Sequel Part 1

Freedom

1. The right to do or say what you want without anyone stopping you.

2. The state of being able to do what you want, without anything stopping you.

3. The state of not being a prisoner or slave.

I stood in the middle of the town square and admired the capital that I had grown up in. Not much had changed, in my absence of three years. The rows of houses still stood neat and quaint, with gleaming bronze knockers and shiny terracotta tiles for the roof. Children scampered around playing in the streets, some barefooted even, giving of the air of blissful innocence that could be perceived only with kids. The street vendors peddled their wares in small stores alongside the roads, some with shops, some just little pushcarts.

People were staring at me with opened-mouth astonishment. Wait, they were staring in my direction with bewilderment, not at me.

Well, that was some relief. And some much-appreciated change.

I looked around and found him prostrated on the cobbled floor, crawling after a young woman who had a similar hair colour and hairdo as I did.

"Please….please…I'm begging you…" he pleaded, moving like an insect across the floor after the shocked and completely confounded young woman.

I sighed heavily. When one's eyes are on the ground, one usually cannot distinguish people from people. "Emm…Darius? I'm here."

Darius, on hearing my voice, lifted his head and looked around wildly. When he spied me, he hurriedly came over, knees scrapping against the ground. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a several large gold coins, which he dumped before a flower seller. Arming himself with a large bouquet of vibrant red roses, he fumbled in his pocket until he took out a small box.

Oh no…I groaned inwardly. Not again…and in the middle of the capital's town square with so many people to gawk at my embarrassment as well!

He seemed to have completely missed the look of horror and awkwardness on my face. He went down heavily on one knee with a loud 'thump'. He opened the velvet box and smiled hopefully. "Larissa, the Crimson Flash, will you, for the 104th time, be my wife?" He asked.

This was one of those moments when you wished either the sky would collapse and cover you, or the ground would open up and swallow you, or you could just vaporize into thin air like alcohol, disappear like someone just cast a very successful warp spell and melt into a puddle of liquid so that no one can see your face.

Just for the record, I changed my name to Larissa. Crimson Flash was the title others gave me. Because I, apparently, moved so fast when battling that I only resemble a flash of red light, everyone gave me the name of Crimson Flash. Impressive? Not really. Considering that in the zenith of his career my father was known as THE Assassin, mine could be considered pathetic.

I could almost imagine Father's scornful face if he ever heard about my title. "Ha!" He would say haughtily. "You call that a title? That's pitiful! Go and train more, girl, until you can hold a candle to my name!"

And thus I still trained at all the major arenas, continually trying to improve myself. And there was where I met Darius, only son and sole heir of some wealthy merchant who supplied seafood to the nobility and the royal family using his middleman status between fishermen and consumers. In short, he was rich.

It started out pretty okay for the both of us. We sparred, and I won, but he wasn't too bad with a sword either, only his strokes were a little on the sloppy side and thus they were easy to deflect. He cried foul (probably a habit cultivated from the spoiling by his parents) and we sparred again. Again, I won, and again, he nullified the result by informing me that I cheated somewhere (although he couldn't identity where) and we sparred again. And the routine went on for ten times a day, for an entire week.

If it had not been for the fact that he paid me a red gem (or a blue gem when he felt generous) per match, I would have snickered at his spoilt attitude and left. But it was good money, just when I needed it too, and thus I put up with him and his funny attitudes.

After a week of intense fighting (that described his point of view, I felt completely relaxed as I deflected stroke after stroke), he admitted defeat and proclaimed his utmost admiration for me and requested me to be his tutor.

Obviously, having just escaped from the clutches of wealthy and powerful people, I valued my freedom over money and declined.

He was persistent. After five rejections, he decided that my personality fit the girl of his dreams and decided to propose.

We scarcely knew each other and before I could stop him he was down on one knee with a diamond ring he got from who-knows-where.

After I rejected him again and again he started following me around, trotting all the way from where I met him around Jehanna, giving me heart attacks by dropping to the floor and proposing at the least appropriate places.

He once tried proposing in the middle of the arena, in the middle of a fight that I was having with this warrior with beefy muscles and a gigantic axe, and he refused to get up out of harm's way until I accepted his proposal. I had a nightmare that day trying to defend both of us from one lumbering warrior, whose axe looked like the kind used to slaughter wyverns.

I digressed. Blinking, I looked down at the man looking up hopefully at me, his face shining in awe and wonderment as though I was one of the saint's personal seraphs from heaven, which I was not, by the way.

"Okay," I sighed. "When would you ever stop following me and proposing to me?"

He cocked his head like a puppy and thought for a moment, face scrunched up in concentration. "When you get married to someone else…" he said slowly at last. "But you won't right? You'll marry me right? Me and only me right?"

