Life or Death

Chapter Fourteen

          I'm eleven years old again, and I am getting ready for bed. I haven't seen my parents much today; we don't normally have meals together unless it's for something important.

My ladies' maids have just left, either to go to their chambers or their homes in the village. I wait a few minutes before I hear a knock on my door. I know it's Andra because of the special knock she used. I opened the door quietly as I let her in.

"Hey," she says. Her blonde hair is free from its usual braid, and she immediately drops to the floor as she presses one of the floorboards. It pops up, revealing a decent number of books we've stolen from the library.

Andra, thanks to her father, was taught to read when she was much younger. When the new general and his daughter came from across the sea, we were both only six. Yet Andra was already reading books grown men had never heard of.

I was never allowed to read. My parents said it wouldn't do anything, since all I needed to do with my life was marry and keep the Whitethorne bloodline going with my offspring. After a few weeks of begging, Andra finally started to teach me. Now I was a pretty decent reader, and we stole books from the ginormous library as often as we could.

Andra hands me the book I was halfway through, and I plop down on the bed. She does the same and we sit there, reading, not saying a word to each other. That was how we liked it. That was how we were. We could spend hours together and never say a word, no problem.

~

A few hours later, a guard, named Jack, barged into the room. I screamed as I tried to hide the book. Thankfully he doesn't notice.

"Highness, Andra, you need to come with me. now."

"What is it, Jack?" Andra says as we both jump up. Out of the corner of my eye I see Andra step in front of the broken floorboard, blocking Jack's view of the books.

"I can't tell you until I know you're safe. We need to go." He grabs both of us by the hands and urges us to be quiet.

Fear begins to pool in the pit of my stomach. Something is wrong. Otherwise, Jack would just tell us.

"Where are my parents?" I ask. "Where's Matthias?"

"We're almost there," is all he says. We turn around a corner before he stops dead. I almost run right into him, but Andra pulls me back just in time. Jack's tall frame blocks our view from what made him stop.

"Girls," Jack mutters. "I want you to run back the other way. Andra, you know where to go. Don't look back. Do you understand?"

"But—"

"Now, Highness."

Before I can protest a second time, Andra pulls me, and we run back the way we came. We don't stop until we reach a different hiding spot, this one a staircase in the walls that led to a bunker.

It was a whole day before one of the guards found us. That was when I found out that my parents were murdered, and so was Jack.

Morana had intercepted us, and Jack had sacrificed himself for me and Andra. They found him face down, bleeding out from a stab wound to the heart.

When he died, he had left behind a pregnant wife and two daughters, Elayna and Elise. The sounds of their cries for their father were enough to break a grown man.

We barely had any time to grieve for my parents or Jack. A few weeks later, Matthias was crowned king, and I was almost completely forgotten. Though I never saw my parents' or Jack's bodies, I still saw them in my nightmares, cold and lifeless.

Gone.