Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
TYNAN
Istayed in the poorly lit corridor until the stars appeared in the row of narrow windows of the gallery. It was close to midnight, my shift was to be relieved by another guard at any moment, but as it happened every night, I dreaded the time to come.
I tried to catch any signs of her still awake behind the door, but everything seemed quiet.
I took a seat in a plain, wooden chair, stretching my legs.
My eyes returned to the standing clock; its deep brown mahogany surface was clean and its shape was carved with precision.
The sharp edged hands pointed straight up and for a moment I got lost in my thoughts.
The light sound of footsteps brought me back to reality.
Jenkins appeared at the other end of the hall and marched toward me with a gloomy expression on his face.
“Kent,” he muttered, looking somewhere past me.
Without saying anything to him, I got up from my chair and walked away.
“Aren’t you going to update me?” he raised his voice slightly.
“Figure it out.” I said, not stopping.
My already sour mood worsened as I descended from the grand rooms to the more modest quarters of the servants, and the guards stationed among them.
I scowled knowing that my day was by no means over, even after I finished my guarding duties. Without giving myself any more time to dwell on it, I pushed open the rickety door with partially peeling, light blue paint and walked into the guardsmen’s rooms.
There were numerous narrow beds, and multiple soldiers rested on top of them. Plenty of guards were still awake, playing cards, laughing, and drinking. I walked through them, straight to a back corner.
“Hey, Kent. How’s your heiress?” a bitter voice called out, but I ignored it.
Most of the men were from the blue clan, and thankfully, I did not know any of them. The fact that the clan was so large allowed me to be well-hidden inside the palace.
As I approached my bed, I quickly noticed that a pair of someone’s muddy boots had been placed on top of my pillow, leaving dirt smudges on the pillowcase.
I looked back, but no one met my gaze. I clenched my teeth, loathing every second I had to spend with the people who were supposed to be my comrades.
The cowards hated that I was assigned to guard Alina so quickly after joining, but they were too spineless to say anything to my face.
“Who did this?” I raised my voice, but only silence followed my words.
I threw the boots off my bed and turned the pillow before peeling off my flying suit and dropping on top of my covers.
It was not the worst sleeping arrangement I have ever had.
At least there were no crawlers I had to worry about.
Before my eyes finally closed, I thought about the girl with hair the color of the brightest flames, and porcelain skin dotted with light, golden freckles on her cheeks, sleeping comfortably in her bed.
My eyes opened, and they immediately swept across the room. All the lights had finally been extinguished. The sounds of snoring and the faint rustle of bodies moving on the bunk beds around me told me it was finally safe to start my day.
I got up, donned my leather suit, and laced up my boots. I stepped on a floorboard that creaked under my weight, and I froze, listening. Everything remained quiet, and I continued moving through the room.
Carefully, I entered the hall and crossed the gallery to the eastern side of the palace. I opened the window and climbed to the top of the roof. Increasing my speed, I ran along the edge of the stone wall, before jumping down to the pavement below.
I had always thought the palace was poorly guarded, but every night when I left it behind, I was grateful for it.
The Queen’s Palace was in fact, a separate compound within the city lines, but instead of protecting the non-infected population from the crawlers, it protected the men and women of power from the commoners.
There were still hours before the sun would reappear on the horizon, but the capital was never completely quiet.
I would bet anything I owned, that the light of the torches and the sounds from the entertainment district drove the undead behind the city walls absolutely insane.
One glance at Railand from above confirmed it; waves of crawlers gathered at the base of the colossal, thick walls, stretching out their veiny hands, hoping one day the massive construction would fail.
Loud screams shattered the usual hum of the city, and I looked around.
Homeless people, drunks, and drug addicts still lingered, making themselves comfortable around the gambling dens and opium dives.
Railand was vast and overcrowded, with its tiny, box-shaped apartments crammed into every available space like a grotesque cluster of fungi.
People from the surrounding territories all made their way into the city after the disease ravaged their region, overpopulating an already crowded territory even more.
