by Mandy Rosko
He walked briskly into the room, his back straight, as if he had every right to be here, and had no reason to be afraid. He wore the blue and white colors of the guards who worked in the castle, and Amanda’s breath caught when he stopped in front of her. His presence made her gasp and her stomach quiver as something inside her yanked her to him.
“What—”
“We must be gone from here. Now.” Hargreave grabbed her by the arm, his hold tight, almost painful as he dragged her to the door.
She didn’t fight him. She walked quickly at his pace. “How did you get in here?” Then she smelled something foul enough to make her nose cringe, and suddenly, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
Actually, no, she did want to know.
Amanda couldn’t figure out how to get out in the time she’d been living in the castle, and yet, somehow, Hargreave was right here.
He didn’t answer, his face serious as he glanced around the halls.
Amanda took note once more of the colors he wore. There were no red stains on the uniform, but she shuddered to think of where he might’ve gotten it.
“Did you kill anyone to get in here?” she asked, swallowing hard, that feeling of needing to be near him, to be close to him, suddenly not so strong now that she realized he might’ve had to end a few lives to get in here.
“A guard outside and two in the dungeons. That’s all.”
The wave of relief at such a small number of casualties was instantly chased away by guilt as Hargreave yanked her through the halls. Any number of lives was too many, war or no war, and more people would probably die because he was going to war with Eldric right now.
“Down this way. Come,” Hargreave said.
“That way’s the dungeon!”
“It is,” Hargreave agreed, and Amanda saw no choice. It seemed counterintuitive to go deep into the basement area of any building in order to get out of it, but if he knew a way that she didn’t, she was all for it.
They got down two levels, into the dark where there was no electricity and only a handful of torches to light the way, when a small voice called out to her.
“My lady!”
Amanda’s heart sank as Hargreave pulled his spear from the holster at his hip. One click of a button and it was at full size, and he held it menacingly as Olga came rushing down the stairs in her plain cream dress.
The tiny knife in her hand was pathetic.
Amanda grabbed Hargreave’s arm. “Don’t hurt her. Don’t hurt her.”
“I wouldn’t,” Hargreave said, pulling away from Amanda, a look on his face that spoke to his disgust that she could think he would do such a thing.
Olga trembled from her spot on the higher ground. The little knife looked like nothing at all as she pointed it at Hargreave.
“Release her.”
Even her voice didn’t sound all that impressive, though Amanda appreciated the effort, even as she was terrified for the girl’s life.
Hargreave smiled, a menacing-looking thing as he leaned his spear against the wall and held out his hands. “There. I am unarmed,” he said.
He had to have more weapons on him. “Olga, run.”
She didn’t move, even as Hargreave approached her, like an animal stalking prey.
“You would do well to put that down, sweet. You could hurt yourself.”
Olga looked at Amanda, and Amanda realized how much she liked the girl, how she didn’t want this for her, didn’t want her to die because Hargreave didn’t want witnesses.
Maybe it was something in Amanda’s eyes that made Olga turn and try to flee, but she was too slow as Hargreave rushed up the stone steps two at a time and caught her around the waist.
“No!” Amanda rushed up after them, but it was too late.
Hargreave grabbed Olga’s wrist, slamming it against the wall until she dropped it. She didn’t put up much of a fight. She was nothing compared to him, and when Amanda made it up to them, her stupid, worthless dress slowing her down, Hargreave was already in the middle of threatening the poor girl, his hand clamped over her mouth and jaw.
“Now, you will be silent. I’d hate myself to have to hurt a woman, but I will do it if necessary, understand?”
Olga nodded quickly, eyes so wide Amanda could see the whites all the way around them, as well as the tears that had caught in her eyelashes.
“Good,” Hargreave said, grabbing the back of her neck and pushing her to Amanda. “Let’s go.”
