Two Thousand Years
Page 29
Chaos immediately exploded around them.
Reylor’s intense magic overpowered the Annals, tearing the book asunder in a blast of flame and fury. Each fiery fragment engulfed the library where it landed, and soon the tomes and their cases were up in smoke.
The pain in Treyan’s back hurt like nothing he felt before. It was as though he was numb or paralyzed from the pain. He could barely see through the stars and smoke, but he heard a woman exclaim through the commotion.
“My Lord, we must go!”
“I told you to leave!” he heard his brother exclaim as he walked in Treyan’s direction.
“It’s a good thing I didn’t, apparently,” she retorted smugly.
“Enough. Where is the child?”
Lexan. He was still here.
Bracing his arms to hold his weight, Treyan put all his might into getting up, but was capsized by a boot grinding into his fresh wound, crumpling him to the ground.
“I wouldn’t do that, brother,” Reylor sneered from above.
Treyan screamed as the torment ran through his body, and Reylor stepped firmer upon his back.
“Though killing you now would be too easy.”
“My lord!” the woman again screamed as the ceiling began to give way, falling around them in a fiery mass of plaster and glass.
Reylor rolled away from the rubble, leaving Treyan to suffer the onslaught alone. Debris filled the air amid the smoke, creating a dark cloud that quickly covered the library.
“If only I had the time to say goodbye to your wife.” Reylor’s taunt was cut short as another collapse of the library’s infrastructure trapped Treyan within the blazing inferno.
It was the smell of burning that made Alex the most nervous, and the look of concern the Councillor gave told her there wasn't much time remaining. Her eyes glanced to the door of her room, and already the hallways nearby were filling with smoke.
“Empress.”
Alex looked between the Councillor and the sleeping Princess in her arms. How her daughter could sleep at a time like this, she had no idea. Perhaps it was for the best—the less she was subjected to the better.
Her fears were confirmed upon another tremor shaking her walls, accompanied by the sound of a collapsing structure. She would have run for the door, yelling for Treyan, if the Councillor hadn't grabbed her arm to save her from damning her and her daughter to certain death.
“Empress—Alexstrayna—enough! It is time to leave! You must consider your well- being, at least for your daughter's sake!”
“What about my son?" she snapped. “What about Treyan? They are still out there.”
“Treyan will see to it that Prince Lexan is brought back to us, but there will not be a place to come back to if we do not escape now.”
Another rumble and bits of the ceiling began to fall in on them as they shrugged away at the onslaught.
“You have my word, once you and the Princess are safe from the palace, I will do all in my power to search them out and return them to you.”
Another explosion.
“Empress, please,” the Councillor pleaded.
Enough was enough and she nodded reluctantly. She grabbed the satchel Treyan readied for them and stood with the Councillor near the fireplace while the he prepared the Key. In a moment it erupted into a swirl of blue flames, ready for her departure.
“You promise to send Treyan to us? And continue the search for Lexan until we return?”
“As soon as—”
He was cut off by another explosion, rupturing the beams of the ceiling, causing the structure to collapse around them. Alex was thrown back by the impact, protecting Sara with her body while she was flung to the floor. She lost sight of her bearings as she attempted to dodge debris, wood and plaster, but soon the magic of the Key called to her like a beacon in the night. She crawled her way to the portal, giving one final glance behind her, but the Councillor was nowhere to be seen in the mess.
She was about to call out to him when another explosion within the room itself unceremoniously threw her and Sarayna into the welcoming vortex of the Key, giving Alex little choice but to leave her husband, her son, and her Empire behind.
52
Alex awoke to Sarayna crying within her arms. They were sprawled on a hard floor with debris from the world they left behind surrounding them. Regaining her senses, she angled her head towards the fireplace, but within was empty and quiet.
The Key had closed behind them.
Alex sat up, comforting her daughter as she looked at her new surroundings. The dying sunlight created shadows across the floor, but she knew this place, and she knew it well.
She was back at her apartment in Boston.
She stood as best as she could as she balanced an infant in her arms, and walked to the nearby bay window while brushing the dust from her clothes. The once-familiar sun was setting over the city skyline she knew so well from so long ago.
So, this was their escape plan.
Her head snapped back to the fireplace, remembering Treyan was supposed to follow her. She rushed back to the fireplace to see if there was something—anything—remaining of the Key that would give her the sliver of hope that he would return to them.
She saw nothing. The fireplace was bare. She had to keep herself from scraping her nails against the masonry, as Treyan once warned her against so long ago. But before she was consumed with grief, she heard a ringing in the distance.
