Evadere (10 page)

Two men hurried forward. One took hold of Rooney’s arms, the other his legs. I turned my face so I wouldn’t be able to get a glimpse of his crushed skull. Then a boy brought a cup of water and held it to my lips. It was cold and refreshing as it trickled down my throat. I felt better for the moment. I drank the entire thing, and then he ran off to get another cup full for Jo. We were pulled to our feet and I clumsily stumbled toward some sort of vehicle up ahead. Once inside, I sat down and leaned my head against the side of the wall of the wagon. Jo was across from me, and some more well-dressed contributors positioned themselves nearby to keep an eye on us. I felt the wagon lurch forward. I felt Jo’s eyes on me, but I was too tired to be able to fight the exhaustion any longer. We were now captives, likely off to the castle. Their plan had been a success, yet we had lost Rooney in the process. The wetness of tears spilled onto my eyelashes. Then my eyes closed, and I finally slept. When I woke up, I knew we’d be at the castle.

Chapter 7

“Jo?” I whispered in the dark.

There was no reply.

“Jo!” I hissed a little louder.
 

“I’m here,” her meek voice said nearby.

It was pitch black as I sat up on the cold, hard floor. I put both arms up and tried to search around. There was nothing.

“Did we make it?” I asked.

“To the castle?” Jo said. “Yes. You’ve been sleeping.”

I had slept through the entire trip to the castle along with them bringing me in here.
 

“We’re in a dungeon,” Jo added.

I cringed at the word. It made me feel even more worthless than I had before. I clenched my hand into a fist and then extended out my fingers. My joints were so sore. “How long have we been here?”

“Not long. A few hours at most,” she answered. “I feel like we’re waiting for something. I don’t know.”

I rubbed my temples as the beginning of a headache was forming.
 

“What are you going to do?” Jo whispered.

It was up to me to get us out. I had to say something to the very next person that came in here. I had to be bold and tell them I was a human and that my being here was a mistake. I had to convince the royalty to somehow accept Jo also. This was going to get messy, I could feel it. It seemed that everyone here loathed humans just as much as Scaves.
 

A hint of light began to fill the room little by little as a heavy door opened on the opposite wall. I threw my hand in front of my eyes as they adjusted. Jo scampered across the floor and huddled near my side nearly knocking me backwards.
 

“Over here, your majesty.”
 

“Where?”

“There. What would you have us do with them?”

“How many Scaves did you say?”

“Two, your majesty.”

“I really don’t know what to do …”

“Get up,” someone commanded.
 

I unshielded my eyes and stood, leaning over and offering a hand to help Jo stand also. She took my hand, and we walked over to the thick bars before us. I had to squint to focus on the two people within arm’s reach on the other side of the bars. I could make out the form of a male contributor similarly dressed to those who had picked us up and hauled us here. Then out of the shadows another person stepped into sight. All fatigue instantly fled from my veins as I covered my mouth and gasped.

“Anna?”

“What …” I stuttered.
 

Jo let go of my hand. I could feel her eyes giving me a questioning look.
 

I grabbed hold of the bars with both hands and pressed my face against it. “Is it really you?” Before me stood Emry dressed in a red gown, a white cloak on his back. He seemed equally as shocked to see me.

“Let her go. Now,” Emry said in a very commanding tone.

The man at his side hesitated. “Your majesty?”

Emry’s face burned as his temper flared. “Are you deaf? Let her out.”

The man fumbled with his keys. His hand trembled as he finally found the correct one and unlocked the steel door. The moment he opened it, I rushed past him and practically leapt into Emry’s arms. He stumbled backwards happily as I wrapped my arms around his neck.

“Anna! How in the world …?” He wrapped his arms around me as well and twirled me in a circle. “I’ve missed you so much.”

“Me, too,” I whispered, tears threatening the edges of my eyelids. “Me, too.”

Horrified by our sudden bonding, the contributor’s face drained of all color. He just stood there for a few moments before shutting the barred door again.

Emry gave the man another glare before returning his attention to me. He placed me in front of him and put his hands to my face. His eyes became gentle as he looked me over. “What’s happened to you? Are you all right?”

“You have no idea what I’ve been through. I never thought I’d see your beautiful face again.” My brain hummed with all kinds of things I wanted, needed to say to Emry this very second. The adrenaline pulsated through me. This was just so unexpected. I thought I’d never experience this kind of joy again. Here he was, standing right in front of me. We were together again. I knew I’d be safe. My worries had vanished. The feeling was surreal.
 

“Come,” Emry said, turning me toward the door that led out of the dungeon. He placed a hand on my back as he looked over his shoulder at the contributor. “Let’s get out of here and go talk.”

I nodded and glanced backwards. Little Jo was still standing there, face pressed against the bars, dumbfounded by what she was seeing. “Wait.”

Emry gave me a puzzled look.

“That’s Jo,” I told him motioning toward the dungeon. “She’s my friend. You have to let her out. I can’t leave her here.”

He hesitated for a moment, his eyes meeting the horrified look of the contributor.

“Emry, please,” I pleaded. “She’s the only reason I’m here. Without her, I’d be dead.”

“Get her out of there, too,” Emry instructed the contributor.
 

Jo grinned as she stepped away from the restraint of the dungeon and hurried to cling onto my arm, her eyes shifting curiously to Emry.

Emry led us up the stairs from the dark dungeon and into the brightly lit magnificent castle. The floors, walls and ceilings were all made from cement with handcrafted designs of art etched into it. It was lined with luxurious, colorful furniture. I tried to take it all in, but my mind was still processing that Emry was here. He had no hesitation of where he was going as we walked up a shining spiral staircase with a very unique twisted rope railing. He turned abruptly into the first room on the right at the top of the stairs and pulled me in with him. The contributor had followed. Emry raised his eyebrows at him as he got ready to shut the door.

