Junkland (The Hoarding Book 1)

by Patrick Johns

  He stumbled back into the room and fell on his bed. He reached over to his nightstand and picked up the necklace. He twirled the gem around in his fingers, thinking of Lily. He placed the necklace back on his nightstand and his eyes were caught by something else: the diary. He reached over again and picked it up.

  Drunken anger filled his body. The diary was the reason Elyara was dead. If they didn’t get this stupid job from Riago…if they hadn’t woken up earlier than everyone else had…

  He yelled and threw the diary across the room. It landed with a thump by the door.

  Miller cocked his head up at the sudden noise.

  Jahrys laid back, staring at the ceiling. He let his head roll to the side, facing the door. He found himself looking at the diary again. It was open to a random page. Something on the page caught his attention. Was he imagining it? He rubbed his eyes to be sure.

  Jahrys raised his head to get a better look. The page had writing on it, and it was legible. Jahrys jumped out of bed and walked over to the diary. Riago must have missed this page, he thought, as he picked it up and brought it over to his desk across from his bed. He lit a candle, laid the diary down, and began to read.

  Chapter 20

  Alana

  THE SPACE AROUND her was dark, tight, and cramped. She could barely see her hands in front of her as she crawled. Clouds of dust surrounded her. Her throat was scratchy, making it hard to breathe. She stopped every couple of minutes to let out a cough, trying to clear her lungs. No matter how many times she crawled through the tunnels, she never got used to it.

  She had discovered the secret passageway when she was ten years old. It had been a tough time for her. It was shortly after her mother’s death, after they had burned her body. Her father had permanently shut the Eastern Gate and limited access to the Western Gate. He had stopped her sword lessons with Sir Mazo Dapher and told her she was to remain inside the Castle Keep—that was what had sent her over the edge.

  Alana had been furious and had pouted all day inside her room after her father had told her the news. There was a painting on a bookshelf of her, her mother, and her father, all happy and smiling. She had let out a scream and ran over to the bookcase clumsily. She was going to destroy that painting of her broken family. In her fury, she had tripped over her rug. Her body had gone flying forward towards the bookcase. She had thrown out her arms in desperation to protect her fall and the bookcase caught her. For a second she thought it was going to topple over, but there was a loud click and the bookcase moved.

  Alana had regained herself, taking her weight off of it. She had watched the bookcase swing away from the wall, revealing a small door behind it, just big enough for a person to crawl through. That was how she had discovered the first of many secret passageways.

  She had spent most of that year exploring parts of the castle she had never been to before. Alana had kept track of all the secret passageways, mapping them out in the back of her diary. It gave her freedom to roam wherever she wanted without having Mother Claraine and her handmaids following her around. When they thought she was by herself in her room, she was really out exploring Astenpoole.

  She found it marvelous that no one else knew about the secret passageways except for her. The only conclusion she could think of was that King Alas Danor had built the secret passageways back when he had constructed his plans for the castle. He must have been a secretive man, and the secrets must have died with him. Alana would have thanked him if he were still alive today. She was able to use them as she pleased—except for the one now boarded up in her room.

  When her father’s men had found her outside the castle wall the night of the Hoarding, her father had been furious. She had never seen him so angry before. In his fury, he ordered his men to strip every inch of her room until they found something. Eventually, they found the secret passageway behind her bookcase. They had boarded it up so she could no longer leave without permission.

  But that didn’t stop her. There was another secret passageway a few floors below her room in the library.

  Alana would never leave the castle again; it was too dangerous and her father checked up on her too frequently. However, she did use the passageway to continue her sword lessons with Sir Benjamin in Riverside. She also used it to check the Retrieval Stations to see if her job had been fulfilled.

  That was where she was going now. It was a month before the Coming of Zalus and the castle was already busy planning and setting up for the sacred holiday. Alana thought this would be a perfect opportunity to check if anyone had found her diary without anyone noticing her disappearance.

  She had been so foolish, dropping her diary three years ago. She had been planning to tell Jahrys the truth that night. She didn’t want to keep it from him, he deserved to know. She had brought her diary with her as proof that she really was the princess and not Lily Bellsworth from the Manor. But it had slipped from her pocket when Jahrys pushed her away from the falling debris of the building during the Hoarding.

  As each day passed, Alana feared more and more for Jahrys’s life and for the lives of his friends. Who knew if they were still out there, but she had hope. She had to have hope. What else did she have to live for?

  Every month Alana would crawl through the tunnels in the Castle Keep, out to the abandoned house a few streets away from Pooles Road, and down towards the Western Gate—where the Retrieval Stations were located. She had to be discrete about it. No one could know she was putting out a job. If anyone found out she was looking for a diary, all of Astenpoole would be out looking for it. And if it fell into the wrong hands…

  Alana didn’t want to think about that scenario. It couldn’t fall into the wrong hands. She had to get it back. The diary she wrote was putting her life, her father’s life, and the lives of everyone inside the castle at risk.

  If the Hoarders found it, they could easily discover how to enter the castle. Alana had mapped out everything.

