Unwanted

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Deltora Quest characters.  However, I do own Dakota, a character I have chosen to throw in.  My best friend, Stephanie, owns Dakota's boyfriend and best friend, the mimic, Lillend. (I don't think I will be putting Lillend in this, however, I probably will have Dakota in this)

Summary: This story is pretty much a story about romance between L/J (Lief and Jasmine).  It will also have quite a bit of romance between Ranesh and Marilen.  Anyhow, I hope you all enjoy this fanfic… although, I'm not sure how often I'll update it but I might update it once or more times than that a day, depending on my end-of-the-year homework and such from school.  Over summer you'll probably receive several more fanfics on Deltora Quest from me.

WARNING: If you people don't like very fluffy/romantic moments between characters, skip the part about Ranesh and Marilen at the end of this chapter.

Chapter IV

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Jasmine helped Lief lay down, while Barda started a fire.  It was dark out, and cold.  Jasmine draped her blanket along with Lief's and Barda's over Lief, because Lief was shivering from both the cold outside and something else.  Barda and Jasmine huddled close to the fire, and to each other, to keep warm, and had Lief lying by their feet.

Jasmine was supposed to be keeping watch, Barda and Lief were both asleep, and Jasmine began to fall asleep, but tried hard to stay awake, without succeeding.

After a couple of hours, Lief woke.  He was feeling quite dizzy.  He took his empty water flask and moved to the river's edge to refill it.  He knelt by the water, dipping the flask into the cool river, when suddenly, something lunged out of the sand at him. 

He just barely stumbled back, falling, landing dangerously close to the fire.  It was like a giant eel, with pinchers protruding from the top of its head, and on the base of the four pectoral fins it had.  It had a short and stubby dorsal fin, and a long, lashing tail.  Lining its long, slim body were a series of different glowing spots.

The head of the creature was large, with two glowing spots behind each small eye, and large, sharp teeth, and a tongue that had three claws on it.  The eel-like creature extended its tongue, trying to spear Lief with it.  He got Lief in the arm, and was pulling him towards the gaping mouth.  Jasmine and Barda had woke, and Jasmine used her dagger, and stabbed it into the spot between the creature's eyes.  Barda sliced the tongue of the creature, and pulled Lief away.

Jasmine moved away from the thrashing and bleeding creature.  She moved swiftly to Lief and Barda, as the creature slowly died.  She knelt down by Lief, and pried the claws of the tongue out of Lief's arm gently, tossing that part of the tongue aside.

"Lief, take off your shirt," Barda and Jasmine ordered.  Lief did so.  His sleeves were too tight to roll up, so he had to take it off for Jasmine to wrap up the wound in his arm that the creature had made.  The trio also noticed something else.  The pain that Lief had felt in his upper body had resulted in a bruise, of nearly his entire chest, and back on him.  For a while the group just stared.

As the night went on, a thick fog began to form.  The group was huddling close together, Lief still without his shirt.  Jasmine was between the two boys, they had insisted upon putting her there, even if Lief needed the warmth most.

Jasmine was asleep, leaning on Barda, because that way she would not hurt Lief.  Barda was awake and sitting up.  Lief was leaning against Jasmine for support, but was wide-awake.  He and Barda were silent.  The eerie silhouette of the dead eel fish could be seen through the fog, still a slight gleam in the eyes of it.  Lief was quite shaken after that attack, but was calming down.

The hours ticked by, slowly, but surely.  The trio remained where they were until dawn.  A faint red glow of the sun could be seen on the eastern horizon through the thick fog which still lay across the land.

The group decided to move on anyways, and did so, making sure to stay close together, in case they were attacked or Lief collapsed again.

They moved silently and carefully through the fog, walking blindly forwards.  This was probably part of the reason that the messengers didn't make it, or it at least slowed them down.  The eerily thick fog was very hard to travel through.

Jasmine was starting to fall behind, but struggled ahead as a downpour began.  Lief slowed considerably, and nearly could not see his companions ahead of him through the rain and the fog.  He reached forward with both hands.  "Barda?  Jasmine?" he called, hoping they were there.  Jasmine grabbed one of his hands, while Barda took the other, reassuring Lief they were still there.

None of them let go of each other, not wanting to lose one another.

~*~*~

Ranesh sat in the library, watching Joseph bustle around the library.  Ranesh was bored out of his mind as he watched, head in his hands, elbows resting on one of the library tables, he yawned.  Joseph scrambled off behind some other bookshelves, and Ranesh just stay put.  The library doors opened silently, and quietly Marilen entered the library with Sharn.  Sharn moved off to find Joseph, while Marilen moved to Ranesh, now standing behind him.  He knew she was there but he did not turn around.

Marilen leaned down, arms slipping around Ranesh's shoulders; she put her head against the back of his shoulder.  Ranesh let her, taking his hands and moving them to hold Marilen's hands.

Marilen kissed the back of his shoulder gently, and Ranesh simply let her.  Ranesh brought one of Marilen's hands to his lips and kissed her knuckles gently, looking in the direction of Sharn and Joseph, even if they were hidden by the bookshelf.  Marilen smiled when he did, she nuzzled the back of Ranesh's neck gently, stroking his chest with one of her hands, letting him kiss the other one.

"I'd suggest if you're going to be this affectionate Marilen that we move to a different room," Ranesh said.  "I do not wish for Joseph to shoo us off because of it."

"Good idea," Marilen said.  "Come on, let's go to my room," she released him, and moved off out of the library. 

Ranesh stood to follow, and until then he had not realized just how much he had enjoyed her affection, since he nearly fell over when he stood, still quite happy because of the affection she had shown.  He regained his balance as best he could and followed after Marilen swiftly.

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Wow, took me quite a while to make-up that chapter.  Ah well, here I go off to write the next.