Blamed

Chapter 4 - Auradonians

His golden eyes bore through my pale greens, freezing me in shock.
How did he get in here?

"In a bit of a pickle, Mistress?" Asked Danny, and I glared at him.
To my surprise, however, it did all but make him chuckle.

Danny seems to have grown a few guts since I last saw him, when we imprisoned my mother the second time.
"Calm down, Mal," I raised an eyebrow - he never calls me by my real name. "Look what I have."
Something appeared in my face, jingling and momentarily stunning me.
Momentarily.

Danny unlocked my Cell, pushing the stub of iron from the lock, and grasped my forearm, gently pulling me out.
I turned away from Danny, meeting Evie's red-brown irises and smirked, until something hard hit the back of my head.
My hands shot out to catch the keys in my palms before they clattered to the ground, making a racket that I doubt we can afford.

I looked to Danny, raged, and he shrugged.
"I thought you would want to let the others out."
I shook my head, "right, thanks."
He nodded, and we both sort-of just stood there, him especially, as if in a daze, the silence was awkward.

"Well," my head snapped towards Jay, "this was fun, but can we please get to the escaping?"
"Yeah," I shoved the key roughly into Carlos' lock, and twisted, then moved on to Evie's, then Jay's.

Once all three of them were free, I turned around to address Danny again, but was faced with an empty room.

"He's gone..." Muttered Evie;she rested a hand on my shoulder.
But I ignored it, staring at the door.
Why would he bother?
To show up, and free us, if he was just going to leave the second it actually happened, without telling us why?

I shook my head, scattering the thoughts, and began to move towards the door, hearing the footsteps of Jay, Evie and Carlos following suit.

BANG

Something crashed overhead, against the hard metal surface of the corridors we were in, in a floor above us, that apparently exists.
Sirens began to whir, and the cool steel of the walls was briefly illuminated by a blood-red flash of light - on and off, on and off, matching the pace of the heartbeat in my ears.

Jay swore, "Isle. Run!"

<><><>

How could they possibly have realised that we were out, already?
Were there cameras in the cells?
Well, even if there were, I doubt they could see any better than we could.
Lot of good, that would do.

Our feet heavily pounded the hallways, as we turned randomly at every corner - left, right, right, left, forward, right, left, left.
But everything still looked identical to whatever was before it.
The same squalid corridor, with its few lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling on single wires, the barred iron doors, bolted shut and the red flashes of the siren that was still sounding.

It was when I heard footsteps that came from directly Infront of us that we skidded to a halt.
Glancing around frantically, looking for a place to hide in order to evade the imminent threat - nothing. My stomach dropped.
I was going to die in here, facing punishment for a crime I didn't even commit.

Or at least, that would've been my fate, if Jay hadn't decided to break that door down.
All four of us ran through, disregarding the tattered slab of iron on the floor that was the result of Jay's stab at an escape.

<><><>

It was a long time before we actually achieved something, I couldn't tell you how long. But long enough.
Light streamed into the vent that we were all rammed into, 5 minutes ago to escape a rather thick group of guards.
I was still at the back, holding my nose, as Jay, who was at the front (and luckily for him, closest to fresh air, it smelt like something had died in here) pushed his body against the cover; the only thing standing between us, and freedom.