by B. T. Narro
“How many yards of stone is it? I might be able to break us out.”
“I don’t know. Two yards?”
Kirnich stopped them at a corridor. “If you can get through that, Desil, we turn here.”
“I could, but it might take half of an hour.”
“Then we keep going to the great hall. Too many will see us on the way to the back and reveal our location.”
But how many wait at the front? Desil trusted that Kirnich and Beatrix knew this castle better than he did, so he let it go.
He heard shouting ahead, as well as the sound of shuffling feet, as they went down more hallways and past more doors. The people who did see them ran the opposite way or cowered against the wall and protected their heads. Desil didn’t know what in particular they were afraid of, but he was certain he felt the most fear of anyone. He’d suffered through nightmares like this, attempting to escape from somewhere without any idea how he would make it.
This was no nightmare. There was no waking from this.
He felt breathless as they entered the great hall and witnessed dozens of guards rushing to block the door. There were already two in front of the massive entranceway, fidgeting as they held up their swords, looking toward their incoming comrades for help. Kirnich rushed them.
“Move or die!” His deep command while charging gave Desil new hope, as he saw fear break across the guards’ faces.
“Archers!” Beatrix warned.
Desil glanced up at dozens of them aiming down from the balcony of the first floor as a stream of swordsmen came out from every opening on the ground level, many more flooding down the stairs.
“Don’t shoot!” Allephon pleaded from the bottom of the stairs. His voice was firm with his next words. “Beatrix, stop. As king, I order you to stop!”
She didn’t even bother to look his way as she kept running beside Kirnich, with Desil just behind.
“If you have any love for our family,” Allephon yelled, “you’ll stop and speak to me!”
She halted in front of the two guards at the door and spun. Allephon stood halfway between them and the stairs, his arms in the air.
“Everyone stop. Let me speak with my sister.”
The last few men still moving toward the door finally came to a halt. About a dozen were just a few steps away from Desil, all with swords drawn.
“If you go through that door,” Allephon warned Beatrix, “you won’t just be suspected of murder. You will be a breakout, and I can no longer protect you.”
Breakouts were considered guilty of whatever crime put them in prison in the first place. It was the same to run from arrest.
“You abandoned me, Allephon. You left me in there with him knowing he would kill me.”
Allephon made his way toward her. “Come with me so we can talk.” The armed men nearby flocked around him, but he shooed them away. “No guards.”
“You will say what you must right here.” Beatrix’s blood dripped from both pant legs.
“Father would not want you to run. He would want us to settle this.”
“If he saw how you abandoned me, he would never ask me to stay. I cannot trust you anymore after what you did.”
“You need treatment, whether you trust me or not. If you run, you will be caught if you don’t bleed out first.”
“I’d rather take my chances than stay here where I’m destined to die.”
“I will protect you until the truth comes out.” He hadn’t moved far from the stairs, except to reach out his hand. “Come here.”
Beatrix shook her head, her face pale as death. She wavered on her feet and Kirnich propped her up.
“You can’t protect me. Not from him.” Her next words were spoken to herself. “He’s too strong.”
Kirnich nudged her forward with a hand on her back. “We must leave. But the door…”
She nodded. “Unlock the door, Allephon. Letting me leave is the only way I’ll live.”
The king walked past his men, many falling into step with him. He stopped when he noticed them. “Stay where you are.” They obeyed and stayed behind as he approached Beatrix.
“The only way we can beat him is together,” he said in a voice meant only for her ears, Desil barely overhearing. “I need your help, and you need mine. I promise I will do everything I can for you. Let me make up for my mistakes.”
“You knew he would kill me.”
“I admit I figured he would get Basen’s whereabouts from you, but I swear I didn’t know he intended to kill you. He must know he’d be executed for murder if he had.”
“No, he rigged the rope to break. He sent away all the guards so no one would hear my pleas for help. He planned to pretend I had broken free and tried to kill him, forcing him to defend himself.”
So that’s why we found no one on the way to the torture chambers. Jimmin didn’t want witnesses.
Allephon seemed to be having trouble speaking as he swallowed air. “I had no idea,” he managed to get out. “I’m sorry, Sister. That’s even more reason for you to stay. There’s no hope for you if you escape.”
“Please open the door, Brother. I’ve made my decision. Tell your men not to follow.”
“And then what will you do?”
“I will find a way to kill him.”
“My king!” shouted Jimmin from one side of the great hall. He dragged the leg that still had a dagger imbedded in it. “You’re in danger by being so close. Back away and give the order for her to be shot down before she kills someone!”
The entire great hall stirred, archers nocking arrows.
“There is no need for that!” Allephon announced.
“Open the door, Brother,” she insisted. “You will not win this debate with him.”
“My king,” Jimmin said, “you are blinded by your love for your sister. She is a murderer and a liar. She will say anything to you to stay alive, but she doesn’t care about you. She doesn’t care about anyone but herself. For your own safety, you must back away and give the order to shoot.”
“This can be settled with words alone! Jimmin, I am ordering you to keep quiet.”
