Chapter Twenty: Slipping into Shadows
Jakk stood there, frozen with shock as Bane steadily looked at him with his eyes, amber orbs that seemed to radiate heat.
"Why are you here? To put the sword in Aki's room and blame her?" A knife flashed into his hands. "You have stolen too much from us, Skyaar...you keep the key and lute that does not belong to you, and an orb which you have filched off of another..."
"No, Bane...no. You know I didn't steal it. I found it here...Bane!" Jakk reached for his rapier, the other hand still grasping the sword.
The flick of a hand sent the knife twirling at the thief from Bane's palm, but the thief brought both rapier and sword up, producing a loud clang as metal hit metal and bounced off.
Jakk dropped the sword and ran, pushing back the mage and sprinting down the hall, down the stairs and out on the streets. He had been asleep for a long time, for it was already dark outside, and lamp posts were lit. Where were the others? No matter. He ran down the cobbled streets, seeking shelter. Safety.
Instinct told him to go into dark places, where he could not be seen. As he had done on the streets of Tranmankand, he went into a dark alley, and his memory flew back to a similar alley in the his home, and his meeting with Peach. It was there all the adventure, madness...all of it, began. Slowly, he looked down, at his chest, feeling the orb glaze heatedly at the skin.
A minion, a pawn...they are nothing to you...your home is besieged...The things that...that lady told him...he shivered.
Was he a pawn? They certainly treated him like one now, Jakk thought. But Sara...no even she was distant now. His fingers tightened the grip he held on the orb involuntarily. He reached down to touch his rapier, felt the bulging of the Lute, and the familiar shape of the Taruna Key.
He would not be a pawn for anyone, and he could not stay in the the company of those three. No...his adventure started and ended in an alley. The thief slipped into the shadows, and was swallowed by the darkness.
Four paths become one,
but their journey just begun.
Into darkness one falls,
slipping into shadows when it calls.
End of Book I