A Queen Conflicted (Alys Book #3)

Chapter 27

NOTE: Content and trigger warning for this chapter (and following ones). Insinuated SA/rape. Nothing explicit, but please skip this chapter if you are not comfortable or may be triggered.

When the sack over Endolynn's head was finally pulled off, she was standing inside a dwelling she did not recognize.
The men who had captured her had pulled her off the mount she had been seated on and guided her roughly as she stumbled across tiles, through winding halls, and up several staircases.
It was night; the only sources of light came from oil lamps mounted on the walls.
In the dim orange light cast by the lamps, Endolynn scanned her surroundings as best as she could, worried the men would cover her head again.
Her hands were still firmly tired behind her back. One of the men roughly cut the rope, intentionally going slow to antagonize her.

"Make yourself at home, Your Majesty," the man hissed in her right ear from behind before the finished cutting through the rope.
Endolynn immediately shrugged her shoulders up and leaned her head forward to escape him, but she did not need to; he shoved her forward hard.

She stumbled but caught her balance easily now that her hands were free.
Turning to level a glare at the awful man, she saw he had quickly retreated with the other one out of the room. A sturdy door made of bars closed shut between them, and both men gave her menacing smiles as a key was turned into a lock, sealing her cage.
Endolynn met their smiles with a stern calm, unwilling to fold to their tactics.
Once they had left her sight, she quickly turned her attention back to the room she stood in.
It was set up oddly.
As Endolynn carefully stepped into the middle of the room and looked around herself, she realized there were single beds set up against the walls. Two on each side, and two on the back.

There were windows on each of the walls except the one with the locked gate, but they all had bars in them.
This is the strangest prison I have ever seen, Endolynn murmured to herself as she continued to search the room with her eyes. She had been sure she would have been thrown in a dungeon right away.

"It is no ordinary prison," a small, feminine voice came from her left, and Endolynn spun to face the person whom it belonged to, her heart rate spiking. She had thought she was alone.
A figure pushed itself up to a sitting position on one of the two beds she was facing, the brown blanket falling away to reveal a woman.
A woman who was no stranger to Endolynn. Even in the crude lamplight, she recognized the blonde hair and cold blue eyes.
"Jocelynn?"

Endolynn's voice sounded weak even to her own ears. She could not believe her eyes as the missing princess nodded once in confirmation.

Along with the disbelief, a bunch of painful memories came to the queen as she looked at the woman who had caused so much terror in her life in such a short period of time.
"You are about the last person I expected to see being brought in here, Alys," Jocelynn remarked plainly, staring back at the queen.
Endolynn flinched, partially because Jocelynn's voice was so hollow and empty of her usual contempt, and partially from the name.
"It is Endolynn, now," Endolynn whispered in response as her eyes quickly ran over the parts of Jocelynn she could see. The princess had brought her legs up onto her bed and her arms hugged them to her chest.
"That is right," Jocelynn's voice was emotionless still, "Forgive me."

The queen blinked in shock. Had Princess Jocelynn just apologized her to? The same Jocelynn who had been ruthless before when they had both been staying in Tarkam Palace years before?

Words failed her. All she could comprehend was that whoever had taken Jocelynn had taken her as well.
But why would that be? Who could possibly want the both of them? What good would they be?

Jocelynn had virtually no worth other than to be a ransom for her family or Prince Mihrab, but a ransom had never been asked for.
And what worth was she herself? With Zaiden set to rule Balear after she stepped down, and Dastrehan in Tarkam with their children, taking Endolynn was pointless.