“I’m sorry, Sire, but I cannot.” Jimmin limped forward. “Your king needs your help,” he told the many men who seemed eager to use the weapons in their hands. “He has too good a heart to see what kind of person his sister really is. She admitted to me that she murdered her father. I will attest to this in front of psychics, but first she must be struck down.”
“No!” Allephon yelled. “No one will move until I say so.”
“It is his sister changing his words,” Jimmin continued, addressing the men. “He cannot order her death while he is being manipulated, but he will realize as soon as this is over that he should’ve told you to shoot. Beatrix killed your king. She killed my king. She killed his king, his father. She is smart, wily, and terribly strong. If she gets out of this keep, there is a good chance she will escape the castle. We have to do what’s right, even if our new king cannot give the order himself.”
Desil could feel the energy of the room changing. Archers shifted to get a better angle. Swordsmen moved closer.
“Open the door!” Beatrix told her brother through her teeth.
Allephon turned and ran toward the switch. “Do not attack her! Do not shoot her!”
But Jimmin was yelling the opposite. “She is not to be captured. She is to be killed! Archers, shoot now!”
Desil heard a thud as Allephon pulled the lever near the stairs. Beatrix raised her palm and took down the two men in front of them. Desil and Kirnich grabbed the handles of the door and pulled. Arrows beat against it as they squeezed into the opening, Beatrix between them.
Soldiers were right behind them. Others came from the courtyard in front, all yelling about the escape. At least one was a mage, shining a beam of light to illuminate them in this dark night.
“We go around back,” Desil said as he took the lead and turned to run parallel to the long wall of the castle keep.
“He will.”
Desil didn’t hear Kirnich’s reply as he opened his mind to the other plane. He’d never reached it before while awake and moving, but something felt different now. His connection was as strong as remembering a vivid dream. It was not as if he was entering a different world but as if something had pulled him there.
Leida’s voice was the first sound he recognized, only he didn’t actually hear it. “desil. desil.” The noise was little more than a feeling. “desil. finally! where?”
He didn’t know how he could respond. He tried shouting, but his voice was sapped by the energy in this place.
“kyrro’s castle. we need a portal behind the keep now.” Desil was dimly aware of himself running beside Kirnich, mumbling his words aloud.
“What are you saying?” Kirnich asked, then looked behind them. He said something to Beatrix in front of him, which caused her to turn around too and lift her hand as if to cast a psychic spell. Desil could do nothing to help them, as it took too much focus to keep his mind in both planes. Beatrix and Kirnich slowed until they were behind him.
“We need a portal behind the castle now,” Desil tried to say again, but he heard himself in the physical world and felt nothing in the plane of energy.
“help?” she asked.
“Yes.”
This wasn’t working. He kept trying to speak, but he couldn’t get his words through the right plane. He felt her speaking to him without using her voice, like someone would communicate with a facial expression. He had to show her what he needed, not tell her.
He heard nothing from Leida as he realized he had slowed, Kirnich grabbing his arm.
“What’s the matter with you?” Kirnich asked, bringing Desil fully back into the physical world.
“I’m telling Leida we need a portal behind the castle.”
Kirnich replied with something that sounded like confusion, but Desil had already lost track of himself in the physical world as he re-entered the other plane.
He could feel energy floating below him, great power…dangerous power, like standing next to a boulder at the top of a hill. He couldn’t shout in this plane, as he was disconnected from his voice, but his connection to energy was stronger here. Waves of red sizzled with unfelt heat, crackled with no sound, and sloshed excitedly with no obvious emotion. They…or perhaps it…seemed to call to him.
He tried to connect his mind to this vast sea of energy. He felt himself getting close to succeeding, akin to almost remembering a forgotten name.
He wasn’t sure how, but he suddenly felt part of it. Desil wasn’t wholly there; it was like remembering a small part of a song he used to know, but it was enough to give him voice.
“leida? leida!”
“yes. where are you?”
He spotted her far away, as if he had stood on top of the Fjallejon Mountains and peered down into the Academy with a spyglass. It wasn’t that he saw her with his eyes. The energy communicated her presence to him through what he thought of as vibrations, only they clearly weren’t.
His own vibrations were as strong as a quake. “behind the castle. we need a portal now.” He felt his vibrations travel through the energy, carrying his message.
Something entered the energy besides the two of them. Or was it someone? Fear shot into Desil, breaking his focus.
His mind fled the plane without Desil choosing to leave. As he came back into his body, he was unaware how far he’d run along the wall of the keep.
“Which wall are we at?” he asked his companions.
Beatrix was looking behind them. She lifted her hand, paining two men catching up and causing them to fall as they yelped. Another twenty were right behind.
“This is the back wall,” Kirnich told him. “We’re nearing the location, but I don’t see a portal.”
Desil’s mind left them again. The other plane felt different as he entered it this time, disrupted by a great force. He connected himself to the energy and immediately heard Leida.
“father, i can’t get out.” Leida seemed to be in a panic, though Desil could feel nothing besides her words. Something else took all his focus, a man or creature putting a strain on the energy that made it difficult for Desil to hold on.
It found him. With deafening words, it seemed to shout, “Tell me your name!”
