The Ageni Series: Queen

by Yyanna Leigh Michaels

  Chapter 10

  Egasinu

  I walked quickly to the hut that Gawonii had left me in earlier, tugging on the soiled clothes plastered to my body and wanting to strip them off and scrub my flesh.

  The necklace around my neck faintly glowed, and then I heard snorting and labored breathing following me through the trees. I turned abruptly to see the biggest Yracs lumbering behind me, its snout opened in a pant. I caught more movement in the trees and nearly jumped out of my skin to see about a dozen, mostly likely more, rorrets perched in the trees, watching my every move.

  I almost fell on the soft ground in hysterics. My life had turned into a freak show.

  Waving my hands at the entourage, I yelled. “Shoo! Go away!”

  The Yracs yelped, its head thrown back to face the night sky. Then, it shook its head. It sat back on its hunches, clearly disobeying my wishes.

  I tapped my foot irritably. “Go home! I mean it!” I looked to the trees. “All of you.”

  The rorrets’ quills rustled, and the big giant lug before me shifted behind me and pushed me to the ground with its snout.

  “You have got to be kiddin’ me!” I cried, jumping up off the ground and starting to walk again. “Fine! Come! All of you! Maybe you can keep my betraying, murdering husband away from me!”

  I headed back in the direction of the hut, determined to put some distance between the heart of the village and myself.

  “Lailah,” I heard behind me, but I continued walking. “Lailah, talk to me.”

  Recognizing Kasey’s voice, I paused briefly to look over my shoulder at her, then walked away until I reached the hut. She slipped through the crack in the door when I went to shut it, locking it behind us.

  I heard the lock click as I stood in the middle of the floor, staring at an invisible spot and trying to make sense of my life’s turn of events. Snapping out of it, my hands trembled as I tried to remove the clothes that were stuck to me when I felt Kasey’s hand cover mine to calm my movements. She placed my hands down at my sides and began to remove the dirt and blood-stained clothing, all but the necklace, from my body. She carefully tried not to provoke the Mohe-inflicted wound on my shoulder and the many other injuries.

  I sensed Gawonii approaching the building seconds before the handle jiggled. “Lailah,” he called through the door. “Let me in, please.” Kasey looked at me, waiting for me to tell her what to do.

  I had no words for Gawonii. There was nothing I wanted to say to him, nor did I want to see him, but I knew Kasey wasn’t going to refuse access to her leader for me, regardless of the circumstances, so I remained silent.

  She finally walked away and opened the door before closing it behind her once she’d stepped outside. It didn’t take very long, as I’d expected. The door opened, and I readied myself to see Gawonii, but Kasey came in alone. My eyes widened in shock, following her as she disappeared into the bathroom. Not one word was said.

  My eyes turned back to the door. I waited, but it never opened. I searched my mind; I was alone and truly grateful for that.

  Fully relieved, I slumped down onto the bed, exhausted.

  All that I saw, felt, and had done continuously looped through my mind … Gawonii and the others murdering me … the deep-rooted urge to kill along with the hatred and bitterness carried over from my spirit’s anguish … and the creepy, unclean feeling of inhabiting the creatures’ minds.

  Stop it, Lailah! I thought, blinking back tears, but crying was all the strength I had left to do. I heard water running in the bathroom, and I was thankful Kasey was here. I needed something familiar to keep me from falling apart.

  A chill coursed through my veins, alerting me to a change in the room’s atmosphere.

  Iswali …

  He apparently didn’t get the hint when Gawonii was turned away.

  Cold, clammy fingers squeezed my chin, his thumb stroking away the tears.

  “I can take you away,” he said, and my heart skipped at the thought. “Let me take you from here, away from your oppressors. Away from the contempt they still harbor in their hearts for you. They don’t know you like I do.” His fingers gently covered my face. “They don’t love you like I do.” His lips trailed along my moistened cheeks. “These lessor beings don’t know what it is like to hold such power and bear it alone. You endure jealousies from your brothers and sisters because your power is greater than theirs. They don’t understand the need to be loved beyond the gift. You don’t have to suffer alone, my queen. I hear your torment … I feel your heartache.”

