3. Julian
Julian
This is it. My chance to escape. This time for real.
I count the seconds as the gilded clock’s arm moves excruciatingly slowly toward three in the morning. The gigantic house quieted down about an hour ago, but it’s like everything has switched to slow motion. Every minute has been torture and anticipation in equal part, a little excitement, too.
The empty halls of the mansion in Mexico flash before me, tangible and suffocating.
Everything is quiet, too quiet, too still.
The rustle of the trees, the gurgle of the water in the pond, the hiss of the fridge are the only noises around here.
I’ve explored the house countless times, looking for something to do, but just like the day before and the one before it, there is nothing.
Isidoro took everything, every form of entertainment, every distraction.
My sanity is slipping, my mind is shutting down, especially when the sun sets and nature itself goes to sleep.
Being alone is worse than imprisonment or death. The lack of stimuli can really drive you mad.
My nostrils flare, senses heightening as my mind snaps back to the present. I won’t get another opportunity to escape after tonight, especially when he exiles me back to that goddamn mansion, right after his stupid coronation, for which he brought me here.
Big. Fucking. Mistake.
Grabbing the backpack I found in the walk-in closet, I cast a quick glance around the mostly empty room.
The couch taunts me with its comforting cushions.
Eight new episodes of the space hunting show I follow mock me from the TV after months of no entertainment.
A bottle of fresh blood sits on the coffee table.
I scurry over to it and down it in one go. Better not waste that one.
“This will work,” I promise myself. It must. Fear twists inside my chest. I was captured once, but it won’t happen again. I fucking refuse.
“Damn this!” I growl, baring my teeth as annoyance spears through me.
Two months. I’ve been a prisoner for just two months and I’m at my limit. I don’t think I can survive another day completely alone in Mexico. I will lose my mind and die, for real.
The clock’s arms finally line up. It’s now or never.
Rage floods my veins, red-hot and demanding. I give into it, only a tiny bit, getting a taste that I know will drive me through the rest of tonight. Fuck you, Isidoro Antonio Altamirano!
I peek at the door over my shoulder, hearing no movement outside as expected.
Since my arrival yesterday, I’ve done my best to memorize the layout, the guards’ patrols.
At least the ones I could see from my window.
This will work. Across, the heavy drapes sit halfway pulled over the bay window overlooking the backyard and garden.
That’s my escape route, out the window and down from the third floor of this wretched castle-like home in New York.
Careful not to make any unnecessary noise, I poke my head out once I’ve opened the window.
The smell of jasmine and wisteria waft in the air, sweet and fragrant and unsuspecting.
Summer will be here soon, but I’d rather not stick around.
I take a heartbeat to appreciate the flowers, clutch the strap of my backpack and jump down.
My landing is less than graceful, the drop was lower than I thought, so I didn’t have time to stretch my legs in position.
As a result, I plop on my ass in the creeping phlox that runs parallel to the side of the house.
And as if getting my gray tracksuit all muddy ten seconds into my escape isn’t bad enough, my foot lands on the sprinkler’s mechanism, breaks it, and water shoots out from the thing in all directions.
“Fuck.” I jerk away from the flowers.
But it’s too late, of course it is. All it takes is the time between two blinks for me to get completely soaked.
“Great. Tonight is going just fucking great.”
I quickly shake off the water and mud, then direct my attention toward the woods beyond the rose garden and metal gazebo.
There’s my escape route. From what I could see during the very short, supervised walk they let me take yesterday, an old but tall, wrought-iron palisade fence sits past the trees, and behind it is a maze of brambles.
It’s thick and tall, and you’d be a fool to attempt crossing it, but that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
Is that a stupid idea? Probably, but no one ever accused me of being the sharpest tool in the shed.
Being captured while posing as my father at a fancy Gala with a gazillion guards certainly proves it.
Gritting teeth, I stifle down a sneeze. Escape calls out to me, it’s so close I can practically taste it.
All I need to do is head for the fence and the thorn hedge, that was the plan.
I can handle some prickly plants, it’s no big deal.
My eyes drift to the outbuildings on the other side of the rose garden, away from my destination.
“But…” I bite my lip. “Fuck me. Shit.”
