X X I I I

                                    

                                          

ANDORRA COULDN'T breathe.
	At first, she didn't do much about that fact; she instead laid on her back and let her senses come back to her, slowly. First, she felt the ground beneath her, sturdy and hard. And not at all cold, like she would have expected. Then, she let herself take in any sounds around her, which at first was nothing but cotton in her ears. And then, as if the sound was slowly leaking in, she could hear yelling.
	Not the sort of yelling that made you jump up in fright and begin to run away. It was more a frustrated yelling, the kind that came from aggravation over something perhaps not going your way.
	And then, the smell of burning hit her nose. Sulfur was in the air, and her nose twitched uncomfortably at the scent of it. When she turned her head to try and dispel the lingering smell, her face met something cold.
	Her eyes popped open. And she came eye to eye with another person.
	She sucked in a gasp - her first breath in that short span of time, which ordinarily should have killed her, but did not - and she sat up.
	Alarm filled her chest, but the person put a finger to their lips. They didn't sit up like she had. They continued to lay there, still and silent, like they had done this before. Perhaps they had. 
	Andorra took a good look at the person before her. She was a young adult, perhaps the same age as Andorra herself, and she looked similar enough that she could be classified as a summer fae. Shorter blonde hair, tannish skin, brown eyes. She was unnervingly similar to Andorra herself.
	Another shout, another yell, and Andorra's eyes slid across the space they were in to find the source. The expanse of lawn they laid in was bare, nothing of notice around them. She couldn't pinpoint where they were in Anlithamy, if they were even still in Anlithamy. 
	There was a person a few feet away. The one doing the screaming. She was stomping, punching the air, looking like she was fighting an invisible opponent.
	"If you lay down, she won't see you."
	Andorra laid back down, her heart thumping in her chest a little erratically. "Who is she?"
	"The Prophet says she is who we both become."
	Andorra's eyes popped open again, her gaze meeting the milky blue of the sky above. A chill worked its way down her spine. "Who are you?"
	The girl offered a timid smile. No, not timid - tired. "My name is Maia."
	Andorra laid very still right then, her heart stuttering in her chest, her breath frozen on her lips. Wherever she was, she knew immediately that she was inside of her mind. And beside her was the same girl who started it all.
	When Andorra looked at her again, she saw the essence of a girl who was nothing more than ordinary. The type of girl Andorra could see wanting power, wanting friends, wanting a life to live. Something other than the bare scraps of being bullied.
	But, not yet. She didn't look particularly fond of any sort of power trip laying there. She looked normal and at ease.
	"So that is the Rabium Bellua?"
	Maia didn't bother looking over at the other girl. "She's who we become. The Prophet says we're similar, you and me. If we lay here, she'll leave us alone."
	Andorra wanted to lay there. She wanted to stay hidden. But, that wasn't what she was sent here to do, wasn't what she had to do.
	"I can't. I have to defeat her, for the both of us. I have to get back to Anlithamy."