CHAPTER 10
It had been weeks. Aden had gone against his father's guidance and talked to every charlatan and cheat claiming to know about another world. He'd been away from home for a month. Weariness plagued him and Aden inched closer to hopelessness. But it wasn't in the tent or traveling cart of a proclaimed psychic or magician, but in the shadowed corner of a pub many days from his home that he found his miracle.
“I highly doubt you’ll find a portal to your loved one in this place.” The sarcastic voice came from a man sitting along in the corner behind Aden. The man didn’t look up, only continued to use his knife to swirl his drink.
Aden was tired, and even more tired of talking to those who really knew nothing. Still, the stranger’s choice of words caught his attention.
“This place happens to be one of the few holes I’m not actually looking in.” Aden downed the rest of the strong liquid in his mug and turned around on his stool.
“Perhaps that’s why you haven’t found her yet.” The stranger looked up, his face surprisingly young for the aged eyes it held.
“And who are you to make such and observation?” Aden examined the man before him. He appeared to be at least a decade his elder and wore modest clothing. He looked nothing like the men Aden had been dealing with.
“I’ve been to the world on the other side of the silver-rimmed abyss.” said the man. “I know the man who claims to rule it.”
Aden slid into the chair across from the man.
“The name’s Eric by the way.” Eric leaned back in his chair and his mouth seemed to curl up on one side just like Brett’s did.
“Aden,” he replied, cautiously holding onto his skepticism in case this was only another scam.
“I know - you’ve done quite the job making yourself noticed.” Eric tipped his chair back onto two legs.
Aden nodded, unsuccessfully trying to sense Eric’s breadth of usefulness. “You say you’ve been though the portal. As I understood it, the world on the other side is a paradise. Why would someone ever leave?”
Eric’s smirk solidified, but his gaze grew distantly bitter. “Every paradise has a venomous snake.”
“Brett.” Aden whispered.
Eric cocked his head to one side slightly. “I take it you’ve met the head snake?” He folded his hands and smiled.
Aden nodded with clenched teeth while he fought to keep down the hatred that boiled toward that snake, as this new stranger had accurately named him.
“You’re looking for a way to follow and or rescue a loved one from this other world. Let me guess - he pranced in and offered said loved one the thing they had always wanted, but miraculously kept you from following.”
He narrowed his eyes and Eric, but Aden kept him mouth shut.
Eric chuckled. “I know how Brett works, that’s all. Your girl, I assume it’s a girl, isn’t the first he’s charmed into paradise.”
Before his heart could sink too much further and his worry could fester too much more, Aden took a deep a breath. Int he least, he’s been counting on the hope that Iris and Catherine were safe, if not happy. But if they weren’t the first to be taken, what guarantee did Aden have that they weren’t toys in Brett’s lonely world?
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Something Bigger Part 1
Teen Fiction"We could run away." He'd suggested. But that was before the offer came. The offer that changed Iris's life and sealed the fate of more than a few. Aden should have pulled her away, he should have broken free of the hold. But maybe this was fate.
