Dare To Love A Dragon - Chapter 144

Francis ran around the palace trying to find Alex to warn him of what he had discovered. What had happened to them was somehow related to Arimelari and was hurting. The truth was that the haunted house was messing with their heads.

He moved around but Alex was no where to be found. He could find the rest of the family either but knew they were their with him. Since their were pictures on the wall with them on it.

“There are so many fishes in the sea but if you keep holding on to one that will never love you back. You will only hurt yourself,” he heard from the room that he had just passed.

He had recognised the words, it was one’s that he as Avan had said to the prince. It was crazy how the words sounded familiar to his heart but foreign to his mind.

He turned back and slightly pushed open the door to see the inside of the room.. “It’s easy for you to say. You are Francis, with the king on one hand and me on the other, it is easy to tell me that,” Ander replied to him.

He checked the room for a painting, because the day that he had said that to the king, he was asleep and didn’t respond to him. The room had no painting and there was no him in the room.

The Ander in the room was speaking to him directly. “Why did you walk into my life if you were only going to leave me?” Ander questioned to him.

“Why did you teach me the word love if you were just going to leave in the end?” he went on to ask.

Francis was trying to find what was causing the illusion in the room but the room seemed fine like it was Ander speaking to him. With the knowledge of Ander’s death he was sure that Ander wasn’t in the house with him.

“Loving someone isn’t always about getting loved back. Sometimes it’s just being satisfied with the fact that you loved someone,” he let out.

“Then can I ask for one last hug. I promise that I will stop loving if you give me a hug,” Ander requested.

Francis saw no harm in giving him a hug. He embraced him and held him close to his heart. It felt nice to embrace Ander like that, if only the real one was still alive then he would give him a million hugs.

He opened his eyes and stared ahead only to freeze when the wall was filling up with paintings of real events. There was a painting if him and Ander at the lake. Him and Ander while he was still shattered, the fight they had when he found out how Ander felt of him.

Memories that he had with Ander were forming on the wall. He broke the hug and moved back from shock.

The last painting stopped midway like him hugging Ander was what was painting them.

“Since you forbid me from loving you. I forbid you from remembering me,” Ander said and snapped his fingers. The memories that had slipped out of him to the painting were erased from his mind.

He still recalled who Ander was abd the memories from late in their lives but the memories since Ander was a baby to his birthday were erased from his mind.

Ander vanished from the room leaving him alone wondering what was going on. He glanced at the wall and saw the paintings and thought nothing of it.

“Help,” he heard a scream from outside.

He rushed out to see who it was that was calling for help. He ran to the stairs where Ander laid on the floor clutching his knee that was hurt.

“Ander, how did you get?” he questioned not sure how Ander was standing before him.

“It’s hurts Francis, make it stop,” Ander cried out to him.

Francis ripped his clothes and tied it around Ander’s knee to help him. Memories of every time that he had helped Ander formed as paintings on the wall as he continued to tend to Ander’s knee.

Francis recalled that Ander was dead and moved away from Ander. “You can’t fight it, once you forget me. You will have to forget everyone else in your life,” Ander said and snapped his finger before he vanished.

“I have to protect my memories,” Francis stated and turned around. “Ouch,” he let out when he knocked heads with someone.

“Hey love, where have you been?” Alex asked him.

“Alex,” Francis called out relieved. He embraced Alex into a tight hug, he was trying to figure out what the house was after and why it was after his memories. He opened his eyes, there was a mirror behind them.

The weird part was that he could only see himself and not Alex. It was like Alex wasn’t there at all. Thinking this he pushed Alex away from him.

Alex smirked and broke into an evil laugh that mocked him. “I told you can’t fight me. I will come in every form and I will take what belongs to me,” Alex said.

Francis glanced in the wall ahead and saw paintings of the how he and Alex met to the point of their wedding night. All of which were captured in the paintings.

“Alex please, I can’t forget this,” he pleaded tears forming in his eyes. “I would do anything you want but please not this memories,” he begged.

“I wish I could forget meeting and everyone else but sadly I have to live with my memories. Unlike yours mine are only bad so why should I spare you?” Alex asked him.

His face had become sad, the evil look in his eyes was still there but sadness too.

“You aren’t real,” Francis heard before Alex vanished.

His memories were still with him. “Are you okay?” Annak asked him.

“Get away from me,” he said pushing her away. He wasn’t a fool to fall for another illusion and forget his past.

“It’s me Francis, the real and I’m not an illusion,” she said to him.

“That is exactly what an illusion would say,” he let out angrily.

“We need to find the other. I was with Zorra but she vanished after all her memories went up the wall. I can’t seem to find her,” she explained to him. “We don’t need to touch if it makes you feel better,” she added.

“Do you know what is going on here?” Francis asked her choosing to give her the benefit of the doubt but just in case he would keep an eye on her.

“The place creates illusions to trap us. If you fail to believe the illusion then it comes fit your memories. If you don’t recall what truly happened than you will believe the illusions,” she said to him.

Francis followed behind her, that much he had already figured out.

“Touching the illusions allows it to steal your memories, that and if you give it something of yours. Whatever don’t touch or give anything to anyone you see,” she advised him.

“Where do you think Zorra went to?”

“No idea but when she vanished I heard a monster scream. I don’t know how important that sound is but I have heard the sound three times I’m guessing three more people have already vanished,” she stated to him.

Together they went around the rooms looking for anyone who wasn’t an illusion. They cut the illusions with their swords and they vanished or just believed hard enough that they weren’t real until they vanished.

“Loving you is all I had to live for Avan,” they heard when they entered the throne room of the palace. “You have betrayed me and now I shall leave this life,” they heard.

Ander turned around and looked at them. He smiled them and raised the knife and cut his wrist. He gazed directly into Francis’s eyes as he did so.

“This is an illusion but it feels so real,” Francis uttered looking at Ander. The guilt of his actions that had ruined the boy’s destiny surfaced as he watched blood flow from his cut wrists.

“That’s weird,” Annak noted.

“What is it?” Francis questioned looking away from Ander.

“Ander, he is weird. The blood it feels real,” Annak said.

“It is supposed to, how else is it supposed to fool us if it isn’t?” Francis questioned.

Annak had her suspicions and neared the boy. She raised her sword and used it to poke at Ander. ‘You aren’t real,’ she thought.

The boy still remained there standing staring at Francis like he wanted him to know that he eas responsible for everything.

“If I disappear find a way to save us,” Annak said. Before Francis could ask her what she meant, she dropped her sword and hugged Ander.

She waited for her memories to be taken from her but nothing happened. Ander was unlike all the illusions that they had met. He was interested in her memories or making her suffer. He just stood there watching Francis.

“Ander’s blood,” Annak mentioned to him. “It’s fueling the place,” she added in shock.