Wow guys, it has been a long time! :D But Falling to Rise is back! Now that LOST is done, I have more time to write and plan the next book, along with the behind the scenes stuff for LOST.

Drawing link: http://catthedrawer.deviantart.com/art/Mitch-Ref-Falling-to-Rise-577836433?ga_submit_new=10%253A1450041766

I like this chapter a lot, I can't explain why, but I just like the way I wrote it, I hope you all enjoy! :D

~~~~~

Falling to Rise

Chapter 10

"Unless we base our sense of identity upon the truth of who we are, it is impossible to attain true happiness"

~~~~~

Traversing through the streets of Duhita was very, very interesting. First off, Seto was not used to people coming up to them and greeting Adam with a bow of some sorts. To be honest, the attention made it a lot harder to get to their destination.

It was already midday of the day after Seto's hectic encounter with Jerome and his near death experience, and he was beginning to feel like they would never reach the castle.

"What is the matter with all these humans!" Jerome hissed under the shadow of his cloak that concealed his body and his identity. Of course his hands were bound, but not one person seemed to pay him or Seto any mind. "They flock one person as if he were their beloved king, but he doesn't even come from this kingdom." He scoffed.

"He's just a nice guy..." Seto muttered.

"Welcome Prince Adam, we did not expect you to be visiting our prince so soon after the last meeting," a man donning the brilliance of a hand-crafted chestplate and leather padding on his knees and elbows.

Adam laughed, "This is an unexpected time to come by, but it is urgent that I get to the castle quickly."

"Of course," the man bowed, "Citizens, please make way for the friend of our prince and those that accompany him."

Like taking a breath of fresh air, Seto felt relieved to no longer have people surround him, or more of, surrounding Adam and in turn it overlaps to surround him. With a sense of urgency the man in armor lead them through the not so dense part of the forest towards the center of the capital.

~~~~~

Seto would've liked to enjoy the kingdom a lot more if he wasn't so nervous as it is. He always thought the prospect of travelling to be a wonderful idea, since travelling would be the best way to learn information regarding the cultures of different kingdoms. He's been fascinated with history since he was young, and always hoped to be a teacher after his time in the Emedo Army.

Seto, Jerome, Adam and Ian stood in front of the large gates of the Duhitan castle. Standing taller than any structure in Keuta, Seto was amazed at the overbearing size of the castle and was almost too taken aback to notice Adam and Ian being lead in. Of course Jerome, still bound by his wrists kicked Seto lightly in the ankle. Unfortunately it was the same ankle Jerome had bitten yesterday, so Seto couldn't help but gasp and stumbled at the slight pain. But he got the message and stopped looking at the castle and rushed to follow the other two.

Adam took a breath and whistled as he looked around the inside of the castle, the large arching ceilings, the lavishly handpainted designs on the walls in gold colored paint, the many paintings donning the wall of whom were probably the members of the royal family over the many, many years they have existed. "Sure has felt like a long time since I've been here."

Seto couldn't get over how wonderfully designed the whole place was, it was starting to make him wonder, how his family's castle might've looked like if his family still owned it. But the idea of having to sit through getting a painting would probably be exhausting.

"The prince is just through these doors, I apologize, you may have to wait, while I inform him he has guests." The armored man informed them while respectfully bowing.

"Of course, don't worry, we won't mind waiting." Adam waved off the man's concern, he nodded and walked through the large wooden doors and closed them behind him.

The four of them were left in an unsettling silence. Jerome leaned against the wall, it was hard to tell if he was looking at anything, Seto shifted uncomfortably as he looked from left to right, Adam and Ian talked quietly amongst each other.

"He isn't as cooperative as you think he is, if only you could see, he's only working towards what will benefit him." Ian muttered and turned away from Adam when the two giant doors were opened.

"The prince will see you now," the man bowed and let them pass, he halted Adam and whispered in his ear. Adam glanced behind him, and laughed.

"His name is Jerome, it won't be necessary to take him to any dungeon, he's with us." Adam affirmed, the man frowned but nodded as the four of them walked through.

They were no doubt in the throne room. It was by far the largest room Seto had ever seen, at the very far back of the room was a raised floor with steps leading to it. On top of the raised floor sat a single astonishingly beautiful chair--no throne. A throne for a king.

Someone was already sitting in the chair, a man who looked extremely accomplished as his position made him appear very relaxed as he rested his head calmly in his hands that sat on the armrest of the chair. A crown made of finely spun thread with a single red jewel hanging from it rested on his slightly messy hair.

"Adam!" he yelled exuberantly, he sat up from the way he'd previously been lounging.

"Mitch!" Adam yelled back, and walked much faster towards the back of the room where Mitch as Adam called him stood up from the throne and walked to Adam also. The clothing he wore was very unfamiliar, much like Ty's odd version of a scarf, it look like the prince wore something similar to a dress, tightly bond with a special kind of band, and buttoned at the top with odd straps. The clothing took on an appearance as some sort of clothing specially designed for combat. A large amulet, very similar to Adam's, hung around the prince's neck, but instead of a purple jewel, a red jewel was in the center instead.

Seto felt the rope in his hands being tugged, he looked back to see Jerome had stopped walking.

"I don't care if you kill me, I'm not taking another step closer towards him."

"Him? Do you mean the prince?"

"Of course! Who else would I be talking about?" He hissed at Seto incredulously.

Seto glanced over at Adam, who was energetically hugging the prince of Duhita, he caught Ian watching him and Jerome carefully before turning away towards Adam.

"I'm sure they wouldn't mind if we waited back here, I wouldn't be very good at negotiating anyway." Seto half-joked hoping to bring up Jerome's grumpy mood. He got no answer, instead Jerome sat on the ground in silence. "Ok..." he sighed but stayed standing.

