Beautiful Deceiver Chapter 2

The only problem with being invisible was the inconvenience of not knowing exactly where your partner is. Anaya swore under her breath as she smacked into Farion for a third time that morning. The sun had just peeked over the winter horizon of dead looking trees and grey landscapes when they left, but now it was in her eyes and she didn’t know where she was stepping.

Loathing the upcoming task of fetching her sister for the fifth time that year from imprisonment or worse, Anaya unsheathed her sleep sword and jabbed at a single guard. He promptly collapsed, but the sword had left no wound, and he slept soundly. He would wake twenty minutes later with a powerful headache, but nothing more, and Anaya decided it was now safe for Farion to lock-picked the door.

Once inside, they raced along the empty passage way with inhuman speed, Anaya only slightly faster than her brother. If she took off her soft leather boots, she would outrun him by a long shot, but she dared not to because of the clacking sound her talons would make on the stone. The rescue had to be accomplished quickly and silently. They reached a passage way with several doors, one of which contained their sister.

Anaya used her broach and transformed into a mouse.

“Give me a minute, Far. I’m going to check under each door. Do what you wish, but don’t get caught.”

“You know that is impossible.”

She smiled and shrank, white fur spread across her body and she disappeared into her tunic. The only problem with transforming was that whatever she was wearing didn’t change with her, other than the broach itself which shrank to match her new size. Anaya twitched her new whiskers and ran in a few small circles to test her speed as a mouse. Farion used his own trinket’s abilities to shrink down to her size and scratched her head.

“You know, you are adorable when you turn into an animal.”

“I’m always an animal… just not usually with so much fuzz,” she replied and scratched her new muzzle with her hind leg. “Tickles a bit”, she squeaked.

“Just don’t get stepped on once you get in there,” he warned and leaned against the wall, which was much bigger than him now.

Anaya scurried under the first door. She noticed that the only thing in the first room was chairs and a dining table. She circled around and found a kitchen in the second room and a meat pantry in the third. Starting to grow annoyed, she tried the fourth and found a tea room and the fifth and discovered a large room full of crates with fresh veggies and fruit.

“Far, I can’t find anything. Let’s move on,” she said as she got close to him. He glanced up from his half nap and smiled, growing to his normal size. She turned back into herself and, as Farion turned away embarrassed that she was naked again, proceeded to dress.

“Could you warn me next time?” he complained.

“Shut up, you big baby. Should we go to the basement or the attic?”

“Prisoners are usually either kept in the King’s personal chamber, which I seriously hope not, or the basement. Let’s check there first,” he said and was invisible again. She followed the tiny sound of his breathing and they made their way down several flights of stairs before they arrived at the castle dungeon. They then progressed to the rooms actually holding prisoners and looked through the small windows in the doors.

The first prisoner looked incredibly worn out and old, like he had been there for years. He was strapped to shackles that hung him from the ceiling by his wrists. A good sized beard had grown on his face and his hair looked greasy and irrevocably matted. She walked by without a second glance.

The second was a young boy and Anaya noticed that there was a fresh wound on his hand. There were also healed over nubs where a few fingers should have been, meaning he had committed thievery multiple times, and for each crime, the guards had cut off a finger. She urged to set the poor boy free, but she reminded herself that he would be released after a week or so of imprisonment for the size of the crime, and depending on how much he stole. Imprisonment varied to the value of whatever the boy had stolen, but the finger removal was inevitable at this day and age.

And besides, she added for comfort, he was given three meals a day, plenty of water, and something to do. In prison, he might just be getting more food then he would out in the real world.

The third prison room was empty shy of a few roaches, but the fourth had a few people. Each of them was middle aged and wild looking; like they had all drank a little too much wine. For some reason, Anaya could not remove her eyes from the third man. And then she realized that the third man was a woman! Women were not normally imprisoned with men. The reasons were obvious to her, but maybe the guards had not realized she was a girl, as Anaya had at first.

But now that she watched them, she also noticed that the men did not dare even get a few feet close to the girl. In fact, if she moved, they flinched as if afraid of what she might do. Anaya decided this prison room could be ignored if the woman was not in danger and continued on. But when Farion noticed the girl, he tried to get Anaya’s attention by whispering her name.

