Control (Book Seven) (Fated Saga Fantasy Series) (23 page)

“What was that?”

“Hurry, get inside! Check it out!”

An elderly couple insisted on being the last out, waiting patiently as
the twenty other prisoners got through and ran for their lives towards the rendezvous location: the Sadorus estate.

There was a pathway that started at the back
of the prison, breaking off in three different directions, leading into the woods.

Draped in total darkness, it
took a moment for the prisoners’ eyes to adjust so they could see the correct path they needed to follow. Schoolchildren had worn this path well. 

“The prisoners are escaping,” a guardsman called out repeatedly.

The lead prisoner, nicknamed Scarface, urged the elderly couple to get through. He would follow as the last one out.

They squeezed through just as Stripers rushed around the corner. The elderly woman thrust her provisions into the hands of Scarface, while at the same time, her husband grabbed the potion bottle Scarface held in his hand.

“Run,” the old man ordered.

The elderly man turned and threw the potion bottle towards the guardsmen. It blew up in front of him, sending dirt and plumes of smoke into the air.

“What are you doing?” Scarface demanded.

The woman
took his hand and said, “Run. Get everyone to safety. We’re too old and weak to make it. No arguing.” She pulled another potion bottle out of her sleeve, aiming it towards the Striper guards, now working their way through the first explosion.

Scarface didn’t have time to argue. He obeyed, knowing full well he was leaving them to their doom. The only price worth their lives, was if he could do as they asked. Keep the others safe. Keep them alive. 

The elderly woman waited until the guard was just about upon them, and dropped the potion bottle just a few feet in front of her.

Her husband grabbed her and they ambled in the opposite direction of the other escapees. The right side path d
idn’t go far, coming out just at the front of the prison, in the street. It was also a thin path and they had to run, one in front of the other. The husband stayed in front, hoping to protect his wife.

Lights were flickering on inside every house.

Curtains opening.

Faces glued to whatever was happening outside; a place they were forbidden to go if they were ove
r sixteen, or at all, if it was after dark.

A shadow flew overhead. Wings snapped in the heavy night air.

The elderly woman screamed, tripped and fell. Her husband turned to go back for her. A foreboding shape landed in between him and his wife, blocking her from view and forcing his retreat.

“Sylvia,” he called out to her.

Two guards caught up and grabbed him roughly, securing his body with younger, stronger hands.

He called out to his wife but she didn’t answer.

Sylvia got to her feet, her body shaking. She knew what was coming. There was no stopping it. She mustered every bit of courage she could find and faced the Scratcher head on.

It leaned forward, staring into Sylvia’s aged eyes.

She didn’t flinch, even when it flashed its fang-like teeth at her.

She kept her gaze firm and straight into the Scratcher’s red and black eyes as it wrapped its wings around her body.

“You can have me,” she told it. “But you won’t win.”

The Scratcher threw its head into the air let
ting out a shriek that rippled over the entire island.

A moment later, her
lifeless body slumped to the ground.

The Scratcher took to the air with a triumphant and deafening screech.

Harold, Sylvia’s husband, lost his balance. He knew what he was about to see, but just the same, seeing the dead body of his wife caused his knees to buckle.

“Where did the prisoners go?” a guardsman asked him.

Harold did not reply. He barely even heard the question.

The guards shook him violently, one holding up his face.

“I’ll ask you one more time, where did the prisoners go?”

He did not answer.

A guard slapped Harold across the face.

“Do what you will with me. I won’t tell ya nothing,” Harold said.

“You might just change your mind about that when I get through with you. So I’ll ask you one last time, where did the prisoners go?”

Harold flung him a determined grin.

The guard raised his arm to hit Harold again, but it was stopped mid swing. 

The guard made a grunting noise and turned to see who had stopped him.

“KarNavan, my apologies,” he bowed his head. “And my Queen,” he added anxiously, upon seeing Juliska Blackwell stroll out of the shadows.

“There is no need for your kind of torture,” said Juliska, her voice cutting. “Not when I can get what I want, so much faster.”

She approached Harold, her long form-fitting jacket skimming the frost covered cobblestone as she walked.

“What are you going to do to me?” asked Harold, his voice uncaring.  Suck out the rest of my already spent life?”

Juliska ignored his retort.

“You know, you should bow to your Queen,” she said.

The guards had to fight him, but they got him to his knees.

Harold looked upon Juliska Blackwell with hate-filled eyes and then spit onto her pointy shoes.

“If I’m going to die, you might as well know what I really think of you,” he said.

“The feeling is mutual,” she replied with a bored smile. “Harold, where are the prisoners going?”

“You know I ain’t going to tell you.”

“I know. Just being polite,” she lied. 

She raised her arm, holding something in her palm.

A smooth, round stone.

“You want to change your answer?” she asked him.

“Why? So you suck the magic out of me and kill me anyway?”

“This is the problem with you people,” she said matter-of-factly.

She turned and spoke as if speaking to anyone close enough to listen.

“You’re all too eager to sacrifice yourselves for the so called
greater good
. It makes it very hard to find out what I need to know. And I will find out. Because the thing is,
Harold
,” she spun back around, “that this island is completely under my control. No ones leaves. No ones comes. Unless I permit it. They have nowhere to go. You’re all just delaying the inevitable.”

