Perigee Moon (35 page)

“Off with you then. If you are caught, you know nothing of me.” With that she shoved me out the door and slammed it shut leaving me to the night with only a stranger and my fears to accompany me.

“Up you go miss,” Nathanial said as he hoisted me up onto the horse’s back. I tried to keep my cool and not show my nerves. But the truth was I had no idea how to ride a horse, so here I was at the mercy of an animal I knew nothing about. Great. After he’d mounted his own steed Nathanial laughed as if he could read my thoughts and grabbed the leather strap around my horse’s neck.

“Don’t worry miss. I’ll keep hold of him. You just hang on tight and enjoy the ride.” He smiled warmly at me and I felt instantly at ease. Nathaniel seemed nice. I wondered if he had any idea of what went on in Marion’s home, the kind of evil she brewed there.

Nathaniel made a clicking sound between his teeth and the horses lunged forward into the night.

“Thank you Nathaniel,” I said as the forest enclosed us. Moonlight had illuminated the dirt path, but the encroaching trees were black all around.

“It’s nothing miss,” he said, keeping focused on the path. I wondered if he really knew how dangerous this would be. Especially if he were caught aiding someone like me. If this didn’t go well, I knew I’d end up right alongside Alex at Gallows Hill. No matter what, Nathaniel didn’t deserve that same fate.

“Nathaniel this is going to be dangerous. Do you understand that?” I asked nervously. If he decided to let me go alone I’d be lost. Riding an animal I had zero knowledge of and wandering a dark dirt path at night.

“I know miss.”

“And you still want to help me?” I said.

His mouth tilted up into a smile as he turned on his horse to face me. “Alexander has always been kind to me miss. It will be my honor to help him now. And your journey would be a lost cause without a helpful guide in these woods.” He turned back to face the path as if this were all the explanation I should need.

We were quiet after that for most of the ride, as was the forest around us. No one else was foolish enough to travel this path at night. Three hours on horseback would have been excruciating for even an experienced rider, I would imagine, so when the dim light of lanterns began to shine through the trees my thighs were aching. Nathaniel motioned for me to be quiet as he tied up our horses to a tree and helped me down. God I’d never been so happy to be on my feet. I followed Nathaniel through the village until we spotted a large timber building just twenty feet away. Dim lanterns hung from the eaves outside the entrance and there was a murmur of voices coming from inside. “That’s the jail there,” Nathaniel said. “I hope you have your plan miss. This is as far as I go on this journey. Once you’ve done your deed I’ll be waiting with the horses.” I stared back at him wide-eyed and full of fear as he whispered good luck and disappeared into the shadows.

Plan? I thought about my plan. The one that I wasn’t even sure I could pull off. I ran over the simple spells I’d learned in my head and said a silent prayer. Alex was in that building and if I wasn’t successful, by morning he’d be dead. Who was I kidding? There was an excellent chance that by morning we’d both be dead. This had to work.

Without another thought I lunged into the darkness, pulling my cloak tight around my face, and headed for the jail.

My heart clenched and my throat closed off as fear took over. The voices were closer now. I hugged the timber wall outside to hide in the shadows as two men stumbled out of the jail, their laughs bellowing into the night, some sort of drink sloshing from their mugs. They were drunk. After they’d gone, I took a deep breath and peeked around the corner. There were four more men at a table playing chess and drinking. What kind of jail was this anyway? Well the fact that they were already sloshed did give me a little more confidence that my sleeping spell would work. I quickly sank back into the concealment of shadows and centered myself once again on the growing ball of raw energy inside my chest. I imagined it growing brighter and hotter by the second, doubling in size and power, until I could feel the warm glow of it all around me. Then I sent my chant out into the air.

“Through every door and window pane let this power spread, let anyone against my will sleep like they were dead!”

I thrust my arms out releasing the energy within me like a wind, letting it carry my voice like dandelion cotton on a breeze anywhere it could gain access to the building. I held my breath and less than a minute later the voices stopped and the sound of a mug clattering to the floor urged me forward. I peeked around the corner and couldn’t believe my eyes. They were sleeping! Every last one of them. I rushed in and checked the steady rise and fall of their chests. Breathing. They were fine. Some of them were even snoring. Yep, I rocked. I smiled, and then quickly weaved through the building to find Alex.

Once I was in the vicinity of the cells, I gasped, grabbing my cloak and covering my nose and mouth, but even that did little to block the stench. This place was disgusting. Just as the thought ran through my mind a rat scurried across my boot and I had to clasp my hand over my mouth to keep from screaming.
God help me. Alex where are you?
I drifted through the timber building. It was huge and there were so many prisoners. Most were sleeping, but some were crouched in corners crying, completely unaware of my presence. There was no way I was going to find Alex this way. The darkness, the smell, the clammy air. They were all but seeping into my skin and I thought I might lose my mind if I didn’t get out of here soon. God, how long had Alex been here? How could he stand it? I finally gathered my courage and decided to call his name.

“Alex?” I whispered. Then again. And again. By the fifth whisper tears were sliding down my face and a feeling of hopelessness was settling in. The high I’d felt from my earlier success with the sleeping spell was now just a memory. I had no idea how long the spell would hold, but I knew I’d already been here too long. I turned a corner and whispered louder this time, my voice broken on the verge of a sob.

“Alex!” I sucked in a breath of putrid air and spun around as a weak voice stopped me from behind.

“Rowan?” I tripped, running back to the cell where it had come from and crouched down on my knees. Alex was there, chains binding him to the wall so that he couldn’t even sit. The rusted manacles dug into his wrists and secured his hands to the wood just above his head.  Streaks of blood, which looked like black oil slicks in the darkness, stained his face and clothes.

