CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“Wycke!” Saris and Piers screamed at once. No, no, no, no! This couldn’t be happening.Please, magic, make the gargoyle fly again!
The gate stopped clanking, and hard footsteps pounded away. At least the guards were gone for now.
Piers caught movement from the corner of his eye and turned.
Jess wrapped her arms around Saris from behind, lifting her off the ground.
Saris thrashed, beating Jess with her fist. “Let me go! Let me go!”
“No!” Jess snapped, bouncing Saris in place to make her point. “Do you honestly think he gave us a chance to escape so you can go and say, ‘Hey, y’all, I’m here to let you catch me?’”
Saris put up a bit more struggle, then slumped. Her voice came out a mere whisper. “I’m sorry. You’re right.”
Jess shifted her gaze to Piers.
Surely Saris wouldn’t try to run again. Piers nodded.
Jess lowered Saris to the ground and let go.
Saris shot forward, heading straight for the gate.
“No!” Piers screamed. Not another run this soon. He charged after her, but she’d gotten a good head start.
Jess huffed and puffed behind him. “Knew. I. Shouldn’t. Have. Let. Her. Go.”
Saris stood with her hands wrapped around the gate bars, head down. A tear rolled down her cheek. “When our mother died, I promised to keep him safe. That I’d always keep him safe.”
At least no guards appeared nearby. They’d probably run toward the gargoyle.
Jess clasped Saris’s shoulder. “We can’t help him if they catch us too!”
“Too true, Your Majesty,” came a new voice.
All three of them turned toward the robed figure striding towards them. Smaller than a guard, not dressed like a gardener. Damn it! Piers needed a weapon. He mentally smacked the back of his own head. He had magic. No idea how to use it, but he had it. “Stay back,” he barked, raising his hands in imitation of Wycke throwing fireballs.
The stranger waved a gloved hand in a gesture too precise to be random. Piers froze, arms by his sides. “The way to subdue someone more powerful than yourself is to strike first,” the figure said, throwing back his hood.
Coffee Shop Elf Boy,Piers would’ve said, if he controlled his mouth. Elf Boy nodded at Jess, giving the barest hint of a smile.
“We have to help my brother!” Saris cried.
“You cannot go back, Majesty.” The elf spoke smoothly, as though he carried on a casual conversation. “Already your brother has been taken into custody. He is out of our reach.”
Who, exactly, the elf meant by “our,” Piers didn’t know.
“They’ll kill him with the flimsiest excuse! Some people here hate him!” Saris kept her eyes on the fallen gargoyle.
The elf remained calm in the face of Saris’s rising panic. “You have no need to fear. My cousins are well-placed to look after his safety.”
Saris tore her gaze away from the gargoyle to fix her attention on the elf. “But why? Your tribe hates us.”
The elf gave an indulgent smile. “We don’t hate you. We fear you. Not because of what you might do to us, but what you might do to this realm. Come with me.”
Saris folded her arms over her chest. “Why should I trust you?”
“Because I know the way.”