  His cool hands cupped my flushed cheeks, and I rolled my eyes shut.

  “They all betrayed you even before the moment you had arrived. The night I found you running away, I was the one who opened your mind to reveal all of their treachery. I awakened you when Gawonii wanted to suppress all that was inside you. How much longer are you going to endure their abuse?” Strong arms wrapped around my weary body, tucking me under the protection of his size and making me feel small. My necklace glowed brightly, but I ignored its visible warning. “Come with me,” he pleaded. I relaxed in his arms, needing the comfort and knowing that Gawonii would never hold me like this. “Come with me, my love.”

  I felt his lips in my hair, and I sighed.

  “Lailah …”

  I had forgotten about Kasey. I opened my eyes, watching her appear in the bathroom doorway. When she saw Iswali, she had little time to react before the room faded to darkness.

  I could hear Kasey shouting, sounding light years away, none of her words making any sense to me.

  “Her betrayal to you is an upmost insult. She understood the rules. She knew her purpose and yet she betrayed you by falling in love with the man that should have been yours, Your Highness … and he returns her love.” I succumbed, lifting my head to meet his gaze. His lips pressed to mine, and I shivered. Kasey’s voice began to drown out, and all I could hear was the beating of my heart.

  When I opened my eyes, I was no longer in darkness, and the hut was gone. I stared into Iswali’s beautiful eyes questionably, then let my gaze move over his features to stare at his alabaster white hair. My fingers ran through its silkiness until my fingers caressed the lower half of his back.

  “Anything you desire, I will provide. You deserve to be treated in the way that befits royalty,” he cooed.

  He stood up, and I was able to take a good look at the room he’d sat me down in. It was the same room I had seen when he caught Gawonii and I traveling through Black Heaven.

  Iswali lowered himself beside me, his beautiful face inches from mine, to plant a kiss as soft as butterfly wings. The moment his lips touched mine, the room blurred.

  “Iswali,” I whispered, scared.

  “Shh.” His hand covered my face to close my eyes. “For now, you rest. I will be your protector.”

  I spiraled into a deep hypnosis, my head full of monsters and mythical spirits that he gently began to pull from my subconscious.

  “Egasinu.” were the last words I heard spoken as I drifted off to sleep, forgetting all, including my husband’s betrayal.

  Here, I was safe.

  Here, I could rest.

  Here, is where I wanted to be.

  The Valley of the Gods (Book 3)

  July 2021

  Chapter 1

  Purgatory

  My eyes opened to the sound of children laughing.

  I looked around the dimly lit room. The only thing providing light were candles sconces along the walls. Iswali was nowhere to be seen.

  More laughter…

  I sat straight up in the bed.

  There it goes again.

  I placed my feet down onto the cool marble floor and shivered.

  Why does everything in Iswali’s home have the same temperature as him? I silently fussed. Wrapping the bedsheets around my body, I followed in the direction that I heard the sound came from.

  My bare feet padded on the cold floor in the bedroom until I came to the door leading to wha
tever what was on the other side. Taking a deep breath, I swung the door open readying myself for any surprises only to be met with an empty hallway.

  A girl’s giggle had me nearly sprinting to find her.

  I swiftly made my way through the poorly lit hallway that was covered with fine art. Wonderfully painted pictures adorned the wall with large carefully painted vases provided accents. I ran down one side of the hallway where I thought I heard the barking coming from only to come to a dead end and having to choose another hallway…then another…and another. Soon I stopped at an intersection of four hallways leading to nowhere.

  I spun in a circle with no clue of the direction I should go next until I heard a something other than children laughing. I faced in the direction I heard the sound.

