The Willows: Haven

by Hope Collier

  “Kevin won’t stop until he’s hurt everyone I care about. You included. I can’t do that.”

  “Ash, listen to me.” Allie met my gaze, her eyes hard as steel. “Kevin has more than one option when it comes to this treaty thing. You don’t have to do this.”

  My eyebrows fell. “But the treaty…”

  “Did you read it?” she asked carefully. I shook my head. “It doesn’t have to be you. You were already there, that’s all. Now sit tight and let me get us out of here.”

  My stomach knotted in fear and doubt, but I nodded, forcing my shaking fingers to let go.

  “It’ll be fine. I promise,” she whispered, her eyes fixed on mine before she disappeared into the trees.

  I backed further into the crevice and rested against the wall. Trying to calm my nerves, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath then another till my heart slowed. The scent of sandalwood suddenly filled the space, and my eyes snapped open.

  “Kyle,” I whispered, guilt weighing heavy in my tone.

  Fiery gray burned into me with mixed emotion. A muscle worked in his jaw as he fought a feeling I couldn’t identify. Kyle took a step forward, his muscled frame filling the tiny space. I searched his expression, trying to find an answer. Finally, his face gave way to sadness, and a wave of betrayal washed over me.

  “We don’t have much time,” Kyle murmured, his voice grim. “Kevin is with Harry.”

  My hands balled into fists as I silently questioned him.

  “I’m sorry,” he said and looked away. “I had to get him off your trail. With this rain, I can’t tell who’s leading you away…” He took a deep breath, moisture building in his eyes. “But you can go.”

  “What?” I gasped. How did he know?

  “Ash, you want to leave. You have to leave.” Kyle’s tone turned soft yet sad. “And if you were going to wait for me to take you, you’d be back at the house.” His expression fell. “Whoever came for you did it without our knowledge. They’ll get you out safely. You need to go.”

  “Kyle, I…” My words failed me. What could I say? He was willing to risk everything for me, and I was just sneaking away. He didn’t even care as long as I was safe.

  Kyle’s fingers brushed my face, his eyes searching mine. “Go and be happy, Monet. You deserve that much.” He dipped down to brush a mournful kiss across my lips. Salt water crept into the corner of my mouth as my eyes closed, but I didn’t know whose it was.

  Kyle’s hand fell away, and a bitter cold took its place. I looked up to find him gone, leaving me to the nothing. A fresh hole ached in my chest. What was I doing? Kyle wouldn’t be the only one to suffer my vanishing. What would happen to the people here? What would happen to my people? Hot tears streaked down my face.

  “Ash?” Allie’s quiet voice broke through the sadness. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded and wiped my cheeks.

  She sniffed at the air, her expression darkening by the second as recognition set in. “It’s time to go.” Her hand tightened around mine, and we slinked around the corner and through the carved entryway of the factory.

  Our bare feet moved silently through the marble foyer. The smell of herbs mingled with the caustic scent of hydraulic fluid. I followed her lead as we pressed our backs into the wall and peered around the corner. Despair seeped through me. Four guards manned the reception area, and workers milled in and out of the doorways, clogging the open space. We’d never get through this place unseen.

  “Gentlemen, I need to speak with you outside.” Kyle’s hard voice rang from an open door across the way. Allie ducked behind the wall, but I watched, knowing what Kyle was about to do. His gaze flickered in my direction before escorting the guards through the entryway.

  The men left the desk unattended, and Allie’s hand tightened around mine.

  “Now or never,” she whispered and tugged me past a closed door. We rounded the edge of the hall and crept to a door marked supply closet.

  I lifted a brow when she gestured for me to go inside, but followed her direction. Allie clicked the door shut behind us and slid a bolt into place. She looked back to me, and I mouthed, “Now what?”

  Allie jutted her thumb toward the ceiling. A small ventilation grate sat in the corner, ten feet over my head. Did she really believe we could fit through that?

  My heart raced in my chest and sweat beaded across my forehead. I stared wide-eyed and shook my head in protest. She pointed toward the opening, urgency set in her expression, and laced her fingers together. My vision swam with claustrophobia. The room swayed, and I shut my eyes.