  It was roughly a two-hour trip to get to the Retrieval Stations from her tower inside the Castle Keep. So she had to move fast. The tunnel wasn’t smooth. Her knees were starting to sting from scraping the stone beneath her. But she kept crawling, her hands moving along the cold surface as she twisted and turned through the tight tunnels. She had them memorized at this point. She could do it with her eyes closed, but it was so dark, it was like they were closed anyway.

  Mice occasionally skittered over her hands and brushed her legs. She felt their little paws and bodies against her skin and shuttered. She never made a sound, however. She didn’t want anyone to hear her through the walls.

  She was still crawling out of the Castle Keep when a sudden noise through the wall made her stop. Her sudden halt made the dust in the tunnel rise. A deep voice echoed around her in the tunnel. She held her breath, afraid to make any noise. She felt a little scratch in her throat that she had to hold. She listened closely.

  “When she assigns the job to the boy, he will die,” a voice said.

  Die? Who will die? thought Alana as she placed her head closer against the hard wall. She didn’t recognize the voice, but it sounded like a man.

  “But will he find it? You are sure he will find it?” it was a woman’s voice, but Alana couldn’t make out who it was. The voices were muffled through the wall.

  “I am sure of it,” the deep voice assured her.

  “We have waited too long already. We cannot afford to waste any more time.” The woman sounded anxious.

  “Yes, my love. You’ll soon have him. And then we’ll have what we need and we can be together again.”

  Dust crept into Alana’s throat. She didn’t realize she was breathing so heavily. She tried to hold it in, but she didn’t think she could contain her cough. She turned her head and tried to muffle her cough inside her arm.

  “Did you hear that?” the woman sounded alarmed.

  “Stay here. I’ll go have a look,” the man with the deep voice said.

  Alana froze. She was too scared to move. H
er heart was pounding in her chest. It was beating so loud she thought they would hear it through the wall. Sweat was rolling down her brow and her arms were shaking uncontrollably. Her body felt as if it weighed twice as much as it usually did.

  She waited for the footsteps, for the door to open and slam, but all she heard was silence. She decided to keep moving. She needed to see if someone found her diary. Who were those people and who were they talking about? Who is going to die? She wondered as she crawled.

  After what felt like hours, the tight passageway opened up, and Alana was able to rise to her feet. She found the ladder and climbed to the top. Her hands searched the wall, looking for the switch. She found it and pushed it inwards. There was a click and the door swung open. She stepped up onto the floor and dusted herself off. She finally arrived at the abandoned house two blocks from Pooles Road. She closed the door behind her and swung the painting that was covering it back towards the wall until it popped back into place. The painting was dusty, but Alana loved it. It was a painting of a beautiful sunset falling behind the Western Mountains, a sight that hadn’t been seen since the Hoarding.

  Alana put her hood up and crept her way outside into the chilly night. She made sure to stay away from Pooles Road. She didn’t want to be seen as she walked through twists and turns, towards the Western Gate. Houses lined the streets with balconies hanging over her. She was reminded of that night sailing up the river with Jahrys.

  She took a path that led her just north of the Western Gate. She did not want to be seen by one of Sir Krist or Sir Martellus’s men on the wall. They had been heavily managing the castle walls since the Hoarding.

  She walked up the steps to a wooden door. It creaked as she pulled it open and walked inside. She entered a large room that had been built inside the wall. She noticed a foul smell in the air as she weaved through pieces of paper lying on the floor. There was an overweight man passed out on the couch in the corner to her right, his stomach hanging out past his shirt. She walked past him and passed two desks that were covered in stacks of papers and folders. Alana had to constantly kick pieces of paper off of her shoes that had glued themselves to the bottom.

  Past the two desks was a hallway that branched off to the left and right, following the length of the wall. She took the left hallway, passing a bunch of tiny rooms with people either reading under a candle light, or leaning far back in their chairs, snoring loudly. No one seemed to pay her any attention. She kept walking until she found the man she was looking for.

  She entered the room. She rolled her eyes when she saw him with his head flat on his desk, snoring. She walked over to him, shaking him lightly.

  “Riago? Psst. Riago? Wake up.” She finally gave him a hard slap on the head.

  “What? What’s this?” Riago’s head spun left and right as he tried to get a hold of reality.

  “It’s me. It’s Alana.” She smiled at him as she pulled her hood back to reveal her face. She must have looked disgusting after crawling inside those dusty tunnels. She probably looked like a ghost.

  “Ah, Princess. You startled old Riago,” he ran a hand over his balding head. “I thought you might be one of those Hoarding things from the Junkland.” He wiped drool from his mouth. “What can old Riago do for my fair lady at this hour of the night?”

  “You know I can’t come here during the day,” she reminded him. “Any luck on my job from last month?” she asked anxiously.

  “Job? What job?” he was still trying to wake up. He poured himself a cup of coffee. “Would you like some?” Riago offered a cup to her.

  “No thanks,” she declined, feeling agitated from his poor memory. “The job I’ve been giving you every month for almost three years now, Riago,” she put a hand on her hip.

