Despite Arlen maintaining his calm composure outwardly, he was ready for blood.

He leaned his shoulder against the acacia tree in the garden of the Southern Prince’s summer palace, and surveyed everyone’s position. Jed was leaning against the tree’s trunk behind him, while; Tork, Bonnie, and the Queen were hiding crouched behind a hedge nearer to where the servant’s entrance lay. Keynan and Declan were the most risky in their hiding place behind a tree, that had no other shrubbery or plants around, and had chosen that spot only for its proximity to both hidden groups.

With their backs to the rocky mountain they had descended from that morning, they overlooked the paths the servants used from the Prince’s house, all hidden and knowing that no one could easily attack from their backs.

He studied the team of ragtag warriors that were visible to him with a critical eye.

They had 3 pure blooded magic users, and 3 Magee fighters. Add in a particularly angry Servicer, and there was a chance their plan would work. However, Arlen also knew that there was a total of 5 Servicers in the crowd of royals that currently resided with Prince Raphael, which complicated matters somewhat.

While Quickening could only occur for short spurts of time, it was definitely a problem. In an entire day a Servicer could blur through time a total of 30 seconds, so it had to be used carefully.

Arlen had been mastered his control of the quick speed slowly, but the ever presence of Aggie’s pain in suffering had been the best and worst kind of motivation for him to overcome any mental blocks.

He had been surprised to learn that Bonnie had in fact also been a Magee fighter, and that had been how she and Declan had met. The more prime fighters they had, the better Arlen reasoned. He was curious about the married couple, but he would have to discover the details of their story once Lady Beatha was safe in his care. Until then, there was nothing else that mattered more.

Everyone was waiting for the first groups of servants to approach their hiding places to assume their disguises for the day. In Keynan’s vision, he had described seeing a cheering crowd down by a ship, and true to what he saw; there already seemed to be tables sitting outside the servant’s entrance ready to be moved.

It wasn’t long before, 2 servants of slender build began making their way down the gravel path towards the lawn carrying one of the tables. They were clearly carrying it towards the white sandy beach, where a single dock stood, where a ship loomed over, with its gangplank running all the way down to the sandy shore, making the dock an unnecessary feature.

“These 2 will suit myself and the Queen.” Jed whispered to Arlen, his blue eyes glimmering as they trained on the two.

“You’re sure you can get them over here?”

Jed didn’t turn away his attention form the 2 servants, but his tone lowered an octave as he addressed Arlen’s question seriously.

“Mind magickers rightfully put most people ill at ease. We are taking away from someone’s free will, and I exercise my ability as little as possible for that reason. Do not mistake my caution for ineptitude.” Arlen’s mouth hardened, but he nodded in silent apology.

As the servants began approaching the bend of the path by Arlen and Jed, they both suddenly blinked and both quickly set down the table they were carrying, and stepped to the side of the path.

The two servants without a moment of hesitation stripped their white wigs, beige trousers, long black coats, and linen white shirts with ruffled cravats until they were in nothing but their long undergarments.

The two then doubled over clutching their stomachs, groaning softly in unison, until their eyes closed, and they both slept peacefully.

“What did you make them see?” Arlen murmured mildly impressed.

“They both felt like they were going to be violently ill, and will believe that they both fainted when they awake.”

It took longer for the next 4 servants to fit the others physiques, but when they did eventually come out, they were met with the same fate as their kinsmen.

The Queen, Declan, Arlen, Keynan and Jed convened together on the gravel pathway while Bonnie and Tork remained concealed.

“Remember, Tork causes the distraction, Bonnie steals the boat. In the chaos, we grab Aggie and disappear to the grotto.” Arlen murmured as they began to file down the gravel path behind the crowd of Lords and Ladies that had decided it was time to begin their afternoon festivities.

“Now is the time for silence Arlen. There are keener ears than you know of around us.” The unmistakable clear voice of Jed echoed in Arlen’s head making his hand twitch, but a quick glance from the Queen reminded him to keep his composure and eyes down.

Of everyone, he was the most likely to stick out with his slanted dark eyes and olive skin. They had managed to cover his complexion with a bit of powder the Queen had at her Keep, but his eyes there was no hiding.

Arlen was surprised that the Queen looked no older than himself once she had scrubbed her face clean of the Minkies paint, and had brushed her tangled red hair until it shone brightly. She claimed that looking like a regular citizen was the best disguise this time around, though even looking at Keynan and Jed clean faced was strange for Arlen. They looked so… normal. Though there was something a little too bright in Jed’s eyes, and a bit too much knowingness on Keynan’s face, no one would be able to know that they were Minkies that had been alive and young for longer than a single lifetime. Even the Queen walked with far more confidence and comfort in her skin than any woman possessed.

They all had powdered their faces, and all kept their heads down as they all waited anxiously for Lady Agnes Beatha to appear.

*

Aggie sat in her cell; her back against the wall, her elbow rested on her bent knee with her foot flat on the floor. She stared blindly at the door as she had done for the night once her sobs had subsided, and instead an eerie calm settled over her that perturbed the other prisoners.

They couldn’t know there was now an emptiness in her that brought with it clarity of mind.

