A/N:  Hehehe, and you all thought that I wouldn't be back with the ending for weeks!  Well, I'm not that mean.  Not all of the time, at last.  ^_~ Things get a bit dark here, but have no fear – good will triumph over evil!  *sits back down after jumping out of her chair in dramatic gusto, as Frodo, Erik, Spike, and Orandor eye her a bit warily*  Knock it off you guys. 

CapturedHeart:  Thank you for the tip on italics – I must indeed watch for using them too much, but it's somewhat unavoidable in this particular story, seeing as how I employ italics when they tell stories and all that jazz…  Clarice's skin – well, let's just say she was wearing powder, which made it look less tanned.  It just seemed to fit in the moment.  Or perhaps her skin just randomly gets lighter and darker…I dunno…

Riene:  Yes, I am an infuriating author, and proud of it, m'dear!  But perhaps you'll forgive me the cliffhanger now that I'm back to wrap things up.  It's kind of a must, because I won't be able to access the web very easily after this Monday, when I'm being packed out of my house.  Yikes.  May the fates have mercy on my poor little life. 

Rosethorn:  Hey there!  Glad to hear that Gavin's still alive (and hopefully behaving).  I pray that he didn't annoy your friend Cassandra too much however…hehehe.  Oh, and he gets to play a part in the end of this story for a bit, if you're interested to know…

Cheler:  Well, thank you for that!  I'm glad to hear that you think my writing's awesome, even if I am almost about to make you go crazy.  Hope this helps things a bit.  ^_^

All Mighty Terrestrial:  Actually, I have thought about getting all three of the stories I've written so far of this series published…haven't gotten very far in doing so yet, but I'm working on it…  As for Miracle Max… *grins* Well, I guess in this case, I'll just have to play Max!  Let's see how that goes…

And now for something completely different.

Chapter Eighteen –

Torment

 "Skye!" her dream self called. 

A deep, dark forest full of twisted, threatening trees surrounded her, closing her within its black depths, only the faintest bits of strangled light showing through the treetops, as the wind howled around her, tearing at her and shrieking the worst thoughts – threats, fears, and hopelessness – into her ears.  Sobbing, she ran through the trees, trying to find a way out, but for every step she took, the distance grew, and she always came back to the same spot. 

No way out…no way out…!

Loneliness and grief overwhelmed her, and she fell to her knees, burying her tear-streaked face in her freezing cold hands, sobbing anew with fresh, hot tears that stung her skin like a thousand burning needles.  She cried for the past, and for the present, and for the future that now loomed before her.  She cried for her prince, and she cried for herself.  She cried for a world that would one day be without fairy tales.  She cried for him.  "Skye!"

The howling darkness wrapped around her then, choking her – she could not breathe, it was crushing her, it was so close: so hot, oh help!—

Cold.

Waves crashing; gulls crying.  Wind blowing.  She was cold – so cold.  Where am I?  So cold – so silent, so alone.

So alone.

"Erik…"

And then, with the choking sob of a terrified, grief-stricken seventeen-year-old girl who had just seen her one and greatest love mortally injured before her eyes, Clarice jerked back into consciousness and opened her eyes, gasping in the air and staring then at the surface that she had been lying upon. 

It was a dingy, gray stone floor, and it was very cold.

The air that she now had in her lungs was dank and stale, and smelled faintly of sea-brine and damp hay, and stagnant water.  The smell of a prison…

And she tore her eyes from the stony floor, looking up with a painful gasp at her surroundings.  Four stone walls were all around her, and in one of them was a thick wooden door, bolted and bound with dull iron.  In another – the wall that was opposite the one with the door – was a huge, open window with sharp, spiky steel making up its frame.  In the corner behind her was a pile of wet, graying straw, a wooden bucket of some sort sitting next to it. 

But Clarice only briefly noticed this.  Her mind was on that window.

