Chapter 9

Amy thought for a moment, even though her mind is telling her 'no', her heart is saying 'yes'. She knew she can't let her father, nor her people down, as much as she knew they were after her for a huge amount of Liras. She sighs and says,

"As much as my mind says no, thinking it could hurt him, I know I have to tell him. We need Scourge gone from Italia and fix it all before we fall as a great European nation."

"It must be tough, knowing that this could affect the child, but this is his birthright, that was your birthright and your fore fathers birthrights. He has every right to know that he will take our country and rule."

"I know, Shadow. Thank you. We better both tell him, like you said, he's mature for his age."

Shadow nods and they leave to see Matteo with Knuckles sleeping, only to be woken up by Julie-Su and Sally, who had just placed Lucas down for a nap.

"Guys, wake up. It's already noon and you two are asleep? I can't believe it, but Matteo and Riccio are so much alike!"

Matteo yawns and sees his mother and the knight . He felt a weird vibe when he saw his mother with the other hedgehog, it scared him. He quickly goes to his mother and hugs her with great love.

"Maman, hug me?"
"How can I not. Come here, sweetie."

Amy picks up Matteo, who was small for his age and hugs her while they nuzzle heads.

"Know that I will always love you. You're my baby."
Matteo smiles and squeezes his mother.

As she puts him back down, Sonic breaks in the door in great shock and with some good news. Amy wanted to run, but Shadow held her hand, telling her to trust him. She sees him and has changed from his look, and his accent was still British, but no longer an evil one. His eyes were filled with joy and no longer lust and Sonic no longer gave Amy that same dirty look he did back at the Vatican. He indeed was cured, but Amy needed to see it to believe it. Sonic then brings someone forward and by the look of its stature, it was a female. The figure was shaking, quivering in fear. Sonic then says, "Sally, Sally, I found Volpe!"

Amy remembered the name Volpe, but where? After a few seconds of thought, she remembers.

"F-Fiona?"

She then steps forward and replies, "R-Regina? Is that you?"

"Yes, it's me. What happened?" Amy asked as tears of fear begin to swell.

"That tyrant! H-he called one of his knights on me and h-he r-raped me. Amy, why were you even engaged to such a tyrant?" Fiona asked with fear in her voice.

"I don't know, it was arranged. That vicious monster, how dare he do this? Sonic where did you find her?" Amy asked, showing no fear to her rapist.

"I found her by the palace gates. And Amy, it's wonderful to see you again."

Amy, still in fear of Sonic, kept her distance and said, "I-I-it's great to see y-you, Sonic."

"I have a lot of explaining to do for you. I can't have you suffer the infliction I placed on you, and I need to clear my conscience for myself, my wife and my son, who you already met."

"I'll give you time. Right now, we need to find a way to take Scourge down."
"Where's Shadow, I got a message for him, From Mephiles."



Amy turns and points to Shadow, who was talking to Knuckles, and they seems as if they were catching up on the good times. Matteo then walks up to the two and all three smiled and laugh. Sonic nods and walks over to the two. As he walks towards them, Knuckles gets on the defensive, only for Shadow to poke him with his elbow and whispering, "He's clean now, he can't hurt us."

Shadow looks at Sonic and he hands the letter to him. Shadow opens it and reads what's being stated on the letter. He nods as he reads it and says, "Sonic, I need you to sneak inside the palace and see if Scourge got new recruits or if they are insufficient."

"Got it."

"Very well, go." Sonic nods, kisses his wife goodbye and rushes out the door at amazing speed. Sally smiles as she holds Lucas and turns to Amy. "Well, Amy, we have a lot of catching up to do."

"We sure do. Let's sit."

Sally nods and they sit on the floor. "How did you find Sonic?"

Sally sighs and begins, "I found him when I was imprisoned in England, due to theft and when I was on my way to prison, we stopped at the Asylum for shelter. As they took me and a couple of other prisoners up to find empty cells, I see Sonic, bound in rope and cloth. His hands tied behind his back and looked ill. We stopped for a moment and then a knight says, 'here's an empty cell for that little bugger.' That bugger, was me. The knights were talking and he said, 'good idea, let her in there.' They put me in Sonic's room and they took off the rope from his hands. I was truly scared. They then lock me up and Sonic comes up to me and looks at me like a blind man seeing the sun for the first time. He kneeled next to me and touched my cheek. He then hugs me and nuzzles me. He then kisses me, and we made love in that very cell. I read his eyes, he loved me, but was very confused, so much confusion made him lose his sanity and got him in that English Asylum. But when Sonic was marked clean, he still was imprisoned, so we escaped and when we got back to Italia, knights cornered us and that is how your friend rescued us."

"Wow…but I can't believe that Sonic was cured. What happened there?"

"Sonic was mentally unstable due to you falling for Riccio or some other hedgehog. But all he said was that you loved Riccio, yet you did not, is that true?"

Amy sighs and says, "Yes, but I never regretted the he and I got intimate. For that was how I conceived my baby. I am blessed with him. But he has no father figure in his life now."

