Soren
Something’s off.
I yank against the knots, ignoring the pain in my body. I have to give credit where credit is due, I suppose, seeing as the two women who tied me up did a fine job of it. I hear a door close and water running, then make my move. Maeve thinks she has the upper hand because she’s a princess, because she’s a witch, but I know she’s more powerful than how she’s acted so far, and that makes me nervous.
She could have bound me here using those powers. She could put a ring of fire around me, preventing me from escaping, but she didn’t. There’s something about the moonstone that’s not sitting well with me now, which means I need to go get it before she does.
I yank on the ropes until they loosen just a touch, then slam my weight into the chair several times until it starts to break. I grit my teeth, praying that she’s showering and taking her time with it instead of, I don’t know, washing my blood from her hands. Another jerk and the chair begins to snap. A second jerk, and it breaks completely, caving in on itself. I fall to the ground but lean forward, shaking the splintered pieces of wood and stuffed fabric out of the ropes. I can’t walk through the castle at this point. I have mere seconds to find a way out of this apartment before she comes back into the room.
I limp toward the window. There’s a balcony that stretches the entire length of her apartment, but below is a four-story drop right onto a street now teeming with people going to work or setting up for another night of the festival that won’t end. I open the door to the balcony and slip outside then race toward the very edge, the corner of this wing of the palace, the top branches of a large, hopefully sturdy tree scraping against the railing.
The wall to the front garden is built around the ancient tree. I could climb down, then walk along the top of the wall, then jump from roof to roof…. Yes, that’ll work. It has to work because I have no other options.
I rip the rope free of my wrists and ankles before climbing over the railing. My boots leave bloody footprints on her perfect mosaic tiles. I close my eyes, say a prayer, and jump.
Branches snap against every inch of my body as I fall through the canopy. My back crashes into a large, thick limb, breaking my fall enough to allow me to reach above me, grasping for more branches. My swollen, bruised fingers lock around one and hold, stopping my fall to what could easily have been death, and I hang for the space of a breath before finding my footing and climbing down.
I don’t have time to hang around, no pun intended. I watch a trio of guards walk along the wall only ten feet below me and make a move when they dip out of sight. I swing from a branch with all of my strength, using my weight to send me flying over the wall to freedom, landing with a crunch on the roof of what I think is a bookstore. The second my boots hit the ground, I run. I run like my life depends on it–because it does.
The princess isn’t what I’m worried about. It’s the silver band that’s no longer around my wrist and the hunters who would have been alerted by now that I’m free, and probably on the move, which means I have to get the fuck out of Moonrise if I want to survive the day.
A few people shout up at me in alarm as I sprint across the flat roofs of buildings hugging the main square. Old Moonrise comes into view, but I don’t jump down to the street until I’m out of the festival district. My body aches. Yet, adrenaline keeps me moving, and in a few long, painful minutes spent sprinting, I cross the stone bridge into Old Moonrise and skid into a turn toward my apartment building… which is gone.
“Fuck my life,” I hiss under my breath as I watch smoke funnel into the early morning sky. Half of the building gone, the rest burnt to a crisp, and what was once my shitty studio apartment is now a gaping hole of scorched plaster and old stone.
A crowd lingers nearby, watching royal warriors canvas the space, roping it off.
I run my hand down my face and curse into my palm. My money. The money I meant to use to pay the debt.
It’s gone.
I cut through an alley, walking briskly to the backside of the building. The sunrise sets the side streets and small shops in shades of gold and light pink as I look up at the only surviving wall of my apartment with a sigh. The fire escape survived, which is now my only way up, so I take it, ignoring the warriors teeming two stories below me and the idea of falling through the scorched floorboards as I climb through what remains of the window, the glass shattered and falling through the grates in the metal fire escape.
The hole where I hoarded my treasures is gone. Burnt dollar bills flap in a soft breeze, scattered across what’s left of the floor. I gather any that remain intact, stuffing them in my pocket, and search for what I came back here for.
I kick a piece of debris away and see the pale, opalescent gleam of the moonstone. I must be the Goddess’s favorite this morning, because Her light is most definitely shining on me right now as I pluck the moonstone from the ground without even looking at it and tuck it in my pocket.
Maeve has my leather jacket. She has my watch and my wallet, too. I don’t have a fancy cellphone. I have a burner phone which is now living up to its name when I crunch its burnt remains beneath my boot on the way out.
I walk at a calm, steady pace through Old Moonrise, my mind blank save for the task at hand–getting out.
I missed the morning train, but there’s another at ten, which is only two hours away. It means reaching the Roguelands in the morning instead of this evening, but so be it. I have enough money for a train ticket, at least.