“Help will come,” said Harold. “You just wait and see. You may think you’re the
Queen
, and maybe for now, you are, but it won’t last forever.”

Juliska’s face turned murderous. She leaned down to look straight in his eyes. “Unlike you, Harold, I do have forever...”

She stood and turned on the spot.

“Let all seeing this tonight, bear witness to the punishment of treason to your Queen.” She reached out her arm and slammed the stone into Harold’s forehead.

She even didn’t turn to give him a glance. Her eyes watched everyone else, watching her.

Harold weakened. The stone’s power surged through his body, seeking out any bit of magical ability and power he had, until there was nothing left.

Juliska pulled the stone away.

Harold fell to the ground. Alive, but barely. 

Juliska closed her hands around the stone, walking away without giving Harold a second look.

“KarNavan, come,” she ordered. As she whisked away, she said to the guards, “Clean up this mess.”

Harold, weak as he was, crawled to the body of his dead wife. It took every ounce of strength he had to reach her.

“They got away
,” he told her. “They got away.” He rolled over and gazed up into starless night. “Help better come soon,” he mumbled, closing his eyes for the final time.

##

Jasper Thorndike looked away from his beloved Aloyna, stepping back into the battle, his silhouette instantly lost in a sea of warriors.

T
he scene around Meghan, Colin and Colby melted away.

A new one building itself around them.

Meghan got a shiver. She didn’t know if it was part of the spell, or if for some reason, in real life she was cold.

In this new memory, i
t was day. From the position of the sun, Meghan guessed early afternoon.

Fires smoldered. S
moke billowed. The battle was over.

They were once again on the grounds of the estate.

Eight robed figures stood in a semi-circle, just outside of the home; they held a woman between them.

It was Aloyna.

Jurekai stood in front of them all.

“You are a traitor to your people,” he spoke with a biting hatred. “My own mother.”

“I did what I must. Jasper has the Immortality Stone. It’s no longer within your grasp,” she replied evenly. “And one day, I will stop you.”

“That is where you are wrong!” he said, stalking
up to her. His dark eyes peeled into hers. “You’ll pay for your sins, for the rest of your very long life.”

“I’m willing to pay that price,” she told him.
“I know what you do today, will one day be your undoing. But I will beg of you one last time, to stop. No one person should have this much power. Enough blood has been spilled.”

“Enough of this!
” he said, ignoring her plea. “Take her inside.”

The eight robed figures dragged Aloyna inside the home.

Jurekai Fazendiin followed and once inside, told the robed figures to let go of his mother. His justice was swift.

With the flick of his wrist,
Aloyna’s body dissolved into what looked like grains of sand. With another flick of his wrist, he swiped the sand into the glass where Aloyna’s figure rebuilt itself.

“This is where you will spend your eternity,” said Jurekai. “In these glass walls you will waste away your years, forbidden to speak of your treachery
, or your relationship with Jasper Thorndike. Oh, don’t worry,” he added. “I’ll find him. And I’ll find a way to kill him. And you won’t be able to do anything about it. Then you will finally know what it feels like to be betrayed by your own family.”

“Claims
the boy that killed his own father, my husband,” Aloyna whispered.

Fazendiin strode
up to the glass. “As I will do to anyone else that gets in my way. And you’ll do nothing but watch. I’ll be here, by your side, forever guarding this glass from being broken. Get comfortable,
Mother
. No one from this bloodline will ever free you from your prison.” Jurekai walked away, the eight robed figures in his wake.

##

Mireya and Joseph waited at the back door. She held her hand on the doorknob, afraid to open it. Going out at night was forbidden. If she was caught, she didn’t know what would happen to her or her parents.

But she couldn’t let the prisoners down. They were counting on her and Joseph to show them the way. She twisted the doorknob and opened the door. They stepped outside, inhaling the icy November air. All was quiet except for distant voices in the direction of the prison. Mireya and Joseph crept through the darkness, hand in hand, towards the back of the yard.

There was a pathway that went all the way from the back of the school that crossed the back side of their yards, and continued into the woods, eventually coming out just across from the Sadorus estate.

A terrifying screech filled the quiet of the night.

They froze, staring at each other with the same questions on their minds; had the prisoners been caught? Had any of them died? 

Joseph whispered, “C’mon,” and they worked their way to the edge of the path.

They lit a lone candle and set it on a stump. It was not bright enough to attract any outside attention. It was also not magic, so it could not be traced. But it would let the prisoners know they were heading in the right direction. If they were still coming.

Minutes later, they heard footsteps scurrying their way.

The first of the prisoners arrived. 

Mireya and Joseph motioned the direction they should continue in, and pointed to two sacks stashed on the ground, hidden behind a shrub.
One prisoner paused, saying, “Thank you.” It was Dr. Stamm.

They nodded back, wishing they could tell
him more about his son, Oliver. But the doctor knew they didn’t really know. He fled behind the other prisoners. 

Joseph quietly let them know that Daveena would be waiting for them at the second checkpoint.

The last to come was the leader of the prisoners, the one the called Scarface. He stopped just for a second to catch his breath.

“We lost two,” he told them in a whisper. “
Elderly couple by the name of Harold and Sylvia Browne.”