The Fallen Throne

Chapter 4.1 ✦ Allies

Alaina comes to a sudden halt as she hears footsteps. They get louder as they gradually approach her; but even after scanning the area, she fails to find the source. It's dark in the corridor, so she uses it as an advantage to hide herself in the shadows as she checks the four guards she'd spotted before entering the atrium. Four, still around the same area the last time she'd seen them. Are there more of them?

The sounds of heavy chainmail indicates that it is indeed a guard, but it is neither of the four. Alaina tenses, trying to shroud herself with darkness. She can't be caught, she thinks, not right here. There are too many guards around. If it's a lone guard, she would be able to find a way through; but if there's a few of them, it's rather risky -- she might be forced back to her room under her father's orders.

She turns to the other direction to leave, but it's too late; she's caught. She feels her arm being held back by a strong force, and she struggles to break free. "Let me go --"

But she is silenced immediately by a hand covering her mouth. She is dragged strugglingly away from the atrium and further away from the dark corridor, towards a corner.

"What was that?" She hears a guard who'd just turned a corner say.

"What was what?" says another guard.

Alaina desperately tries to reach out for them, to call for help; but she hears a soft whisper -- a voice that reassures her.

"Quiet."

She stops struggling immediately, obeying the voice. To her, the voice is her saviour; a voice in a world of screaming silence.

She'll recognise the voice anywhere.

"Your highness?" Lancaster says, letting her go once the guards are no longer in their sights.

"Couldn't you grab me any less hard?" she says while furiously rubbing her arm where he'd gripped her.

"I apologise, but I didn't want you to be caught; and I am certain you yourself would not want to be either."

"I was looking for you," Alaina says immediately, changing the topic.

"Are you not supposed to be in your room?" he questions in return, neglecting her statement. "You know, locked up by his majesty's orders?"

"Please, you would be last person to be asking something so absurd like that." Alaina rolls her eyes, crossing her arms. "You know they can't keep me."

"And what is your motive, now that you have escaped?"

She narrows her eyes to try and make him out in the dark. "Are you asking me because you honestly have no clue, or because you're simply trying to confirm what you're predicting?"

Lancaster sighs in defeat. "You are up to something."

"And?"

"You are going against the king. That would mean going against the entire kingdom, your home; you are betraying your own land," he states the probable consequences of her actions. When Alaina only nods in response as a sign of agreement to what he'd said, he continues, "and since this does not only involve your own kingdom but the remaining six as well, you are turning your back against the whole of Asteria, just by simply denying the proposal that the kings have just agreed to."

Wincing, Alaina says, "it won't be that bad, I'm not doing anything just yet."

"I am merely stating the probable outcomes of your predictable actions, and I cannot guarantee the results would be to your liking. We do not know what the future holds."

"But that would also mean we do not have a future, if we simply sit here idly," she makes her point, "I want answers. And if I can't find it here, I'll have to find it elsewhere."