The siege is still continuing, Meagan's desperate to get to Jenni, and Mariale runs into a certain sheriff who's none too pleased... 

Vain Hope

“This way,” Ebbony motioned. She pointed. “There. This tunnel will lead you to the heart of the Meeting Hall.”
Meagan glanced at the small grate that was its entrance. Behind the Meeting Hall, they were in such a position that the guards making their rounds couldn't see them, but the fact that no guard was stationed here seemed rather fishy to her. “Was this here before?” Meagan asked. “It's kind of... conspicuous. You'd think they'd post a guard someplace this obvious. Why isn't anyone guarding this?”
Ebbony grimaced. “You know what? You ask too many questions.”
“Sorry.”
“Just go through the tunnel.”
“Uh-huh.” She lifted the grate and was about to step through, but then a thought came to mind. “Wait... isn't there a price?”
“Of course.” Ebbony brightened. “Let's see... how about you take it on faith?”
Meagan wasn't sure what to do. What if it was too much?
“You have thirty seconds to decide,” Ebbony said. “Meagan, I can do far worse than a scar. If you think that's all Mariale got off with, a little scratch- well, then she obviously hasn't told you the whole story.”
Through that tunnel lies Jenni. Are you willing to go get her? Yes, at any cost. No matter what it is.
“Go ahead,” Meagan answered. “Take whatever you want. My arm, my leg, my... my heart. My hair. My youth. My anything. Take it.”
Ebbony smiled coolly. “What a good big sister you are.” Her praise seemed to be two-sided, harboring an insult. “Now, just close your eyes. It won't hurt; I promise.”
Meagan nodded and did as she was told. She felt the weight of her wings fall off her back, and completely disappear. It was a strange, alien feeling. Even with a dysfunctional pair, she took pride in her wings. She hadn't expected to feel so helpless without them, even though they had done little to get her out of fights or scuffles in the past. That wasn't all. As soon as she comprehended the lack of wings, Meagan felt that she had some, inexplicably, changed. She suddenly opened her eyes. “What'd you do?” she cried. “What'd you do, take my essence?”
Ebbony shrugged. “I didn’t mean to. My bad. Don't worry, being a human's not that bad. One Ebbony was in a similar position. You'll get used to being blind too.”
“Wha- blind?!”
“You had such nice eyes. I couldn't resist stealing them.” Ebbony snapped her fingers, and Meagan saw her vision darken, as if she was going away from a light at the end of a tunnel. “Don't you love the circumstance? A blind mortal runs to save her sister from the clutches of evil!” Ebbony burst out laughing. “Tragedy! What a complete and utter tragedy! Oh, what the scripter would give to write this play!”
“What kind of monster are you?” Meagan cried, dismayed.
“Me? I've always been and always will be Ebbony,” she answered. “Whether I'm a monster or not depends on your point of view. You 'see' only that which I took from you- but think of what I've given you: the hope to reach Jenni.”
“It's a vain hope,” protested Meagan.
“Of course, but,” Ebbony replied, “isn't vain hope better than no hope at all?” She laughed again, and the wind began to blow, stroking Meagan's cheek and buffeting her bare back.
“Ebbony?” Meagan called. “Ebbony!” It was no use. Ebbony was gone, and the second Meagan realized that, the wind too died.
Meagan sat down on a nearby stone. “A fine mess you've gotten yourself into!” she muttered. “Why don't I listen when people warn me?” She touched her fingers to her face, feeling the skin right under her eyes. It wasn't that she was stubborn- well, she was, but that wasn't the reason she'd completely ignored Mariale's forewarning. It had been Mariale herself that had put her off. Something about that woman somehow made Meagan feel uncomfortable. It wasn't distrust or dislike; it was more than that. Mariale, in her new, regenerate form, scared her. Meagan had never seen a Victura in their full splendor, and now that she thought about it, they were frightening. Their eyes looked more animal than sentient, and they were tall, regal. They gave off an air of nobility that made Meagan feel inferior. Were they superior? No, she certainly didn't think so, but they definitely weren't below her. They were powerful. She could tell. All of this mixed together gave the young valkyrie an instant recipe for fear.
No, you dolt. You're not afraid of her. You're afraid of the unknown, what you can't control. Mariale was exactly that- something you couldn't come close to ordering around. Of course, Ebbony's the same, but you managed to delude yourself into thinking that if you made the choice between the two, you'd have some sort of power over yourself. Meagan's thoughts were glum. But do any of us have power over ourselves, or are we all deluding ourselves? Is everything already chosen out for us? Are our choices only a sham, a masquerade?
“I'm such an idiot,” Meagan said, and stood. She started walking down the tunnel, stumbling every so often. She would have used her sword as a sort of cane, but she decided she might as well obey at least one of Mariale's warnings and not touch it. She kept one hand on the wall to both steady herself and feel the way, and her steps were tentative. What if this stupid tunnel is booby-trapped? Wouldn't that suck? Yes, yes it would, but right now, everything sucks, so I really don't care.