Compelling her muscles to harness their own strengths, she forced herself to stand although bruises innumerable, all about her body, cried out in protest at her movement.  She ignored this – she had to see out that window.  She made it three steps across the room before her knees buckled, causing her to stumble as her surroundings spun about her.  Blindly putting one hand out, she sought the wall's support and leaned against it, closing her eyes and willing for the pain in her head to go away.  She was trying to remember what had happened.

It came back to her in a rush.

A horrible picture of menacing hooded men swarming all around her, cruel, rough hands tearing at her arms, imprisoning her and cutting off all escape that she might have, the Marquis de Mercier's gloating, arrogant face, a dagger gleaming silver and cold in the early morning sun, stabbing her love—

Erik!

From then on, the picture was less clear.  She had been borne away from the side of the one she loved, leaving him wounded and in pain in the middle of the dusty, deserted road just outside the French city of Troyes – blood streaming, staining white silk…  Struggling vainly against her guard, a barking command to halt, the Marquis's cold gray eyes glaring into hers, promising vengeance for the trouble she had caused, then pain, as a hand clamped onto her face, and an awful, bitter explosion of burning revulsion as some incredibly foul liquid was forced into her mouth, poured down her throat, then total, sweet oblivion.

Until the nightmares came.

In them, she saw her love murdered again and again – sometimes, she was Clarice, and her beloved was Erik, and their destroyer was the Marquis de Mercier, who stabbed him in the stomach and then turned away, laughing coldly and triumphantly as his helpless prey fell slowly to his knees, doubled over against the pain.  Sometimes she was the Elven Princess, watching as her Prince Skye was surrounded and tortured cruelly by huge, leering goblins.  But in each of those worlds, she left those visions with the same knowledge – and that was that she and her love had been forever severed from one another, and darkness had fallen.

She went to the window.  She looked out.

There was the sea – gray-green and turbulent, waves tossing a spray of churning white foam up into the wind, which howled around the corners of the great, stony ruins of the fortress that stretched out in either direction of the window's view.  Below her was a sheer drop from the window down to the sea, spanning a distance of hundreds of feet.  The very height of her perch caused Clarice to be dizzy again, and she fell against the wall on one side of the window, taking her eyes from the terrible, awe-inspiring sight.  Where had they taken her?

She was here…alone…and he was not with her. 

He never would be again.

Burying her face in her hands again, she placed her back against the wall and slowly slid down to the ground, collapsing in a heap of torn, listless gray rags that had once been a fine silk gown.  Her hair had long come loose from its sleek knot at the nape of her neck, which had been 'just the size of my two fists!', Erik had once laughingly commented upon seeing her the morning that they had left Paris together, alone but for their carriage driver and footmen.  Now, it streamed tangled, dirty, and limp in clumps and strands around her shoulders and face, a stark inky darkness against the incredible pallor of her ghostly face, out of which looked a pair of large, hopeless green eyes with sunken rings of tiredness, grief, and despondency around them.

She wept again.

Her tears had not spent themselves – no, they had only abated themselves for a short while, until something caused them to flow again as she sat alone in her stony prison – when there was a sound of hollow, determined click of footsteps coming down the stone floor outside of her cell, and then the noise of keys jangling, and the door's lock turning, swinging it open.

"So, the little captive's awakened, I see!" called out a familiar, loathsome voice dripping with arrogance and exultation, leering at her and refusing to allow her escape it.

Clarice did not move.  She did not look up.

There was movement in the doorway; the figure that stood there had shifted position and now came forward, a pair of water-sodden leather boots coming into her line of vision as she glared coldly at the floor, still obstinately refusing to lift her head. 

A pause.

"Well, I can see that your past few days of confinement haven't served to sweeten that sour little temper of yours, lovely," the Marquis commented in mocking disapproval; he was silent a moment, considering, and then he abruptly reached forward and once more grabbed her chin on one hand, forcing her to look up at him, into his cruel gray eyes.  Clarice's own eyes flashed sparks of emerald fire at him, smoldering with her silent, festering rage, and he laughed deep in his throat, seeming satisfied at her anger. 

