The Otherside: Alice: Tough Decisions (Book 6)

After that night Trey kept his distance from me. He was there, but he kept conversation to the bare minimum. It was painful having him there but out of touch. He would train with us, but he would not give much insight, or his normal banter.

“Ace, can you give me a moment with Trey. We need to talk.”

“Are you sure?” Ace responded scared. We were having a sparring Saturday. It has been a few months after Homecoming.

“Did I stutter? I need to get something off my chest.”

Trey looked not amused. “Okay, if you need me call me.” Ace said while opening a portal.

I did a singular wave his way and as soon as he left Trey began to talk. “We have nothing to talk about.”

“Who are you to decide that?” I asked walking closer to him.

“Because I said all I needed that night.”

“Then why are you still around?! It’s torture knowing you love me, but won’t be with me.” I yelled right when I noticed we were being ambushed. “Shit.” I said as six people came out from the trees. Trey pushed me behind him. I stepped beside him.

“Stay behind me.” He said as he pushed me back behind him.

“I am not fragile.”

“Yes, you are. Let’s be honest, without your Goldeneyes you would not stand a chance against me and you sure as hell don’t stand a chance against your mother.” I shook my head in anger. I stepped around him again shifted my arms into blades ran at them. Trey grabbed a sword from a portal and ran with me. “Wait up! Don’t be reckless on my account!” I ignored him and began attacking as fast as I could. I had mastered a better control of my demon. She was talking and begging of course, but I learned over the months how to get her to not take over.

I kept slashing and slashing, but they all kept blocking. Three took on Trey, while the other three decided to go for me. I was trying to keep up with three guys, but in the end I dropped the ball and it ended up with a psychic grabbing me by the neck and throwing me against a tree. My arms shifted back to normal. Before I could react, I felt another blow to the stomach by one of the other two. I fell forward winded. The next blow was a kick to my back making me lay on the ground. I felt the ground for a moment to see the positions the enemy was at. Only two of them were standing on the ground. I moved vines out of the ground to capture them before another blow could hit me. I was trying to make the psychic come down to get me. As I began to get up from the ground the psychic levitated me into the tree and levitated towards me, and then put magic inhibiting chains on my wrists. My vines suddenly vanished from the other two as the psychic dropped me to the ground.

I looked over to Trey to see he had just finished his three and was coming this way. One of the two that I had in the vines grabbed me by the ponytail and dragged me over to where the possible fight would break out.

“Let her go.”

“This does not concern you.” The psychic responded.

“No, it does because what I was going to say before you guys rudely interrupted us was, I promised to support this girl. I promised to protect her until the end of the war.”

The other guy that was held by the vines not holding me by my ponytail punched me in the stomach. The other kept me from falling forward. I was in so much pain but I refused to cry out.

“Just walk away and she will have a less painful time before her death.”

Trey nodded and began to walk away. My eyes began to well up in that moment. My hope was lost; the man I loved just walked away. The guy holding my ponytail, let go, opened a portal and said “Let’s go and take her to her mother.”

The other two nodded. The wizard pulled me up by the chain between my wrists and we all went through We were in the throne room, and my mom was on the throne. She was shocked for a moment, but then she clapped and smiled. “Good job.” She grabbed a package on the table next to the throne and tossed it to them. “Now, can I please have some privacy with my daughter.” They bowed their heads and left.

After they left she walked closer to me and inspected me. “You have grown a lot stronger. I can feel it radiating from you.” I was speechless and trembling. She laughed at me. “You are so stupid! They warned you and everything, but you still doubted it was me? I sent you away to give you and your sad self a fair chance!” she was laughing at me hysterically.

I shook my head about to break down in tears. “So you really killed Dad?”

Her laughter stopped. “Yes and it was so easy to blame it on your Aunt and Uncle.”

“Why did you kill him? Why are you trying to kill me?” I asked feeling betrayed.

“Killing your father was an accident; he just got in the way. Now you.. you are destined to kill me. To be honest you are so pathetically weak, I have no clue why or even how Loveless predicted a little weak piece of shit would kill me.” She walked behind me and pushed me to my knees. “If you weren’t so weak you would be able to defeat me.” tears began to fall, and she began to laugh at it.

Right then a guard came rushing in. “Queen! There is a disturbance in the garden.”

“Then take care of it! I am busy.”

“But he is extremely strong. He took out ten guys at once.”

She shook her head in disappointment. “Why do I even have you dumbasses if you can’t do anything without my help!” She turned back to me and held my chin up to her. “I’ll be back.” she said with anger in her voice. She then pushed me back.

After she left another portal opened up in here. It was Trey, he came for me. He grabbed me and opened a portal to my room and he took me with him. He magically took off the cuffs.

“Why?” I asked with tears streaming down my face. He pulled me into his chest.

“Because it is life.”

“Why would she do this? Why did you save me after turning your back on me?”

“I cannot speak for your mother’s actions, but as for me... I didn’t turn my back on you, you not only needed to see the truth from your mother, but I had a good plan of getting you out. I needed to get help.”

“You risked my mother killing me?” tears were still falling into his chest.

“I knew she would want to talk to you first. Besides I knew I could count on my wizard-shifter pair back home to help. I am a general in this rebellion, I have other people relying on me in this war.”

I shook my head in his chest. “Why are you protecting me for a short time? Why not stay with me after this war? Do you only care about this war?”

He grabbed my chin and pulled my head up to look at him. “No, its because, like you said, it is torture to be around you. I want to get you to where you can be safe and then let you move on from me. You are too good for me.”

“But what if I don’t want to move on? It doesn’t have to be this hard!”

Trey wiped my tear and then kissed me softly on my lips. “It is for the best.” He pushed me to sit on my bed and patted my head. “You are better without me.” he said as he began to walk away.

“I am better with you.” I said as I got up and grabbed his arm.

He silently pulled his arm out of my grasp and continued walking. Before he could open the door, I pushed him to the side and against the wall. “Listen to me!”

He pushed me off with ease. “No, listen to me. Get yourself stronger, you will need to to take on your mom.” He opened the door and walked out.

“I still have a choice you know!” I yelled out into the hall after him, even though I was defeated.

I let him walk away after he ignored my comment. I shut my door and sat on my bed. I reflected on all I had just found out. What was I going to do?

A lot of thoughts ran through my head that night. I didn’t know what to make of my situation with Trey so I did my best to try and let it go. Out of all the things he said, only one I knew for sure was right. I needed to get stronger; whether I was going to fight my mom or choose to stay here. If I was going to stay here, I would need to be strong enough to protect myself.

Sunday morning I did just that. I ventured down into the basement at six in the morning and began weight training. After a couple hours of that I took a jog around our neighborhood a couple times. I kept this routine up, and did it in the evenings instead on school days. Every couple of days or so I would up the weight and amount of laps.

Trey kept even more distance from me since that night. Now it was only Ace training with me on Saturdays. I was feeling frustrated and sad about Trey’s reaction. It was frustrating that he said he loved me and yet he pushed me away. The more he pushed me away the more it hurt. The pain of rejection from the one I love is torturous.