The same fear returned. It felt wrong, unnatural, as if made through psyche. Desil felt a strong urge to flee, but he found the courage to stay put.
“let go of her.”
“I see that you are separated from her. Which one of you is with Basen?”
Desil didn’t know how to help her. He felt one inch from slipping out of the plane.
“I will not let her wake until I’m told the truth.”
“it’s me,” Leida said. “i’m with him.”
“Where?”
“what will you do?”
“Speak to him.”
“i can speak for him.”
“No.” There was tremendous power behind that word, the ocean of energy shaking as if it might rise up and swallow Desil.
He felt Kirnich grabbing his arm, pulling his mind away. He tried to remain in this plane but it was like reaching for a fading dream.
“leida, we need the portal now,” he told her before losing contact completely.
“Get your hands up,” Kirnich was telling him. “It’s over. There’s no portal.”
Desil should’ve felt panic, but his exhaustion was overwhelming. He fell to his knees as he gasped for breath. He tried to get his hands up, but he needed Kirnich’s help as the warrior picked him up and took one of his arms to lift into the air. Beatrix took the other, though she had difficulty standing herself. Blood ran down her arm, falling onto his. Her shredded pants were soaked red.
Desil’s vision blurred. He could only make out the outline of men hesitantly approaching from both sides.
Had Desil, Kirnich, and Beatrix really made it to the back of the keep? Yes, they appeared to be at the halfway mark along the back wall, where Basen had delivered them through a portal not long ago. A hill ran down in front of them, where Desil would’ve fallen if Kirnich hadn’t grabbed his leg. The sloping land met the curtain wall that went around the entire castle. Scattered troops hurried up the hill to intercept them even from that angle. It really was over. Desil couldn’t seem to find his breath, feeling faint.
There was a mighty crack right behind Desil. He fell backward—it was as if he’d been swallowed by some beast, tumbling down its throat. He fell through a short tunnel, mostly dark with some flashes of light, then landed hard onto what felt to be wood.
Everything spun around him. He felt sick to his stomach as he seemed to be rolling, or was this just vertigo and he was lying still? Yes, it was a portal that spat him out!
Before he could celebrate, Kirnich rolled across him groaning. The warrior felt like a boulder crushing Desil’s bones. Beatrix followed, stopping somewhere on his legs. He yelled as his sliced shin felt to be tearing open wider. Hands reached for them out of his spinning surroundings. He was able to discern only that Beatrix had been pulled off his legs and Kirnich no longer sat on his back.
Objects started to come into focus, a bed, a desk. Desil appeared to be inside the room of a house, finally out of the cold night. A lamp lit the crowded bedroom, a black portal in the center with shimmering white lines flashing across it.
“Anyone else coming through?” Basen asked frantically.
“No,” Desil wheezed out, lacking the strength to do more than sit up.
Basen let out his breath and put down his wand hand. The portal collapsed on itself and disappeared.
Desil found himself to be lying beside a bed. Adriya stood over him, giving equally concerned glances between him and whoever was in the bed. One of her long legs was bandaged at her thigh. She had on what
appeared to be a short sleeping gown, her oak brown hair untied and falling just past her shoulders.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Adriya asked whoever was in bed, ignoring Desil.
He didn’t need to wait for Leida’s reply to know that it had to be her in the bed above him. She was the only one he couldn’t see, as both her mother and father glanced at her and everyone on the floor with looks of panic.
“I’m fine. How are they?” Leida asked weakly. “Desil?”
“I’ll be fine,” he managed as he tried to regain his breath. “Beatrix needs help.”
“My stars,” Alabell said as she crouched over Beatrix with bandages in hand. “How much blood have you lost so far, Princess?”
“I don’t know.” She lay flat beside Desil.
“Caregelow?” Kirnich suggested as he got himself up.
“It doesn’t do anything for blood loss,” Alabell told him quickly. “Basen, get my cure kit. Quickly”
He hurried to bring her a thin box of what Desil assumed to be medical supplies.
“She seems to be bleeding most from her legs,” Alabell said. “We need to get them up.”
“She can have the bed,” Leida said, sitting up.
“No, you can’t risk opening that gash on your back,” her mother said. “Lay still, Leida, please. You look as if you’re about to pass out.”
Desil didn’t have the strength to stand, but he somehow raised himself to his knees to meet Leida’s eyes. He found her fingers with his, then moved them across her palm until he had her whole hand. She squeezed so tightly it didn’t seem as if she wanted him to let go anytime soon.
She must’ve been injured after he left the forest. She lay on her stomach, her free arm bent beneath the pillow supporting her turned head. Her back rose with each rapid breath. A nightgown similar to Adriya’s had been folded up to reveal thick bandaging across her lower back.
Though she’d been lying in bed the entire time, the visit to the other plane had clearly tired her. No wonder Desil felt the room turning even though his vertigo had passed.
Leida started to tilt as if to sit up. “Desil.” She moved her hair from her face and smiled weakly. “I heard you.”
He realized then the miracle of what had happened. They’d made it out of the dungeon. There couldn’t be more than a few people who could claim that feat. Basen must’ve opened a portal right on top of Desil.