“But your majesty,” the contributor said. “They’re Scaves.”

“No,” Emry replied. “She’s not.” He slammed the door shut and turned to face me.
 

We were in some sort of study. The walls were lined with books and decorative paintings. Jo wandered about the room in amazement. Emry sat me down on a couch with velvety blue cushions. The sudden comfort felt heavenly. I put my head on Emry’s shoulder and began to weep. I couldn’t help it. I had felt as if I had been forced to be strong and keep all of my emotions inside all this time, and with Emry, my walls came tumbling down. I just hadn’t expected such a happy ending to all of this Evadere madness. Emry lifted my head from his shoulder and stared into my soggy eyes. His own eyes held concern and a fierce anger.
 

I forced a smile. “Your majesty?” A chuckle escaped from my throat.

Emry smirked. “You don’t know, do you?”

I shook my head. “All I know is that our once paradise Evadere is a place of pure hell.”

“What?” He studied me for a moment longer. “I thought you were back on Earth. I thought you knew I was here and what was going on.”

“Why would you think that?” I asked, now realizing he had never been worried about me. He hadn’t even searched for me. “You left me on the beach. I thought you had gone back to Earth without me.”

His eyebrows got lower. “My mother sent for me. She said you were safe and that everything had been explained to you.”

“Your mother?”
 

He nodded. “My mother, the queen.”

I gasped. “Queen Atavia?”

Jo glanced back from the news, concern filling her scared eyes. Then she continued to walk around, running her hands over top of a statue in the corner.

“You know her?” he asked.

“Only what the Scaves have said,” I answered.

“How did you end up with the Scaves? How did you end up here?” His temper was flaring again.

I took a deep breath. “You left me on the beach,” I repeated. “I couldn’t transport myself back to Earth.” I didn’t want to explain. I wanted to know exactly what was going on here with him. “You’re a prince?”

“I’m going to be king,” he said sticking his chest out a little as he did so.
 

“Well, now I guess we know why you can transport. Only royalty can do that, right?”

“I thought you didn’t know anything,” he said.

I rolled my eyes and grinned. “I’ve been all over this planet trying to survive, trying to find a way back to Earth, back to you.”

“Are you hurt?”

“Not physically. Maybe a little emotionally from what I’ve witnessed the last few days. Did your mother explain to you what’s going on out there with the contributors versus the Scaves?”

“They’re dangerous,” Emry quickly said.

“The Scaves?” I met eyes with Jo again who kept her distance and just listened.

He nodded.

“Only Karn.”

“You know about Karn?”

“Oh, yes,” I told him. “I’ve met Karn.”

“What?” He took hold of both of my hands as if he were never letting go again.
 

“He’s mean, yes, but only because this world has warped him into becoming this gruesome beast who has had to survive without nothing his entire life.”

“Anna, you don’t know what you’re saying. The Scaves are a horrible people. They’re trying to kill me. They want rid of the blood line,” Emry tried to explain.

I ran my fingers through his brown hair and traced the outline of his distinct jaw. “I was a Scave for a few days, Emry, and I couldn’t imagine how terrible it must be to actually live as one for an entire lifetime.”

He opened his mouth to interject but decided against it. “I’m so sorry you’ve been through all this. I swear I had no idea.”

“All I knew is that I had to get to the castle, that someone here would have the ability to get me home. I just didn’t know how I was going to convince anyone here of why they would help me.”

“Why wouldn’t they?”

I frowned. “Because I’m a human.”

He gave me a worried gaze again as if trying to look through me to see what I had been through the last few days.
 

“Please,” I said. “Tell me what’s going on.”

He closed his eyes for a moment, his hands still gripping onto my own. “Atavia is my real mother.”

“So you said.”

He nodded. “Right. She hid me on Earth when I was a baby because the Scaves were after me. They killed my father.”

“Karn killed your father.”

“Yeah, Karn. She didn’t want to give me up, but she knew if I were to stay here, I probably wouldn’t survive. She set up the entire adoption thing on Earth. Lainey Tritt was a discrete choice.”

“Did Lainey Tritt know you were a … prince?” The word stuck in my throat. Emry Logan was a prince of Evadere. I had always known he belonged to this world instead of mine.

“No, no. Anna, can I get you and your friend anything? Have you eaten? You look …”

“Beautiful?” I laughed, knowing how disgusting I probably did look. It hadn’t even entered my mind until he had mentioned it that he was looking at me in all of my filthy glory. “I do need to be cleaned up.”

Emry stood, ready to command someone to draw a bath for me I’m sure.

“No,” I said, pulling him back onto the couch. “I need to know everything. Please.”

He took a deep breath and ran his fingers through his hair. As he looked down, the pieces of hair fell back down over his eyes. The familiarity of this habit of Emry’s was wonderful.

“You’re right. Okay. Ben Hanley, my so-called lawyer, is really my protector. He’s watched over me on Earth since I was a baby and has reported my every move to my mother.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. He came for me on the beach. My mother knew of all the trouble I had gone through on Earth with Mrs. Anderson, and she sent for me. It was time for me to come home, she said. It was time for me to fulfill my destiny as king and deal with … things.”

I knew he had meant to say the Scaves, but now sensed my sensitivity on the subject. “Mrs. Anderson the witch?”

“She’s from this world originally. She practiced black magic here. She was beginning to threaten royalty and became a hindrance to my mother, so my mother exiled her to Earth. Somehow she found out about me there.”