Chapter 55: Hidden Truth!!

**Nora’s POV**

The brightness spread like a fog over my vision as soon as I lifted my eyelids. I tried to move, but my body was trembling and debilitated from an aching pain engulfing my core to the bone. I gasped wimpishly as I tried to move my hands; I couldn’t because they were handcuffed on the backside.

Shit!

The events of the past few hours started emerging as a photographic film at the back of my mind. Damn! I am fucked up in the worst possible way.

A gush of relief bound my body as I felt a familiar touch and warmth of Meghan.

“Meghan!” I said weakly.

“Nora! Are you okay? She asked, touching my forehead as if checking my temperature. I nodded with my glassy eyes flooded with tears.

“No, I am not. What did I do? Fuck! I don’t understand. It was not me. Something came over and fogged my senses. I tried to kill Rorik!” I kept bumbling the last sentence again and again, “I tried to kill Rorik! I tried to kill Rorik!” almost panting myself.

“Nora, please try to be calm,” Meghan placed her hand on my shoulder to appease me, wiping my tears. I saw Liam’s worrisome eyes gaping at me, “Liam”, I mumbled as he battled his eyelids, giving me an assuring look.

“We trust you,” he said, showcasing concern in his eyes as well as voice.

“How come you guys are here?” I asked, scrutinizing the room of the royal palace.

“They came to our dwelling and smacked everything in our rooms upside down, trying to search for something. Few of your things are in their possession,” Meghan said, trying to sound normal, but I knew she was as scared as me, maybe more, because I am more shocked than scared.

“Why search my things?” I was pretty puzzled.

“Don’t know, they just came and did their work like robots and brought us here as well.”

“I am so sorry; you both are facing so many problems because of me. I am the one who dragged you here,” I cried, cursing myself for their misfortunes.

“Nora, please, we are friends, and that’s what friends are for, always helping each other”, Meghan responded, cupping my face as two royal guards entered the room and beckoned me towards the passage. I suppose they are taking me before the council. Meghan and Liam steadily followed me.

I was summoned to a large hall with already few people waiting with their vulture eyes prying on me. The first two persons my eyes subconsciously fell on were Ronin and Rorik. They both stared at me as if I was shitting Ghouls. I glanced a quick look at Rorik and scanned the damage. I thought he would be hating me now, but all I could see was a worry for me in his moist eyes. He was sitting on a chair as his leg was hurt, whereas Ronin stood beside him, almost close to hyperventilating. Their expressions were dismayed and troubled, with their eyes booming with thousands of questions. Ronin even tried to come towards me, but Rorik held his hand, gesturing him not as if warning him of dire circumstances.

Then there was their father, Valor and Svil, who seethed the emotions of pity and sympathy. My eyes got the load of Sypha, as expected; she was hiding a devious smile beyond her shady face. I swear I was so tempted to hurl my middle finger at her and punch on her evil face, but my hands were tied, but still, I gave her a cruel half-smirk.

The next two faces ogling at me were full of rage and spite; their eyes were breathing fire, swallowing me whole in flames and burning me to bones. If looks could kill, I would be dead over hundred times now.

The one was their mom, and the other was an unknown face, but I can vouch by the looks, constant changing of skin flakes and camouflage of dark blue eyes to black that he was none other than their uncle- the sixth single-headed Orynx.

His rugged, handsome face proudly flaunted his life as a warrior, yet, there was a sadness in his eyes, like a heartbroken person, one who was devoid of love. He reminded me of Ronin when I saw him first at the Lost Soul’s grove. There was a tale of loneliness and cravings for true love behind those ruthless eyes. His eyes spoke a thousand words of his solitary life. If I am not wrong, the moment he saw me, I could feel an array of emotions fogging his eyes, as if he would melt and turn into putty, but the very next moment, he composed himself, and his demeanour changed.

The expressions on his face now confirmed that he was the one going to interrogate and decide my sentence. I could sense him struggling with his serpent form to take over. Something about me was getting him high on his nerves, and believe me; it was not anger. I feel blood-bound to him as well, the way I feel for Ronin and Ornith.

“How do you know Dasan?” His husky voice reverberated through the hall so that everyone could hear clearly.

“Who Dasan?” I mumbled, looking down to avoid his intense gaze on me. He came near me, lifted my chin and lowered his face, looking into my eyes and whispered, “Look in my eyes and answer”. I was intimidated by his sudden closeness, and I bet he came near me to sniff me. I nodded and lifted my head.

