The Dragon King’s Substitute Bride
Chapter 13

HERA

Freedom at last.

Or so I thought.

It isn't until the whistling, biting winds that tend to prevail on high hills press my cloak against me that I realize my foolishness.

And I stop with a loud gasp, digging in my heels and gripping the door hard.

Just in time to avoid falling to my death.

I stare out the door at the dead drop of over a hundred feet.

Another step and I would have fallen headlong into the waiting arms of the many small rocks littered at the feet of the castle's dark hills.

Unless I turned into a mountain goat and learned to climb down or I suddenly grew wings and flew over the jagged peaks of Dragon's mount, there was no getting away through this door.

A strangled laugh replaces its way to my throat, breaking into a sob at the end.

Why is there even a door here?

Whose dastardly idea had it been for crying out loud?

I close my eyes and push all my panic to the back of my mind.

The only way to get out of this accursed place and to the foot of the what I have now decided is more a rugged mountain that an hill, is through the tall, ribbed castle gates that lay between two heavily manned, guard towers. From there I could make my way down the winding rocky path I had seen Midas ride off this morning and to the forest I had seen from my window.

But to do that, I need to replace and get to the courtyard and out the entrance of the palace itself.

Only one problem; assuming I do manage by some struck of luck- unlikely given how I had fared so far- but suppose I did manage to get to the castle entrance.

The tower gates would be swarming with guards, even more so with my noticed disappearance. What then?

I say 'pretty please, bat my lashes and hope the guards are so smitten by my beauty they fall over themselves trying to please me?

I would have better luck hurling myself down that chasm.

Getting away just went from a ridiculous fool hardy plan, to a sheer impossibility.

But damn it, I had started this and I would either finish it, or get caught trying.

I cautiously step out of the kitchen. I can hear hurried footsteps and excited, agitated voices echoing all around the palace and I know they've found out I'm not in my room.

I decide against retracing my steps to avoid running into Garwith.

But it's been a minute since I heard the sound of alarm.

What if he's ahead of me now, wouldn't it be wiser to go back and hide in a place he most certainly would have already looked?

My indecision causes me to stand rooted to a spot in the passage in front of the kitchen door.

Then I hear hurried footsteps coming from my right and I quickly duck back in, holding the door shut with my back pressed against it as I scan the room, heart pounding, for suitable hiding places.

I replace myself actually considering if I can fit in the oven and even though I'm the farthest thing from amused, I have to hold my hand over my mouth to stop the sudden burst of hysterical laugher at the absurdity of this entire situation. They are barely inches away and I can make out the words from their hushed voices

"Do you think it's true?"

"Does it matter if she's human or not? If we don't replace her, the king will have our heads before we can even blink much less try to explain."

"Let's go this way, there's only one way out the palace and she could not have gotten far."

I wait half a second then open the door cautiously, just in time to see the two guards take a left turn further down the hall.

There is only one way out the castle and those guards were headed there.

So I do what any logical, sane slave trying to escape a heavily guarded dragon castle does.

I follow them.

Pressed flat against the cold walls, making sure to keep to the darkened areas and walk on the balls of my feet so I do not make a single sound.

I look both ways, to make certain they are completely gone before I turn into any passage behind them but by the time I turn around a corner the second time, they are gone.

Almost like they have evaporated into thin air and I am left, vulnerable and thoroughly bewildered.

Then just as suddenly, a strong arm wraps itself around my waist.

Before I can cry out in alarm, short bony fingers clamp against my mouth, digging into my cheeks and cutting off my scream.

And one moment, I'm standing in the passage, the next I'm being dragged into a dark room smelling of moss and mildew.

I struggle against the grip of whoever has found me and replaceing purchase; I clamp my teeth around a finger and bite hard.

My assailant struggles not to shriek in pain and instead flings me across the room.

I land back first against the hard wall.

Stars explode in my head and pain travels down the back of my neck.

"By the gods I did not mean to. I swear on my life."

I struggle to a seating position, my entire body screaming in protest.

"Henette?"

Dragon folk were not just physically bigger than us humans, they were much stronger too.

That is why this girl with big, sad eyes and her stained white servant's apron was able to so easily toss me around like a rag doll.

A decision she so obviously regrets.