“Oh God. Alex? Are you alright?” I asked, shaking the bars, trying to find a way in. Waves of pain and bitter desperation rolled over me and my stomach churned. I looked up and realized they were coming from Alex.

His head hung as if he didn’t have the strength to raise it. “Please leave Rowan. You shouldn’t be here. You have to leave before they find you,” he said through a cracked voice that barely resembled the boy I remembered.

“They won’t. I spelled them to sleep. Now help me get through these bars,” I said, taking on a businesslike tone. All I wanted to do was hold him, to tell him everything would be okay, but I knew that would never again be possible if I didn’t find a way through this. And quick.

“I can’t. I don’t have the strength, it’s gone.” His voice gave out like a puff of smoke and I could feel the panic in me taking over. The buzz of quiet desperation coming off of him immediately disappeared like a flame being snuffed out, and I knew he was no longer conscious. I had to get him out of there. I decided to try magic. I had no idea if this was even possible but it was worth a try.

Rebecca if you’re there. Please help me now.
I sent out the silent prayer and hoped against hope that she’d come, but after a moment I knew it was just me in this frigid hallway. I wrapped my fingers around the bars and concentrated on the warmth brewing inside of me. Not an easy thing to do when the building felt like a dungeon packed in ice. I let it build slowly, slowly and then forced it out through my hands. The sound of the bars bending and warping beneath my fingertips woke a few prisoners nearby. They started crying out for help, for freedom. Finally the bars bent enough that the lock busted free and I swung the door open. The other prisoners were screaming now. Their fear and anger bombarding me. Blocking them as best I could, I moved forward, wondering how much longer the spell would hold on those guards with all this noise. I didn’t waste any time. I wrapped my fingers around the manacles, closed my eyes, let the magic scream through me as it seeped from my bones. I opened my eyes when I heard a pop and the metal went slack in my grip.  I peeled the broken manacles from Alex’s wrists
,
unwound the chains from around him and let him collapse over my back. I nearly buckled under his weight, but managed to haul him out of the building without the guards waking, without those horrid screams for help paralyzing me.

Alex was limp against me and completely unconscious. I tried not to think about the weight, or how serious his injuries might be, but before we could make it back to the horses my knees gave out and we both fell into a pile in the dirt. I stood up, fastened my fingers around his wrist, and began to drag him, praying that I wasn’t injuring him worse than he already was. I could feel liquid oozing from his wrists and I knew it was blood. They were rubbed raw from the chains and his skin was shifting and tearing beneath my grasp. It was too much, but better than death. I whispered apologies that I knew he couldn’t hear as I placed one unsteady foot in front of the other, unaware of my surroundings, only knowing that I needed to get far away from this village. Far away from that Godforsaken jail.

“Miss. My God you made it!” Nathanial cried as he jogged over to help me. Once he had Alex’s weight supported I collapsed, silent sobs taking over. I had saved Alex, but I could still hear the other’s screaming in my mind. Mothers, fathers, children, spending their final moments in that disease-ridden dungeon. And I’d left them. Left them to die.

“Miss we haven’t time for this now. We must move,” Nathanial insisted, pulling me forward. The sound of angry shouts rallied in the distance and the flicker of torches could be seen through the trees. They were coming. I nodded and wiped my face on the cloak now covered in blood and dirt, both from Alex. Once I was on my horse, Nathaniel hoisted Alex up so that he was draped across the horse’s back like a ragdoll. I fastened my arms around him and gave Nathaniel a nod to indicate I was ready. This time was different. Even the horses seemed to feel the urgency of our escape as we raced through the night. I could feel they were as tired and fatigued as we were and I prayed that they would hold strong. Alex murmured sleepily against my leg as I pulled my fingers through his hair. It was matted with blood and for the first time I let the anger that was building within me take over. Anger for what they’d done to him. Anger for what his Aunt had let them do. Alex was right; I didn’t belong in this time, this place. But neither did he.

“Just a few more miles to Ms. Foster’s,” Nathaniel said as the horses slowed to a steady trot. He was sagging against his horse and I could see he was exhausted. So was I. I tightened my grip around Alex and sat straight up.

“No!” I shouted, maybe a little too loudly. Nathaniel spun around, his head jerking up, nearly falling from his steed in the process.

“Excuse me Miss?” He steadied himself as he cast me a confused look.

“No Nathaniel. We can’t go back there. I have to get Alex out of here.” I stopped, letting him process what I was saying and then added, “Do you understand?”

He nodded gravely and the look in his eyes answered the question I'd been wondering all night. He did know what Marion was up to.

“Wise choice Miss. I have a safe place I could stow you so you and the young man could rest for the night if you’d like,” he said. As good as that sounded, seeing as how my strength was all but depleted and Alex was near death, I knew we couldn’t risk it.

I shook my head. “Thank you Nathaniel but no. We can’t take that kind of risk. Do you know the place where Alex holds his circles?” I asked, knowing that my reference to Alex’s use of magic shouldn’t jolt him. Not if he was aware of the things Marion did.

“Yes Ma’am. It’s the same place his sweet mother practiced under the full moon.” I felt my shoulders roll back in relief. It wouldn’t be long now, and we would be safe.

“Just a little farther. It’s almost over,” I whispered and leaned down to press my lips to Alex’s forehead. A metallic taste burned my lips. I could feel the dull throb of his pain pressing into me like needles.

I kept my hands fluttering over Alex as we rode. Trying to infuse him with what little strength I had left. I didn’t know if I was doing any good but the steady rhythm that his breathing took on made me think that I was. I would need him to be able to walk if I was going to get him to my house once we were on the other side. I almost whimpered thinking of the pain that was to come, but it was worth it. Alex was worth it. I was repeating this to myself when the gleam of a fire caught my eye. I tensed as Nathaniel guided my horse through the clearing and a dark willowy shape emerged from the shadows.