"You really did hold him quite dear in your little maiden heart, didn't you?" he taunted her, maliciously. "He was the earth and sky to you, wasn't he?  Having him was both this life and eternity for you.  You would have walked from here to the ends of the earth for him, only to see him be mowed down like the pathetic, insignificant field pest that he was – and now your heart has been broken, never to be mended."

His mocking words bored into her head, becoming a rattling, whirling commotion within her brain, growing hot and loud.  Earth and sky – having him was life and eternity – you would have walked from here to the ends of the earth – for him – pathetic – insignificant – he was—!

And then, knowing full well what she was doing, she lunged out of her crumpled position beside the wall and flew at him, eyes burning like those of a ghoul and nails bared, seeking to scratch the very eyes out of his face.

"You…monster!"

Armand was unprepared for her assault, and so he was momentarily taken off guard by her assault; however, he was taller and stronger than her, though not nearly so tall or strong as some other men, but even at that, it was enough for him to very quickly overpower her, grabbing both of her slender wrists in his hands, and throw her roughly off of him, and onto the stone floor.  He continued to hold her down, even as she fought like a cat: biting and writhing and scratching and kicking, which gave him quite a bit of trouble, angering him all the more.  He pulled back one arm, briefly releasing her arm, and, swiping it down through the air—

Thwack.

Clarice lay silent.

Gray eyes burning with rage and humiliation – for never had he been so effectively impeded in his will by anyone, and a seventeen-year-old girl at that! – he placed his hand back on her wrist, kneeling on the floor and pinning her there. 

Through the blur of grief and anger that threatened to overwhelm her vision, Clarice noticed that this Marquis looked very much different from the one that she had last seen.  His face was drawn and pale, and there were dark rings under his eyes as well, making his features seem haggard.  His normally sleek, impeccable low ponytail of dark brown hair had somehow come undone, and now his hair hung in sweaty, disgusting strands about his face.  Even his clothing seemed somehow altered – no longer was it fine and without a crease or stain to mar it; no, now it was torn and dirty, as wrinkled and limp as her own. 

What on earth was this supposed to mean?

Before she could think any more on that, her enemy's voice broke into her consciousness.  Snarling at her, his rank breath spilling onto her face and causing her to want to turn away and gag, he said, "Now that was out of line, my pretty little captive!  If I were you and I wished to live, I would not act in such an unseemly manner again!"

"And what if I don't want to live?" she hissed back at him, with effort.

Armand's gray eyes gleamed coldly – heartlessly, and his lips twisted into a fiendish, inhuman smile that was almost more of a leer than anything else.

"You don't want to live?  Surprising words for a well-bred and well-brought-up young lady of the court!  Well, milady, that may be arranged for you – but only after we have finished our business with you.  For, you see, all of his talk about that jewel was mostly true: there is a jewel, and I intend to find it.  But there never was any ancient feud between to rival families – oh yes, he told you that, didn't he?  What a delicious lie for the man who told you that he cared for you more than anything else, the same man whom you love with an utter, undying devotion, a passion!  No, there never was any feud, and he wanted that jewel for quite a different reason…for the same reason that he wanted you!"

Leaving her stunned with those words, he released her and stood, slowly backing away until he had reached the doorway.  There, he turned and gestured to a large, shadowy, hulking figure that awaited his command in the corridor just outside.  Clarice's eyes widened as that figured approached her: it wasn't anything about the form itself that caused her so much fright, but what it bore in its hands.  All thought of what the Marquis had just told her flew away.

She began to scramble away on her hands and knees, until her back came to meet the wall, her fingers scrabbling like that of a madwoman, trying to somehow rend stone from stone and make for herself an escape.  But there was no escape.  She was trapped.

Still, the figure came towards her.

And from the door, the laughing voice of the Marquis.

"So here we are, Mlle. Boisvert – he is safely out of the way, once and for all, and we have you here, to do as we wish with you until you either cooperate with us, or choose the alternate route of your only other option…although I do not think that suicide will be an easy way to death for you, in this place!"