She looked around and, when she didn't find anyone, turned visible for half a moment to hold a finger to her lips in his general direction, shushing him silently before fading into the shadow again. She had no idea why he would think that was a great idea. When they were safely in the area where no prisoners were being held, she turned on him.

“What do you think you were doing?”

“There was a girl in that prison cell standing over two recent corpses! What were you doing just looking in and moving on?”

“Two corpses? No, she was sitting on the other side of the room to two men.”

“Those men you saw are dead,” he said and threw a pebble down the empty corridor in frustration. “She killed them silently and apparently quickly.”

This shook Anaya slightly, but then she thought of something. “Maybe that was why she was in prison!”

“Why would she kill someone in her position?”

“How should I—“ Anaya was interrupted by the pebble. It had been thrown back at them by something and was skidding towards them along the stone floor. When it stopped, silence engulfed them. Farion pushed on her head and made the silent language symbol for cat. Anaya immediately used the broach to transform into a common house cat and curled up on her own clothing, looking innocent and asleep, keeping one eye slightly open. Just in case, she kept a bottle of transformation potion in her mouth, be it small enough to stash anywhere, and hoped the person coming down the stairs was just a guard. Farion shrank and buried himself in her fur, hiding on her back.

They sat there for a while, hearts beating faster from either fear or their smaller size, Anaya couldn’t tell, until a small form made its way slowly down the steps. As it drew closer, she recognized it to be the girl from the cell, and decided to abandon her clothes and make a run for it. Luckily, Farion had been kind enough to tie her endlessly large on the inside yet rather light and small bag around her kitty waist so that she still had the rest of her belongings.

The girl immediately noticed movement and looked down at Anaya’s little cat form. She did not, however, noticed that the movement was Farion instead of her tail. The girl apparently either did not like cats or was interested in Anaya’s clothing that she was lying on, for she kicked out at her and caused her to dart off down the hallway into a patch of shadow and hiss with surprise.

“Blasted pest,” she scowled. Her voice made Anaya tense. It was scratchy and cracked after every word, like it took her an immense amount of effort to speak.

“A boy?” she assumed as she scooped up the tunic and leggings Anaya had worn instead of her usual dress or skirts. Anaya would have smiled if she were not a cat; however, she still felt exposed here and needed to move on, and she seriously did not want to be around this girl any longer. She padded along, keeping her steps silent, and when she was clearly out of sight and hearing range, made a run for it to the other prison cells farther down.

“Far,” she whispered, “You’ve been rather quiet and still. Are you alright?”

He replied by falling off her back. She spun around to see if he was ill or injured and found him perfectly fine, yet he was signaling the slicing of his throat.

“Hush.”

She nodded, knowing there was someone nearby. Though she was the one in animal form, Farion’s hearing was twice more powerful than hers. By the time she heard the crackle and saw the light, far before even a human would be able to hear it, Farion had jumped onto her back like she was a steed and had even kicked her like one to make her move as quickly as she could. She was running from a burst of living inferno that sizzled on the damp stone walls and caught fire to any object it touched. And it was catching up with them.

“In here!” he shouted and leaned his body to the left, causing her to turn. She was guided into a room of pure darkness. He then jumped off and grew to shut the door that was made of steel, protecting them from whatever magic constructed the ball of flames. Magic, unless it was extremely powerful, could not penetrate steel.

The ball of fire skyrocketed by, its light seeping in through the window in the door and danced along the wall behind them, causing the temperature to rise instantly. The room was small but it contained a single prisoner with short hair and tattered clothes. It was too dark to notice much more. The ball continued and hit a wall that, if she hadn’t turned left, would have met at a dead end and their deaths.

“What was that?” Anaya screeched and turned back into herself to conserve energy, not caring that she was naked as the darkness concealed her body. She was breathing heavily and did not notice the tiny voice coming from the wilted figure tied to a post in the center of the cell.

“Anaya… we are not alone.”

“I know that, a prisoner is in here. We need to get out of here and find Nami. Did you notice any paths leading to the surface? Do you think the King still has her?”

“Anaya, this is Nami,” he exclaimed and ran over to her.