  The sound of sobbing came from up ahead in a room at the end of a corridor. Light began to shine from the room reminding me of the many different beacons that filled the Gvnega galv’lati or Black Heaven Gawonii and I traveled through searching for Ahyoka.

  Forcing my feet to move forward, I tiptoed to the open room until I was able to peer inside through the door.

  “You are trespassing.” A voice cracked full of such sorrow that my own heart ached.

  That voice.

  I heard that said to me before. Unable to stop myself, I stepped into the room.

  Goodness! I thought shielding my eyes. Why is it so bright in here?

  My head jerked downward the moment my bare feet touched soft dirt and grass and not the hard, cold marble of my last location. My toes wiggled in the grass while I took a good look at my surroundings. A gorgeous landscape spread out in front of me as the sun warmed my skin.

  Tall trees with multi-colored leaves and large white flowers were scattered throughout the valley.

  I have seen this before. The day Ahyoka was rescued and always…always in Gawonii’s mind whenever he made love to me.

  The lake sparkled like it was lit up by diamonds along the plain from the sun beaming down on it. A bridge made up of finely carved wood rose up over the lake providing access from one side to the other embankment. Flowers draped over the bridge, weaving between the railing to cascade over into the water.

  A girl ran across the bridge laughing at something I could not to see. Her long black hair flowed behind her, her bare feet slapping against the wooden planks. Soon a boy followed after her replaying the scene I witnessed before.

  A strangled noise could be heard coming from beside me. I turned to see a figure curled up against a tree watching the scene play itself before me. The outline of a body resembled a woman and I could hear sobs coming from her.

  I moved closer to get a good look.

  “You are welcome.”

  I stopped, hearing her voice.

  “Excuse me?”

  Shiny black hair covering her face fell away.

  “You should be thanking me.” Ama said. Her beautiful face was pale, and tear stained. She sat idle not caring to glance at me but for a moment before turning her attention back to the children. I observed her noticing the pale pink gown she wore making her appear soft unlike the woman I saw that destroyed that village. I also noticed that she was missing the Usonvi.

  “Thanking you? Why? I am in this mess because of you.”

  She threw her head back laughing loudly. I spun to look at the children. When I saw that they had not heard her, I faced her again.

  “They cannot hear us,” she said. “These are nothing but my tortured memories that I am cursed to endure.” Ama leaned her head back up against the tree to stare at the two children at play. “We were happy then.” I heard her continue. “He loved me then. Everything was perfect. No worries, no responsibilities yet…just each other.” She gave me a second glance. “I saved your life. That is why you should be thanking me. If I had not intervened, you would have been ripped apart. You are not quite immortal yet, my dear.”

  “Maybe that is what I wanted to happen.”

  My retort was meant to show that I didn’t care one way or the other whether she helped me or not but she only smirked, her eyebrows slightly raised, amused.

  “You are not ready to die. As much as you fight this new existence, this existence has been the only time in your life that you ever felt alive. You were nothing before me and you know it.”

  Angry, I pressed my lips together. So much for giving the once Goddess of H2O the benefit of the doubt. “Enjoy your sorry existence.” I threw back at her turning back the way I came. “I’m not the one doomed to watch my mistakes over and over again knowing the outcome can’t be changed.”

  She shifted her position on the ground finally giving me her full attention.

  “What did I say that was not the truth?” I stopped walking to face her. She stood up and I was reminded just how tall she was. “You are alive because of me. You are stronger because of me. You have great power because of me. And…” She paused, her smile not matching the pain in her eyes. “You have Gawonii because of me. You may fool others and you may fool yourself, but I am a part of you and your heart beats for him as mine did.” Then she sat back down under the tree returning to view the two playing a few yards away. “What would I give to do it all again?”

  Dark circles around her eyes added to the subjugated despair that covered her while she watched her life continuously repeat before her. As the scene changed, she cried begging it for a few more moments of its time but the pictures jumped through her happier times to when Gawonii denounced her, severing their betrothal. Beside me, she grabbed for me to hold onto him for a moment, but time kept moving.

