Stolen

The Reveal (9)

Tam's POV:

"WHAT?!" I shriek. How can she be sitting here, all princess-like, when her

selfish father has the cure that can save the entire kingdom? My sister? The poor kids' suffering? Here she is, acting like it's no big deal!

"CAN YOU EXPLAIN, WHY ON EARTH YOU'RE SITTING HERE, DOING NOTHING?!" I continued.

"Hey, hey, maybe we should take a break, you know, take a chill pill, Bangs Boy," Keefe said, who was taken along with them.

"Seriously? Are you actually trying to defend her right now, it's her fault that people are dying!" I practically yelled.

"Tam. Let. It. Go. She's not worth it, she's just royal scum, like the rest of her family," Sophie interjects as she glares at Biana. I look at her with utter betrayal on my face. After everything, I thought we were on the same side.

"It's not okay! She can't just be so casual about it when my sister is dying right now!" I argue back. That stops her next words. She pales considerably.

"She has the plague?" Sophie askes, her voice no louder than a whisper. I nod, taking a shaky breath. My eyes burn as tears I didn't know I had in me welled up in my eyes. I closed my eyes and tears rolled down my cheeks.

"I- I didn't know," she tells me. "I didn't know!"

"I know. How could you?" I reply, wiping my eyes.

"Then can you tell me what this," she gestured to their surroundings and Biana (who still looked frightened from Tam's outburst) then looked up at him, slightly pleadingly. "Is? It's not her fault, you know. She might have known that her father has the cure to the plague, but what could she do? King Alden has to have a reason to not save his people, and if she tried to interfere, we both know she would've gotten killed."

"That might be true, but what about the sick? The ones who are dying every day? I'm only in this mess because I've been stealing money to fund Linh's health. Getting painkillers and medicine isn't cheap, you know."

Sophie stared at me, then sighs, and reaches up to tug out an eyelash. She does that a lot, and for some reason it makes me want to tug out my eyelashes too.

"So, you steal for your sister? You're not some selfish person who keeps his money for himself?" she asks, a hint of surprise on her face.

I'm offended. "Of course not. Why would you ever think that?" I definitely don't keep seventy percent of the gold I steal to myself spending it on band posters and products, that's for sure. Definitely not because Linh would get mad if I gave her too much money she knows is... borrowed. Not when I told her that I got a well-paying job as a guard at the palace. But it's all to protect her, so if people condemn me, so be it.

"I gave all the money to her and she probably shared it with her boyfriend Wylie," I continued, shooting Sophie a yeah, our cab driver, don't ask look.

"Well, that's a surprise," Sophie muttered, and then said aloud, "I don't know about all of that, but we need to get that cure from the king. Thousands of lives could be saved."

Biana – who I'd honestly forgotten was there – speaks up before I can freak out any further. "It wouldn't hurt if we took down my father and my brothers while we're at it, too."

We were free once again. Sophie and I exhale at once in relief. We walk out into the cool night air – Wow, it was night already? Making small talk and holding hands, we walked down the street and admired the beauty of the kingdom. We catch a cab and climb in, telling the driver where to go.

All of a sudden our cab comes to a sudden stop. We hear thumping, and next thing you know, we're being swung around, as we take a sharp u-turn back the way we came. What's going on? As our cab screeches to a stop, someone comes into our compartment next thing I know, I feel dizzy, and I collapse.