happy.
A noise made him flip around. A woman in blue robes stood in the doorway, unable to take her eyes from the once proud king of Chell. She had scars on half her face.
“What have you done?” She said calmly.
“Who are you?” Kenton said, his voice quivering.
“You just killed the king of this land.” Her voice didn’t sound angry or sad, on the contrary she sounded impressed.
Kenton edged closer to her, eying the sword he dropped. “Tell me who you are. Are you a Welgo?”
“Yes.”
“How did you get up here so quickly?”
“I live here.”
“What?”
The woman picked up the sword and tossed it to him. Kenton caught it and held it out threateningly.
“I live here. Chellion let me live here in exchange for telling him Welgo secrets. He then told those secrets to the king.”
“And you . . .” Kenton saw dark splotches on her blue robes. “You killed him? The lord.”
Thora nodded.
“Why?”
“It was time to change sides again.” She said simply. “Same as you.”
“I’m not changing sides. I’m protecting the Chell that I love.” Kenton said defiantly.
Thora backed out of the room. “I’d better go then. I need to tell Victor everything I’ve done today. It took a lot of hard work letting those Welgos in and killing the lord.” She continued to look at the king. She then turned and raced down the hall.
“No!” Kenton shouted, chasing after her.
Thora grabbed the door to the stairs and pulled it wide. Kenton grabbed the door as it closed and ran down the stairs after her. He tripped and collided into her. They both tumbled down the stone steps and into the hard wall at the end. It was too dark to see what was going on. Kenton took the sword and lunged it blindly. Thora screamed and tried to find Kenton’s neck. When she did her hands slipped, they were now covered in wounds and blood.
“I need this!” Kenton roared.
After a few seconds of struggle Thora’s hands fell to the ground and everything was silent.
The commander struggled to his feet and stumbled into the third floor hall. It was empty. He assumed the Welgos hadn’t gotten that far and the Chells were all hiding in the basement. His clothes and arms were covered in blood, but he didn’t know which was his and which wasn’t.
Slowly and carefully—his head swimming, his eyes in a daze—he found his way to the second floor and to the first. Welgos and Chells ran indiscriminately all around. Several bodies could be seen and he tried his best not to step on them. The doors were wide open, so were the gates. Kenton slid the sword through his belt and continued on with his hands up, ready to say the one Welglandish phrase he knew should it come to that. Surprisingly no one stopped him. That is until he came to the tent. The Welgos there recognized him. They grabbed him and led him inside.
Victor sat at the table looking over a piece of paper.
“Oh my, adjutant, you don’t look well at all.”
Kenton was pushed into a chair. He almost fell out; he was so close to losing consciousness. Victor called for water and a pitcher was brought. Kenton downed the whole thing as quickly as possible. He felt a little better and sat up.
“I did it.” He said, distraught. “Call them back.”
Victor put the paper down and gave a wide, horrible smile. “Who?”
“The Welgos. Call them back. I did it.”
“Where’s the head?”
“On the fourth floor. I can tell you how to get there. I can show you.”
“No, no, I believe you.” Victor said. “I see you have his sword.”
“Then call them off.” Kenton repeated loudly.
Victor stood up and paced the small tent. “They haven’t found most of the people in there yet.”
Kenton stood up as well, anger rushing forward. “You lied to me. You told me I had two hours.”
“Yep.” Victor said playfully.
“Well I did it so get your hounds out of my castle.”
Victor stood quite still. “Your castle?”
“You said—”
“I don’t recall what I said.” Victor lamented. “I’m so forgetful sometimes.”
“We—we had a deal.” Kenton said miserably.
“Did we? Oh well, if I don’t remember then I can’t very well take up my end of it.”
Kenton dove at Victor. Several Welgos came in and grabbed him at once, taking his sword from him.
“YOU PROMISED ME!” Kenton shouted.
Victor punched Kenton hard across the face. “I don’t care—and you know why? Because I’ve got them and you have no one. I have the whole kingdom now and you have NOTHING! Now I’m going to make you a new promise. I’m going to let you leave and in ten minutes I’m going to send these here friends of mine to kill you and your brother. I’m going to flay you both and set you on fire—you know why? Because I want to.” His eyes turned demonic. His voice poison. “I want to see you burn up and breath in your smoke because I can. Now get going. You only have five minutes.” He turned away.
