Promising Light (47 page)

“Oh, no, I’m sorry to hear about
that,” Di said, unrolling the scroll and looking at the sketches of
Dar, Evan, and Sierra. “What happened?”

“She simply disappeared,” William
said, frowning. “And these three vanished the same day. We believe
they’re looking for the ancient texts.”

Di’s eyes widened as she stared at
William and Arlan. “I’m… sorry, what?”

“You know as well as we do about
the magical families,” William said. He motioned to Matilda. “A
Cosa and a Mahri. And you two are Borens.” He looked at Evan, then
Dar. “What about the two of you?”

“Ethan’s a Boren,” Chad said,
putting his hand on Evan’s shoulder. He was the preteen boy again.
“He’s my brother.”

“Please, your Highness, we aren’t
looking for any trouble,” Di said.

William took his gaze off Dar to
look at Di. “Neither are we. We only want to find Lady Grace and
those responsible for taking her.”

“Are they asking for a ransom?” Di
asked before taking a sip of her tea.

“No, they plan on using her for
the prophecy,” William said. “I’m sure you remember the one that
killed a dozen Avialies last time they tried to fulfill
it.”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Di said.
“So, they’re seeking the ancient texts and they want to fulfill the
prophecy?”

“That’s what we believe,
yes.”

“And you want Lee to help you find
them?” Di’s voice hardened. “Is that why you’re here?”

“In a way,” William said, drumming
his fingers on his leg.

It was silent for a moment, and
then Kyler cleared his throat and leaned forward. “Ms. Diana,
please, my sister’s in danger. We need to find her. We have to get
her away from these people.”

Grace clenched her teeth. Is that
what the prince told him? That she was in danger? She wished she
could talk to Kyler and explain herself.

“It seems to me like the only
people she’s in danger of is the Protectors,” Matilda
said.

“Excuse me?” William asked, his
jaw clenching.

“The Avialies want her for the
prophecy, right?” Matilda asked. “They’re going to keep her safe as
long as they do what she wants. That’s what they tried to do for
Sierra and Sashe.”

“But she’s not going to do what
they want. I can’t imagine what they’ll do to her when she refuses
to help. What they have done already.”

He couldn’t believe that, could he?
He was lying because he knew that Grace had been planning to meet
Sierra and Evan. He knew that Grace was probably helping them. He
was only saying these things to appeal to Di and to make Kyler hate
the Avialies. Just like all of them were lying about her
involvement. It wouldn’t look very good for the Protectors and the
King if the General’s daughter was helping the Avialies, would it?
Did her mother and father know the truth?

“They’re not good people,” Chad
said. Grace looked at him, her eyes wide. “I mean, they’re the
reason Uncle Ivan is dead.”

Another moment of silence, then
Kyler asked quietly, “What happened to your uncle?”

“He died trying to protect the
Avialies,” Chad said, staring at the table in front of him. “Even
though he should have known…” He looked at Di. “That’s why you
moved here, right? To get away from the fighting.”

Di nodded. “Yes… and I don’t want
Lee to get to pulled into it again.”

“But we are fighting for an
innocent lady,” William said, raising his voice. “We can’t leave
her to the plans of the Avialies.”

Dar suddenly groaned, putting his
hand to his head. Grace watched with horror as his fair hair turned
dark, and his stature diminished in size, and he was suddenly back
to his original form. Evan, too, was no longer the preteen boy, but
himself. Grace gasped, stepping back as she realized Cosa magic was
at work, revealing them all.

Kyler and William leapt to their
feet, staring at Dar and Evan. “Where’s Grace?” Kyler
demanded.

Grace’s eyes widened; she hadn’t
felt the air change around her like she usually did when Matilda
revealed her. She looked at Sierra, then Matilda. The Cosa sat in
her chair, her jaw tight, her hands clenched into fists on the
kitchen table. She’d somehow kept them hidden.

William drew his sword. “I should
have known.” His voice was low and deadly.

