The Heir Read online

  “You see, I would let him go on his way, but he still has the information I need. Don’t you, Ryker, you sad excuse for a guardian knight?” He pushed Ryker’s face hard onto the ground then stepped on his face, causing blood to ooze from unhealed wounds.

  “Stop it! You are a monster! He doesn’t even know anything! Take my melody. Take me for all I care, just let them all go.”

  “No, Emma, what are you doing?” Shad shouted, this time aloud. I pulled away from his grasp.

  He was so shocked by my words that he let me go for just a moment, and it was just what I needed to stand firm for my plan. I couldn’t see a way out of it—no other way than for me to give Cade what he wanted. I was what he wanted. If I went willingly, maybe he would let everyone else go. I could save them all. The guards around Cade moved to Shad, to hold him back from taking me.

  “Ah, what a smart girl we have here,” Cade said with a smile, as he walked over to me.

  “Please, let them go. It is me you want.” I was meant for this, I thought. I survived the crash, maybe, because I was needed at this moment in time to save them all. Maybe this is my wish on the stars coming true. Maybe I will finally see my parents again, and all the pain and all the sorrow will be over forever. I stood firm, convinced.

  “It is indeed, dear, but I do still need a way to return home, or my plan is ruined. You do see?” He asked, cupping my cheek in his hand. His touch sent my stomach coiling, and my body wanted to convulse. He touched a finger to my lips, and it took everything in me to not pull away. He leaned in close, his breath on my lips. “I do see the appeal you have; you are a beauty, aren't you? Hard to see you this well when I was doing all that sneaking about.” He turned my face to the left and to the right. “You would make me a wonderful Queen.” He kissed my cheek, and I could not handle his touch any longer.

  “Don’t touch me. You murdered my parents. Do you not remember that fact? I despise you. I will come willingly, but the pure hatred and disgust I have for you—that will never change.”

  Cade laughed. “You find me handsome do you not? I am, after all, where Shad gets his good looks.”

  I shook my head.

  “No? I am offended, and I dressed so well for the occasion of our first meeting.”

  “Just get this over with.”

  As if he had not heard me, he went on: “Yes, yes, I did not, however, kill them—your parents, dear, no. I did not kill them. Unfortunately, it was one of my men who hit them—an accident, I will admit. We were following you, and, yes, one of my men got a little impatient, wanting to know if you were the one. After your parents died, and the shield your father had on you dropped, we knew you were the one. So although it was not on purpose, it did help in the end.” I reached out my hand and slapped him across the face.

  “Now, I will let that one slide, seeing as your parents did die, but that was the one and only free pass, princess.” Cade motioned to two of his guard’s behind him, and they were on me in moments. Shad jumped to my side quickly, breaking away from the guard’s hold.

  “Leave her alone,” he shouted as he pulled the guard away.

  “Shad, please, I am who he wants.”

  Shad glared at me in anger and irritation.

  “No, I am not losing you.”

  “This is all touching, really, but you see, there are really no options for you all.” He shrugged his shoulders and motioned the guards to move me. I was placed in the cage-like cell near Keil and Ryker, the cell I saw earlier when I entered the room, with its pristine metal bars. “So as soon as I get the little tidbit about how to make it on back to home-sweet-home, I will be on my way.”

  “I have everything you want,” Shad said, walking over to where his brother stood.

  “Excuse me?” Cade smiled, and I wanted to vomit.

  “Take my melody,” Shad offered.

  I gasped, “Shad, no!” I screamed and banged on the bars. He was ruining my plan; I could not live in a world without him. Shad didn’t look at me. He just sent me a mental message that was jumbled and quick; I felt the emotions more than the words, which clearly meant that he was sorry and that he loved me and that he would never leave me. He knew that he would never regret saving me. I cursed at him, yelled and cried, and begged him not to sacrifice himself for me, for Ryker, or for Keil, or for anyone. I knocked my shoulder against the side of the cage, kicking and screaming as the metal stung my wounds from the sharp cave walls. I was helpless. I could not help. I could not do anything but watch.