Sally shakes her head and says, "I doubt it, look at him and Shadow, they're getting along very well. They even play around, what kid wouldn't want someone like him, and I think he likes you."

"To tell you the truth, Sally, I loved him since we were kids. We are actually childhood sweethearts, but we never admitted to each other that. "

"Wow, how cute. I wish I was you."
"Being a princess stinks. I have rules to follow and I can't be around any person without a guard. That's why Shadow is my guard most of the time. Anyone else who takes his place, they're going to have a tough time with me."

Sally laughs and says, "I am so lucky not to be you then."

"-sigh- well that's all I got to do. Besides, we need to leave today." Amy replied as he adjusted her shoulder guards and gauntlets as Sally looks out the window for Sonic's return. "You love Sonic a lot don't you?"

"He's the only one I had ever experienced true love with, ever. I never had an experience like you had with Shadow."

Amy was shocked and very surprised. "Wow, so this is like a-"



"A love-at-first sight, yes." Amy smiled at Sally and Shadow says, "Everyone, we will be leaving at the darkest hours in the night. So everyone needs to take what they can and we are headed for the Pantheon to meet up with an ally to help us."

Everyone nods and they quickly got what they owned and waited for the sun to fall. As the sun had set, the warrior and the knight called Matteo to tell him his future after this fight. They call him and he obediently listens to his mother and follows them to the room where they were. Amy sighs and Shadow places his hand on her shoulder, calming her down. She begins saying, "Matteo, we have something to tell you. But you need to know…-sigh- you are the future of this country. I am actually the queen of Roma."

"What… Maman?" Matteo asked in shock.
"I am the queen of Roma, Matteo. I should have told you, but I guess I never realized how mature you were."

"Maman, you're a queen, and that means my father the…"

"No, he's not the king. Your real father is in the skies, Matteo."

"M-my f-f-father i-is…"

Amy nods solemnly.

Matteo looks down at his feet and begins to tear up. Shadow kneels by him and pats his head, with Matteo accepting his sympathy and looks back up at his mother and Shadow. He hugs Shadow, sums up his courage and asks as his voice breaks in sadness,

"Can you be my dad…sir? I know that you love my mother, I read your eyes, please, Shadow…p-lease… I have nobody to turn to."

Shadow grins, pats his head and said, "That was the plan. But we wanted to tell you later after the battle. But you were ahead of us, because I was handed the kingdom by your grandfather and I am to marry your mother, under your grandfather's wishes."

Matteo wipes his tears away and snapped back to his obedient self. He smiles and hugs him back, like father and son. Amy stands with her arms crossed and smiling and she kisses her hero. She then says, "Well, we must get ready, we leave in a few moments and we'll be meeting Mephiles?"

"Yes, he really wants to see you again. Besides, remember when we met him?"

"Of course. But I did say sorry for attacking him when I thought he was you."

"Um why did you wanted to attack him, mamma?"

Amy smiles and coos, "Oh, your first Italian word. Well, Shadow and I were playing in the abbey."

"That huge place that looks like a convent?"

"Yes, well we were playing in the abbey and I attack what ended up getting me in trouble when I got Mephiles instead of Shadow and still to this day I felt bad of attacking him."

"Well, you can always pay back by letting him pounce on."

"Shadow, do you not pay any attention to my style of fighting?"
"Um…nope."

"Ugh, just like my brother."
"Speaking of your brother, he fled Italia for the United States, saying he'd rather be a free peasant than remember the times he had here."



"My brother never did respect my parents." Amy sneered in shame of her elder brother. "Well, we better get moving, it's almost time."

Shadow and Matteo nodded and they quickly got into hooded robes and they were the first to leave. Matteo and his messenger hawk, Hawkens, quickly followed Shadow through plazas and paths to the Pantheon, where they see a dark figure wearing black pants, a black vest and with throwing stars in his hand and daggers in his coaster. He was amazed.

"Wow…"

Matteo then hands Hawkens to Shadow, who writes on the scroll…

Permesso Ora! Mephiles è in vista ed i cavalieri sono andati.
(Translation: Leave Now! Mephiles is in sight and Knights are gone)

X Shadow.

Shadow then ties the small scroll to the hawk's talon and he flys back to the hideout. When the hawk reaches the hideout, He hands the note to Sonic. He reads it and then calls out to the others, "Guys, let's go. Shadow found Mephiles."

They nodded and left in the pitch of darkness. Sonic then thinks this is a good chance to apologize to Amy for all the infliction he has caused, but he had a feeling it was going to take a while, so he decided to tell her after battle. He looks over and sees his wife about to fall due to her tiredness, so he carries their child and lets Sally rest her arms a bit. Amy looks at Sonic as he and Lucas rub noses like a father does with his son. She was glad to see Sonic happy and no longer having romantic feelings for her or mentally insane. As they walked, they notice something on the rooftops. Sonic gets on the defensive along with Knuckles and they look around. They then see a small figure and it had yellow firey eyes, and its body surrounded by and aura of fire. Sonic told the others to stand back. The creature got closer, and closer and…

Who could it be? R&R Peeps!