She scrambles towards me and despite the fear and remorse I can see in her eyes, I'm the one who scoots back even though there is nowhere left to go. "What are you doing?"

She opens her mouth to answer but a shadow falls over the closed door.

She puts a finger to her lips instead indicating for me to be quiet.

When the shadow moves away, she moves towards the door, standing on her toes to peep through the rectangular opening at the top.

She reaches out to me. "They are gone. Come."

I shake my head and the small movement sends bolts of pain shooting down my spine. Distrust adds a bitter taste to the dryness of my mouth. "Answer my question first."

She shakes her head too, desperation tinting her urgent whispers so that it sounds like she might burst into tears at any second.

"No, you don't understand your grace. You come with me now or it will be too late."

I stare at her and her outstretched hand for a second.

I take it.

She helps me to my feet and opens the door carefully.

"This way your grace."

She leads me down a short dark corridor with no windows and opens the doors to a flight of stairs with barely 7 steps.

The floor becomes hard packed rocky soil at the foot of the steps and I can see a single lone torch illuminating the cramped space covered in dust and cobwebs.

The noises of the palace are barely audible and I have the sudden mind numbing realization that perhaps she meant to kill me and hide my body in some dark abandoned castle room.

She takes the torch off the wall and turns to me repeating that single word, the same quiet, insistent urgency in her tone. "Come"

I follow her through what looks like a basement passage with wooden boards above our heads, shaking slightly and raining down dirt and dust on us whenever someone above walked across them. Finally we come to a large wooden door with three bars across it.

She gives me the torch and quietly sets about trying to lift off the heavy wooden planks barring the door.

Dragon folk or not, the bars are very heavy and I lean the torch against the wall and help her lift them off. As we set the heavy board on the floor, Henette turns to me. "Yesterday, the stable boy was sent to the market to buy hay for the palace steeds."

What?

We lift off the second plank. "He bought the wrong kind and today, the horse master insists he must return the bad hay and get the specific grass type he asked for." "Henette..."

She powers on, ignoring me. "As we speak, he is on his way to do exactly that. When you come out this door, you will see a covered cart filled with hay on the ledge right above you and a mare attached to it."

The third plank comes lose and drops to the ground with a muffled clatter. "Your grace must climb into that cart and cover herself with bad hay if she wishes to successfully leave the palace."

She pulls the door open, and at first it resists, like doors tend to do when they have not been opened for a long, long time.

And then suddenly it gives, flooding the dark space with bright light.

She presses something cold and steely in my hand.

I look from the small dagger to her wide expressive face.

She nudges me towards the door. "You go now."

I shake my head. "I don't understand. Why are you doing this?"

Her gaze drops to the floor, and her voice is barely a whisper.

"My father stole from the king and to save his own neck sold me here the second my hands could grip a cleaning cloth. I have worked in dragon castle many years your grace, working till my hands bleed and my back aches and not once, has anyone bothered to say thank you..."

She raises her head and her eyes are brimming with tears. "...until you."

I reach towards her but she shakes her head. "Go now and may the dragon gods guide you."

I would prefer if they didn't. But I don't tell her that.

I step into the light and I can see we are below the palace courtyard.

A short flight of steps to my right lead straight towards where the guards are milling noisily about and parked inches from the wall, hitched to a grazing muddy red horse with a swishing black tail is the wooden cart filled with the bad hay.

I turn around and open my mouth but she is already gone. The door closed firmly behind me like it was never open.

I creep hunched over, up the steps so I am hidden completely behind the back of the cart.

Lifting the brown canvas, I climb in and arrange the hay over and around me as best as I could.

Even if you lifted the canvas covering the cart, all you would see is the huge lump of hay the horse master did not want.

And no sooner have I finished, that the whistling stable boy appears. Humming a merry tune that grates on my ears and irritates me.

I hear him settle into the seat and moments later, we begin to move.

A rhythmic swaying motion punctured by bumps that send flares of pain everywhere.

I do not dare to breath.

Not only because there's grass sticking painfully in my nose but also because I'm sure any second now someone would shout and halt the cart before it made it out the castle gate. But nothing like that happens.

And when I finally summon the courage to peak out from my hiding place, I see the dragon castle, magnificent and ominous, receding slowly but steadily in the distance.