Searching for the source, she found her purse on the floor exactly as she left it on the night she left. Her phone, still holding a battery charge after all this time, rang from within.
With one hand she picked up the purse and rifled through it to retrieve her phone as the ring tone carried on.
It was Crystal.
“Hello? Crystal?”
“Alex? Oh my god, are you okay?”
“I'm…I'm fine...what's going on?”
“You tell me! I've been trying to get in touch with you all day! After you called me when you got home from the bar last night, and haven’t answered your phone since, I've been worried sick...”
“...the bar last night?” Alex blinked at the empty fireplace, trying to connect the dots.
“Umm, yeah? Remember? We went out for your birthday, and I found that guy with the ponytail, and you called me to tell me about your apartment...”
Alex had stopped listening and needed to sit down quickly. She found a chair in her kitchen, at her own breakfast table—everything as she remembered when she left it. She must have heard her friend incorrectly. After all that happened, and everything that transpired, it had only been a day's time?
“Alex? Hello? Is that a baby I hear?”
“I'm here...I'm here. Actually, Crystal, I need you to come over.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah,” she confirmed, looking down at Sarayna. “There's something I need to talk to you about...”
“Good, I’m right down the street anyway. Not to mention, I love gossip. Is it—” but Crystal was cut off by the sound of something breaking within Alex's living room.
“Just come over here. Now.”
She hung up the phone without waiting for a response, focused more on the commotion in her apartment than anything. Had Reylor followed her back? He had once said he had Keys in place...
She crept along the wall towards the living room entrance, keeping her ears open for the intruder. She had been in this position before, but this time she would not be taken unawares. Reaching across the kitchen counter top, she grabbed a knife from the butcher's block. Her only regret was having Sara in her arms, but she wasn't about to let her out of her sight, and there was nowhere she could put her that would be safe enough for a baby while Mommy fought off the bad guy.
Shifting her baby to her left side, she led with the knife in her right hand towards the living room, ready for anything that might jump out at her. Peering around the corner, she initially saw nothing out of place. Everything was as it should hav
e been.
All seemed well until a figure wrapped in a black robe began crawling across the floor.
“Alex?” a low, harsh voice called out to her.
She screamed and ran from the room, back into the kitchen to protect her newborn from the prowler. She crouched by the apartment's door with her knife in hand, ready for a fight. Whoever—whatever—it was, she heard the figure begin to shuffle in her direction, and she raised the knife higher.
With a moan, the hooded figure shuffled towards her, and she used his own momentum against him as she lunged, elbowing the intruder in the temple, stunning him to the point where he let her go as he crumpled to the ground. Taking advantage of her freedom, she ran through the kitchen door back into the living room, the knife still in her hand while Sarayna was cradled in the other.
“Alex?”
This was a different voice coming from the kitchen—a familiar female voice that raised Alex’s panic.
“Crystal, be careful,” she warned, but her friend’s screams had Alex running back into the kitchen.
Crystal's eyes were wide as she looked between the weapon and the baby. “Alex, what are you doing?”
“Crystal, it's not safe here anymore. We have to go.”
Looking around her towards the figure on the floor, Crystal turned white. "Alex, what the hell is he doing here?”
“Who?”
Turning around, Alex followed Crystal's gaze.
On the kitchen floor between them, the robed figure's hood had fallen off in the shuffle, and Treyan, Crown Prince of the Empire, lay unconscious on the floor of Alex's apartment.
53
The end of September remained unseasonably warm as Alex pushed the stroller through Boston’s Public Gardens. She left Crystal alone with Treyan, who hadn’t woken up since they moved him from the kitchen floor to Alex’s bed. She said he had a fever and would do what she could to bring it down, but the wound on his back was refusing to heal, and that was what caused the most concern.
She immediately offered to bring him to her hospital, but Alex refused. He wasn’t of this world and the last thing she needed were more questions about who he was and where he came from.
She was deflecting enough from Crystal as it was.
Glancing up, the sun had made its way around another cloud, peppering the walk with shadows through the leaves. It still surprised her, seeing only one sun in the sky, as if two were all she had ever known- as if this life was nothing more than a fantasy, and the Empire was where she truly belonged.
Maybe it was.
The most she could glean about the differences in time was that where it had only been a day within the Otherrealm was almost a year within the Empire. Crystal never received the note Alex sent, which made her heart ache with both sorrow and relief.
It also meant her parents’ may not have received their letter either.
And if they did, a part of Alex would be grateful for it.
The less they knew, the better. She’d have to leave again, sooner than later.