  “Ah, you see. Now, that is an intriguing idea. Take the crowned prince’s melody and fool the lot of them. That would make everything so much more dreadfully easy. You and I, brother, even look very similar. If I fix this crooked nose, I could pass myself off as prince Shadrict. They all, after all assume I am dead.” He walked around his brother for a moment with a smile. “I still need to know how to get back there, and you wouldn’t give me that information, would you, brother?”

  “I know how. I came through the Dungeons of the Mist. I know where the cave is that holds the portal to Terra,” Shad confirmed.

  Cade motioned to a guard to untie Ryker and Keil and to send them down through the cave to freedom, and I couldn’t enjoy that small victory because Shad was ruining my plan. “We do not need them to witness such an event, do we?” Cade asked. No one replied.

  “You have to promise to not hunt for Emma anymore. You have to promise to leave her alone,” Shad demanded.

  “Yes, yes—I will have very little need of her if I have your melody, I assure you. I will no longer seek her out, but she may seek me out,” he waved the comment off.

  “I would never!” I spat in his direction.

  “Now, Emma, dear, that is not how a princess should behave. Brother, let us get started before the princess passes out or something. She is a little unstable. Here, you draw me the exact location of this cave and let me take your melody, and you and Emma may leave. If you are lying to me brother, and this is not the right cave with the portal, then I will hunt her down and kill her in front of you. Deal?” he asked; then his hand rose as if he were going to give Shad a high-five. Shad reached out, placed his hand on his, and then they both placed their hands on their hearts. I was sure that was the way Terralings made deals or something. I felt as if I had died on the inside.

  “Shad, please. Please don’t do this!” I begged—pleaded. He looked at me, tears in his eyes.

  “Emma, as long as you are safe, that is all that matters. I can survive without a melody.”

  “Please, I need you, don’t make me hate you for leaving me.” He smiled and walked over to where I stood in my prison cell.

  “Hate, huh? That is indeed a strong word, and yet some say that hate is very close to love, Emma—How about you mourn me for an appropriate amount of time, and then you can hate me?”

  “I mean it! Shad, you are going to kill me.”

  “I am doing this to protect you. You are my soul, Emma; no matter what happens to me, I’ll always come for you, as long as this body is breathing. So no hating, no sorrow, okay? I’ll still be with you, in here.” He reached through the bars and touched my heart.

  “Yes, but without a soul? What kind of life is that?”

  “If I don’t do this, and he takes your soul, it is as if he took mine anyways. And you are part of my soul, Emma. I will be alright as long as you are.”

  “Exactly, you see—if he takes your soul, it’s like taking part of mine, too.”

  “Emma, I have to do this, please understand.”

  “No! I won’t! I won’t understand. I can survive without a soul, mine was suppressed for my entire life anyways, so I have a better chance.”

  He touched my cheek, catching a tear, and I pleaded in my soul again and again. But his mind was already made up.

  “You are my best and dearest friend, Emma,”

  I huffed in irritation.

  “Unlock it for just a minute, Cadian. I need some time with her, before—” He cut himsel
f off, no doubt unable to speak the horror of our situation.

  Cade motioned to his guard, and he opened the cell, letting Shad inside with me, and then quickly closing it. Keil and Ryker were already long gone. At least they are safe, I thought.

  “Leave us. We can’t go anywhere in this cage.” His brother laughed.

  “You have five minutes.”

  I watched Cade leave the room, thinking that Shad had to have a plan to get us out of there: maybe the cage isn’t really locked.

  “It is locked, Emma. Listen,” he pushed me, slowly up against the bars of the cage—of my prison cell; his body, was flush with mine, his lips touched the side of my cheek right next to my mouth, erasing the touch of Cade that had been there. He was nearly an inch away from my mouth. He pulled away so that his mouth was a breath away from mine as he spoke:

  “I know what you are thinking in that head of yours. You think that you cannot survive without me. You think that what I awoke inside of you will be lost, that the hollowness that you have endured and that the vile snake will overtake you when I am Soulless. That is not true. You do not need me, Emma. You do not need anyone to be strong.” He caressed my jaw, roaming to my neck. “I know you, Emma, and you are strong. You are a survivor. I know you can live, even if I am gone.”

