Token (Token Chronicles) (19 page)

She puts her hands on my bandage and instructs, “Hold tight onto this, okay.”

 She makes another weird noise, but this time at a much lower pitch. The animal kneels down on all fours. She puts her hands underneath my underarms and swiftly places me onto the beast. With another odd whistle, the beast stands back up and she skillfully jumps onto the animal. She places one hand on a leather strap attached to the animal and gently places the other on top of my hand on the bandage to apply more pressure.

In an instant, the beast is off running at full speed. The bitterly cold wind is vigorously whipping at me. The harsh icy winds are helping me to hold onto my consciousness, but the longer we ride, the cold becomes increasingly more unbearable. My eyes are beginning to become heavy. She keeps insisting I stay awake so I fight off the drowsiness. It feels as if we have been riding forever.

“Just hang on. We are almost there,” she yells over the sound of loud pattering hooves.

My right hand begins to feel wet, and I can see the bandage is completely red now. My blood has soaked through it. Her hand is white from amount of pressure she is applying to the bandage. I begin to worry because I cannot even feel anything anymore. My entire body has grown numb.

We emerge from the dense forest onto an old dirt path. We begin riding straight ahead towards a stonewall. She slows the beast down right before we make impact with the wall. She appears to be waiting for something but nothing happens. I hear a voice that seems to come from nowhere.

“Who is there with you?”

“I found him hurt in the woods. He is going to die if we don’t help him. Just hurry up and open the door.”

“You know your father is not going to like this.”

“I will deal with him when the time comes, just open the door Fitch.”

A portion of the wall begins to slowly slide open. As soon as the entrance has widened enough, we are off in a flash. As we ride through the dark tunnel, lights turn on as we move by them leading the way. We come out of the tunnel, and I am taken aback. The waterfall flowing into the bottom of the cavern, the temperature, the light. It reminds me of home. Of mine and Hadley’s porch. We continue riding past all of it into another tunnel entrance. I want to tell her to turn around. I want to go back. It seems like an eternity since I was there. When we come out the other side, we pass by several people all with the same expression on their faces. Fear. We stop in front of a large stone slab supported by a column of sturdy rocks.

“Where is the doctor?” the girl screams at everyone.

No one answers. They all just continue to stare at me with panic in their eyes.

“I am here,” a man says as he steps out from the crowd.

“Please, hurry,” she pleads. “I have tried, but I cannot stop the bleeding.”

“Sweetie, did your father approve of this?”

“Yes! Just help him!”

“Alright, grab my kit,” he says pointing to his supplies. She quickly grabs it and hands them over while he picks me up off the horse and lays me down on the cold stone slab.

He adeptly removes my bandage inspecting the wound. He removes a small pouch from his kit and tears it open at the top with his teeth. He looks to two onlookers in the small crowd of people and requests them to hold me down. He begins to pour the contents of the package into my open wound. I can see what he poured into my wound looks like sand, but burns like fire. I cannot help it. I begin convulsing and screaming. The pain is unreal.

“I am sorry,” he apologizes. “The pain will only last a few more minutes.”

“Keep him steady,” the doctor says to the two men holding me down. “I will need to stitch him up after the clot settles.”

Desperate to distract myself from the pain, I need to focus on something else. I hear a loud argument, and I turn my head to the right out of curiosity. I see the girl who saved me and a large brown-headed man with a gray moustache.

“What were you thinking? How could you bring him back here?”

“What was I supposed to do father? Leave him out there to die.”

“You have no idea who he is. For all you know, he could be working for Cromus. Are you going to be the one to deal with it if he is? Are you prepared to do that?”

“Well, if I had left him out there, it would have been the same thing as me killing him. I couldn’t live with myself if I had.”

“You may have just put our entire community in jeopardy. What happens after today is a direct result of your irresponsible actions. I hope you can bear the consequences. Go water and feed your horse and put him with the others.”

“Yes, father,” she obediently replies as she walks off with her shoulders hunched over.