  “Search every crevice of this factory,” Kevin’s irate voice boomed through the walls. “I want her found, and found now!”

  My eyes flew open to a panicked Allie. The sound of hurried footsteps sounded near the door. Allie braced her fingers against her knee. I wrapped my long skirt around my waist and fitted my foot inside her grip. Her deceptively petite arms hoisted me toward the ventilation shaft. I removed the grate and tried not to notice the size of the space as I dangled my legs low enough for her to shimmy up.

  A wave of hot stagnant air smacked me in the face, filling my lungs with the distinct smell of coolant. My slick palms fumbled over the rock-floor of the passageway, feeling my way through the darkness. The dreary sound of labored breathing and the soft scrape of bare skin against stone echoed through the emptiness. I wasn’t so sure I didn’t prefer the slow death of misery as opposed to the slow death of suffocation.

  Sweat raced down my skin. My hair matted to my face and the moisture caused the sharp pebbles to stick and grind into my exposed flesh. I distracted myself from the pain with thoughts of Allie. I wouldn’t be alone after all. No one else would suffer my disappearing…

  Guilt punched through my gut. Everyone would suffer my disappearing. Keeping Kyle out of trouble didn’t amend what my breaking the treaty could cause. Their race and ours was in jeopardy if Allie was wrong.

  The time ticked by slowly, and just when I thought I’d snap, Allie stopped with a relieved sigh. I looked over her head to see a faint glow not too far away. The tunnel widened, and Allie moved to hunker in the taller part of the passage. Relief pulsed through me as I rose to match her, heaving my wet mound of skirt up so I wouldn’t trip. We crept to the opening and paused at the mouth to sit down and stretch.

  “We’re out of The Valley, though nowhere near out of danger just yet,” Allie said, directing her gaze outside. I peeked over the ledge and gasped at the masked treetops below. Fog swirled beneath me as the rain continued in torrents. If I thought the claustrophobic tunnel was bad, this was the open equivalent of it. Still, we hadn’t come this far just to quit.

  I drew a welcomed lungful of air and rallied my courage. “In case I don’t make it down in one piece, it was great to see you one last time, and thanks for trying.”

  “Ash?” Allie frowned. “I didn’t rescue you just to go Picasso as soon as we were free. I like my face the way it is.”

  “Well, how do you propose we get down then?”

  “I’m not a mountain goat.” She moved some rocks aside at the lip of the cave. “Here, climb into this.” Allie handed me some kind of harness, assuming I had a vague idea of what to do with it. I twisted and turned the flimsy thing, trying to find the top.

  Allie shook her head. “Like this.” She took it from me, turning it right-side up. I managed to slip my legs and waist through the openings, causing my dress to slip up to the top of my thighs. It wasn’t exactly designed with mountain climbing in mind.

  “I should secure yours to mine,” Allie said to herself then pulled out a length of rope. “This isn’t the safest way to get down, but I can’t just leave a line hanging here for anyone to see, or worse, follow.”

  Allie looped the cord back through a handle.

  “Have you ever been rappelling?” she asked, hopeful. I rolled my eyes and shook my head.

  “Oh, well. Too late to fix that now. Hang on tight, and try not to wig
gle,” she said.

  Allie sent me out, supporting my weight with the thin rope. We dangled high above the mist-ridden rocks below, swaying softly as Allie gauged the strength of the rivet that supported us. It creaked and groaned but held.

  The air on this side of The Valley was colder. I fought the shivers and kept a death grip on my harness. Allie breathed a tense sigh and began to release the rope through the handle, lowering us at a measured pace as she walked down the stone face.

  A sharp crack splintered the silence. Shards of rock rained down from the mountain. Allie’s eyes caught mine. We both looked down, but the fog swirled thick below, making it seem as if the ground had been swept away.

  “Ash?” Allie said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you trust me?” she asked, not giving me the chance to respond. “Hang on and be quiet!”

  With that, she loosened her fingers from around the rope. The wind screamed past my ears and took my breath away. A wall of gray blinded me, heightening my panic as well as my other senses. The sound of our descent caused a compressed echo against the ground we rapidly approached.