He was not helping. My last marriage had been a disaster at best and complete apocalypse at worst. I had no wish, no wish at all, to bind myself down with marriage vows ever again in my entire life.

I stared at the ring. It was a simple band of gold, with a HUGE diamond. I had never seen such a large diamond and I had no idea where he sourced all his jewellery pieces but one thing was for certain. From the time of his first proposal till now, his diamonds had at least doubled in size. Tripled, in fact. The latest one in his hand was around the size of the fingernail of my pinky finger.

"Could you stand up?" I hissed desperately. "People are staring at us." In fact, staring was an understatement. They were openly gaping at the drama that was unfolding in front of them, looking as though they were in a theatre watching a blockbuster play.

"I won't stand until you acquiesce to my demands!" he declared in a grand voice so that everyone could hear him.

I groaned. Well if that was the case, he could suit himself. I still had a lot to do, some of which included visiting Saleh and getting a new bunch of elixirs, and perhaps two new daggers, if my finances permitted. I walked up to the astonished flower seller, who was still staring with a stony expression at the five gold coins.

The old woman probably had never seen so much money in her life, heck.

Slightly embarrassed, I picked a bunch of chrysanthemums (it was spring, and there were golden chrysanthemums, and don't ask me how they did it; probably magic) and handed her several silver coins. "Will these do?"

The old woman stared straight at me, and nodded with the same stony expression on her face.

"Darius…" I hissed as I walked away with the chrysanthemums in hand. "You're starting to scare people. Can you not-"

"Announcement! Announcement!" A pompous old man astride an old stallion shouted in a wheezy voice, waving the parchment with the royal seal in his hand. "Excuse me…"

I stepped aside hurriedly. I had no intention to burst my spleen or puncture my kidney because I was run over by an ancient horse.

"Ahem!" The old announcer cleared his throat. "Our esteemed Queen Ismaire has ordered a royal masquerade ball to be held at the Royal Jehannan Palace next Monday at seven o'clock in the evening so that the esteemed Prince Joshua may choose a bride. All eligible young ladies, regardless of nationality, are welcomed to attend." He rolled up the scroll again and tucked in into his sleeve, riding away on the old stallion.

Instantly, there were excited chatters.

Joshua still hadn't gotten himself a wife? I was vaguely amused. Given his personality, I would have expected him to have married at least thrice after I left. Ahh…but he was indeed almost full of surprises. Perhaps Natasha was still rejecting him? It was certainly possible.

"Do you intend to go, Larissa, light of my life and jewel of my palm?" Darius inched towards me hopefully, finally standing.

I frowned at his inappropriate terms of endearment and affection. "Probably not." As much as I wanted to see him again, I could not risk seeing him without suffering heartache for the rest of my life.

"Why?" Darius whined, screeching like a raven. "You should go! You're pretty and famous! No, you're beautiful and a celebrity! You need to go! You'll light up the entire ballroom. I can assure you if you go, Jehanna will not need to light any candles that night. Your sheer radiance will overpower everyone!"

I arched an eyebrow. Okay…what a weird form of encouragement. Why did it feel as though it did the exact opposite of what it was supposed to have achieved? "It's a masked ball; you're not supposed to see who your partner is."

"Of course," he replied in a tone as though he had remembered all along. "So are you going?"

Going? I hesitated to give a definite answer. I certainly wanted to go, just for the sake of seeing Joshua again, but at the same time I certainly did not want to go, for the sake of preserving whatever piece of heart I have left that was unbroken. And if I were recognized, it would become very awkward for all of us.

But it was a masked ball right? If I wore my hair differently, dressed myself up a little and kept my mask on to conceal my face, he would hardly be able to recognize me. After all, there were quite a lot of ladies with my hair colour, and my hair had grown longer in the three years. My skin had tanned and now I resembled a bronze statue instead of the fashionable tofu sculpture.

"So are you going?" Darius persisted like an eager puppy begging for a treat. "Are you? Are you? Are you?"

I glanced at him. For a moment, I could have sworn that he was going to grow furry and spout a little tail right before my face. "I suppose I will," I said with trepidation in my voice.

"Yay!" He leapt up. He seemed even more excited about going to the ball than I did, even though his role was strictly that of a chaperone, or an escort, whichever he preferred to act as that day. "We need to get you dresses, shoes, jewellery, fans, masks…" He began ticking off the items on an invisible checklist, counting with his fingers.

I sighed. What had I just gotten myself into?

Author's Note:

Darius is utterly adorable and lovable and spoilt. Sigh.

He's an OC, yes.

Bored.