I pass a clothing shop where racks have been set up outside, various items of clothing swaying in the wind. The shop girl is busy entertaining other customers and doesn’t notice me pulling new pants and a fresh shirt from one of the racks as I walk by. I cut into an alley, walking into a tight hovel between two buildings, and change out of my bloody clothing. I stop in a bodega next, buying a sandwich and a small coffee just to gain access to the bathroom, where I wash my hands, face, and hair in the sink, blood swirling down the drain.
I hate this. I’ve always hated living like this, but it’s not the first time I’ve had to scrub myself down in a bathroom with flickering fluorescent lights illuminating my every move. I thought the last time would be exactly that–the last time, but no. If I don’t leave Moonrise now, the hunters will find me, though I have a feeling the princess will find me first… and if she gets roped into my mess…
I look at my reflection in the mirror, running my fingertips over the scratch marks across my cheek.
She can fight. I’ll give her that. But it won’t be enough to save herself if she lands in the same mess I’ve been drowning in since I was a teenager.
The trek to the train station takes over an hour. I steal a ball cap from a shop catering to the tourists currently swarming the city for the festival, tilting the bill low over my face to keep it in shadow when I buy a train ticket, using the last of my money to secure a private room for the overnight leg of the journey to Twin Rivers, the last stop of the line.
I’m not going all the way, though. I sink onto a metal chair and hang my head, exhausted beyond belief. I let myself drift for a moment, mentally mapping my course, trying to conjure memories of the Roguelands. It’s been at least three years since I’ve been there. I have friends there–friends who live off the main roads. Friends who work against their will for the same people I do. Friends who can help, even if it just means helping me lie low for a few days.
I look down at my busted knuckles, my bruised hands. I think of the princess, shaking my head at her memory. She’s… infuriating. So confident but lacking the skills to use that trait to her advantage. Maybe giving me such an easy route of escape will be a lesson for her–a hard one to swallow, but a lesson all the same.
I know what the press says about her. She doesn’t do interviews or hold public events, not since her older sister was considered dead for a month and miraculously returned, unharmed, with a mate…. Yeah, that situation caused a frenzy, to say the least. The news of Princess Brie’s marriage to a relatively unknown man, a captain of her father’s army, was quickly overshadowed by the announcement regarding a new kingdom joining the Allied Kings, a kingdom led by her own mate. Emberfyll remains, however, closed off to tourism. I know there’s a naval base there, but that’s it.
Then, King Ryatt’s father died, and the news of that overshadowed Princess–Luna Queen–Brie, or whatever she is now. And for a while, speculation about Princess Maeve died down.
Now, she’s all anyone can talk about.
And I had the pleasure of coming face to face with her.
The train pulls into the station right on time, and I board, but it’ll be a while before I’m allowed to close myself into the private overnight room. I choose a seat in the farthest car, where I end up being the only passenger for the first two stops before the train departs Moonrise and the surrounding cities completely and dives into the heavily forested border between Moonrise and the Roguelands. I’m just starting to fall asleep when something smashes against the window directly beside my head. I startle, turning my head to watch a little gray bird slide down the glass before falling out of sight. I ignore it, checking the watch I swiped from an unsuspecting passenger, and decide to see if I can go ahead and close myself into my room for the night.
The sun is setting when I close the door to the snug private cabin, which has nothing more than two benches facing each other and a few thin blankets folded neatly on the table between them, tucked under the window.
I throw myself onto one of the benches, closing my eyes. Sleep washes over me like a tidal wave, dragging me under into pure, blissful, silence.
A sharp series of knocks wakes me up. I haven’t been asleep for more than a few minutes judging by the golden light of the sunset still flickering through the window.
“What? This room is occupied,” I grumble, rubbing my eyes and blinking to adjust them to the light. The knocks continue, then pound, shaking the entire door. “What?” I snarl, turning the lock and throwing the door open before my brain has a chance to catch up to my body.
Maeve crashes through the door, her cheeks flushed and eyes glazed with… rage? Maybe, I’m not entirely sure. She braces herself on the doorframe then weakly tries to throw a punch, but misses, her entire body slumping and tilting forward.
I’m not sure what force propels me to act in this way. My brain is telling me to knock her ass out cold, to carry her over my shoulder and toss her from the train, letting nature run its course, but my instincts take over, and I grab her as she starts to fall, her eyes rolling back in her head.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I hiss, turning in the snug space to kick the door closed, but I knock her head against the wall accidentally, and she yelps in pain. I turn the lock and dump her on a bench, then step back, raising my fists in preparation to defend myself from her again, but she looks… different.
She looks all wrong.
“Are you… okay?”
“Fuck off,” she gasps, baring her teeth, but her eyes water. “Where the fuck is my necklace? I need it.”
“How did you get on this train?”
She takes a single, shallow breath before her eyes flutter closed, then promptly passes out.