~~~~~

"It's so good to see you, when I heard you were visiting out of the blue, I was overly glad," The prince of Duhita said, then added as a whisper, "it's much better than sitting here waiting for something to happen."

Adam laughed joyfully. The prince took a step away from the light-hearted environment and turned back to sit in the throne, "I can imagine you aren't here just for a visit."

The mood turned from joy to serious in a matter of seconds, Adam stopped laughing and cleared his throat, "Yes, well, you're right... Recently, we were attacked at the army base--"

"Attacked? By what?" The prince leaned in a bit out of curiosity.

"Well, we're not entirely sure, some of my captains believe it was a sorcerer who transformed into a morvic, and the other's say it's a morvic with the ability of magic."

"And you want my assistance in eliminating it?"

Jerome's fur bristled under his clothes, not that it could be seen under the layers of clothing he wore. "No, actually, what we want, is your help with detaining him, we believe the man inside of him can still be reached, and we hope to save him from actions he may regret."

The prince nodded in thought, Seto was left fidgeting as he waited for an answer, Adam had said that everything would be fine, so he had nothing to worry about, right?

"No." The prince said at last, "I can't help you, my father has fallen ill and my mother has been tending to his illness as of late. Which leaves me here to stand in as king until he's recovered, as much as I would love to help, I simply can't at this moment."

"I told you he wouldn't help," Ian said into Adam's ear.

Adam held up his hand, "Leave this to me."

"I understand that this must be a trying time for you, and I send my condolences to your father, we would only need your help for a small amount of time."

The prince who sat atop the throne heaved a heavy sigh, "It's great to see you again Adam, however, I've done lots to help you in the past, and I have yet to await the fulfillment of one request that I've asked."

"I've been away from my home for a long time, and my father is a busy man, I still have yet to propose the idea of an alliance between our two kingdoms, but you know I would never break a promise." Adam stressed, pleading to Mitch respectfully.

He nodded, but his expression remained apologetic, "I won't help, I'm sorry." He waved his hands to a few guards, "I imagine you all must be tired from your journey, and it would be rude of me if I didn't let you rest up. My guards will escort you to a few spare rooms, dinner is at sunset if you'd care to join."

"Thank you," Adam said and walked towards Seto and Jerome as the guards opened the large wooden doors. The small group filed out of the throne room and followed after a pair of silent guards.

"You should've listened to me Adam, this was a waste of time, it would've been easier to just deal with the problem ourselves, instead of traveling here."

"Stop worrying Ian, I know Mitch will help us."

"So what do we do now?" Seto spoke up.

"Let me go," Jerome snorted.

