Fortune Favors the Bold

4

"How many casualties?"

"Approximately 103, with over 40 currently recovering in hospitals."

"And these 40 are ensured recovery?"

"Not exactly."

"That is not an answer."

"Their injuries are too life-threatening to make sure a guarantee, but medical personnel is doing all they can in order to prevent more civilians from losing their lives."

Chancellor Adira slammed her hands down on the table, furious. "How did the explosive even make it into the ceremony? Do we not have guards and security checkpoints at every entrance?" She hissed; her face red as she looked at all the leaders surrounding her.

One of them spoke. "It seems to have slipped through one of the checkpoints. We are looking into the device's tracking history in order to trace its path into the ceremony."

"Update me then," the Chancellor demanded, silently fuming. Her states of controlled anger were always far more dangerous than those in which she erupted. "Which Province did it come from?"

"Vlasteri, ma'am."

"And which checkpoint exactly?"

The man standing at her side cleared his throat, dreading not having the answer just yet. "We've narrowed it down to those on the Eastern border of The Wall," he looked around the table of silent provincial leaders. "Though we have not identified the exact checkpoint just yet."

She nodded. "Upon identifying it," she turned to meet the man's eye. "Kill all the guards who operated it."

He gulped. "As you wish, ma'am."

"Is that all?"

He shook his head. "It seems the explosion served as a distraction for a deeper operation. The son of Vlasteri's Guard Chief, Castiel Brenden, was selected as a savior."

She nodded. "I am aware."

"Yes, well- you see," he grew nervous at all the scrutinizing eyes watching him. Would he also be killed for this slip-up? "It seems he was switched it with another male during the chaos of the attack."

Chancellor Adira's ears perked in interest. "Who?"

"Convict 286 of the Vlasteric Prison."

"The ex-soldier?" She asked, intrigued.

The man nodded. "I have Guards on stand-by to pull him from the Trials and retrieve Castiel Brenden once again. His exact location is being monitored as we speak to-."

Chancellor Adira raised her hand to silence him. "That is not necessary," she smiled, looking at all the leaders surrounding her who mirrored the same amusement. "Introducing Convict 286 into the group will undoubtedly allow for a far more entertaining development of events. Keep him in," she smirked. "Let the Guard Chief believe in his success until Convict 286 dies. Then three will die in place of one."

"Cohorts," she stood up and lifted her hands to either side, excited. "Let humanity's carnage commence."

Kalani lungs contracted, forcing her to breathe as she gasped. Her eyes shot open with the momentary panic that she'd failed to die and would wake up to the pitch blackness of a buried casket. Then, no matter how loud she screamed, no sound would make its way through the compacted soil above her, and she would be left to slowly suffocate.

Dying at the hands of the Intermediacy would have been mercy compared to the horrors she might face six feet beneath the ground.

But there was no darkness. Instead, a bright light blinded the eyes that still struggled to recover from the traces of drugs in her system. Kalani groaned, slowly turning her head to examine the illuminated room that surrounded her.