“Your memory seems dull; no worries, let me remind you. Dasan is a warlock, an acquaintance of Rebekah, working with ghouls. All of them are enemies of the Kingdom of Westfall, and you let Dasan escape an important nemesis,” he sneered at me.

“I don’t know him”, I mumbled, looking at Ronin, but his eyes seemed helpless.

“Why did you help him flee then?” his voice echoed through the hall as he growled.

“I don’t know. Something happened to me that I cannot explain, something I cannot understand. It was not intentional,” I muttered, trying to look around to avoid his heated gaze.

“Okay, I know what is happening to you as I recently learned some of your mind-blowing talents”, Their uncle sneered before continuing, “Ronin, come here!”

As Ronin came to him, he held Ronin’s hand and commanded, “Ronin! Tell everyone of her extra-ordinary gifts.”

Ronin seemed confused as he looked back and forth towards his uncle and me as he started to speak. This is the first time I saw Ronin getting scared; I have witnessed worry in his eyes for me, but not fear.

“Serpent’s curse doesn’t work on her; She is having the visions and dreams of Ornith; She found the book of Ozarius and portal to Azra”, Ronin enounced, lowering his head helplessly, when I pierced my heated gaze on him.

“Son, you missed something”, his uncle snapped.

“Uh…She is a witch and pregnant with my babies”. As these words muttered by his mouth reached everyone, the commotion rose among the council. They started giving each-other shocking glances, and murmuring echoed through the walls of the hall.

His uncle slapped Ronin with such an intensity that he almost lost his balance and could barely contain his feet. I gasped in shock.

“This is for the mortal mistake done by you. I feel so defeated that all the efforts to train you go in vain. Now I will tell you all the missing bits of information which your dull mind can’t seem to decipher or your hunger for her compelled you to neglect,” He groaned across the hall, taking out a flask of liquid in his other hand.

Shit! The potion of Immolation.

I began to cringe and started to recoil back, struggling to get free from the grip holding me as I didn’t want to go through the burning pain if he decided to pour that damn thing on me.

“Please don’t, I mean no harm”, I mumbled, but he ignored me.

“You know all her gifts, or you can say red flags, and all of them point in only one direction, and yet you decide to chill about it. Not even care to share them with me. If not for your mom, then our whole kingdom would have been doomed,” His uncle snapped at Ronin.

“I don’t understand why this thing even matters. We love each other, and she means no threat despite being a witch. I was a bit amazed at first that my curse didn’t work on her, but that can be due to her being a witch,” Ronin tried to clarify.

“This is where this woman made a fool of you”, his uncle growled, pointing at me.

“You know what, your mom is a witch as well, and this curse works on her”, his uncle spoke.

All the gazes went towards their mom, who seemed indifferent as if someone had complimented her. I know it; she was a damn witch. So, this is true that one witch can sense the others.

“This curse works on all the witches except for one-” His uncle growled as he moved towards me and poured half of that liquid on me as I writhed in pain; my body started burning and rumbling in shock as if different energy or form was overtaking me. My veins started turning black as my lips parted involuntarily, blabbering some gibberish in a pattern as if chanting a spell. My vision turned ultraviolet. A rancid vapour emasculated from my body as my nails truffled into the well-developed black claws with an inhumane strength breaking the chain of handcuffs. The joints of my feet shuffled, pointing my toes backwards. I rose from the floor, and all the people I saw were just the blaze of energy and aura. Green means harmless, whereas red means to kill.

I saw my hideous appearance in the reflection of the mirror opposite me.

My eyes suddenly simmered with the spite of thousands of stars as I pinned my eyes on the red aura of both the serpents ahead of me and my wheezy voice rose higher as I continued my chant.

“Her blood is the main ingredient to make Ornith serpent. The keeper of this curse. The lover and murderer of Ornith. The one and only-

Rebekah!!

She is Rebekah!

From the Land of Azra!!” His uncle roared and moved forward to spill the remaining liquid on me.

**Somewhere in the tunnel below Aragon mountains**

Dasan was trying to hold on to the blood by putting pressure on his shoulder while tying a piece of rag on it. But all that pain didn’t matter to him as his heart was overwhelmed with hope. He took out the small portrait which always held a place in his pocket while the person in the picture has the place in his heart, “I knew you will come back to take your vengeance, to kill all those lecherous races of serpents, dooming them to hell for eternity. Welcome back-Rebekah”.