Dreamwalker's Bride - Chapter 447

Chapter 447: Feelings
Trace squinted in the direction Sapphira pointed, to the direct left of the front gate. Through the trunks, there was a strange sound, almost like metal.

“Do you see him?” Trace whispered, glancing at the woman by his side. She shook her head, but seemed insistent.

The pair moved in that direction, with Trace drawing on his military training to move from tree trunk to tree trunk without being seen. Sapphira tried to mimic his movements behind him, catching on to his hand signals about when to be still and when to move.

Shortly, her suggestion was proven correct.

Trace’s face hardened.

Denholm was using his knife as a makeshift spade, digging at the earth around a seedling.

The metal sounds were his blade scraping against the golden tendrils of roots.

Trace saw red.

Running from his hiding place, he tackled Denholm, knocking the knife from his hand and pinning him to the ground.

Ruthlessly, he began to pummel the man with his fists.

“After all this??” He demanded. “After weeks and weeks of saving the world from destruction, you go and do the SAME THING that caused it all in the first place??”

“Stop!” Denholm whimpered, one eye already beginning to swell closed. “Please, stop! I just wanted… he didn’t miss it last time, he won’t miss it this time. It’s just a baby tree! You can’t let humanity be without magic, can you?”

“Don’t even pretend this is about humanity,” Sapphira stepped forward, but hesitated a short distance away. “This is your selfishness.”

“No, no, I’ve changed!” Denholm’s lower lip quivered slightly. “Trace, how hard have I been working alongside you? Would I ruin that all now, just for myself?”

“Without a thought,” Trace said, although a strange sort of softness entered his tone. Denholm was pathetic, deserving of pity, wasn’t he?

Without a father, without family, and with such a cruel one to begin with, had he really had a fair chance at life?

“You’ve judged me harshly, just like everyone else,” Denholm swallowed, looking away. “I can’t blame you a bit, I’m sure I deserve every bit of it, but now, when I’m trying to assure humanity isn’t left without magic for the next several centuries… if you don’t pity me, at least pity them!”

Trace did. A lot. Magic had done a lot of good for the kingdom, and his family in particular. Nostalgia filled him when he thought about Daniel’s bedtime stories being projected into the air, and the warmth of family time spent together after Grandpa had the insects help tend the crops quickly.

“How many people will die without the doctor to help them?” Denholm looked longingly at the little half-excavated seedling. “Why, even that little tree will probably die without enough space, look how close to its mother it is! The roots will surely strangle it…”

“The poor little tree,” Sapphira sighed. “Even if we don’t let him take it, Trace, we should move it to a better spot…”

“What? No,” Trace shook his head. “What are you doing?”

Quickly, he conjured a gag to choke off Denholm’s words.

But the feelings, the strong sense of longing remained. Intensified. Distaste for death roiled in his gut when he thought about ending Denholm here and now.

It seemed that the man’s power of throwing physical sensations such as heat, cold, and electricity at people had transformed into affecting their actual emotions, even influencing the thoughts behind the emotions.

That would have been helpful for the wights to tell Trace!

They seemed to know people’s powers, and they couldn’t let that little hint about Denholm loose in any of the few dozen words they’d said??

He tried to feel angry, but it escaped him for the moment. All anger escaped him. He felt a desire for peace, for mercy.

And yet, the feelings weren’t his.

“Trace,” Sapphira sniffled behind him. “I want… I feel like I want to let him go.”

“That feeling is a lie,” Trace stared Denholm down with a dark expression.

“I know, I know that, but…” The Princess choked on her words, “I can’t bear the thought of him dying, or his magic being taken.”

“CMMDIT” Denholm choked the strangled words out around the gag in his mouth. Trace tightened it despite the surge of pity that rose in his belly.

“Princess, you are being manipulated right now,” Trace warned. “Do not try to command me to do anything that I know is against your nature, or I will be forced to disobey.”

“I hate being manipulated… don’t I?” Her voice grew uncertain. “I’m fairly sure I do, but I can’t feel it right now…”

“I was there,” Trace said. “You do hate being manipulated, but right now, your feelings are not your own. You must ignore them.”

Trace hoped the Princess was up to the task. Trace had been in war. Emotion was often a liability there, and needed to be turned off for a time to keep going. Runaway, uncontrolled emotion was a quick way to die.

Sapphira, on the other hand, had grown up rather spoiled. Fits of temper were how she got attention and gained her way around the castle for most of her upbringing.

Trace had observed her growing more mature and reserved over time, but that wild, untamed girl was probably just under the surface, and a flood of emotion was bound to bring her to bear.

“But it’s so… you have to let him go, it’s so sad,” Sapphira fell to her knees, tears pouring down her face. “It’s so sad.”

“I’m not going to do that,” Trace fought against the rising tide of despair rising through his middle. It was enough to make him nauseated. This wasn’t helping anything. He needed to kill Denholm now, before more went wrong. Before he was overwhelmed and unable to resist the feelings any more.

Trace manifested vines from the ground, wrapping tightly around Denholm’s middle, holding him in place while Trace retrieved the discarded knife.

“Stop that, or I have to end you now,” He warned Denholm.

“You can’t!” Sapphira cried, “You can’t kill him!”

She jumped between the two men, red-faced and terrified, as a small smile crept onto Denholm’s face.