Amberley
A kiss. A kiss. My lips still tingled as I made my way back to Evan's room. I planned on getting my belongings and moving them to my new room.

Even though my new room was only across the hall, the distance already felt uncrossable and the nights felt cold. I already missed Evan holding me at night. I wondered what he was doing right now.

My thoughts went back to the kiss. How could he even want to kiss me? How could he even think I'm beautiful? How could someone has great as him want someone like me?

His room came into view and I couldn't help but feel like a new person as I opened the door. This all felt like a dream, opening Clandestine doors, fighting Altru's, kissing blonde boys. I felt that I would open my eyes and I would find myself back at the castle, bruised and broken once again. The thought makes my skin itch.

I opened the door and yelped. Derrick Rose was sitting on my bed, a leather bound journal open in his hands. My fathers journal. I had totally forgotten about that. My stomach knots.

He looked up at me, flicking his greasy, long hair out of his eyes. "Hello Princess, I've stumbled across something interesting. Really interesting."

I glared at him, sending my hate into one look. I still remembered that night in the weapons room or the day at power training when he attacked me. It didn't seemed to bother him though, he only smiled a gross smirk, slapping the book closed.

"Give it back, Derrick," I mustered. My voice was still raw from screaming and crying and other things.

"Mhm, I like it when you say my name!" He taunted.

I stayed silent. Suddenly wishing I could send thoughts into Evans head, not the other way around. He was going to be furious to find this prick in his room, snooping through his things.

"Looking for your little boy toy? Too bad he'll hate you after reading this."

I furrows my brows at that statement. Hate me? For my fathers journal? Evan knows anything my father said or does is not my fault.

"It says in here, that your face, body, skills, mind are all creations of your lovely fathers mind. He performed his little experiments on your mom! Turns out, your not even an Altru! You just have some power that you're father shot in your ass."

My stomach dropped. I surged forward and ripped the journal from his hands. He only chuckled at me, holding his hands up in feigned surrender.

"You don't know what you're talking about!"

He grinned and clapped his hands together. He looked immensely amused. I hated that he looked so accomplished.

"I read it, pretty lady. To bad that face is all fake, to bad everything about you is fake!" He said.

It weirdly made sense. I had always thought I was unnatural. And my father was a scientist wasn't he, why would I doubt he would perform experiments on me and my mother?

I suddenly felt a rushing feeling burst through my body. I felt like my veins were on fire and I was made of darkness. I stumbled against the dresser, trying to catch my breath.

"Is everything catching up to you, pretty lady. Is it... over whelming?" He mocked.

A intense anger surged through me. It wasn't the same as the one at the archery practice or earlier with Evan. This felt wrong.

I screamed. My voice sounded like a sonic blast and acted like a sonic blast. The noise bursts through the room, blowing it to pieces. I was shaking violently as the noise echoed out of me. I couldn't stop it. It was to much.

I fell no my knees. Grasping my chest. I just wanted this to be all over! I didn't want to live. My hands flew and the same air like sound bursted from my fingers, blowing around everything. Whatever was left of the room was destroyed now. The power was singing in my ears.

I heard screams and the rushing of feet. Tears racked down my face in a constant stream. My screams were like the wails of the dead.

"Amberley!" I heard voice call.

I buried my face in my hands, shaking my head. I didn't want to hear Derricks voice, I hated him. I hated him. I hated my father. I hated Clandestine. I hated the Iniquitous and Adana. I hated myself. My screams seemed to collapse like the building and I sagged against myself with a gut wrenching sob.

"No, no, no, no," I repeated, rocking myself back and forth. The repetitions seemed to control the chaos around me. The chaos I had caused.

"Amberley, you're going to be fine, but you need to come with me. It's not safe here," the voice said.

I looked up through tear-soaked lashes and caught sight of Joshua and his kind brown eyes.

"Joshua. Nothing's real. I'm not real," I cry.

He bends down and places a reassuring hand on my arm. I yank away, scared I'm going to hurt him.

"Define real. You're pain is real isn't it? You're powers are real, we all saw them just now. So tell me, if this wasn't real then why would would you be feeling this?"

I bent down, clutching my chest. My fathers whip seemed to be coming down on me all over again. The mean words of the Altrus, the dolls made to look like me being burned at the stake back at the castle. All I felt was an intense burning in my chest. It needed to go away. I couldn't breathe.

"It hurts!" I scream.

Joshua backed away, clearly scared I might unleash my powers again. Just as I made to find a way to end it, something took hold of my mind. It wasn't the same caress of Evan's powers but it felt like iron fist wrapping around my entire being and ripping it from its root.

I remember the pain being ripped away from me with a gasp. I felt absolutely nothing as I drifted into darkness.