Olga ran into Amanda’s arms, weeping, and Amanda held her tightly, looking down at her, and up at Hargreave. “You…you’re not going to…”
She didn’t have to finish. Hargreave seemed to know what she was about to suggest because he once again got that disgusted look on his face.
“I’m not Eldric. I’m not monster. Is that what they made you think of me?”
“I…” Amanda shook her head, looking away from his eyes, at the hurt in them, and the disappointment that she hadn’t seen anything good in him, despite the strange feeling that pulled her to him.
She couldn’t say anything to him. Not really. How could she when she’d thought he would slit Olga’s throat with her own knife? Eldric couldn’t be blamed for that since everything Amanda thought of Hargreave came from everything she’d ever written about him.
Hargreave called Eldric a monster. What had he done to make Hargreave think such a thing?
Hargreave’s shoulders slumped. He walked by her, not taking her arm this time. “We need to hurry.”
That wasn’t right. She couldn’t let him walk away like that. She reached out and snatched his hand before he could get far. “I’m sorry.”
He stopped, glancing back at her.
She wasn’t sure what it was she saw in his eyes, but it was better than what had been there before.
And Olga was suddenly much more silent than she’d been a minute ago.
Hargreave squeezed her hand, pulling her, and Olga, down deeper into the dungeon, deeper than even Amanda had been.
“Where are all the guards?” she asked.
“Pulled away to battle,” Hargreave answered as they came to a door. “This is where water is brought to prisoners. It was cleaner when I came through. They used to use it to dispose of waste.”
Amanda didn’t think she wanted to know what kind of waste he was talking about, but when Hargreave opened the door, an amazing sight met her.
Three of Eldric’s guards were in here. One was awake, the other two were unconscious. All were tied up, and one was not wearing the blue and white cloak of the castle guards.
Hargreave had spared them? Really?
“This was why it took me so long to get to you,” Hargreave said, lightly kicking the boot of the guard who was awake and glaring.
“You said you killed some people?”
“I did,” Hargreave answered, not sounding happy about it. “I hid them in the other rooms we passed.”
If he’d killed those men but spared these ones, it meant he couldn’t be the villain Amanda thought he was. He only killed when there was no choice, right?
It still didn’t change the fact that people were losing their lives because of this. Because Hargreave had come here for Amanda.
They’d died because of Amanda.
Her strange trust for him, that desire that was deep in her chest to be near him and follow him wherever he went, multiplied now that she had some real evidence that he wasn’t a monster, but her guilt soared as well. She shouldn’t be feeling this for him. She shouldn’t feel safer with him than she felt inside these castle walls.
It didn’t change one neon bright fact. Wherever he went, she was prepared to follow.
Even when he pointed at the dark, cold-looking body of water at the edge of the stone flooring.
“That is our way out.”
Amanda shivered. Now she knew where the smell had come from.
Oh God.
Chapter 8
It wasn’t a remotely pleasant way out, or even one
that smelled decent. When Amanda tried breathing through her mouth, the smell still seemed to waft up her nose, and breathing through her mouth gave her the weird impression that she was swallowing any bacteria that was in the air, which seemed infinitely worse than smelling.
She put up with the wretched smell. Not that she expected much in their getaway, but God, she’d need a shower when they got out of this hole, and poor Olga shivered and trembled in the cold, dirty water as if it was the worst experience of her life.
Being kidnapped by the enemy of her clan and having to go through that dirty water probably was. Amanda wasn’t altogether too shocked to see the bodies on the ground when they got back to the surface, but they still chilled her insides.
Hargreave grabbed her by the wrist. “Don’t think about it,” he said, yanking her along.
Dazed and feeling like she was experiencing everything outside of her own body, Amanda followed after him. Hargreave held Amanda’s hand, and Amanda held Olga’s.
Again, Olga proved how much this was affecting her with her tight grip. Amanda wasn’t holding on too tight. She hoped Olga would let go and make a run for it, that she’d be able to go back home without getting dragged into this, but the dragon girl held onto Amanda’s hand as though she thought she would die if she let go. It was painful.