  I couldn’t help the sob that escaped my lips, the tears streaming in rivulets down my cheeks.

  “Emma, you are incredible. You will do incredible things in this life. Before I go, I have something I have to say—I planned on one day explaining things to you, over time, but time is running out, and I am afraid if I don’t do this now, I never will get the chance; can I have one selfish moment?” His lips nearly touched mine as his hands cupped my face.

  I nodded.

  “Emma, your friendship has been the most valuable thing I have ever owned.”

  “I don’t want to be just your friend, Shad. Would you stop saying that—” I whispered as I wiped at my face.

  “Yes, you do, but I know it’s different for you. I know because I saw the disappointment on your face when you saw the yellow rose I gave you in your locker, which now seems so long ago. I saw the confusion in the forest when I explained kissing—what it means to people from Terra, so—let me explain.”

  I felt my heart breaking at his words, those horrible awful words of friendship stabbed me in the gut, and I turned my face away from him.

  He smiled and pulled my face back to look at his. “I value friendship; I have never had a real and true friend before. My life was always filled with rules and duty. I value your friendship, Emma, but I don’t want to be just any friend to you, not like Ryker, or like Ash.”

  “This is not the time or place, Shad. We should be figuring out how to get out of here!” I cried.

  “No, I know when I have lost the fight. I have lost to Cadian today. Emma, what I am trying to tell you—this is important, and I am not leaving here the same, so listen; there is no way out of this. Please, Emma, hear me.” He moved his body closer to mine, and I looked at his face, his eyes pleading with me to listen. I couldn’t deny him.

  “I don’t want to be just another friend to you. No, I want to be the one that gets to hold you close. I want my hand to memorize the feeling of your hand in mine.” I felt his hands leave my face as his melody curled around my soul. His fingers found mine, and he held our hands together, raising our clasped hands high above my head, resting on the bars of the cell, keeping me from moving away, so I would listen to him. My hands never fit so right in anyone else’s before. “I want to know the depths of your heart and recognize the rhythm of its beating—I want it to become my own. I want to know the beauty of your soul, the deep, dark parts, and the hard parts—the good and the bad, Emma—I want to know them all. I want to be the one who gets to kiss you every single day just because I can, because I want to, and because—you want me to.

  He kissed my Jaw, trailing kisses that burned me from the inside out. He moved his mouth to my ear, “I want to be the kind of friend whose lips know your lips so intimately—that I know them better than my own.” His arms wrapped around me then. The warmth of his electric touch and his melody swirled around us, and I was entranced by him. He moved his hands over my back. I touched his face—holding his head in my hands, forgetting the wounds on my fingertips as I touched his hair. I pulled him closer to me.

  “My friend—I want to be with you always. I want to sleep beside you and cradle you in my arms. I want you to say my name in the night when it’s dark, to whisper it on your lips; I want it to be the one name you call in trouble or in joy. I want to be the one you find rest in. I want to give you that rest, and peace. If you ever have a bad dream, I want to cast it away.” He smiled his wicked grin as he moved his mouth, hovering above mine again. My hands found his neck, and I wrapped my arms around him standing on my tip-toes.

  “So, yes, darling, I want to be your best friend that knows you entirely: body, mind, heart, and soul. Emma—I do indeed want to be your friend.” He moved his face so he whispered then into my ear, “I want to be that kind of best friend for you—the very best kind of friend that you will ever have, darling.” He kissed my ear and then bent his head down lower, leaving a kiss on the side of my neck and at the hollow of my throat. His hands trailed down my arms, leaving me speechless. “Emma—darling, sweet, kind, strong, and brave Emma,” his voice was low and alluring as he said: “I want to be the best friend that you—that you fall hopelessly, desperately, and madly in love with, as much as I am hopelessly, desperately, and madly in love with you.”