“Sooo...” Tristan said. “I kind of don't like these morbid siege broadcasts. Why don't we put some music on, and then we'll cheer up.”
“Good idea,” Emma agreed. She turned off the radio and stood. “I'll get my phonogram. It's around here somewhere.”
The second the siege was apparent, Tristan and Emma had locked themselves in the faerie's basement and barricaded the door. Emma had an emergency stash of food, so she was good to go for however long they needed to stay- the only thing that was really a problem was the boredom. The two of them didn't even attempt to be quiet, as the door was soundproof, and a few minutes later, strains of music floated from the phonograph. “Is that the Orange Tomatoes' Vintage 1912 album released just last year?” Tristan asked. “Yes, oh, yes it is!”
“If you're an obambo, how are you caught up on music?” Emma asked.
“Easy. When you're wandering everywhere, you're bound to pick up some stuff on the music industry. I feel a dance coming on!” Tristan started boogieing, and Emma groaned.
“Please. Do. Not. Dance,” Emma said through gritted teeth as Tristan attempted several of the Orange Tomatoes' famous sequences and botched them completely.
“But it's fun!” he protested. He stopped anyway and sighed. “I think I used to dance when I was alive,” he said, “but I'm not sure. I don't remember much.”
“What do you remember?”
“Well... there was a woman... girl? I dunno... she told me...”
            My goodness, no, Tristan! Don't die on me, you hear? You have to live. LIVE! Please, don't die. If you die, how am I supposed to live with myself? I can't have more people dying for me, so live! Live and let live, that sort of thing! Tristan... Tristan? Tristan... don't die. Please don't die. Tristan...
“She said 'live,'” Tristan finished. “Next thing I know, I'm an obambo. That worked out well, huh? LIVE.”
“I'm sorry.” It sounded awkward, but what else was Emma supposed to say?
           “Yeah, sometimes I'd give anything to remember the rest- who she was, what she was doing, why she even cared, who I was, what I was doing, why I cared... that sort of stuff.”
            Someone chuckled and whispered, “I can help you with that.”