I was so focused on their conversation, I almost did not hear the doctor speaking to me.

“You were quite lucky you got here when you did fellow. A few more minutes, and I’m not sure you would have made it.”

I look down to see that he is almost done stitching up my wound.

The girl’s father walks over to the doctor and whispers something in his ear as he looks at me apprehensively. The doctor nods his head and reaches in his kit and pulls a needle out. Oh, no. I begin to struggle not knowing what he is about to inject me with. Unfortunately, the two men are still holding me down against the slab. The doctor plunges the needle into my arm. In seconds, I lose consciousness.

When I wake up, I am confined in a small poorly lit room with my hands cuffed. There are bars over the doorway. I am a prisoner? What could I have possibly done to deserve this? I stand up and walk to the bars to see if there is a guard at the doorway. Before I reach the door, the girl who saved me appears. She is by far the prettiest guard who has ever held me captive so far. I cannot help but laugh out loud.

She eyes me peculiarly. “What is so funny?” she asks.

“Nothing,” I say. “Why am I cuffed? Why are you doing this?”

“I am sorry. I didn’t think my father would keep you prisoner. But we cannot trust you. We do not know who you are.”

“My name is Kincaid. What is yours?”

She looks at me suspiciously before she answers.

“Briel.”

“Well, Briel. Thank you for saving my life.”

“You are welcome,” she says with a smile.

“So is this your father’s punishment? To have to stay here and talk to me all day?”

She begins to laugh, and I cannot help but to be captivated by her smile. I have not seen a smile like that since Hadley. Thankfully, she interrupts me before my mind begins to race.

“No, but he did say I am responsible for you.”

“I just don’t understand all of this. Why is everyone so afraid of me? Why can you not trust me?”

“Well, it is because we have…”

A loud voice interrupts from a distance.

“Briel, do not say another word to him.”

Her smile disappears, and she straightens up. Her father then appears. I step away from the door and head back to sit down in my cell. He does not remove his eyes from me when he dismisses Briel. Before she leaves, she looks back to me with concern in her smoky eyes.

Her father proceeds to open my door and enters my cell. He makes sure I am able to see the weapon he has holstered on his belt when he puts his hands on his hips pushing his jacket behind it.

“Move one muscle, and I will kill you. Do you understand?”

I emphatically nod my head in agreement.

“First, I would like to apologize for your imprisonment.”

Not exactly the first thing I was expecting to hear from him.

“We do not get many outsiders down here. In fact, you are the first one we have had in sixteen years now. I suppose you could thank my daughter for that one.”

I don’t want her to continue to get in trouble on my account. Especially when all she did was save my life when she was not obligated to.

“Sir, I apologize for any inconvenience I may have caused, but I was just out in the forest to clear my head. I was severely injured, and she helped. She did the right thing.”

“Well I suppose there is more of her mother in her than me. She has always had a kind heart. Until today, it had only been hurt animals she would bring back. I would send her out on foraging missions for food, and she would bring back animals to save when our community needed the meat to survive. I normally would refrain from sending her out, but she knows how to navigate. With the blizzard about to hit, I needed all hands on deck. Which bears the question, why were you out in the middle of the woods with a blizzard only a few hours away?”

“Honestly, sir, I didn’t even know there was a blizzard coming. Today was the first day I have ever even seen snow.”

He looks at me baffled. I fear I have revealed too much. I need to make sure I don’t say anything about the Ridian camp. He says they cannot trust me, then I definitely cannot trust them either.

“First time? Where are you from boy?”

“I was a Token from the Hawk Islands. I was just purchased, and I managed to escape.” I do not like lying to people, but I feel it is a necessary precaution at this point.

“You were a Token? And you escaped?”

Before he can jump to conclusions, I assure him.

“My tracking chip is removed if that is what you were worrying about.”