The Welgos tossed Kenton and his sword out of the tent. Kenton picked up the blade and immediately ran around the castle to the entrance to the little garden. He pushed open the entryway, crawled through the tunnel, and appeared in the calm and gentle garden.
Cerise stood by the far wall, twisting nervously. When Kenton appeared she didn’t take her eyes off him. He was so bloody and bruised.
“Where’s Ackerley?” He asked darkly.
“He went back inside.”
Kenton looked about to shout, but thought better of it. “Why did he do that?”
“He wanted to get Jarn.” Cerise said, looking serious and overwhelmed, but not scared.
Kenton turned right around.
25.
The castle was now fully overrun by the Welgos. They trashed all the rooms, throwing beds through windows and slicing through doors. They ran this way and that, trying their hardest to find where all the people went. The hiding place was secure for now. Those who made it sat huddled in the dark basement, every noise sounded like impending doom. Those who didn’t get to the basement lay sprawled in hallways, blood still seeping though sword wounds.
Ackerley Morzha hid in one of the secret staircases, listening hard for the Welgos in the hall to pass. He had tried to find his friend Jarn, but when he entered the castle he was immediately chased by several of those horrible invaders. Now he just wished that he could get back to the little garden and wait for all this to be over. Fear gripped him and forbade his movements. Each time he tried to push the door open he heard more people coming and quickly backed away up the stairs.
The door from the floor above burst open. Heavy footsteps came pounding closer and closer. Without a care to what was in the hall Ackerley shoved the door open and took off running. It didn’t take two seconds for him to run headlong into what felt like a brick wall. He fell to the floor and saw two enormous men standing before him. One picked him up effortlessly and held him tight with one arm. They spoke to each other in an unknown tongue.
Ackerley kicked and scratched to no avail as the large man walked casually down the hall with his catch. He joked with his fellow Welgo and patted Ackerley on the head a few times as though helping a lost dog.
The boy was certain that this was the end. Why had he gone in to look for Jarn, who was probably safe in the basement? All those months staying out of the way and now he was probably only seconds from death.
The Welgo carried him down to the first floor. Standing in the main doorway was a man much smaller than the other Welgos. He had a nasty grin on his face as the invaders dropped bodies at his feet. Ackerley was set down right in front of this man, the Welgo who brought him holding tight to his shoulders.
“Hello there.” The smaller man said plea
santly. “Who are you?”
Ackerley was too scared to say anything.
“I don’t suppose—no, you can’t be Ackerley?”
Ackerley still didn’t answer.
“I’ll take it you are. You look a little like your brother, you know that? Not too much, but I do see it.”
“I’m not.” Ackerley croaked, his voice shaking.
“No need to be shy about it.” He motioned for the Welgos to back up. “Now, now, let him go, he’s my friend.”
The Welgo removed his hands and stepped away.
The man very politely introduced himself as Victor. He shook Ackerley’s hand, keeping the overly sweet smile on his face.
“I know your brother; did you know that? We’re friends. I saw him a while ago—now where did he get to?”
Ackerley remembered hearing this man’s name from Thora. Victor, the leader of the Welgos. What stood before him definitely didn’t match the image in his head.
Victor looked around innocently and then shrugged. “Who knows where that crazy kid went off to.” He slapped his arm around Ackerley and steered him down the hall, toward the dining room.
Ackerley went along, not sure what else to do.
“I saved his life—your brother. He somehow ended up in a Welgo funeral and I got him out—no harm done.” Ackerley looked puzzled. “Those are dangerous things, those funerals. Never end up in one.” He chuckled and squeezed Ackerley’s shoulder playfully. “Oh, what a day. It’s been fun here, hasn’t it? I always love a good bit of excitement. Must not have gotten too much of that in this great big castle for so long. Your brother, now he’s had some excitement. It was nice of him to bring it here for you to enjoy too.”