“What did you do with Ethan?” Chad
yelled. He knocked Evan out of his chair, and Sierra ran for
them.

Dar sprang to his feet, taking out
his sword. William attacked him, and Dar raised his sword to defend
himself.

“Please, stop!” Di screamed. Grace
wasn’t sure who she was yelling at: Sierra, Evan, and Chad as they
wrestled in the kitchen, or William and Dar. Arlan joined the sword
fight, and Grace stepped forward to help.

Dar ran into the living room and
grabbed her arm. He pulled her out of the cottage, and yelled, “Get
out of here! Matilda won’t be able to hold it up
forever.”

Just as he pushed her away,
William, Kyler, and Arlan ran out of the house. “Where is she?”
Kyler yelled, taking out a dagger.

“No!” Grace called. “Kyler, stop
it! I’m fine!”

He couldn’t hear her, of course,
and he went for Dar. All three of them went against Dar, and all of
Di’s shouts went ignored. Dar was outnumbered, and Grace assumed
the Cosa magic kept him from changing. She vividly remembered when
he changed into a lion and attacked in the tunnels.

She took out her own dagger, but
she knew she couldn’t be able to hurt Kyler or William. When Arlan
had stepped away from the fight for a moment, she sliced him in
arm. He let out a surprised yell and lashed his sword out, but she
was already on his other side and she cut his other arm. She wiped
the streak of blood off of her dagger onto her dress, sheathed it,
and ran for the horses. She untied one, and, though she was sure Di
and Chad would disapprove, she slapped his butt to send him in the
middle of the fight.

William narrowly avoided being
trampled, and Kyler took advantage of Dar’s shock and pinned him to
the ground, putting his dagger to Dar’s throat.

“No!” Grace yelled
again.

Kyler’s head snapped up, and he
looked directly at her. Matilda’s enchantment had finally worn off,
and he stared at her in shock. “Grace?”

William took her arm. “Grace,” he
said with relief. “You’re all right.”

She pulled away from his grip and
ran to Dar and Kyler. “Please let him go,” she said to Kyler,
putting her hand on his shoulder.

“What are you—” Kyler began, but
Dar pushed his arm away. They struggled for a moment, and Grace
tried to pull Kyler away, but Arlan grabbed her from
behind.

“Don’t touch me!” she yelled,
thrashing against him. He pulled her arms behind her back. Though
she kicked him in the shin and stomped on his foot, he had no
reaction, as though he hadn’t even felt her.

Royal guards and soldiers
surrounded them, and two of the men pulled Dar’s hands behind his
back, chaining his wrists together.

“Let him go!” Grace
yelled.

Matilda and Chad were outside now,
but Grace didn’t see Sierra and Evan. She turned to William,
glaring at him. “This isn’t your country! You can’t just arrest
whomever you please!”

William’s mouth dropped open, and
his shock changed to anger in a matter of seconds. “We’re taking
you back to Haltar where you belong!” He turned on Matilda. “Where
are the two others?”

“There’s no one else,” Matilda
said.

“Wait, you’re helping them?” Chad
spat. “Where’s Ethan?”

Grace tried to hide her confusion;
he was doing this to help them in the long run, right? Not to save
his own skin? She tried to meet Dar’s eyes, but he was glaring at
William.

“Arlan, please let her go,” Kyler
said. He wiped sweat off his brow and stared at Grace.

“We need to tie her up,” Arlan
said. “Jael!”

“Tie her up?” Kyler raised his
voice. “She’s innocent!”

“Ask her which side she’s on,”
Arlan said, shaking her. She felt a few droplets of his spit on her
ear. “Ask her if she’s helping those scum.”

Kyler looked at Grace, tilting his
head as his brow furrowed.

“I want to be here, Kyler,” she
said.

“What do you mean?” he asked,
shaking his head. “They… they kidnapped you!”

“No, they didn’t!”

“In Nyad!”