What do I do? I should stick to the plan, get away from here, board the first plane to Africa or Australia or Europe and never see Isidoro again.
Yes, that’s what I must do, what I spent all of yesterday and today plotting.
But he took my company from me, my baby, my passion, my one and only Sanguine & Silk.
It was in debt, true, but I was going to fix that.
I had a plan. Now, who knows what happened to S&S?
He must pay for that dearly.
My legs take me away from my immediate salvation, across the pink daisies and grass, past the little wooden bridge by the pond with the lilies and koi fish.
A light switches on as I crouch by the corner of the staff lodge, forcing me to duck for cover.
My heart rate elevates and every hair on my body stands at attention.
I hear noise, like a glass being filled with water. With my pulse loud in my ears, I wait.
A minute later, the light switches off. I let out a breath as I keep going, my focus on the stables.
As I enter, the two black stallions stir.
I pet their heads and whisper calming words to them, then go right past their enclosure to the shallow basin.
And there she is, sleeping among the hay and the straw inside her pen—Mary Elisabeth the Second.
She’s a gorgeous, five-year-old Cayuga duck, and she was my only companion for the past two months of exile in Mexico.
I reach out and gently wiggle my hands under her, picking her up. From what I’ve gathered, she’s Isidoro’s favorite pet, which is precisely why I am stealing her and disappearing forever. That sicko doesn’t deserve her.
I grin, feeling the corners of my mouth reach my ears. This will be the perfect revenge. He will regret ever—
Mary Eli lets out a warning quack as she wakes up, confused and disoriented.
I shush her. “We are going on an adventure,” I whisper, stroking her beautiful iridescent feathers. “I’m going to save you. Both of us.”
I would’ve lost my mind if it wasn’t for her. She’s not the best conversationalist, but her companionship made it possible for me to survive that torturous exile.
Mary Eli quacks again, but settles. I stand motionless in the semi-dark, listening for anyone that might’ve heard us.
After a minute and no sign of any guards or staff, I sag my tensed shoulders and pin my gaze on the small window above her pen, from where I can just about see the woods across the rose garden.
Placing Mary Eli inside the backpack, I dart out of the stables.
I hold the bag to my chest as I run as fast as I can, racing against time to make up for the minutes I lost. Every few feet I look over my shoulder to ensure the mansion remains asleep, that no one is lurking in the shadows or tailing me.
I don’t let myself relax until I’ve entered the cover of the trees. White oak, beech and hemlock lead me toward the century-old horse chestnut, which marks the half point to the fence.
“Just a little bit further,” I whisper to Mary Eli when she stirs again. “We are almost there.”
My pace picks up. I am vibrating, already tasting freedom.
Isidoro’s face when he finds out what I’ve done flashes in front of me, annoyingly beautiful even when it’s scrunched in anger.
I can’t wait to be out of this place, to make a new life for myself.
It will be challenging to start from zero with nothing to my name, but I’ve got this.
And once I’ve saved up, maybe I’ll buy something by the beach, with lots of land and a small lake so Mary Eli can graze and swim to her heart’s content.
Smiling as I give into my daydreaming for a few moments, I catch sight of the fence.
It looms high and malformed over a row of low hedges with spiky thorns that match in viciousness the brambles on the other side.
My mouth curls as I imagine what jumping over the fence and into the thorns would feel like.
Still, it beats being locked up in a psycho vampire’s house with no contact to the outside world.
Isidoro can suck it. He may think he’s won, but he couldn’t be more wrong.
The threat of my father will hang over his head forever, because no matter what he does or whom he hires or how much money he throws at the problem, he’ll never find Andras Corvath.
My mouth stretches all the way to my ears and my incisors lengthen.
He’s been at it for two months and he’s gotten nowhere because only I know where my father is.
Isidoro had his chance to find out, I was willing to negotiate and cut a deal.
But instead, he exiled me and humiliated me and made the last two months of my life hell, so now he’ll fucking pay for it.
“Adios, asshat.” I take in the ominous fence and reposition the backpack so Mary Eli won’t get cut up by the thorns. She shakes a little, likely airing her feathers. “Okay, Mary Eli, let’s do this.”