Title: Snake Singer

Authors Notes: Thank you so much to TallemeraRane who helped with the editing of this chapter.

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

The doors to the throne room loomed up before us like high statues, the doors themselves warning us of our fate on the other side. Zane still had his hand closely interlocked with mine, an action that was delicate and childlike even though it held so much more meaning for the both of us.

Neither of us wanted to be there - both preferring to have still been upstairs holding each other, to sleep within the shield of the others presence and wake up in the safety of the daylight.

Zane and I didn't have to speak, or look at each other to know that we were both afraid.

Zane squeezed my hand tighter as he raised his leg up and in one brutal kick knocked the door to the throne room open. I held my breath, expecting to see hoards of guards all loyal to Vasili. I expected to see hundreds of the best Avian soldiers ready to take us over, send Zane back to the Underground Municipality and me back to the arms of my captor who held me with such force that I knew his hold would one day stifle me.

I swallowed hard, expecting everything but what really stood in front of me. Vasili, alone, hunched while sitting on the throne that in my life I had seen many men sit upon. His hand covering most of his face as it leaned against the side armrest. Through my vision I searched the remaining room quickly, making sure that no guard or soldier stood lurking somewhere. I saw nothing.

"Vasili!" Zane called out. With Zane's voice Vasili moved, yet he still hadn't looked up. With the unexpected tone interrupting his thoughts, he raised his head to us. His eyes were bottomlessly alone, and they held me in a deep gaze of longing and sympathy. "Vasili!" Zane yelled again, drawing Vasili's gaze away from me.

"I knew you would come!" he said, but then reverted to his affirmative silence once more. Vasili still sat hunched but he looked away from Zane and back to me.

In my mind I saw again the face of the young boy that I had been introduced to while we both still could be considered to be in infancy. His eyes ever longing even then, longing for something that he didn't have and something that he knew I possessed. The ability to love! Vasili had never loved anything, though he had been given love in quantity by several people. Vasili wants me because I, unlike him, allow myself to feel, even under the fear that by giving myself up to my feelings I might be hurt. A river of understanding flowed over me, and I now recognized all of the times that he cared for me, or looked after me it was because he knew that I loved him, he knew that with that union I would bestow that freedom upon him.

Limitlessly.

Everlasting.

This man, who once stood before me and promised me that he would always be beside me and would never leave me alone to this world. He once promised me peace: "At whatever cost to me I will bring you the stillness in life that you so desire!" He was once so much like Zane, and I believe that he truly meant it, and means it still. He loves me for the fact that I could love him. His torch of feeling fumes with the hope that one day, after many days of given love that he to will feel something.

I recognized this man who stood before me now, not as the boy from long ago, or the troubled man who followed me mercilessly now. He was a creature mad with longing and coldness. A creature un-whole in itself; incomplete. As he looked at me I realized that to him I was his other piece, the missing section of his misguided soul.

"Do you remember when we were children Danica?" Vasili asked, his eyes piecing wholes into me like daggers. "And I promised you peace?"

I remembered, my mind was full of those childhood promises.

I smiled, looking deep into his eyes in return, my voice even as I said: "It was never meant to be Vasili. I will never fill that emptiness within you."

His mouth stiffened, and a frown furrowed his face. "You are mine; it was predetermined, decided by destiny and fate together. We are meant to rule here and bring peace to this land. We are meant to live forever as heros."

"No!" Zane said, letting go of my hand and stepping forward, his body now in front of me, so that no matter how much he wanted Vasili could not look at me, only Zane was in his line of sight. "Danica belongs to no one, it is her choice, and she chose me." My vision was unevenly placed, and I tried to keep one eye on Zane and the other on Vasili, trying to calculate each man's next move and anticipate the danger before it was to late.

Vasili stood from his hunched position, his form statuesque as he became tall and firm before us. With the reach of his hand he pulled form the halter at his waste a sword, much the same as the ones that Zane and I carried. Vasili's sword though, was a battle sword, a clean blade with very little decoration, just cool gray metal slicing out of its holder and prepared to lash out at Zane.

I watched as Vasili and Zane approached each other, their figures tight and narrow as they assumed their combat positions, both with swords vertical and ready to strike at the slightest move. I held my breath as I heard the sound of metal clashing and the fight begin...

Vasili moved first, slicing his blade toward Zane at the hip area, but Zane quickly countered by moving his own sword down and shielding his skin from the deadly weapon. Moment's latter Zane lifted his sword and slashed it toward Vasili's scull and attempted to kill him in one deadly blow. But one inch away from his skin, Zane was stopped. "She'll never be happy with you!" Vasili spoke inbetween breaths, taunting Zane into a deadly verbal fight to counter their physical brawl. "You'll never be able to keep her safe; there will always be someone else to threaten her. If not me, another will come!"

Zane seemed as though he was not listening, but as the fight continued and both of them began to move in a circler motion I saw that Zane's face was tightening as Vasili's harsh word coursed through him. Again, I heard metal slice at each other, and further danger was brought to both men. "Never!" Vasili spoke up again, his voice shaky from the exhaustion of keeping up the fight. "Never will she be satisfied with this life. No Avian can be complete with a Serpiente, which is why it has never happened before. You will plague her with your presence until she is no longer able to be herself, let alone a woman in love with you!"

I knew that Zane was trying to block out Vasili's words, desperate for the silent honor in a fight that he would have preferred.

The fights continued, swords swinging, combat ensuing. Zane sliced the tip of his blade across Vasili's face and formed a large gash across his cheek, which blood quickly gushed from. To counter from the wound that he was now suffering, Vasili moved his sword furiously, and before Zane could react, he sliced open one of his shoulder blades. From my standing position still by the doorway I could see a line of blood gush out from his skin and land harshly on the hard floor a few feet away.

I gasped; please let this fight end!

I knew that Zane was deeply wounded by the infliction that Vasili had caused him. It was more emotionally then physically and I saw his eyes flare with anger. I saw the fire within the deep dark holes of blackness in his eyes, and I could see Vasili fueling that fire to burn ever brighter.

With the slash of his sword over his head, Zane came down on Vasili with no mercy. I could hear the tare of skin as Zane's blade carved a 'C' shape against Vasili's abdomen. Vasili lost his balance from the force of the blow and was left face up on the ground, his hand clutching to the torn material of his shirt to try to stop the bleeding. With in a matter of minutes his white shirt had been almost completely stained red.

When on the floor Vasili knew that he was beaten, and didn't bother to continue fighting. He let his warrior's sword fall from his bloody fingers. Zane held my father's sword to his neck, as if waiting for the right second to plunge the blade into the thick flesh of his collar. "Go on," Vasili said, "do it. I want you to!" Zane positioned his blade, in one fatal swoop he could kill Vasili and we both would be free. Zane raised the blade up high and began to move it down toward him...