The closer they got to the trees, the more Amanda felt Hargreave change. The air around him became more excited, more eager, and when they were beneath the shade of the canopy, he laughed out loud before whistling even louder.
No less than five men in chainmail and dragon scales dropped from the trees. Despite the armor, their wings, and weapons, Amanda hadn’t seen them. They’d painted themselves in mud and stuck leaves to their bodies. They’d actually blended in well in the shade and branches of the twigs.
“We have what we came for,” Hargreave said. “Fall back.”
His men looked to Amanda, then to Olga. “And her?”
Amanda instinctively tried to pull Olga behind her.
Hargreave smiled. “She is our guest. No harm will come to her, is that understood?”
Amanda half expected some disgruntled muttering, or even glares, but with every ounce of respect she’d seen shown to Eldric from his own men, Hargreave’s showed him the same when they bowed their heads.
“Yes, my lord.”
One of the men, a blond with a handsome young face behind a scruffy beard, stepped towards Amanda and Olga, holding out his hand. “My lady?”
It took Amanda a half second to realize he was talking to her. He wanted her to hand over Olga.
She didn’t let go of the girl’s hand. Instead, Amanda looked to Hargreave again. “Th-they won’t hurt her, will they?”
This time, she did hear the disgruntled muttering.
Hargreave nodded. “She is perfectly safe with my men.”
It was the calm expression in his eyes, despite the sounds of fighting that were still so far away and yet so close, that made Amanda swallow hard and release Olga’s hand.
Olga squeaked, and Amanda felt the need to reassure her. “I won’t let them hurt you. You’ll be safe.”
She couldn’t guarantee that, but that same trust for Hargreave and his word returned to her. If Hargreave said Olga was a guest and not to be harmed, then Amanda believed him.
She probably shouldn’t, but there was nothing to be done about that now.
The blond-haired man really did treat Olga gently, and there was nothing sinister in his gaze as he stared down at the smaller woman. Olga squeaked again when the man pulled Olga up into his arms, clearly ignoring the mud and leaves on himself as well as the smell on her.
Olga even blushed when she, reluctantly, put her arms around the man’s neck and shoulders.
So caught up in the sight of them, Amanda released an embarrassing squawk of her own when Hargreave pulled her up into his arms. Heat rushed up her neck and into her face, too. Her hands needed somewhere to be, so it only made sense for her to wrap them around Hargreave’s neck and shoulders.
And despite how dirty they were, despite how much they smelled, she couldn’t help but notice the strength and warmth of him. It was all around her, comforting her like a warm blanket.
Amanda could hardly look at him, but when she did, the way his eyes danced as he looked at her, the pleased smile that pulled at his lips, it made the heat in her face so much more intense.
His next words were softly spoken, as though anything harsher would frighten her. “I would never have left you with them.”
Without any effort at all, and before Amanda could open her mouth to reply, Hargreave’s wings made their appearance, spreading out behind him, strong and vast, before flapping down hard, yanking them into the air.
Amanda screamed. She couldn’t help herself.
Hargreave’s men shouted around her, but she could barely make out a word of what they were saying.
Didn’t matter anyway because when she opened her eyes and looked down, there were hundreds, maybe even thousands, of feet between her and the ground. She would have screamed again if there had been any breath in her.
Oh, right, she was breathing. She was hyperventilating. This wasn’t something she was ever going to get used to, and she remembered falling from the sky when she’d opened her closet door with that skeleton key. Not something she wanted to experience again.
Hargreave shushed her. He did it gently. There was no hint of annoyance or anger in it. “Sweet, be calm. You’ll draw attention to us. Eldric’s men will shoot us out of the sky.”
Amanda bit down on her lips. She nodded, focusing on breathing deeply through her nose.