  “Oh! Right, that job.” Riago rubbed his bald head again.

  His excitement was too much for Alana. “So did someone find it?”

  “No. Sorry Princess…not this time.” Riago took a sip from his cup. “Ah!” he spit the coffee back into his cup and placed it aside on his desk. “By Zalus, that’s hot.”

  Alana let out a long breath of disappointment, watching the steam rise to the ceiling. “Ah, well I thought I’d come visit you with another request.” She reached down to her bag that hung from her right shoulder to her left hip. She pulled out a folder.

  “Here it is again,” she said, handing it to Riago.

  “Ah, yes, another request. You really want this book, huh?” Riago began to straighten up. “Do you have another payment for Riago?” Riago smiled innocently.

  “Yes,” she fumbled around her bag again for the coin. “I’ll give you another hundred pooles for the hassle, plus another fifty pooles for you to keep your mouth shut, and the reward for the job will be anonymous. Just tell them they’ll be paid highly if it’s brought back.” She handed him the coin.

  Riago leaned back in his chair and looked at it. “Ah, my sweet princess, surely you can afford to give good old Riago a little more for the hassle. It’s not easy offering out the same job with no outcome. It looks bad on Riago. I’ve a reputation to keep.”

  Alana grabbed another hundred poole coin from her bag. “How does another hundred pooles sound?” She held out the extra coin to him.

  Riago stared at it greedily. “Ah my sweet princess, that will make Riago a very happy man.” He reached out for the money, but Alana pulled it away.

  “Now Riago. I need you to give this job out to trustful Retrievers. Give it to a team you know will get this job done.” She hoped she made herself clear.

  “As you command, my princess. Riago will do his best.” He sounded serious.

  “Thank you.” Alana handed him the money. “I will check back one month from now.”

  “Goodbye sweet princess. Riago will get on this first thing in the morning.”

  Alana saw him lean back in his chair and begin to snore again. What kind of man am I trusting?

  She left the Retrieval Stations and walked down the wooden steps. As she was walking back towards the path, a shiver went down her spine. Someone is behind me. She turned, but no one was there. Only the empty steps she had just descended. She was about to turn back around when her eyes caught something black sitting on the entrance sign of the stations. It was a crow, and it was staring directly at her.

  Chapter 21

  Jahrys

  HE STUFFED THE diary into his bag: the one Lily had dropped before she disappeared three years ago. Or is it Princess Alana. Jahrys didn’t know what to think anymore. Why did she lie to me? Why didn’t she tell me she was the princess? Jahrys shook his head in disbelief. By Zalus, I kissed the princess…

  Jahrys’s head had been spinning in circles since he had finished reading the legible pages of the diary. The truth about Lily, along with the drinks he had earlier, made Jahrys very confused. She was going to tell me that night. She was going to tell me she was the princess. The legible pages also told Jahrys how her father had her trapped inside the castle. She was a prisoner inside the Castle Keep. That’s why she ran that night when the horn blew. She must have been afraid of being caught outside.

  He was packing his bag now, forgetting sleep.

  “She’s alive, Mill!” Jahrys couldn’t control his excitement. Miller scurried around in happy circles around Jahrys’s legs. “By Zalus, she’s alive!”

  He knew it had been Alana requesting the job from Riago. It all made sense now. He was going to take up this new job and get into the castle. He would save Alana from her imprisonment.

  But the problem was…where to find the wine?

  Jahrys had an idea. He could check the cellar outside his house to see if there was any wine still there that the Retrievers hadn’t recovered yet. If not, his father had always talked about a secret storage he kept inside their home. He had to go back and look, maybe he could find it? He was afraid, though; he hadn’t been back since his parents died. Would his house even still be standing?

  Jahrys added a few more things to his bag: b
read, some berries, a new waterskin, and the necklace. He walked to the door and Miller followed.

  He quietly walked downstairs, not wanting to wake anyone up. The place was still a mess. Bottles were scattered sporadically on the floor, along with crumbs, pieces of clothing, and puddles of beer. Old Lan was still passed out in between the tables, snoring. The entire place reeked of alcohol.

  There was no sign of the old lady. ‘Bring the bottle of wine back to The Arcalane, a day from this hour,’ the old lady had said. Jahrys had less than a day to find his father’s wine before his chance to enter the castle was gone.

  Jahrys almost slipped on a puddle of beer as he walked around the bar to the back room. He unhooked a suit and pushed his legs through. He pulled the suit up his body, sliding his hands through the armholes until his fingers reached the tips of the gloves at the end. He snapped a Captor Pack to his back and the suit lit up. He then attached the tube to a charged Captor. Jahrys finished with his helmet. He tried to hold his bag on one shoulder, but his Captor Pack made it slide off.

  “You need help with that?”

  Jahrys turned around, alarmed. He didn’t notice anyone enter the room.

  It was Kevrin. He walked over and grabbed Jahrys’s bag from his shoulder. He then unhooked a suit hanging from the sidewall.

  “What are you doing?” Jahrys asked him.

  “I’m coming with you,” he said, as if it weren’t a question. He pushed his legs into the suit.