They still had a son to retrieve.
A Betrayer whose life needed to end.
Time was running against them.
A year and a day.
The longer they took to return, the older Lexan would grow. How much of his life would she miss while he was within Reylor’s possession?
And Treyan…
If anything happened to Treyan, Reylor would find himself wishing she was never brought to the Empire.
That same unending rage over what he had done coursed through her, and her hands gripped the stroller tight, the whites of her knuckles showing through her skin as she looked down at the sleeping baby before her.
Sarayna.
Crown Princess to the Empire.
Never before had a Princess been born to the Queen Empress and Crown Prince.
The twins were Princes. Every time.
Part of her knew this was Reylor’s doing. Whether he planned it or not, Sarayna was a part of his curse.
Which made Alex want to protect her so much more.
In that, she was torn.
Remain in the Otherrealm, try to live a normal life, or return to the Empire where she knew Sarayna’s presence would threaten her very existence.
It was a difficult decision, and one she couldn’t make on her own.
She needed Treyan.
She needed him to wake up.
Together they needed to decide.
Because it was their Empire. And their family.
Their vengeance the moment time, the Annals, and the Prophecy allowed.
Acknowledgments
I don’t even know where to start without making this sound like an acceptance speech.
First and foremost, I would like to thank Shayne, Chantal and the rest of the amazing people at The Parliament House for believing in me enough to want to help me in my journey to sharing my story with the world. And to Amber, Sarah, and Candace for always being there to deal with this author’s anxiety and answer my questions about a process I knew nothing about. And to Nicole for being the most amazing editor this writer could ask for- you showed me potential I didn’t even know existed and helped open my eyes about my characters in ways I didn’t even know.
To Sarah, one of my closest, oldest and dearest friends, for the years we spent playing pretend in far way worlds with fantasy princes and evil brothers. For with you this all truly began, though neither of us knew it at the time. You helped my creativity come to light, and whether you wanted to be or not, you were, indeed, my first beta reader and critique partner. You made me realize it was okay to want to write about worlds that didn’t exist and getting lost within in those stories was sometimes a better way to cope and heal during those crazy teenage years. So, thank you for all of that, from the bottom of my heart.
To JR, for painstakingly reading my drafts over and over and over again. For being my sounding board, my editor, my beta reader and my critique partner without even asking. Your feedback was some of the most crucial input I’ve received, and I know, for certain, that the Empire wouldn’t be standing as it is today without you.
To Wattpad, for giving this writer her fifteen minutes of fame. To Wattpad HQ for reading my story and believing it good enough to consider making it a Watty Award winner. To Lisa for convincing me to post my story on Wattpad in the first place, all those years ago, after one naysayer was going to convince me to never write again. To MSZame, Meg, May, Gabe, Ashu, Jamie, Stacey, Kristin, Kelly Anne, and so many others who have supported me in this writing journey—just being able to talk with you daily, knowing that you’re there and you know what I’m going through not only as a writer, but as a person who loves to write- that means more than I could ever say. Without you—any of you—I never would have considered my work publication worthy, and I would have lost my motivation to keep pursuing this dream a long time ago.
To the wonderful people behind NaNoWriMo, without whom I’d never get a novel draft completed, even to this day. And to Chris and Nicole for meeting up with me at our local Panera every Sunday in November to make me accountable in getting my word counts done.
To my amazing husband, Chris, for his continued patience and support. For putting up with my late nights and distracted weekends while I struggled with getting words down and edits completed. I love you and appreciate you so much more than these words can ever convey.
To my daughter, Samantha—if I can teach you nothing else during these impressionable years, I hope you learn to live by example in seeing that anything is possible if you want it enough. Dreams can come true.
To Mom, Dad and Jenn for being the best family this author could ask for.
And to you, my readers. For giving my story a chance. For adding it to your reading lists, for spreading the word. For recommending it to your friends, for your reviews, for your kind words and your honesty. Thank you to each and every one of you, for through you, the Empire truly does exist.
Thank you, thank you, and on
ce more, thank you…
About the Author
M. Dalto is a fiction author of adventurous romantic fantasy and her debut novel, Two Thousand Years, won one of Wattpad's Watty Awards in 2016. She continues to volunteer her time as an Ambassador, where she hopes to engage and inspire new writers. She spends her days as a full-time residential real estate paralegal, using her evenings to pursue her literary agenda. When she’s not writing, she enjoys reading fantasy novels, playing video games, and drinking coffee. She currently lives in Massachusetts with her husband, their daughter, and their corgi named Loki.
https://authormdalto.wordpress.com
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