Beca Lewis [Lewis - Deadsweep

Deadsweep

Beca Lewis

Copyright 2019 Beca Lewis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

Published by:

Perception Publishing

https://perceptionpublishing.com

This book is a work of fiction. All characters in this book are fictional. However, as a writer, I have, of course, made some of the books characters composites of people I have met or known.

All rights reserved.

One

For the last two weeks, I have walked through the meadow to the top of the hill and waited. Ive watched the sun rise and fall, the clouds sweep through the blue sky, and the trees bend with the wind. I have watched the first spring flowers poking up from the ground with their promise that winter is almost over.

Every day I have searched the horizon for signs of their return. At the end of the day, I have walked back down to my fathers home with even more unhappiness in my heart.

Four months have gone by since I returned to Erda. Four months since everything I ever knew turned upside down.

When I stepped through the portal from Earth to Erda, I had been stupid, untrained, ignorant, full of myself, and yet I was happy. Four months later I am a little less foolish and ignorant, a little more trained, and maybe still full of myself, but now I am unhappy.

There is no excuse for it, and yet I keep making excuses, which brings me back to thinking that I am full of myself. Or is it as Professor Link had said to me when we were in the Castle? That I thought I was superior? Do I still? Perhaps. Maybe it would be easier if I did.

Perhaps then I could embrace my future with open arms. I would claim my inheritance as future Queen of Erda, and be comfortable now as Princess Kara Beth. I would let go of my past life as Hannah from Earth. I would rejoice in our victory over the Shrieks and Shatterskin.

Instead, all I could think was that after all that had happened, I was alone. Yes, we had saved Erda from the Shrieks and Shatterskin. Both of those monsters made by Abbadon were vanquished. But we knew that Erdas safety was temporary. Abbadon would be back. Abbadon would not give up trying to destroy magic, Erda, and every living thing but himself. We knew he was preparing another onslaught.

And yet, every day I walked to the top of that hill and waited. And when no one came and nothing changed, I returned to the city and my father, Darius, the King of Erda.

Today was no different. No one came. Even the Priscillas had deserted me. Pris, Cil, and La had become my constant companions, living in my pocket, pulling my hair. Laughing and pranking like the fairies that they are, I had come to rely on them. We had been friends since my childhood in Erda, and yet they had gone with the rest of them. Somewhere.

The only remaining member of our team that was still around was Lady, the pileated woodpecker that had come with me through the portal from Earth and then revealed herself as the woman I knew as Suzanne, and a dragon in Erda. So if Lady was with me, so was Suzanne. Except that she wasnt, because Lady had not transformed herself once since the rest of the team had gone on their fact-finding mission.

I had begged her. Literally. On my knees. Gone out into the woods and called Lady and asked her please talk to me. Tell me what was going on. Please, shapeshift back to Suzanne so we can talk. Or stay as Lady and speak to me. But she remained silent, so I had no one to answer my questions.

Why didnt they take me? I didnt understand. I had been with them for months, fighting beside them, relearning magic. But one morning I woke up and they had all gone, every single one of them. All they left was a note that they would be back.

Even Zeid was gone. And that was the worst of all. We only had a few days together after I remembered who he was. My betrothed. Betrothed, an old word, still used in Erda. No wonder my heart had thudded the first time I saw him. I didnt remember him, but my heart had.

Before he left, we had spent time walking in the gardens of the city of Eiddwen. He told me how hard it had been for him since I had gone away. He said that he had been broken-hearted when I was sent to Earth to keep me safe from Abbadon. He told me his heart broke again when I returned to Erda and didnt remember him.

Now it is my heart that has broken. But I have duties to attend to. My father is not well, and with everyone gone, it is up to me to take care of him. If I was going to be honest with myself, I knew that was why I was left behind. I was the only one that had a chance to save King Darius. I had hoped that my return to Erda would bring him enough happiness to recover and rule his Kingdom again.

When Shatterskin destroyed Rutas village, my mother, Rowena, was one of the people that died there. When my father found out that his wife had died, he too started dying. The once proud man began to wilt. He had given up. He didnt want to live without his wife. I wanted him to live for his Kingdom and me. I wanted to believe that we would be enough for him.

My parents had lived as husband and wife for thousands of years happily ruling over Erda with kindness and compassion. The people loved them, and my parents returned that love ten-fold.

Thousands of years are not that long on Erda. People on Erda dont age past the age they chose to remain. I remember people in Earth saying that they would remain thirty-nine forever. It was a joke in the Earth Realm, in Erda it was true. Pick your age and stay there, slowly changing over a long, long time. The only way people died in Erda was by accident, someone killed them, or they decided to move on. Thats what my father was doing, moving on. If he managed to accomplish it, I would be the ruler of Erda.

I didnt want to rule Erda. Not now. Not ever. I wanted my father to recover. My fathers heart was broken not just because my mother had died, but it was because of his brother, Abbadon. Abbadon, the destroyer, the Evil One.

When the two brothers were first brought to Erda, they had agreed to rule their separate kingdoms and stay out of each others way.

However, Abbadon didnt like sharing anything with his brother Darius even though there was plenty of room for both of them. Peace had reigned for centuries in my father and mothers Kingdom.

But as time passed, Abbadon became more and more invested in the dark side of greed and power, he had become dissatisfied at having only half of the planet. He wanted it all. And he was coming to get it.

The hill I climbed every day was behind the city to the East. I loved that hill. It was where we all had landed in the Sound Bubble after defeating the Shrieks and Shatterskin.

We had stood there together as a community. My friends. My teachers. We had looked at the sun glancing off the rooftops and celebrated our victory. We could see the people of Eiddwen waiting in the streets for us to celebrate with them.

For two days it was glorious.

And then it was over. Everyone was gone. I had no idea when my friends would return, and Abbadon was advancing. I could do nothing alone. I needed them.

Two

The sky had turned gray to match my mood as I walked through the streets of Eiddwen back to our home where my father was now residing. Where he was supposed to be living was back at the Castle, as King. The same Castle where I had lived after coming through the portal from the Earth dimension. But my father hadnt been there to greet me. As soon as my mother died, he had moved back to his family home to Eiddwen where he could pretend that he wasnt the King of Erda.