  His lips met with mine in an instant. If I thought his kisses on my neck and cheek were transcending, they were nothing compared to our lips finally meeting. It was pure electric. Electric shockwaves ran through me as our melodies swarmed around and through us, as our mouths melded together. His kiss was soft, at first tentative, and then desire bubbled within us, and the kiss deepened, sparks seemed to shoot from every point of my body. I wasn’t sure what was up or what was down anymore, if I was still standing or if I was floating on air because that kiss—that electrically charged kiss—was buzzing and electrocuting my insides. That kiss transformed my whole being; it made me his. I was his entirely—every single part of me, he owned. Shad owned my very soul. And as impossible as it was to believe, I owned his, too. I owned all of him, and he was mine.

  “Shad, I thought you said you wouldn’t kiss me?” I asked as his lips grazed mine softly, our breaths mingling together.

  “I always planned on it, darling.” He touched a strand of my hair playfully with a smile on his face. “I just didn’t want to rush you—but I can see now that clearly, that was stupid. You don’t have to marry me, or make me any promises. I will make all the promises to you, I promise to you—” He kissed my lips again, my mouth obeying his every single command. “I promise to be yours.” He kissed the corner of my mouth and smiled at me, his lips only a breath away as he spoke. “What I wish—what I want—is to be allowed to do this,” his voice was a soft whisper, a brush against my lips, “whenever I want to.” As he stopped talking and started to make the kiss soft and tender, I cried, knowing that what we could have had together would have changed the universe. But we can’t have it after this small, fragile, perfect moment, and I felt my soul nearly split in two at the loss. He pulled away from me, still looking at me, his chest rising and falling at a rapid rate, his eyes seemed surprised by my thoughts, and my tears. He has to know that this is what I want, I want him, too.

  “I want that, too, all of it, Shad. I promise to be yours,” I whispered His eyes stared into mine. I wanted to stare into his eyes forever. “You are that kind of friend. If that is what it means to you, Shad—then yes, you are my very, very best friend,” I whispered. He smiled and kissed me again, his body slamming into mine and the coldness of the room melted as we melded together again. Our breaths were heavy as we kissed each other, and our melodies buzzed and twirled around us in such a beautiful sound. How is this possible? Thoug
hts flowed to me from him: his desire to make me his forever, not just in this moment; his desire to make me happy; he wanted me to see Terra, to meet his family, to see his home, to have everything returned to me that was taken away; but mostly, he wanted me—just me.

  I always wanted this, Emma. I will always want this. You have no idea how long I have waited. His lips found mine again, and I tried to memorize the moment. The love he had for me was flowing to me in his melody, and it made me feel dizzy. I was unable to fathom what was happening. It all seemed too good to be true.

  How can someone love me that much? Is such a thing really possible for me? How could anyone love someone so flawed and scarred like me?

  “It is all true, Emma. When you are with me, I have never been happier in my entire life.” He caressed my cheek and kissed me softly, lingering there. His kiss was fire, electric fire on my skin.

  “Shad, I just don’t understand—”

  “The pull of this bond we share, this connection, Emma, it isn’t random. The ancients created it for a purpose. Our souls have melodies, and these melodies are a musical sketch of who we are—they are embedded inside us. If someone finds—” he paused for a moment as if re-thinking what he was about to say, “souls that connect like ours do, it means that they are literally everything the other’s soul has ever wanted and ever needed. I wish I could explain it better, but we have little time.”

  “So, I am your perfect match or something?”

  He nodded and smiled.

  You are absolutely my perfect match. I had never felt such happiness in my entire life. He kissed me again, his lips doing just what he said they would do, memorize mine. A thousand, a million kisses from him would never be enough. I wanted to live in that moment forever, take a picture and make it last and last and last. But pictures fade over time. They can become ruined or burned or lost. How does one hold onto something and never let it go? How does one never forget a perfect moment? His kisses kept electrocuting my skin, making my insides light on fire. I tried to not think it, but I knew: soon this will end, and soon, I will be without him.