The Outskirts: The Sky Raiders (Jace x OC) BOOK 1

The Sky Raiders: 10

I froze.
The boots shuffled. "What?"
"Ansel said we would be punished for not telling what we know." She said. "The kids under that wagon are planning an escape."
The redhead crouched and said. "Well, what do we have here."
"We're free and looking for work." Cole said.
I mentally face palmed. We were under a wagon!
"Free you say," the man chuckled. "I can see your wrists lad. Free for the moment perhaps. Not for long."
The crouching man reached for us, and I rolled the opposite way. I leapt to my feet and took off. Cole was not far behind me.
"Intruders!" The redhead yelled. "On your feet!Intruders! Don't let them get away!"
The shouted words fed my panic as me and Cole raced away. Man all around camp were throwing off there blankets and scrambled to their feet.
Racing toward the open prairie I saw two men running parallel to us, a little ways ahead. They were gradually converging. If they kept going straight, the men would catch them.
"Double back!" I said, just loud enough for Cole to hear.
We abruptly turned and ran back the way we came. The change of direction made us realize that the redhead was coming at us from behind., along with several others.
"Climb the cage!" Cole said. We swerved and climbed the bars. The slavers grabbed at our feet, but missed us.
Crouched on top of the cage, we could no longer see the slavers but the could hear them. I was a confident climber and a fast runner. Heights never bothered me. There was another wagon not to far away. With a running start, we jumped to the next roof, we barely cleared the gap.
"They're moving!" A gruff voice shouted.
We ran across the roof and jumped to another. I made it barely made it across and Cole tripped sending him sprawling against the roof. I yanked him up, but I realized that we had reached the end of the line.
"Still on the move!" Boomed a voice. "They're on this one!"
"We're gonna have to jump!" Cole said. I nodded and we ran off of the roof and jumped as far as we could. I landed on my knees, Cole tried to land running, and face planted in the dirt. We got to our feet, but someone tackle us from behind.
The air was knocked out of me. I squirmed as calloused hands pinned me down. It was very uncomfortable in a dress, luckily I had worn spandex shorts underneath.
Dirt filled my mouth as the hands held me down firmly. Other men crowded around us. A light approached, accompanied by footsteps. I craned my neck to see Ansel. The boots halted a few steps away from me and Cole's heads.
"What have we here." A voice said dryly.
We kept silent.
"Found them under a wagon," the redhead reported. "Must've slipped into camp."
Ansel crouched down, the light making it hard to see his face. "Time to fess up," he said. "Slipped into camp from where?"
"Just passing through." Cole tried.
"One of the girls said they were planning an escape." The redhead volunteered.
"She ratted him out?" Ansel asked, clearly surprised.
"Sure did." The redhead replied.
Ansel nodded. "Good for her. She might make a go of it here. That little darling deserves a reward. We have any of those cookies left? The frosted ones?"
"A few"
"She gets all of them," Ansel said. "Give her royal treatment the rest of the way to the Five Roads. First served, largest helpings, front wagon- Whatever we can do to make her comfortable."
I hoped the cookies would give her food poisoning, but I kept my mouth shut.
Ansel picked up the lantern. "Let them up. Get the girl a new shirt." The men got off us and we stood up.
"Do you have shorts?" Ansel asked. I nodded.
One of the men went to the wagon and gave me a new shirt to put on. It was a grey, oversized tee shirt, it was long enough to cover my spandex, and it was clean, so I didn't complain. I changed in the wagon and a man walked me back to Cole and Ansel.
Ansel studied us through narrow eyes. "Were you planning to steal my slaves?"
"You took our friends." Cole said.
"Your from over there, from outside. You came through with us. How'd you slip away."
I glanced at Cole. I mentally begged him not to tell Ansel that we came through on our own.
"In the confusion we hid behind one of the stone trees." He said.
Ansel glanced at one of his men. "I'm less than overjoyed to hear that. We had people in place to prevent that kind of sloppiness as we welcomed you to your new home."
"Where are we?" I asked.
Ansel grinned. Not a happy grin. The grin of the killer when they knew the police would never fine the body. "That's the question, now, is it? See, we're not in Arizona anymore. We're not on Earth. I'm no astronomer, but this might not even be the same universe as Earth. We're in the Outskirts. Junction, specifically, in between the five kingdoms."
"And that means you can kidnap people?" I said sassily.
Ansel bent down to look me in the eyes. "Well princess, in Arizona, yes, I stole your friends, and in those parts they might find me guilty. Your problem is, we're not there anymore. Once we reached the Outskirts and marked those kids, they became our property according to the law of the land here. And by trying to take my property, princess, well, you made yourself a criminal."
I glared at him. I was so angry that I wanted to punch him, and I would have, but his men were holding my arms tight behind my back.
"Don't call me princess." I growled.
Ansel laughed and said. "This one's got sass."
I just kept glaring and trying to free my arms.
"We don't know the laws here." Cole protested
Ansel chuckled, his grin almost sincere.
"Wouldn't that be nice, scarecrow, if you only had to keep the laws you knew about? I'd spend my life traveling, and stay as ignorant as possible." He eyed us up and down. "You working alone?"
"We're working together." I answer, still glaring.
"Yeah, you guys better watch it, our backup will be here any second."  Cole said
Ansel became emotionless in a scary way. "That wasn't an answer. Try again."
"We're working alone," Cole said. "Nobody else got away."
Ansel glared back at me. "If your lying . . . that'll be it." He warned.
"We're not lying." Cole said.
We stared at him in silence for a few moments.
"What are you going to do with us." Cole asked.
Ansel grinned. "You tell me, scarecrow."