"Not a chance." Ian said back, "We could always just hand you over if we need to, you might be a good bargaining chip," he sneered.

"No! We can't do that," Seto pleaded, that would be a horrible thing to do.

The guards halted, opening the door to a fully furnished room with a large canopy bed, each corner of the bed had a hand carved, wooden posts with a large canopy draped over and secured by the bedposts.

"This will be the young sir's room." One guard gestured to Seto.

"Thank you."

As Seto made his way to the room the guard stopped him, "Oh no sir, it wouldn't do to have that dog in there with you."

"Huh?" Seto noticed the guard gesturing for Seto to hand over the rope in his hands, he'd almost didn't realize that Jerome would have to follow him into the room. And while it would be nerve-racking to have him in the same room, he'd imagine it be worse for Jerome if he handed the rope over to the guard, "O-Oh no, i-it's fine. There's no need to worry."

Seto attempted to head into the room, but the guard continued to stop him, "We insist, a friend of our prince's friend shouldn't have such a thing in the same room as them."

Seto didn't know what to do, he looked back at Jerome, then at Adam, "It's fine, our friend here is just keeping an eye on him, he's...uh..."

"Trainer." Ian said flatly, finishing Adam's sentence, "He needs to keep the morvic by his side in order to ensure good behavior."

"I'm not a--" Ian kicked Jerome in the back of the leg, silencing him immediately.

"See what I mean."

"Right..." The guard nodded and stepped aside, letting Seto and Jerome into the room. The door was shut behind them moments after.

Seto sighed in relief and sunk to the floor, glad that he didn't have to deal with that. The room remained in silence for a few minutes, Seto never realizing he'd let go of the rope.

Seto heard a clatter, he looked up to see Jerome had climbed the large wooden wardrobe at the far back of the room. A chair was knocked down.

Seto stood up, he glanced at the door cautiously, hoping that no one had heard the noise. Then he whispered loudly, straining his voice to be only noticeable by Jerome, "What are you doing!"

"You have to come down immediately before someone sees you!" Seto panicked. Seto watched as Jerome sat on top of the wardrobe and laid back to rest, his legs forming a crossed position. He had a large apple in his hand, big and red, he took a bite from it and immediately spat it out in disgust.

Without looking up to Seto who watched the whole bizarre scene, he hopped down and landed on all fours. Then stood up and patted himself down, the apple still in his hand. He walked over to Seto, who hadn't moved from his shocked stance.

Jerome placed the apple on the nearby desk and left it there, then out of the blue he said, "Why'd you let me stay in this room with you. You could've just let them take me to some dungeon and been done with me."

Seto snapped out of his trance, "What?"

"Why'd you let me stay in this room?"

Well, to be honest, Seto didn't really know himself, just like he didn't really know why he saved Jerome in the first place. It really was just a nagging feeling in the back of his mind, "I don't really know, it's going to sound silly..."

Seto trailed off, he noticed Jerome waiting for him to continue, he sighed and said, "but something in the back of my mind just wanted me to make sure the guards didn't take you, like something bad would happen if I did."

Jerome didn't say anything, "You know, it was kind of stupid to let me in the same room as you, alone."

Seto wasn't expecting an answer like that, "Huh?"

"I mean..." he trailed off and held his paws up and glanced at them, then at Seto, "It's a lot easier to escape ropes, when your captor is no longer holding them, and you are a sh*tty fighter too."

Seto looked at Jerome, what an idiot he was! He wasn't paying attention! He--he--what was he going to do!

"Calm down," he sighed, "It's not like I can go anywhere without a weapon, and... you did save my life and other things... so...." he trailed off.

Seto didn't understand what he was trying to say, he calmed down a bit to laugh. A small and quiet laugh, but a laugh nonetheless.

"W-Why are y-you laughing at me!" he stammered, clearly embarrassed at the fact Seto was laughing at him.

"To be honest...I...don't know..." Seto had to take frequent pauses in between his speech to let the laughs come out.

Jerome started to fume, crossing his arms as he made angry faces at Seto, which only made him laugh louder. In fact, the whole situation was just to silly to Seto, was Jerome trying to thank him? Not that he was saying that it was impossible for him to do so, however, it just didn't seem likely, given the personality Jerome had previously been expressing.

