My Liege And I

Crimson Pendant

Chapter 72

Bai Yang Liu
Furia

Yang Liu had just lifted her foot to step onto the carriage with her maid in assistance when arrows began wheezing around her from the darkness of the night.

Cries of pain polluted the air as the footmen around her staggered to the ground.

Her heart fast paced and she held her chest in fright. She looked around her, bewildered who would dare to commit such animosity. However, she did not have the chance to see who when her head was violently hit and she lost consciousness, darkness consuming her senses.

It felt like many days passed, except it had been only a few hours.

She groaned with her hand lightly holding her forehead as she grimaced in pain. Heavy eyelids to a rooftop, walls, and a door she was unfamiliar with. It was certainly not her bedchamber at the Drakko palace. They had superior furnishings in the Drakko palace.

"You are awake," he said.

Her eyebrows knit in surprise at the voice by her side. Quickly—more than needed, and surely in a way that hurt as her bearings were scattered about—she looked at him. Heavens, she had never expected the relief that coursed within her.

"Lance," she cried, throwing herself at her dearest friend. "Oh, Lance, I am so happy to see you."

She welcomed the smell of him, sandalwood, and... comfort.

The feel of him rubbing her back, shushing her quiet, and kissing her temple, had her almost crying.

"Are you all right?" He looked at every part of her, intensely inspecting. "Did they hurt you?"

She shook her head. "They did not dare, well, yet."

"My apologies for taking long to come for you. I had to bide my time."

She kissed him on the cheek, lovingly. "You have done more than anyone would be willing to sacrifice for me in their lifetime. How can you be sorry?" Anyone except her brother, she internally corrected. He was someone who would die for her if needed.

Not that she mattered more than Li Lian to him, but for the principles he imposed on himself.

"You must fight for your things." Her brother would always tell her when her sisters bullied her when growing up. "People treat you how you have shown them to treat you. Letting them take what belongs to you and being bullied is telling them to treat you as a nobody."

Her dearest brother, she missed him. He would not hesitate to take her worries away from her.

"You are still beautiful as ever," Lance mused. He still carried the love he had for her when they parted, if not magnified.

"You look well yourself." She wove her fingers through his unruly blonde hair.

"I do not know—" He abruptly stopped mid-sentence, his different-coloured pair of eyes widening in shock. "Wh-what is that on your neck?"

She frowned, looking down to find what had him turning into such a state.

"This..." She took the crimson pendant and coddled it in her fingers. "I woke up with it on my first day in Furia."

His head fiercely shook as he backed away. Fast on, he unsheathed his sword that lay on a chaise by the fireplace.

"What is it, Lance?" she panicked.

"The Arakaln pendant," he explained as he inundated his sword into the blazing fire. "The one who gave it to you did it with the intent of knowing where you are at all times. It is a stone used for tracking. Normally we use it during the war to be aware of forces approaching us by hiding it among the belongings of camping footmen."

"What?" She said it out of shock than a question.

"I am guessing it is Lord Liege, that scoundrel." Lance's jaw hardened against his teeth. "Because that pendant can only be controlled by those with immeasurable power since the stone knows to fight back and resist submission."

"He knows where I am?" She tried to tear it from her neck to no avail. She did try in the past and failed. Her maids even stated they also did not think it could be removed.

"The string he used to make a necklace out of it is not common and impervious to breaking. Though luck is with us because it cannot resist the Tylkun blade." He withdrew his sword which swelled with a crimson glow on its tip. "Come here, I shall assist in removing it."

She reluctantly trudged to him, quite nervous to have the blade next to her neck.

"Hurry, we do not have all day!" he snapped. His sharp voice bit, though she understood he was speaking out of fear rather than anything against her. Lord Liege could appear at any time, considering there was a source to determine she escaped his claws.

"Surely he has not realised my disappearance yet. He has been cooped up in the Abyss of Darkness with all his attention focused on cultivation," she rambled to keep her mind busy and not mind the blade radiating heat on her skin as Lance tried to cut through the string around her neck.

"There, there..." He finally mumbled as the necklace loosened from her neck. "I will send someone to dispose of this—"

A loud piercing noise shrieked from outside and the ground greatly shook in response, causing Lance and Yang Liu to sway as they tried to maintain their footing against the invisible force.

"He is here!" Blood drained from Lance's face. "That is his call." He hurriedly took her hand into his.

Whenever a Drakko or Furian of nobility arrived in a place where they did not come in peace, it was unmanned that they would make a call to announce their arrival and intent to duel. Nature placed this mechanism to avoid sneak attacks at the hands of an enraged noble. It levelled a plain field in which the victim could run away to escape or prepare to fight back.

Taking her out of the door, they entered a passage.

"You will run North and I will go South. The direction will take you to the back where there is a horse that you can run away on." Both his hands held her arms as he instructed, "You must run and never look back, while I will distract him so you can gain ground against him."

"You will not go with me, what if he kills you?"

"He cannot, I am a Furian General and he would have the Queen to answer to." He pushed her forth. "Hurry, run! Time is not on our side!"

Tears submerged her eyelids as she pushed herself to race along the passage.

Another loud shrill blast her ears, this time it being more savage and uncouth. A tremor of walls and floor informed her of the need to be out of it as soon as possible. The building juddered as if it would collapse.

Their plan was all about shaky as well, she recognized this as she let herself out of the door at the end of the passage and found a brooding massive horse waiting under a tree.

If she succeeded in getting away, she may never see Lance again—the hero who deserved so much love from her than she had thus far given. Oh, matters of the heart, if only we had much control over them.

Wiping off additional tears, she hurriedly crossed the grass to find refuge beneath the tree's cover.

Yang Liu chided herself for experiencing such fragile feelings when she needed to display strength. She took a deep breath, hitched up the horse, and urged it on by kicking and controlling the reins.

If Li Lian could fight and protect her own, then she too would fight for her own. Herself.

Oh, she was lonely. There was no one to fight for except for herself. Because it was better to stand for someone than herself. 

Better to love than not love at all. Better to fight than not subject yourself to the possibility of failure. Better to live than succumb to death.

S.V