  Screaming madly out of frustration, unable to stop her torture, she fell to the ground.

  “He killed me.” I heard her say through the sobs, her hair spread across the ground as she kneeled before me. “All I wanted him to do was to save me. But he killed me.”

  She let loose a heart wrenching cry; her hands balled up into fists and the earth trembled at her anguish.

  “I only wanted him to save me from them. From the conspiracies on my life from Ghigau and Adsila working with Mohe to find ways to imprison me.”

  Wait! Ghigau and Adsila?

  “I only searched for protection. Iswali was the only one who loved me enough to fight beside me until Ghigau ripped him in two as punishment for being my protector. I needed to be stronger. I had to be more powerful than them.” Her fist pounded the ground. “Why did he not understand that?” Ama pushed herself off the ground and paced. “I tried to make Gawonii listen, but they poisoned him against me, and he left me alone. The more he fell out of love with me the more I searched for something to fill the void.” She looked over at me. “I did not know it would consume so much of me.” She rambled on, at times her hands pulling at her hair.

  “You destroyed an entire village.” I accused her. “I watched you kill innocent people. How could you? How could you murder Mohe’s wife the way you did?”

  Her head snapped around, her eyes wild. “They came after me first! I only went to flush out those who threatened me and Iswali.” She cried her hands clutching my forearms. All her anger and pain overpowered me with her touch. “Then I could not stop it.” She sobbed falling to her knees again. “It was too powerful.” She curled back up against the tree lowering her head to her knees. “It knew my desires. It loved my pain seducing me to thinking it was another. It used me any way it could.”

  “What I felt…you enjoyed. You took pleasure in killing those people.”

  She cried out again tearing at her hair. “You do not understand …You do not know.” She whimpered not making any sense. “But…you will.”

  The last scene that I was allowed to witness was Ama fighting for her life. I watched Gawonii stepped forward like I saw in the vision, hesitating before setting Ama on fire. “Gawonii.” She whispered. He lifted up his hands and we watched her go up in flames. “I loved him.” My heart constricted at the emotion laced in her voice. “I deserve to pay for the choice I made to destroy that village, bu
t I do not deserve purgatory.” Her head fell back onto the bark of the tree as her eyes stared ahead, lifelessly. “Today I am only forced to watch my sins. I guess that is the powers that be calling themselves giving me a break.” She burst into a fit of laughter. “Maybe they did it for you.” She continued once the laughter died down. “Usually, I am forced to be my own protagonist suffering through my joys and pains over and over again.” Her eyes rolled over to glare at me. “Maybe it is you I should be thanking and not the other way around.” She turned her head away from me to curl her body up like when I found her. “Leave me.” I heard muffled under all the hair and clothing.

  

  My eyes opened and I looked around at my unfamiliar surroundings. I was still in Iswali’s home. Sitting up slowly, I took a good look at the room he left me in. The room was too refined to be Iswali’s. This must have been Ama’s room in her time. Water glistened on white and lavender roses as they cascaded along the fixtures on the stoned walls. They seemed to bloom brightly unlike everything else outside of Iswali’s home or was it because I was there.

  I placed my feet down onto the marble floor that was cool to the touch bringing me back to the reality of the situation. I looked down at my body remembering that Kasey had undressed me before Iswali made his appearance. I stood nearly naked but too far gone to care.

  A bath has already been made for you. I jumped hearing a whisper in my mind. I jerked my head up to see Iswali, surprised. He smiled holding out his hand to me. Still in a confused trance, I gazed down at it first before placing my smaller hand in his. Iswali tenderly pulled me to my feet and led me across the marbled floor that reflected back my image of my nakedness through the shiny stone as we walked. We passed a makeshift garden filled with an array of different species of flowers that turned vibrant in color and crept along the fixtures as we walked by.

  “Why am I so powerful?” I couldn’t help asking.

  Black pearls glanced in my direction. “What is the main source of life, Priestess?”