"I'll just leave!" he said, he made his way to the door, hissing under his breath "I knew it, just like a human, always ridiculing us morvics." Just as he made his way to the door, a series of knocks echoed from the other side of the door. This silenced Seto immediately and halted Jerome's movement.

"Hey Seto," it was Adam, "It's sundown, meaning there's dinner in the great hall, would you like to join?"

At first neither Jerome nor Seto made a move, Jerome looked at Seto warily, clearly expecting for Seto to call out for help or something, "U-uh," Seto glanced at Jerome, then hesitantly said, "N-no, I um... would rather eat dinner um... here."

"You sure?"

"Y-yeah..."

"Ok..." Seto thought Adam left and both he and Jerome seemed to relax. Suddenly the door was pushed open, Seto held his breath as Jerome balanced dangerously on his toes and kept himself from falling backwards, he stayed silent as Adam's head peeked into the room. Jerome was hidden far enough behind the door, so Adam didn't see him.

"Hey, where's Jerome?"

"In the wardrobe!" Seto said all too quickly.

Adam looked at Seto funny, "Is he sick?"

"No, uh, just uh...I'm hungry, do you think you could send someone over with food soon?" Seto laughed nervously as he rubbed the back of his head, his eyes glanced every so often at Jerome.

"Oh! Right! Sorry, you just seemed a little odd so I thought something was wrong, but of course, anything in mind?" He laughed.

"No, just anything," Seto made his way quickly to the door and started to close it, "S-sorry Adam, I just need a little peace, t-that's all."

"O-oh ok," Adam's voice was drowned out by the closing of the door, Seto heaved a heavy sigh and closed his eyes. He took deep breaths to try and calm his pumping heart, right now, everything just seemed to crazy. Why was he getting so worked up, why did he stick up for Jerome, why did he shut Adam out? Oh how he wished he could make sense of the jumbled thoughts in his brain, but nothing made sense right now. Everything was not as it should be, he should be terrified that Jerome was no longer tied down, Jerome did try to kill him, but he felt more comfortable than fearful.

"Why do you keep doing that?" Jerome said after a while of silence.

"Keep doing what..." Seto murmured absentmindedly.

"Sticking up for me. You're the human pet, you let them walk all over you, yet you're helping me; I'm their enemy pretty much."

Seto stayed silent, Jerome took a seat on the ground in front of Seto. Seto looked up at Jerome, he looked into his peering animals eyes. Jerome leaned in and sniffed him, startled, Seto sat back.

"It's hard to get over that you aren't human, or at least not fully. If you had been human, I'd sooner be dead than stay in the same room as you!" Jerome laughed lightheartedly, and though Jerome seemed to be somewhat pleased, that last statement only dampened Seto's mood.

It was only because Seto was not human that Jerome could like him, but it was because he was not human that people wanted him dead.

"I'm... I'm human." Jerome stopped laughing and looked at him funny.

He took another sniff at him, "No, you're definitely not, I should've caught the difference earlier, but you are definitely not human."

"Of course I am! I-I have been my whole life! Always!" Seto yelled.

"I get the feeling you hate being known as a non-human." He shrugged, "Though I think it is stupid, you did save my fur many times, so the least I can do is shut up about it. Just one thing though, eventually you'll have to acknowledge that you aren't and never have been human."

Before Seto could say another word a knock came from the door, "Sir, Prince Adam sent me to deliver a meal to your room. I shall place it outside your door, sorry for the disturbance."

Seto got up without another word and opened the door enough to bring in a tray. He closed the door with his foot and sat back on the floor in front of Jerome. The rich smells of the food almost swept Seto off his feet, but he wasn't hungry, not anymore.

He saw but one thing he grabbed before pushing the tray towards Jerome who happily began to dig in, ignoring the cloth napkin and silverware and all forms of grains and vegetables.

A cookie. A single cookie, warm and soft in his hand, it was definitely fresh. He missed his mother, right now, she would always know what to say to him to make him feel better.

He wished he could see her right now.

~~~~~

Tell me what you guys think? This was kind of a long chapter and somethings are going to happen next chapter. 

Don't forget, I love to hear your theories and other things.

AND

If you are interested enter in my 100 followers contest, deadling is January 1st! :D

~WrittenDarkness