Title: Snake Singer

Disclaimer: Characters belong to Amelia Atwater-Rhodes, but the plot belongs to me.

Oxygen clogged my throat as the sound of the woman's voice rang through my ears. My eyes were covered but in my mind I could map out the woman's features. From her long stretched boots to her leather and fur skinned clothing. I knew that it was Adelina...

My bones and my muscle stiffened, I was afraid to move, with Adelina standing over me. "My pretty little Naga, look where fate has found you!" I heard her say, suddenly feeling warm fingers stretched out across my face. I felt her flesh trace the long gash across my skin and I could feel blood start to pour from the open wound. Her fingers went slowly down my cheek and then faster as she traced the bleeding wound down my neck and upper body.

I could feel tears swell up deep behind my eyes but I refused to cry.

Adelina's grip over me grew firmer and I found myself holding back cries of agony from her fingers pushing into my open skin. "Pretty little Naga!" She spoke, finely releasing me from her grip, and I found that I could breath once again. "I hear from my trackers that you were extremely easy to spot and capture." I wanted to speak, I wanted to tell her how much I hated her, and that Zane and Rei would find me any moment and kill her for doing this to me; but I held my tongue. "Incase your wondering, I sent a squad back to the caves where we found you." A lump caught inside my throat, what if she had captured Zane and the others, what if they were all dead. "Don't worry though, they abandoned the site and we found no trace of them there." I let out a sigh of relief, one loud enough for Adelina to hear, but I didn't care, Zane was all right, and I knew in my heart that he was on the way to find me.

"Speak, my little weakling, tell me what you have to say for yourself!" I could feel her hot breath smoldering across my skin, so I knew that she was close, but still I refused to speak. "Well then" she barked matter-of-factly as if I were an old toy that she had forgotten how to play with. I heard the commanding click of her boot heals as they strut across the unevenly hard surface of the ground. I had no idea is she had walked far away from me or if she was just pacing in front of me, but I twisted my face and followed the sound that her boots made; trying to know where she was at all times.

"Where to start?" She began, her boots still clicking against the ground, which made me come to the conclusion that she was pacing in front of me. I could feel a smile twist across her face. "I'm sure that you had forgotten all about me, my precious little Danica!" Her voice took on a motherly tone as the clicking of her heels stopped and I felt a hand stroke my cheek. Her fingers running delicately down the other side of my face, as though she suddenly cared very deeply for me, but her voice quickly turned violent again. "As I was saying; I'm sure that you hade forgotten all about me the day after you got Zane into your arms. He didn't kill me though." The clicking of her boots began again.

"Death was to good for me I suppose. Zane knew..." She stopped, as though the rest of the story were too painful for her to continue with. I found myself deeply intrigued though, honestly I hadn't really given a second thought to what had happened with Adelina. I had always assumed, that being that she had helped to murder the queen of the serpiente people that death would be her punishment. Zane had never spoken of her after she was captured, and I had always thought that it was only because it was too painful to him, because he had once been such good friends with her, and in a way loved her.

"Zane knew..." Her voice cracked slightly, as though her throat were clogged with tears. "Zane knew that I would except death, that I would not seek asylum or sanctuary with the other tribes of shape shifters. He knew that I would not question my punishment, so he let me live. I suppose you could call it living" she continued. "The Underground Municipality!" I had heard of it, though in truth I had never set foot in that place. It was only where the people who had done the most unthinkable crimes were taken. Avian and serpiente alike were imprisoned underground inside a municipality and were never to be set free again. Prisoners were often left to there own devices, and many turned to cannibalism to feed themselves. Many had tried to escape that dreaded place; they had tried to claw there way out through the dirt but the soil had been ridden with a deadly poison, that my own people were too afraid to use because it was so deadly.

"Prisoners barely last three months inside that place, but I held on. To live a year in that place is unprecedented and I did it." Her voice grew louder, and now she was screaming. "It was nothing to form an army, by then avian and serpiente alike banded together with a single goal. Freedom; and we got our freedom Danica, it took so long to get out, but we did it, and now we have another goal. Do you know what that goal is Danica?" She paused, as though waiting for me to answer but like before I said nothing. "All right then; our goal is to overthrow your peaceful little kingdom and kill Zane."

Anger swelled inside of me and as though I were a bomb ready to go off I screamed: "Never!" The second syllable of my word was barely out of my mouth when I felt her hand slap me. A blow so strong that it flung my head against the side of the wall. The wound on the side of my face had been hit again, and I could feel more blood pour from it again. The pain was so intense that I couldn't help but scream out in agony.

"Danica, Danica, Danica!" She spoke, her voice taking on the tone of a child; I could barely hear her over the sound of my sobs. "Don't be sad" she said, stroking my face again. "I will kill Zane, but you will follow him soon after."

"No!" I screamed again, over and over until my voice gave out. The room around me went silent, and I longed to be able to see what was going on. Every bone in my bony was screaming in tense pain, and I let my back give out, and I fell sideways onto the sharp ground. My hands and feet still bound, but I had no strength to get back up. I didn't want to live without Zane, and I never would. I tried to stop my weeping, trying to hear what was going on.

"Silence her!" I heard Adelina command, though to whom I knew not. "I'm going to find Zane, make sure that she can't make a sound."

I let out another scream, pleading with her to take me instead of Zane, that my death would cause more pain to him then his own death but I heard no more from her.

I waited, not knowing what she meant by silencing me, or what would happen. I tried to be still and quiet, and sense what was going on around me. I continued to wait...

Finely I felt a sharp leather boot slam its heel into my stomach. The pain sent sharp surges up my body and magnified the pain that I was already feeling from the attack earlier that day. Another Kick came into my side, and another, so many that I lost count. From my mouth I could taste the sour poison of blood as it dripped from my throat and onto the ground where my head rested on. I knew that in that second I was dying...