“No, while you were unconscious, we scanned you for any active bugs that could have been planted on you. You were clean. If you actually were a Token, I am sorry. It’s a terrible business. But it is precisely why we relocated down here. I did it to protect my family, my friends. I had already set this community up before the Rebellion ended. I was a part of the Rebellion against Grodar. We had to learn how to hide and properly conceal our forces from Cromus. Rebels were constantly hiding underground, creating secret underground camps, until we were betrayed. Every single camp we had was destroyed, except this one. I told no one about it. My daughter was even born down here. We are free to live here away from Cromus’s tyranny. Away from his cruel and terrible world. Those of us who are old enough remember how bad it was. We cannot expose ourselves. If you were a Token, then you can understand why I cannot risk anyone finding us. They could have taken my daughter away if they really wanted to. I could never let that happen. We are all safe here. Especially, if we all follow my rules. They are simple. No one comes in or out without my permission. We do not let outsiders in because they cannot be trusted. You say you were a Token. That may be true, but I have no way of knowing for sure. I have to protect my people.”

“I promise you I was. It is the truth.”

I show the man the mark of the Token on my back. He ignores what I show him and changes the topic.

“They have informed me the blizzard has begun. No one is leaving here for weeks, regardless. So if you were thinking of trying to escape. It is impossible. For the time being, you will remain captive here until I decide what to do with you. We have enough food and water to last for weeks, and if you need anything, feel free to ask.”

“Thank you,” I reply understandingly.

He stands up and begins to head towards the cell door.

“Sir,” I say.

He stops and looks back to me.

“What is your name?” I ask

“I suppose you never would have heard of me living on the Islands your whole life, but it’s Magnus. Magnus Queen.”

Chapter 13

I can see Hadley there sitting on our porch waiting for me. Deeply staring back at me with her loving eyes. Beckoning me to come closer. I am in the lagoon. I keep swimming towards her, but the harder I swim, the further away I am from her. I swim and swim. I grow tired, and my body is pleading with me to give up. I desperately want to surrender, but I cannot. I have to keep trying to reach her. But my efforts become futile. No matter how badly I want to get there, the gap only grows larger. I am surrounded by water. My muscles no longer able to work, I am drowning. Surely she will jump in to save me.

I awake disoriented and soaked in water lying on my bed in my cell. I am doused again with another bucket of water flying at me. I can see Briel standing in front of me with an empty pale in her hands, but there is no smile on her face this time. Her eyes are no longer light and care free, but instead, they are angrily directed straight at me.

“What are you doing?” I scream out at her.

“You lied to my father. Why?”

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“Don’t lie to me. I heard you out in the woods when I saved you. You said someone will start worrying about you if you don’tf return. You told my father you were a Token who escaped from his camp. You were lying to one of us, and I don’t think it was me.”

“I lied to him to protect my people the same way he is protecting your people from me. You understand right?”

“Well, you are only here because I brought you here. I cannot let you put us in danger. I need to know the truth, and you are going to tell me. Or I will tell my father you lied to him. He will not be as kind as I have been.”

“It will be just as dangerous for you to learn the truth.”

“Just start talking. I need to know.”

“Fine. I was telling your father part of the truth. I am a Token, or I was one. I was sold at auction a few weeks ago to the Ridian Elite camp. But when I arrived, it was nothing like I expected. The Ridian camp is just a cover for the new Rebellion forming against Cromus and Grodar. We are preparing to ignite a new war, but this time we will win.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because of me. I am supposed to inherit the abilities of my father. To be able to control the elements of the natural world. Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water. In fact, the more I think about it, I think it is what happened to me out in the forest. I think I caused the lightning storm somehow.”

Her eyes widen. She just stares at me and put her hands over her mouth as her empty pale falls to the ground.

“I think I know who your father was. Or at least, I have heard of him. I will be right back,” she says.

In confusion, I ask, “Where are you going?”

She has already darted out of my cell before giving a response not even thinking to shut the gate behind her. I stand up, and I think about running momentarily, but I decide to stay. If they were telling me the truth about the blizzard, I will not be able to get out of this cavern regardless. My curiosity is nagging at me to stay put. She returns seconds later with her father Magnus behind her. He does not look happy with her.