarled, pointing at them both before turning around, keeping herself to the end of the cage as much as she could.
A couple hours had passed in the cell and there was a window of tension separating Zelena and David from Nadri. It was so thick that a knife couldn't possibly cut through it. Nadri had been silent since the incident, cooped up in the corner of the cage with her knees up to her chest and Killian sat by her side simply resting his hand on top of hers as it laid on her knee, stroking her soft skin mindlessly. She'd feel him squeeze her hand every now and then, Nadri would look up and see him with a loving smile.
"Do you remember the last time we were like this together, darling?" Killian whispered, inaudible to the others, as he sat close to Nadri. She looked up at him and nodded her head, pushing some of her curls back behind her shoulder. Nadri looked a lot better, apart from being agitated at what had occurred in the cell, she was beginning to peak up a little bit more. "That was the first time I realised how strong you are." Killian complimented, interlocking their fingers. Nadri's eyes were attracted to the rings that were presented on his hand. "How much fight you have in you, love. I know it's still in there."
"You think that I have the will to break out of another prison after I spent an eternity in one, Ruveyzun?" Nadri lowered her voice back, her tone unsatisfied. "I got out of one hell and thrown into another and now I'm stuck in a cage all over again. I just..."
"And I'll get you out of this cage too, Nadri. Your fire is so strong and I know we will get out of here together." Killian promised her definitely, clutching her hand. His blueish-green eyes searched her face as she tried to look away from his caring gaze. "Believe me, I want to drown that witch as much as anyone else." His eyes sneered towards Zelena who was standing against the other side of the cage, picking at her painted nails and then his eyes drifted who David who was crouched down by the cell door resting his head in his hands. "You know that Charming didn't mean to hurt you, right? The lad's strong, if he wanted to hurt you-"
"Then he would have, right?" Nadri sniped. "I know I was out of control, Killy and maybe I deserved it but in that moment that one tiny moment I had this flashback of…of him. It was his hand on me, it was his voice saying my name." Nadri felt her skin crawling already knowing that Hades had entered her head soon as David's hand connected with her body to put her on the ground.
She shuddered, the need to be sick overcoming her again.
"I don't know what this is, raaviir. This trauma haunts me, it's like a plague that keeps making me sick. I feel angry one moment and the next I am happy. What if…" Killian hung on to her broken words, trailing to swallow the lump in her throat that welled in her throat. It was like the more she spoke the more her throat wanted to give up on the words and break into a sob. "What if I came back wrong?" A tear slipped and Killian shook his head, shuffling closer to her to get comfortable on his knees to look her in the eyes. "What if I'm wrong?"
"You are not wrong." Killian's words were firm as he moved his hand up to cup her cheek and caress her smooth skin, wiping away the tear away that had escaped her eye. "You did not come back wrong, love. The furthest thing from it." He shook his head, wanting her to hear every word and wanting her to know that he meant everything he said. "I want you to listen to me, love. You were, are and always will be, a powerful being. The only person that I know who would put themselves through a world of pain for someone else and protect them at all costs. You have so much fight and when you think you've given up you find some more. You are so far from wrong darling. You have been through unimaginable pain and I will by your side to support you." Nadri let out a stifled whimpering sob and threw her arms around Killian.
"I am thankful to the Gods for you, Killy." Nadri breathed out into his shoulder, desperately keeping the tears back from falling. He cuddled her closely, his heart tearing at Nadri's low self-esteem. She was like a child trying to process emotions that were foreign to her. She was trying to process a trauma that she hadn't come to terms with that was now finally over and for that she thought she was broken.
Moments later the groundsman walked back through the doors of the room that they were being confided in. The couple looked over their shoulders and Killian jumped up to his feet, outstretching his arm for Nadri grab his hook and lift her up to her feet carefully. Nadri wiped the tears away from her face briskly and cleared her throat, wrapping the cardigan around her tightly.
"Unfortunately, I was only able to keep half my promise." The groundsman spoke as he approached the cage in a hurry, a prominent deep gash across his cheek, freshly weeping blood down his skin, that wasn't there the last time that he was in the room with the others.
"What do you mean? Where's the wand?" Zelena demanded in a desperate tone, alarmed.
"I repaired it, but then the Warden took it from me. I didn't come empty-handed, though. Seems the Orderly, he enjoyed a little bit too much whiskey today." The man rifled through the inside of his tweed jacket and revealed a small, chipped metal key. He placed it in the padlock, turning the lock with a click and the latch came undone, unlocking the gate of the cage and unwrapping the chains to discard them on the ground.
"We need to get the wand back from that warden. Do you know where he is?" David interrogated as the shy man opened the door for them, stepping through first. The others were quick behind him, Nadri close to shoving Zelena out of the way just so she could feel what it's like to not be contained.
"Eh, no, uh, but first things first, before we find him, we must have a way to defeat him. He's quite powerful. Now, I might have a way, but it is dangerous." He was unusually jittery, Nadri could only assume it was because of the terrorisation that had previously been inflicted on him.
"Were you hurt?" Nadri stopped, looking at the crimson liquid that had begun to dry against the cut on the man's cheekbone.
"O-Oh I-I had a bit of a scuffle with the Poole. I am fine, it's j-just a scratch." He rambled, more and more nervous with Nadri's looming purple eyes analysing his every word. Nadri went ahead behind David, Zelena shortly following on. Killian lingered around the steps, turning to the man suspiciously with his hands balled into fists.
"We just went to hell and back. I'm not afraid of your Warden." With that they continued on.