Grace stopped struggling, watching
William speak with Di and Chad. They had Matilda chained up now,
and Grace turned back to Kyler. “Yes, in Nyad, but not this time,”
she said. “I want to help them.”

Arlan let go of her for a moment,
and Grace spun around, trying to strike him in the face, but the
man she assumed was Jael grabbed her arm. He and Arlan forced her
arms behind her back again and tied rope around her
wrists.

“This is ridiculous!” Kyler
said.

The two men pushed her into the
carriage, and she moved around in time to see them dragging Dar,
Chad, and Matilda to another carriage. “What are you going to do to
them?” she yelled. She tried to step out, but Arlan pushed her back
into her seat. “They didn’t do anything!”

“Oh, it wasn’t your group that
killed the guards in Rahuda?” William asked as he got in on the
other side of the carriage. Kyler sat down next to him, both of
them across from Grace.

“No,” she said shortly. “Let me
out.”

“No,” William said.

“I didn’t do anything wrong!”
Grace exclaimed.

William said nothing. The carriage
moved forward. Grace watched as Di’s house faded away. She’d left
her bag. Shaking her head, she told herself she’d be returning
soon. The prince couldn’t do this.

She turned to Kyler. “The night I
left Haltar, I heard a couple Protectors talking with Father. They
were going to kill Dar. Or force me to marry the prince. Or make it
so I could never have children. Or do all three.”

Kyler stared at her in shock. He
finally looked at William, asking, “Is that true?”

William shook his head. “I doubt
it.”

She groaned. “Why would I make that
up?”

“Because you’re in love with Dar
and you want a reason to run off with him,” William said, his voice
low. “You want a reason to disgrace your family by fraternizing
with Avialies.”

“Goodness! They’re just
people
, like you and
me!”

William gazed the passing scenery;
Grace wondered if she could leap out of the small window. “When we
get back to Renaul, you’ll realize how foolish you’ve been,” he
said.

“You’re the foolish one if you
really think the Protectors are going to let me come back into
court and live a normal life,” Grace said. “I’ll be surprised if
they even let me live.”

“Don’t say things like that,”
Kyler said in an affronted tone.

“We’re not going to let Dar live,
that’s for sure,” William said quietly. He met her eyes for a
moment, and she had to look away from him in hopes he wouldn’t see
her sudden tears.

They had to get out of here. They
were still in Kleisade; this wasn’t William’s realm. If Di told the
authorities, someone may defend them. But Di had told Chad she’d
come to Aron to escape the violence; would she do more to inflame
the anger of the Protectors? Would she to protect her nephew? Then
there was Chad’s strange behavior. She thought he was tricking the
prince to try to help them later on, but maybe he was only looking
out for himself. Either way, it hadn’t worked; he was tied up with
Matilda and Dar. But where were Sierra and Evan? Maybe they could
help. Or Lee.

“Why do you want to help them?”
Kyler asked after a few moments of silence.

“I don’t think what the Protectors
are doing is right,” Grace said. “They’ve cursed an entire
bloodline because they think the magic is dangerous.”

“It is dangerous,” William said.
“Look what it’s done to you.”

“It can be dangerous, yes,” she
admitted. “But you can’t blame innocent people for the danger of
some people.”

“They’re all the same. You don’t
understand because you’re infatuated with Dar, but they’re
untrustworthy. All the magical families are.”

Grace said nothing in response,
shaking her head. She asked Kyler, “How are Mother and Father
taking it all?”

“Mother’s falling apart,” Kyler
said. “Crying all the time, lying around the house.” He paused and
shrugged. “I think in some, small way though, she enjoys the
attention.”

Grace half-smiled. “I thought as
much.”

“But she’s still worried about
you.”

“And Father?”

“He wasn’t happy to find out his
only daughter was kidnapped by Avialies for the second time,”
William said.

She wanted to snap at him and ask
if she could have a conversation with her brother without his
interruptions, but she held it back. No need make him even angrier.
She did glare at him, though.