  It was close … closer … immediate.

  My body jolted to a sudden stop, and the nylon harness bit into the sensitive skin of my hips. The rope recoiled with a loud snap and dropped us on our backsides. Allie jumped up and yanked me in the same direction as a chunk of the mountain came crashing down, landing on the place where we had been.

  “What the heck, Allie?” I wiped water out of my eyes and worked the harness off, babying my new bruises.

  “Hey, don’t look at me.” She loosened her buckles. “It was rigged the best way I could get it. One anchor isn’t meant to support two bodies at the same time.”

  “I’ll say.” I shook my head and stared around the forest. “But you got us out in one piece. That’s what counts.”

  “We’re not in the clear yet. Come on.” Allie moved toward the base of the mountain. “We only have a small head start, and we have to reach water.”

  She gathered up the remainder of the gear and shoved the equipment under some boulders. I noticed her hands shaking and stepped closer.

  “Al? What’s wrong with your—” I didn’t get to finish my question as I flipped Allie’s hands over. Her palms and the insides of her fingers looked like someone glued them around a fiery poker then yanked it out. Burnt and mangled skin left way for blisters and exposed tissue.

  “Allie!” I gasped.

  “They’re fine,” she said. “They just sting a little.”

  “Sting a little?” I said with a grimace. “Allie, they’re just…”

  “Ash, I’m okay.” She tried to smile. “They’ll be fine in no time. Let’s get out of here.”

  We took off in a sprint, weaving through the forest. The rain persisted chilling my heated skin, though it lightened from a monsoon to a steady fall. My lungs ached but we pressed on.

  “Do you smell that?” Allie glanced back as she ran.

  I drew a deep breath. The faint scent of a lake somehow stood out from the rain. I smiled and nodded.

  “You’re learning to tell the difference. That’s good. We’re close now, it won’t be much further.” Allie picked up the pace, and The Valley fell further behind with every step.

  “Al?” I asked, my breath fogging.

  “Yeah?” She slowed to my side.

  “How did you know where to find me? How did you know I was in trouble?”

  Allie slowed to my side. She looked into my eyes for a moment before turning her gaze down. “I had a run-in with the Dryads a while back,” she explained. “Harry was involved.”

  My stride faltered before I regained my rhythm. “What happened?”

  “Harry wanted you. He hoped that I might be of some use in that way, that he could use me as some kind of bargaining chip or ransom if need be. If you didn’t do whatever it was they had planned, they’d threaten you by using me. It didn’t quite work out like he planned though.”

  Bargaining chip? Just like Ilana’s baby. Harry’d had good success with bargaining chips in the past.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “The day we left after the swimming incident, we were expressly forbidden to contact either you or Charlie. And for years we obeyed … until I disappeared. We were as fooled by Harry as everyone else. Mom just assumed the Dryads were involved. She was afraid they’d taken me to get to you, so she called Harry trying to get in touch with your dad to warn him.”

  My breaths came too quickly. The shock, the pain, the fear … the hope, it overwhelmed me.

  “My mom said Charlie called you the week before,” she continued, her voice low. “He wanted to talk to you about all of this. He was going to tell you everything.”

  “And I wouldn’t come,” I muttered, my chest heavy with guilt.

  “Don’t beat yourself up, Ash. You didn’t know. It wouldn’t have worked out this way if you had come then,” she said. “Trust me; on the one hand, it worked out better.”

  I couldn’t forgive myself so easily.

  We jumped over a small ravine riddled with rotten logs, careful not to slip in the dead leaves. The underbrush grew thick, and Allie zigzagged along trying to break as few branches as possible till the dense foliage gave way to a clearing.

  “So what happened?” I continued. “How did you escape?”

  “Oh, no…” Allie stopped suddenly, her bare feet skidding across the ground with a squeak. I balked behind her, confused when her arm flew up to hold me back.

  “Allie, what are you …” My sentence fell in despair.