I did not blame them, it was almost impossible to survive outside the city’s walls.
After the infection flourished in Talman, people from the big cities slowly transported all the wood and metal from the nearby settlements into the capital, creating an abundance of building materials.
But everything around me was repurposed without care, or proper consideration of the utilities, or any sort of aesthetics.
My eyes darted toward the monumental stone wall that separated the city’s edge from the wasteland outside. There were watchtowers along the walls and soldiers who guarded the last standing capital of all dragon clans.
I navigated through the constricted passages and after a couple wrong turns and congested bridges, I entered an alley, where the prostitutes took a break from working the streets.
Their bright dresses and the assortment of colorful wigs only partially concealed what was underneath; the decay of living flesh and bone, abnormalities and gruesome lesions.
A new disease was infecting the commoners of the big cities, and it was flourishing in all the overpopulated areas.
I averted my eyes, not yet used to seeing the disfigurements of the women and men who had no choice but to work the streets for the coin that was so difficult to get.
Finally, the contours of the unremarkable, well concealed house that was clearly leaning to one side came into sight. The lights were on, and I lifted myself up and walked along the thin metal wall to my target.
“Ty!” Frid called when I entered the single room apartment through the window.
“Long time no see, man.” Victor gave me a mock salute and Sol inclined his head.
“How’s everybody?” I stretched my shoulders, looking around.
“Bored,” Victor said.
“How’s the girl?” Frid spoke over him.
“Not good.” I sighed and walked to the metal sink to wash up.
“Is she still sick?” she continued.
“Yeah.” I looked up at the reflection of my face in a miniscule, cracked mirror.
“I still can’t believe we’re here to save someone we don’t know, and who doesn’t know us,” Victor mumbled.
I turned, picking up a fresh towel from the shelving nearby.
“You don’t have to participate if you don’t want to,” I said looking at each and every one of them.
“Don’t be mad at him, he’s just been stuck indoors for way too long. I think the ladies of the night frightened him too much to leave the house,” Frid explained.
“I’m not scared of them!”
“Yeah, right. How else would you explain why you haven’t gone out with any of the girls from the city? It’s been what? A whole month?” Frid snickered.
I looked back at Victor. His ash blond hair was getting too long and he did look restless, especially when he glanced back at Frid.
I never told them the whole story of my vision, everything that happened to all of us in Darragh.
I still was not sure if it was a good idea, things were very different there.
My thoughts went back to the image of Alina’s face when she looked at me.
Her hand in my hand, the endless fields and mountains.
That echo of the past brought other memories.
Victor holding Frid in his arms, their kiss at the winter solstice.
And shortly after, Sol’s decimated body.
Followed by Sage dying, two burning bodies tangled together.
“Ty? Ty?” Frid shook my shoulder.
“Yeah. Sorry.”
“You did that thing again. You just blanked out.” Frid looked into my eyes.
“Flashbacks?” Sol asked, and I nodded.
“Man, I still can’t understand how that’s even possible.” Victor rubbed his forehead.
“I’m not sure either,” I responded.
“Well, if you’re truly mated, your consciousness was just showing you one possible way your story could have gone, if you took that path.” Frid added.
“The path you did not take.” Sol nodded.
“This is way too confusing. Are you sure it wasn’t just a dream?” Victor asked.
I crossed my arms over my chest. Of course I was not sure.
I still did not know what to make of it.
My rational mind told me that it was impossible, that I was delusional, that I was confused to believe in something so farfetched.
But my instincts told me otherwise. In my mind, I was a deranged fool, but in my heart, there was no hesitation.
I knew what I knew. Alina was mine. She belonged to me.
She was my mate. She was the part of me that had been missing for all these years.
Shortly after I returned from Devil’s Cave, I knew that I would do anything to get her back.
The amount of effort and time it would take was irrelevant.
She was in the palace, so I had to be there too.
I stayed until the stars began to fade away and a faint glow painted the horizon. When the sun finally made its appearance, I was already back in the guardsmen’s quarters washing up and preparing for my duties.