Oleander smiled. “I've always liked sheriffs.”
“I haven't,” Carmen replied. “Some of them are so snobby. Like my ex-boss, for example. Just try negotiating with the sheriff of Dietum on weapon bans- oh.” She stopped. She'd forgotten. All of Dietum was dead, and she knew she shouldn’t talk like that about dead colleagues. Even snobby ones. “Never mind. Um, why have you always liked sheriffs?” She sighed, then snapped, “Frida, don't stop!”
“Sorry,” apologized the shadow, and sprang up from her sitting position. “Onward we go!”
“A sheriff saved Cattallus' life, once,” Oleander answered.
“How noble,” Carmen sniffed. “If only the entire police force was like that. Most of them are in it for the paycheck, not the heroism. If they say they are, it’s the hero worship they want.”
“That sheriff died, and Cattallus was so moved, she said that if she got the chance, she'd become a sheriff. Did Cattallus ever tell you?”
“No,” Carmen replied. “We don't talk much. Oi, Joel, what's the holdup?”
“Arya fainted,” Ayana answered. Joel nodded to concur.
“I'll carry her,” Jess offered. “You know, until she comes to.”
“Thank you, Jess,” Oleander said.
“Are we close, Frida?” Carmen inquired.
“Almost. There's only a turn, and then we've got the side entrance. There should be a guard, but he knows me. He'll let us through.”
“Okay.” Carmen stopped. “I want you to go back, Ayana. Take Arya and wait for me. I'll be there soon.”
“Nope, sorry,” Ayana retorted. “Linius is there, and I still have to give him his dinner- an all-you-can-hurt buffet.”
“Ayana, go back.”
“Why do you care?”
“Ayana, can it and go back.”
Ayana scowled and started into Carmen's eyes, defiant. Carmen stared back, and Ayana understood. “Oh, you want to be the one to avenge Annalise, don't you?”
“Go back.”
          “I can't let you do that! That was my goal.”
“Ayana, this isn't about revenge. It's about fulfilling the wishes of a friend,” Carmen replied. “You'd understand.” Please, Carmen... take care of her for me. You know how I always wanted to start over, have a family... that worked splendidly, didn't it? Would you believe I actually thought I could have one with him? Aha ha! Listen to me, laughing at my own shortcomings. That girl is the closest thing I'll ever have to a daughter. If anything happened to her, I'd never forgive myself. So, Carmen, I implore you... take care of her for me. Carmen shook her head. “Please go back.”
“Fine,” Ayana relented. “Once Arya's safe, I'm coming to help.”
“Go ahead,” Carmen agreed. Better be done quickly, then. “Oleander, you and your servants go too.”
“Why?” Oleander asked. “I'm a Victura. I'm not a weak child. I can handle myself.”
“When I take you to see Cattallus, I'll explain, okay? Just trust me. Please.”
“All right.”
“So you go alone with Frida?” Joel asked. “That's risky for a human.”
“I'm not a human,” Carmen replied, “and yes, it is risky, but I'm willing to chance it. It's something I need to do.”
“You're either stupid or hiding something,” Jess said. “Spill it, human.”
“Are you trying to insult me? I told you, I'm not human. Just... go. Trust me.”
“I trust you,” Oleander consented. “There's something about you that gives me a sense of deja vu... have we met before?”
Carmen smiled. “Perhaps, but I don't recall. Can you all get a move on and go already?”
He nodded. “Jess, Joel, Ayana. We'll retreat for now. Let's go. Hold hands- I know a shortcut.” After following his instructions, Oleander called a word, and they disappeared, seeming as if they sank into the pavement, swallowed hole. The road looked as if it had never been disturbed, and the only trace of them were shadows, walking along the ground with their forms, but with no body. These were not the same shadows as in Dietum, or as Frida. They were attached to a body, but the body was in a different... world? Dimension? They weren't upright, and they weren't able to contact anything on her side.
Carmen watched the shadows for a while, then sighed. “All right. Forward, Frida. Lead on.”
“Right,” Frida nodded. “This way.”
After a couple minutes of walking, Carmen saw the grate that was the entrance to the building. “Malum is ahead?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm.” Carmen knocked and picked something off the ground. She twirled it in her fingers, and frowned. “A feather...?” Her eyes widened. “Meagan!” she cried, and yanked the grate off with sudden force. She dropped into the tunnel and took off running.
“What's up?” Frida asked, sprinting after her.
“There's a kid in there!” Carmen exclaimed. “I thought you said this tunnel was secret!”
“It is!”
“It wasn't guarded?”
“It was. No one could have gotten past without a badge- which I have- but still... he was very capable. Where could he have gone?”
“I think I have a clue,” Carmen said, and stopped. She pointed. “Look there.”
Armor littered the floor, and a motionless form lay face-down. Carmen prodded it with her foot, flipping it over. The guard's face was serene, as if he was sleeping, and a silvery scar was on his cheek. “Was that scar there before?” Carmen asked.
“Um, no.” Frida answered. “Is he dead?”
“Well, no.” Carmen said. “It's strange. His body is cold, he has no pulse, and he's not breathing...”
“He still gives off essence,” Frida whispered. “I don't think dead people can do that. So he's dead, but he gives off essence...”
            Carmen shivered. “This is a message, but I don’t think it’s for us. Let's go. I don't want to stay here.”
“There are two doors ahead,” Frida informed. “Take whichever one you want.”
“Why the choice?”
“Both get you there.”
“In that case...” Carmen grinned. “Left.” Then her smile vanished as she remembered Meagan. It wasn't safe for a child to be running around a villain's base or stronghold. She drew her pistol and rapped on the left door, then opened it.
The room was devoid of life. Several cylinders covered in white cloth were lined along a north wall, and a door was to the south. Carmen strode to the nearest and pulled the tarp off. “What're you hiding, Linius?” she muttered. The tarp fell away, and Carmen smirked. “Bingo.” She looked up, saw the contents, and furrowed her brow. “What the...?”
