Chapter 24
Starkas
"You said she's alive!" Starkas shouted at the old man.
"Oh, but she is, she's still breathing."
"Then why isn't she waking up?"
"Well, she was drugged not to wake up until she's given an antidote, and the antidote is in this room."
"Where?"
"Oh you'll have to find it yourself." Starkas started looking at the walls, at the paintings. 'The room is so clear there is no way an antidote is here and I didn't see it!' He thought, touching the painting with the woman blowing the flower. Starkas felt a tickle in his hands, he saw a petal, a rose petal just like the one in the picture, in his hands. Starkas couldn't find where it came from, he looked at the ceiling which he couldn't see because of its height. Confused, he put his other hand on the painting as if to recreate that. He wasn't disappointed, it happened again, another petal, in his arms.
Starkas started touching the other pictures, he went to the angel flying to the sun. When he touched it, a light came through her wings and around the angel's body. Starkas removed his hand, and he got an idea. 'This is a puzzle, a test.' Starkas touched the picture of which men knelt to the king, he heard their cries, their prayers, their demands. He then went on to the two armies and touched it, a battlecry shattered his ears, the sound of steal on steal and screams of the dying were so strong he let go immediately. He then went to the feast, touched it, and he tasted the food, the ox meat sizzling in his mouth and the bacon going in with the fried bread, he bit his lips thinking it was real, then he backed out, and went to the hooded man. Upon the touch of the picture Starkas felt pain through his heart, as if someone had just stabbed him there, the pain made him faint, into the darkness.
"Are you ok?" Starkas started to open his eyes, trying to see who's talking. 'Mother!' Starkas almost screamed out, but couldn't, the words stuck in his throat. He opened his eyes fully trying to see what's happened, "Here, drink this." Emma said, giving a glass of water to Starkas who was thirsty to death. "What's going on?" He asked
"I saw you passed out on the floor, I didn't know what to do so I dragged you to my chamber." She said, "Who are you? And what are you doing here?"
"D-Don't you know?"
"Know what?" She looked at him, tilting her head.
"Mother."
Her eyes started widening, big, big eyes, looking straight into Starkas's eyes as if she just witnessed the most shocking thing in her life. "C-C-Starkas?"
"Yes." He said. Emma ran to him, hugged him, and started crying, " I thought you died, he told me you died! Oh my god you're alive, and here, for me?"
"We thought you were dead too."
"Oh, tell me all about it, what has happened, how are you? What happened to your father?" She said. Starkas wanted to speak but she didn't give him the chance. "Oh wait, let me deal with this man first." She said, going to the entrance of the tunnel. 'We're in the secret bed chamber, with the control panels and all, did she really carry me all the way here?' Starkas was thinking, but it didn't matter, for all he wanted had happened, and finally, he might live a happy life.