Thirty-Six
Thirty-Six
The gun jammed. The chance stroke of Rui’s bad luck saved John Brown’s life. In the confusion, Brown tackled Rui to the ground,
knocking the gun from Rui’s hand. Shrieks from the onlookers split the air as the two began to wrestle upon the carpet, rolling
around on the ground, beating each other’s skulls with blows that made bones crack.
I froze. I didn’t expect Rui here. Had he followed me? My thoughts were whirling as Mrs. Phipps and Harriet screamed on the
other side of the room. Some attendants had already escaped in the commotion.
“Protect the Queen!” Ponsonby shouted, but nobody moved to save her. Harriet and Mrs. Phipps ran to the corner of the room,
nestling by the grandfather clock away from the mayhem. Bertie let out cowardly whines as he scurried backward, dragging himself
across the floor until his back hit the cabinet.
Rui managed to flip the burly Highlander onto his back and punched him repeatedly in the face until he spat out blood. Ponsonby
chanced it. He ran toward the Queen, grabbing her hand and leading her out of the drawing room while Brown lifted Rui and
threw him down upon the coffee table. The wood smashed.
“This is madness!” Mrs. Phipps cried while Harriet covered her ears and screeched.
And in the chaos of this madness, the Queen was getting away. I wouldn’t allow it. Quickly, I grabbed a piece of the shattered wood, its sharp point transforming it into a stake, and followed her out of the room.
I won’t let you get away, you witch. I gritted my teeth as I ran through the corridors of Balmoral. I can’t.
It didn’t matter if Ade forgave me or not. I would never forgive myself.
“Stop!” I screamed as I entered the foyer. As Ponsonby and the maids ushered the Queen toward the door, I lunged for them.
Ponsonby tackled me first, but the man was a coward. He wasn’t any match for someone whose rage had been forged in the flames
of sorrow and violence.
Bending down, I dodged his arms as he tried to grab me and elbowed him in the gut.
Bile flew out of his mouth as he shuddered and heaved. The maids let go of the Queen to scream as I punched him in the face
and kneed him in the groin. One more punch and he was out cold. The maids forgot about their queen entirely. They ran out
the door, saving themselves. But in her haste, one knocked over the tall candelabra next to the wall. The fire caught the
carpet and began flickering.
“No,” I said as the Queen tried to slip through the door. “Stay right where you are.”
“Sally! You’re mad!” the Queen cried as she cowered in the corner of the foyer.
“But Your Majesty, madness is your family trait.” I shrugged. “A product of generations of inbreeding, is it not?”
“Sally!”
“Go back to the drawing room,” I ordered. And when she didn’t move, I dragged her by her ridiculous billowing black sleeve
and dragged her back to where Rui and John Brown were fighting to the death.
My nerves were shot, my hands trembling, but my breaths shallow as I marched Her Majesty back into the room, the point of my blade against her back.
“You have so much to pay for,” I said through gritted teeth, tears stinging my eyes. “So much loss. So much pain.”
“I would change it if I could,” said the Queen. The rubbing skin around her neck jiggled as she panted in fear. “I would have
your little friend live again.”
“Ade. His name was Ade.” I ripped off her bonnet and threw it to the ground. “And my name is Ina. Say it!”
I poked the back of her spine, drawing a yelp from her lips. Rui hit John Brown with a swift uppercut, but the Queen’s servant
wasn’t so easily defeated. He tackled Rui to the ground, biting his arm. Rui let out a pained gasp, but my focus wouldn’t
be deterred, for the Queen hadn’t yet spoken. She hadn’t yet done as I’d told her to.
“I am not Sarah Forbes Bonetta. I am not named after my captors and their murder ship. I am not a gift, a pet for you. And
you are no queen but the Queen of Ruin. Say it. Say my name!”
The Queen remained silent. Her pride as a monarch was absolute. She would rather die than give in to me.
“This letter will be published in the papers,” I said. “I’ve already set everything in motion. Your ruin is upon you, you
old crone.”
Queen Victoria turned and looked at me over her shoulder, her expression filled with the malice I knew she always had inside
her.
“The British royal family will not be ruined,” she said. “Not today. Not by you.”
“What’s going on?” Captain Davies barreled into the room, covering his face from a flying piece of wood knocked out of Brown’s
hand. “What are you doing? We need to go! There’s fire! The castle’s on fire!”
It was that one moment of distraction, that one moment I turned to Davies behind me, that Bertie needed. Leaping off the ground, he pulled his mother away from me and threw me to the ground. The stake flew from my hands.
“Sally, stop this! You’ve gone mad!” He fell on top of me, pinning me to the ground as I struggled to reach for my stake.
“No matter what she’s done, she’s still the Queen of England.”
“No matter what she’s done,” I repeated in disbelief. He’d heard everything. Her crimes. Her sick fetish that led to murder.
He’d heard everything . “Is this your answer, Albert?”
“Sally!” Rui screamed, and turned toward me. That’s when John Brown dove for his gun.
“No!” I screamed as an injured Brown aimed and shot.
Rui gasped out in pain as the bullet pierced his side.
“Rui!” I scrambled to push Bertie off me but the prince’s weight was too heavy. He held me in place, cursing and begging.
The look Rui and I gave each other may have lasted for a split second and it could have lasted a millennium. It would never
be possible to remember it clearly. But in that moment, I saw Rui choose. I saw him look at me, restrained by the Prince of
Wales, captured as a prisoner of a war I didn’t start. I saw him see me in danger, bound for the gallows.
I thought love would send him charging toward me, unafraid of the dangers that lay between us.
I saw him choose himself.
Brown aimed his gun at Rui again, but even with a bullet in him, Rui was too fast. He jumped out of the broken windows and
disappeared into the woods.
“You were right, Ade,” I whispered as I stopped struggling. “Their love for me is conditional.”
The Queen fell to the floor. “Have her confined immediately,” she ordered all in one breath. Needless to say, the wedding would be postponed.
I lay upon the ground, a rueful chuckle upon my lips. The game was over.