The cylinder contained a sleeping, curly-haired redhead wearing ancient clothes. “That's mine,” a voice said, and a figure stepped out of the tunnel, her face exactly matching that of the sleeping woman. The only difference was the scar on her cheek.
It matched the guard’s exactly.
“Who are you?” Carmen asked.
“My name is Mariale. That,” she gestured, “is my first body.”
“Is it dead?”
“No, and that's the cruelty of it. It's waiting for me to return, but I never can. It's a waiting vessel for a host who yearns to but cannot come.”
“How'd you get here?”
“Caught a random guard straying from his post in the front, used the River until he spilled, and made my way here,” she shrugged.
“How did you end up with two bodies, or whatever it is?”
“It may sound ridiculous, or impossible.”
“Nothing,” Carmen said, “is impossible.”
“All right then.” Mariale took a deep breath. “About 500 years ago, my husband and I breached the Dream World with the Gate we had created. Although we took the credit, we actually only followed the instructions of a mysterious individual, one with many names. In our language, she is called Ebbony, and that is the name she goes by today. She demanded a toll, a price, for the knowledge she had given us. We were arrogant, and we told her we wouldn't pay. She smiled coldly and told me, 'When the moon covers the sun, you will die- yet you will live.'
“Maybe three years later, our country witnessed a solar eclipse, heralded by a bright flashing in the sky. At the same time, the Entia Nocte sieged our city. I would have died, but at the last moment, I fled to the Gate. Since you cannot take your body into your dreams, I left it behind, but I couldn't cross to the other world. Something had locked the other side, and the one behind me, so I was trapped between the two. In this limbo, the Gate revealed a property I would have had no chance of realizing. It can heal, and it viewed me as wounded. I lay there for 500 years, and it fashioned me a new body for me.” She touched her face. “This one.”
Mariale gestured to the cylinder. “So, technically, I am an artificial being. What alchemists in my time only dreamed of- an actual, counterfeit Victura. Who knows? Maybe the soul is fake too, and the real Mariale died long ago. What an atrocity this existence is! Perhaps I should have died. Perhaps I did. Who's to say?”
Carmen blinked. “Okaay...”
“Did you understand anything I just told you?”
“Most of it. It’s just… strange. You mentioned your husband. Does he know about what happened?”
“No. I didn’t want him to come with me because I knew Malum might have… my body.”
“I think you're the real thing,” Carmen declared.
“Why's that?”
“I don't think a fake can cry over the past of someone they were modeled after.”
Mariale shook her head. “How would you know I cried? I guess so, but the question is, how did it get here? I left my body all the way in Alenn, thousands of miles to the west.”
Carmen frowned. “I don't know. Malum might try to bait you with it. If this body were to be destroyed, would you die?”
“No, but you may be right. He might be trying to do exactly that.”
Carmen sighed and pulled the cover off the second. “Who are you?” she whispered. A sleeping thirteen-year-old with brown hair was there, wearing clothes similar to Mariale’s, and Carmen gave a little cry. “My goodness,” she breathed.
“What is it?”
“That's Cattallus. He has Cattallus.”
Mariale frowned. “Cattallus went through the Gate? But how does that work? Centuries ago, Oleander and I tried to show it to her. She couldn't pass. There’s no way… How...?”
Carmen yanked off the tarp of the third cylinder, hands thoroughly shaking. “This one's empty,” Carmen said.
“That one's for Meagan,” Frida explained. She'd been silent, ruminating on Mariale's story, but now she spoke. “Bella and Requiem, the last needed, are in the center already. These were to be moved. They will be, soon.”
“He has four,” Mariale muttered. “So he needs only two more. Ariana and Esilanna were prime candidates, but one's dead.”
“Meagan. He's using Meagan.”
“That makes no sense!” Mariale exclaimed. “This Gate was built to be used only by Victura. He can't use a valkyrie, a fairy, and an elf-”
“Half-elf,” Carmen added. “She's half Victura. And what exactly does he want to do?”
“Even so, he won't be able to do it,” Mariale said, ignoring Carmen's question.
“Sure he can,” Frida said. “He already has four of the six hearts needed.”
“The last one needs to be still in the Gate,” Mariale murmured. “He wants Meagan to be the one in the Gate?” She turned to Frida. “Surely you realize what a taboo he's about to commit,” she snapped. “He's arrogant to think he can come close to making a Heart- the Gate’s Heart. It has no master, and he’s a fool to think otherwise.”
“That's not true,” Carmen whispered. “That thing has a master. It was created to. That Ebbony... she may have done more than shut you in that thing for five centuries. Somehow, she got control of it.”
“Perhaps.” Mariale frowned. “I have a question for you. Several, actually. How is it that you know Cattallus and Malum? Who are you, exactly?”
Carmen smirked. “The best answers, we find out on our own.”
“I don't accept that as a response.”
“Too bad. I don't really care.”

Dragonlord Stephi : Tried to read this last night but I was sleepy . Anyway this one was a very good story . Shame Meagan lost her sight though . I guess that makes her easy pickins for Malum . And just because I want to be on the same page here ... en IS Cattaluss right ?  Apart from that even though there is not much action in some of these chapters you still manage to draw the readers' attention with twists and turns .. like the loss of sight thing . And that my female Shakespaere is not easy to pull Well done ( Parden my spelling there ) 

Mr. Zed : No, Marian is Mariale. Cattallus is Mariale's sister-in-law and Oleander's sister.

Did I already reveal Catty's identity in this chapter? No, I don't think I did. It's probably really obvious, though.

Sorry . I meant is CARMEN Cattaluss . Am I right ?