  A shadow emerged from the trees.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Resolution

  The figured shrouded in mist and darkness inched closer, his cloak billowing in the chilled air. Moisture clung to my eyelashes as my muscles coiled with adrenaline. Blood pounded through my veins like ice. I eyed the imposing shadow moving toward us then scanned the area, a hundred scenarios running through my head. My palm burned against Allie’s arm. I yanked her behind my body, more afraid of being separated than anything, and prepared to run.

  Allie sighed in exasperation. “Um, stroke! Seriously,” she scolded the silhouette. “What are you thinking, creeping out like that? Sheesh!”

  “What?” I questioned, taken aback by her reaction. The wind howled at my back, whipping my hair around my face, then witched directions. A hint of warm cedar mingled with the rain. It couldn’t be.

  I shut my eyes as a wave of mixed emotion overcame me. I couldn’t handle this, not now. Not after surrendering to the fact that he was gone and not coming back. That he didn’t want me and never would.

  “Ash, you okay?” Allie spoke at my side.

  I disregarded her question and tried to slow my breathing.

  “Ashton?” Another deeper sweeter voice questioned just in front of me.

  I shook my head, unwilling to open my eyes. I didn’t want to see the face of the man I loved outside of sane boundaries simply staring back at me with cold indifference. I wanted to turn and run the other way, but panic froze me in place.

  “What’s happened? Is she in shock?” he asked.

  “Well, it’s not exactly like you left her in the best position, now is it?” Allie quipped. “Maybe she thinks she’s hallucinating. Maybe the stress is finally getting to her. I don’t know.”

  Gabe’s scent enveloped me. I imagined the look I’d once seen in his eyes — the ocean on fire. My erratic pulse quickened, and the empty space in my chest threatened to drown in warmth. Unwilling to sacrifice what part of me remained, I recoiled and opened my eyes. Gabe wore a half-hearted smile then his gaze moved downward, taking in my once-beautiful dress. His eyes narrowed as comprehension sank in.

  “Yeah, I cut it close,” Allie said, catching sight of his expression. “But we need to get moving. Now.”

  A clearing appeared at the forest edge. Allie and Gabe paused at the fringe, their eyes scanning the open area with care. Gabe s
niffed at the air then nodded to Allie who grabbed my hand. She lifted her finger to her lips then we set off into the deadly quiet meadow.

  Our footsteps glided over the damp ground without a sound, but every sense worked overtime as the peak of the mountain broke through the clouds. Gabe cast repeated glances over his shoulder as we moved, his eyes hard on the place I’d just escaped. Finally, I caught sight of the waning sun glistening off a lake.

  Gabe paused as we reached the water’s edge and knelt down.

  “Stand still,” he instructed, his tone as crisp as the evening air. “This is slowing you down.”

  With a rough yank, he ripped my dress just above the knee then he tore my sleeves away. Goosebumps raised on my exposed flesh. I didn’t know if it was the temperature or Gabe’s demeanor as he wrapped the torn material around a rock and chucked it into the lake. He followed suit with his cloak then looked to me.

  “No one will find see them there. Go ahead,” he murmured.

  I dove into the lake, relishing in the sensation of the open water enveloping me completely. The water was like a breath of fresh air after being trapped in a cage for months.

  An hour into the swim, a small island rising out of the water caught my attention. Skeletons of gnarly evergreens clawed upward as if to pluck the stars from the dimming sky. The land lay eerily quiet, feeling more like a graveyard.

  “We’ll stop there for the evening,” Gabe said to Allie. She lifted an incredulous eyebrow but nodded.

  We climbed ashore, and I winced as the sharp rocks scraped against my feet and cold air nipped at my skin. The sun crept behind the mountain, stealing what little warmth remained.

  “Why don’t you get some firewood, and I’ll scrounge up something to eat,” Allie said, watching Gabe with a stern expression. He sighed but strode off into the dark trees.

  “We’ll be right back, Ash,” Allie said. “I’m going to catch some fish, and maybe see if I can find anything worth eating on the island.”

  I plopped down on the soggy ground, but my foot twitched anxiously. I felt edgy, like I didn’t really belong here. Perhaps I didn’t belong anywhere. Maybe that’s why Gabe gave me up to begin with. I only brought heartache to the people around me. Anywhere I went, trouble followed.