Escape (Book 1 of the Gods' series)

Chapter 12

“You did this! You could have seriously hurt her!” Dylan nearly screamed, Gabriella immediately squared up to him and snapped back at him, “I didn’t know it was all, eugh! She was bleeding and I panicked!”

“Why did you panic? All you want to do is kill us like that madwoman Nyx! So tell me, I’m intrigued, why did you panic?”

“She panicked because she is one of us! She is human! She was brought up by Nyx learning the complete opposite of what we have! So just give her a break! Ok, Dylan?” I had stepped between them and was staring at Dylan, it was hard to act angry around him, but I had to stop it. “Why are you standing up for her? She’s obviously not gonna help us by hurting you!” I pushed him away from the gate into one of the other corners, “She wants to escape, just like us, she promised she would help us get out as long as we help her get out, so just play along, for our sake.” He nodded and I walked away from him.

I approached Gabriella and whispered, “Did you get our ‘death’ clothes?” She gave a small laugh and nodded. She kneeled on the floor and brought out from under her stool several piles of clothes. I kneeled on the floor with her and Dylan peered over my shoulder, Gabriella then sat on her stool with the clothes on her lap. From the top of the pile she pulled a beautiful floor length snow-white dress that was embroidered with silver jewels on the chest, the jewels carried on to the bottom in trails like a silver waterfall, resting on top of it were a pair of white ballet flats, “That is Jess’ dress, beautiful isn’t it?” I nodded at Gabriella then looked at Jess, she was turning restlessly on the floor, so I guessed she just sleeping, I then glanced at Aaron, he too was sleeping because he kept moving too. “This is Aaron’s suit.” Gabriella put the white tuxedo like suit with a black tie on the floor with Jess’ dress, she put some nice black evening shoes on the floor with it she then pulled Dylan’s suit off of the pile, it was black with a white blouse, the jacket had one of those tails that pianists had on the bottom, he had shiny black shoes to wear and long black trousers. Dylan leaned close and whispered in my ear, “Very James Bond, I like it.” heard the smile in his voice as he hugged me tightly and I giggled in surprise, Gabriella took the last piece of clothing off of the pile and it made me gasp. The dress was long, very long and black, it would fit snugly around its wearer, the fabric looked like silk, it didn’t have straps, but it had something that looked like straps that were too big so they slipped down off of the shoulder, it was tight up until the lower waist, then it flowed down freely. Gabriella smiled and said, “This Charlotte, is yours.” She then pulled out a pair of black stiletto sandals and placed them on top of the pile. “Right,” Gabriella said with a smile, “I will leave you to get changed, I will come back in 10 minutes to collect you, see you later!” And with that she was gone, I walked over to Jess and gently shook her shoulders, she mumbled softly and slowly opened her eyes, I did the same with Aaron but Dylan took over after he tried to hit me in his sleep.

I helped Jess with her dress and shoes and then walked over to my clothes. They seemed scary; I hoped I wouldn’t look fat, or that it would at least do something for my figure. Everyone else was already dressed and chatting with their backs turned to me in the corner. I quickly removed my tan outfit and unzipped the dress; it slid smoothly over my body and made me gasp with its coolness. When I went to fasten the dress up, I realised the zip was at the back, I was going to call Jess to me to help, but cool hands quickly zipped it up for me, I turned, startled and saw Gabriella smiling at me sweetly, “It looks really nice.” She whispered. “Thanks.” I replied. I looked down at myself; the dress clung to my body and exaggerated my curves, it pooled around my feet like a lake of black treacle and to be perfectly honest, I would have looked beautiful if I had chance to do something with my hair. As though she’d read my mind, Gabriella pulled out a gem encrusted, black hair clip that she neatly put into my hair, there was only one strand that didn’t want to go up so she said it made me look like a ‘movie star’. I quickly put my strappy sandals on and stood up, “Right then are we all ready?” Gabriella asked. Everyone turned to face us; I grinned as Dylan looked at me open-mouthed, I walked over to him, “you don’t look so bad yourself.” I said as I circled him twice.

I looked back at Gabriella who was smiling at us all, “So,” she started “we need to get the staff from Nyx, then we have a chance of beating her. And by the way, you all look like you’re in a spy movie.” I beamed at her and watched as she unlocked the barn like prison cell we were in, she turned towards us, “I’m sorry about this, but Nyx wanted you handcuffed so you couldn’t escape, but don’t worry, I will tie the knots loosely so you can escape on cue. Or, whenever you want to fight Nyx.” She pulled four, long pieces of rope from her belt and tied out hands behind out backs loosely. We were all slowly marched out of the prison cell and into the huge marble room again, it had been transformed into a gorgeous ballroom, full of people dancing happily to the sound of classical music. There were chandeliers hanging from the roof with hundreds of candles flickering to the rhythm of the music in them, (no cheap light bulbs here). On the roof were gold sheets draping from one place to another, lined with red, it looked vaguely like a birthday party I had once been to when I was five, just way less fancy. There was a golden throne on some marble steps, on this giant throne was Nyx, she had changed her clothes since I had last seen her, she was now wearing a twilight purple dress that went to the floor. She was sat n the throne kind of awkwardly, I would have expected her to be sat with her back straight and her hands neatly folded resting on her lap, but no, she was sat sideways with her legs limply hanging over the side of the arm, her torso was facing forward towards us, but if I were sat in her position right then I would’ve been awfully uncomfortable. An entourage of muscled men surrounded her; they looked uncomfortable and sweaty in the heat.  When her eyes locked on mine she smiled and shouted, “Ah! You have finally decided to join us! And don’t you all look ravishingly lovely!” I looked quickly to the floor as all of the guests looked at me and my friends. I heard several people laughing at something, but other than that the room was eerily silent. Nyx gracefully rose from her throne and walked slowly to the edge of the stage, she spread her arms wide to us all, “Well, now you are here, I can get on with the main event. Ladies and gentlemen, you are all here today for one obvious reason. To watch and support me as I execute the newest apprentices of the gods!” She had a wide grin on her face and a wild glint in her eye as she addressed the crowd.

She was going to kill us? Nyx, was going to kill us, I thought it was supposed to be the other way around! One of Nyx’s entourage of men brought four big wooden blocks from the stage and carefully put them in front of us, they had half circle dips in and looked slightly stained. Another man gave Nyx a huge axe type thing, I finally realised that Nyx was planning to behead us in front of hundreds of people! I looked at Jess she had fear in her eyes and was twiddling her thumbs relentlessly. I then remembered that Gabriella had tied my bonds loosely, so we could escape if needed, well now was a time that we needed to be free, I looked at Dylan and he must have thought the same thing, he looked at me and mouthed “get Jess” I nodded and he got Aaron, I looked at Jess and that very second, she looked back at me, we both looked back at Dylan, he looked at Nyx who was drawing closer to us, the axe she was carrying looking bigger than her, as she approached the wooden blocks Dylan shouted “Now!” Our bonds fell to the floor behind us.