♚

I awoke with a start. I jerked up and crawled to my feet. My back was stiff and I realized I had been laying on a mat. A mat just like the ones in Alvar's class.

I saw her on her chair. The one everyone hated because she though it was a throne. I tried to reach for the usually dislike of the old woman but grasped into nothingness.

"You'll go back to hating me in a second, Princess, don't worry. Derrick only took away you're feelings temporarily," she explained.

I felt nothing as she said the words. I looked around and found Derrick slouching in a corner. He looked horrible, like pebbles had pelted him a hundred miles per hour from every direction. His whole body was bloodied.

"Look at me, girl," Alvar said. As if I was a good little solider, my head snapped her way. She seemed to be in thought as she took me in.

"Derrick is going to let go. You're going to feel so much. Too much. You need to release it. Release your power, Amberley, let it be free and you'll be free."

Suddenly, everything seemed to collide with me like the butt of the sword being slammed into my chest.

I dropped to the floor and clutched my chest. The pain from earlier was back in full force. Word thrown at me from my past seemed to be played on repeat, giving me no relief.

"No," I gasped. "Take it back!"

Alvar only shook her head and gestured to the padded room. "Be free!"

Power seemed to burst from every pore in my body. Every scar, every tear, every sadness seemed to create this constant stream of pure power. Like air, but you couldn't see it.

I screamed and another blast rocketed from me. Everything was blown to bits, just like Evan's room. The power flooded out of me until I no longer cared about my father's fist, I didn't care if Evan liked who I was, I didn't care if anyone liked me. I was free.

The power seemed to turn off as if it had a switch. I gasped as the room came into focus. Everything in it seemed to have disintegrated into debris. Dust and other particles floated around the room. The reinforced walls and ceiling and been maintained though.

I sucked in a breath. My fingers tingled and I turned them up in front of my face. I admired them for a second before a thought came over me. I turned to a nearest object.

The rock climbing wall seemed unaffected. That made me angry. I threw my hands at the wall and the same substance burst from my hands, blowing a crater-sized hole into the wall.

I laughed giddily. I spun around and felt lighter somehow. I felt powerful. Who knew four weeks down in Clandestine would make Amberley Da Ville powerful.

I tried to blast something else but it only sputtered from my hands. I suddenly felt insanely tired and drained. I remember smiling as I collapsed.

~

I am small. I look down at myself and I instantly recognize what body I'm inhabiting. My own... except fifteen years ago.

My four year old body is walking along a canal of water. The murky water is in full force now... one misstep and I'll be whisked under the current and gone forever.

I feel a immature panic grip me and my small body turned on its own accord. My eyes fell on a little boy around my age. Sterling Valentino... I could tell my his lions mane.

"Are you scared, little girl?" The little boy taunts.

My mouth scoffs as my feet walk agilely across a wood beam that marks where the side of canal is.

"I think your the scared one, lion boy!"

A gust of wind blew and caught the skirts of my dress. I stubble slightly and my foot closest to the side hung in midair for a second before I regained my balance.

"What's happens if I fall? Will you miss me?"

The little boy feet pitter-patter behind me. "No!"

My feelings are hurt now. "What do you mean, no? We're friends!"

"I'm not friends with girls who are dumb enough to fall into a canal and die!"

The little version of me understood his response in her young mind. "And what if I died in a sword fight... what if I was killed by a mighty villain while protecting you... would you miss me then?"

"I suppose I would miss you then but only because that story has me in it!"

The little me scoffs and jumps onto the land besides the canal. I turn to the the boy with my hands on my hips.

"Say you'll miss me, Sterling! Or I'll never play with you again!"

The boy jumps off too and mocks my position. "If I miss you, that means you'll be gone and you'll never be gone."

"Why not?"

"Because you're my best friend and mommy says best friends never leave!"

"And what if I do leave? Will you miss me?"

"Yes! I'll miss you!"

The little girl knew she won and went to give the boy a kiss on the cheek. "I'd miss you too, if you ever fell into the canal or got stabbed."

"I'm too strong for that! I'll never die," he answers.

The little me narrows her eyes at the boy. "Who ever gets to the castle last, dies first!"

My body turned towards the direction of the castle and set off into a sprint. The sound of my feet pounded in my ears as I ran. The boy hollered from behind me and soon he had passed me.

"Hey!" But my foot had caught on a branch and I fell onto the grass beneath me.

The little boy turned and stopped his pursuit of victory. "Are you okay?" He yelled.

"No!"

The little boy glanced at the castle with longing before coming to crouch besides my little body and help me up.

"You could have won!" My mouth says.

The little boy shrugs and picks a piece of grass from my black hair. "Best friends never leave."