As much as she didn’t like the way the butterflies twisted and slammed around in her stomach with every flap of Hargreave’s wings, getting shot down would mean falling again. Not something she wanted to deal with.
“That’s it, good. You’re doing so well.”
Hargreave’s voice sounded genuinely proud. Amanda wasn’t looking at him. She was too busy burying her face in his chest, but she could almost hear the smile on his mouth. It felt good. It really did.
“Don’t…don’t drop me.”
Even her words sounded like they wanted to crawl under a rock and hide.
Hargreave chuckled at her. “I would sooner spear myself.”
She believed him. That feeling inside her, the good one, stirred up again. For better or for worse, Amanda felt a pull towards this man, that she could trust him to hold her this high off the ground and keep her safe.
She relaxed, her muscles melting out of that tense, high-strung sensation that had been making her entire body cramp up without realizing it. She immediately felt better, and decided to take the risk and pull her face away from Hargreave’s chest.
The wind on her face was cool, almost cold with the height they were at and the speed they soared. Amanda looked back at Hargreave’s wings, noting the spines and spikes in some places, the red scales, and the black leathery look of them. They were beautiful.
It was also when she realized he wasn’t flapping them like a bird anymore. It seemed he’d only needed to do that to get high up into the sky. They were locked tight, allowing Hargreave to glide. Amanda still felt that up and down motion that turned her stomach as they hit currents of wind, and she had to close her eyes again, get her bearings, and then open them up one more time.
She could see Eldric’s castle fading away in the distance behind them, and in front of them, the horizon, the green fields, and even a flock of some kind of bird.
It was the most beautiful sight she’d ever seen in her life. If Amanda had a camera, she would have taken a photo and made it her desktop background image. She really would have.
Amanda searched out for the blond dragon and spotted him. He was somewhat behind Hargreave to the right of them. Olga still looked frightened, but the red flush on her face looked anything but angry. Maybe Amanda had humiliated her with the screaming fit.
Now she was embarrassed.
&
nbsp; “Where are we going?”
She almost had to yell her words. The wind was louder than she would have thought up here.
Hargreave smiled that mischievous smile that made his eyes sparkle and dance. It made him look young and handsome and almost carefree. “Home.”
Amanda didn’t ask anything after that. It didn’t seem like a good time to have a proper conversation about anything, and she figured, with the way Hargreave continued to signal to his men, that they still had to watch out for Eldric’s men to make sure they didn’t get attacked.
Amanda had written about the distance between Hargreave’s and Eldric’s castles. It was supposed to take at least an hour to fly between each one, but since she couldn’t transition between scenes, it felt longer to experience the flight for herself, and in that time, Amanda discovered she could get a little nauseous in the air like this.
She couldn’t even spend the hour thinking up questions she wanted to ask Hargreave when they landed. She was too busy focusing with all her mind and body on the power of not vomiting.
Please don’t get sick. Don’t let me get sick. I don’t want to puke.
Amanda could just picture some poor squirrel or deer down below, minding its own business, and then getting hit with a wet load of her vomit.
She wasn’t a comedy writer, so that didn’t sound the least bit pleasing to her.
Amanda squeaked when she felt another change in the wind, and when Hargreave started to come down for a landing. She hung on tighter, letting the killer butterflies in her gut get used to the feeling of descent.
“Hold on, sweet.” Hargreave laughed almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth. “Not too tight. You choke me.”
She was holding on a little too tight, but Amanda couldn’t for the life of her force herself to give Hargreave any slack. No matter how tightly and securely his arms were under her legs and around her waist, if she let him go, she somehow just knew that death would be waiting at the end of a long fall.
Hargreave went down incredibly fast and Amanda really did think they were going to hit the ground hard before he pulled up at the last second, his feet touching the ground as he landed almost at a run. The rest of his men did the same. Amanda was sure that if she had been watching the landing from somewhere else, she might have thought it was graceful, but all she wanted in that moment was to get down.