His laughter welled up in her mind and she closed her eyes, ceasing to struggle as the shadowy figure knelt before her and brought forth its one weapon: a clear glass vial full of a shimmering green liquid that seemed to glow in the dimness of the cell.  Clarice felt the cold, numb bliss of shock set in, washing in waves over her consciousness, and waited for the total blackness of oblivion to claim her once more, but it did not come.  Instead, there was a prick of white-hot pain on the inside of her elbow, and then that pain grew and climbed up her arm, through her veins like so much devouring, heedless fire—

And all she could do was lie helpless as that laughter surrounded her, deafening her with its volume and inescapability, and scream.

I know you're out there – wherever you are, come and HELP ME!

*                       *                       *

It was cold.  Cold, and silent, and empty.

He had failed – failed what?  He had been on a quest of some sort; he had made a vow – a vow to do what though?  He couldn't remember.  It was all to foggy – there was too much pain, too much exhaustion and pain and bitter grief for him to think, to remember…what was it? What was it?

'Do not fear…yours is not a destiny to always be alone…'

The shimmering, androgynous voice called to him out of the void of unconsciousness, and life coursed through his veins once more; no, perhaps not life, but an awareness of reality, consciousness itself.  And suddenly he remembered.

His eyes flying open, he jerked back into the tangible world.

Armand had said he had failed, but that was not true.  It could not be true – not while life yet remained in him.  Injured, he was, perhaps: but he had been injured before, and gravely, at that, and he had lived.  He had lived, and it had not been the end then.

It was not the end now.

That dagger, however…

Well, it would be painful, but something had to be done about the hunk of metal that jutted out of his stomach, stabbed into his body at a point in the exact middle of his torso, just below where his ribcage ended and his diaphragm began.  He sat up, trying to be careful and slow about the whole ordeal, but a fresh gush of thick, warm blood came anyway as soon as he had lifted himself off of the ground.  He gritted his teeth, tensing throughout his body.

This was really going to hurt.

Birds roosting in the nearby trees were startled into flight by the ragged, inhuman cry of agony that suddenly tore through the forest, and he slumped back onto the ground, pressing his sweat-streaked face into the dew-soaked grass and moaning with pain.  So, was this how destiny was going to find him – lying face-down in the middle of nowhere, defeated as any lowly, base army of rebellious peasants who had attempted to make battle against a fully-armored cavalry, arrayed in steel and trained in the art of war? 

Let it never be!

The silver dagger dropped to the ground, there to be forever forgotten.  With trembling, unsteady hands, he tore a long strip of cloth from his cloak and cautiously, gently tied it around the gaping slash of a wound in his torso, hoping that it would staunch the flow of blood enough to keep him from losing so much of it that he would be rendered unconscious again. 

He had a mission to complete now, and he would not accept defeat. 

Standing on his feet once again, he looked to the northeast: the direction that his attackers and his beloved had gone in when he had last seen them.  A dark, thick layer of churning, tumultuous clouds had begun to well there, in the sky above the treetops.  Already, a cold, thin wind was beginning to tear at the forest, whistling towards and around him. 

A storm was coming.

He was resolute, determined.

Princess, I'm coming.

Suddenly, a queer, buzzing tingle went through his head, momentarily dulling his senses, and he reeled on his feet for a moment.  But not for an instant after it had passed did he think that it had come from his wound; instead, he lifted one hand and put it to his ear, his fingertips cautiously, delicately, going to touch the suddenly feverish skin of that particular body part.

A convulsive shudder of dawning knowledge passed through him.

Oh no.

It's begun.

*                       *                       *

A/N:  Something odd is stirring in the air – something very strange is happening wherever Clarice is right now, and somehow, Erik knows it.  How is this possible?  What can all these bizarre occurrences mean?  What on earth does the Marquis want Clarice for?  And how will Erik ever reach her in time – if that's even possible, bar by the aid of magic, which doesn't seem all that likely…  Wish to find out?  Read on!

(Oh, and if you r&r, it won't be such an awful thing… *Orlando and Arin give their most charming, swoon worthy grins*)