As the rest of the prisoner’s woke up, they knew with a single glance at her deadened eyes and shadowed face, that nothing any of them could say would help her, so the morning passed in silence, until the unmistakable laughter and chattering from the shore drifted in through the small window.

“Lady,” The cold hissing voice was Lady Venom, who’s throat had a slight rasp after the previous night’s fight. The call went unanswered.

“Lady, just know that when you finish him, you will have a shadow of my respect. Nothing more.”

Aggie said nothing, only waited.

“Sounds like more Lords ‘n Ladies joined the party.” Gent said soberly as the moments passed in quiet rising tension.

Aggie slowly removed her shirt and turned over her chamber pot. Spilling the contents behind her hay pile, she then covered its bottom with her shirt.

With one sharp jab, the pot neatly shattered into long shards. Aggie pulled her shirt back over her head, and selected one particular long jagged piece.

Gent drew in a sharp breath as he watched her tuck the shard up her sleeve, and Lady Venom gave a small bow of her head as the rest of the prisoners felt their hearts beat harder. Aggie resumed her previous position, and waited.

Everyone knew what was coming, and they all couldn’t wait the long awaited moment occur.

After another half hour, the heavy equal-measured footfalls of First Mate Ikes descended onto the prisoner deck.

He narrowed his eyes at Aggie who stared at him without any fear or respect, or…

Ikes frowned. She looked… different.

Her eyes were somehow darker.

“You’re first place now Beatha, you will get introduced first, so do not dally.” Aggie said nothing, only stared at him, biding her time serenely.

“If you do not move, your Fey Bitch will be paraded naked in front of the Prince.” He growled as he slowly pulled out his keys and unlocked her cell.

Still, the Lady said nothing.

Ikes stepped over to her, and grabbed her left arm brusquely, extending his claws ever so slightly to draw blood from her arm as he wrenched her a half a foot off the ground. His face neared hers, his pupils were barely visible slits. It was only then, that Aggie finally spoke.

“Ines is dead.”

The shock of her words made the Beast Awares slacken his grip for a moment. At the same time his eyes widened, Aggie grabbed the dagger from his belt, and using her bent knee with her foot flat on the ground, launched her head into his face, the force of the blow shoving him back against the open door of her cell.

Before First Mate Ikes could regain his balance, Aggie threw the dagger hard into his chest.

A small ‘oomph’ left his mouth as Aggie rushed him immediately, not giving him a second to process her attack.

He raised his left arm up to block her automatically, only he wasn’t aware she had a another weapon, and he was using his right arm to clutch the knife in his chest.

With her left hand Aggie swiped the porcelain shard across his eye, and using Ike’s shock and her momentum, pushed him with her full strength to the side of her cell. She stepped outside the cell, slammed the door closed, and heard the lock click as a roar began to build up in the throat of First Mate Ikes.

Aggie didn’t hesitate in any of her movements.

She flew up the prisoner stairs, and as soon as she burst through the hatch, she closed it, and locked it behind her.

By a stroke of sheer luck, she moved too quickly for the remaining crewmen to notice her amongst their chores. The majority of men were already on land taking bets for the Lords and Ladies, and the few remaining were recovering from hangovers from the party night before. They all believed the prisoners to be too weak at the end of their journey to put up much fight regardless. Especially when the Royal guards and Servicers were mixed into the crowd outside.

It wasn’t until Aggie stepped onto the deck that she slowed, and walked to the top of the gangplank where James Murphy stood raising his arms to the cheering crowd.

She stowed the porcelain shard in her right hand, and folded her hands atop one another, with her sleeves hanging down to hide the fact that she was in no means bound or shackled.

Slowly, Aggie stepped out onto the gangplank to overlook the group that was far larger than the previous night’s onlookers. It appeared that the rest of the Lords and Ladies had arrived that morning, and had all been regaled with Lady Beatha’s fight, as they all cheered as loud as they would a hero returning from war when she appeared- except they laughed as well. Hard, deep laughs at the joke of a Lady before them. Her hair touching her shoulders choppily, her physique that of a scrawny boy, and her hands bloodied, calloused, and bruised from her fights and training in her cell.

As Aggie stood at the top of the gangplank on the overcast day, she stared at the cruel faces.

She even recognized a few of them as business partners with her father. Men and women that had once regarded her as a sweet young woman, whom had treated her with the utmost care and affection, now jeered at her.

Then his voice was beside her.

“Your highness! Lords, and Ladies, I thank you for your patience!” They once again began to erupt in even louder cheers.

Aggie’s eyes found Prince Raphael’s. He wore a dusty blue silk coat with another ruffled white linen shirt, and deep blue pants to match as he laughed with his peers from under a canopy, a golden goblet of wine in his hand. He smirked at her and raised the goblet to her before drinking deeply, his teeth already stained purple.

She then found her mother who clearly hadn’t been able to leave, and stood awkwardly with the crowd. A group of Ladies behind her were clearly whispering about her and were loud enough to be heard. The color was high in her cheeks, and her hands were in fists at her sides as she stared at Aggie with pure fury, and perhaps even an ounce of hatred.

“It won’t matter soon anyway.” Aggie thought idly.

The Captain’s voice broke through her thoughts, and brought her back to the task at hand.

“I present to you, our prized attraction and fighter, the scandalous Lady Agnes Beatha!”

There was more commotion as everyone called out their doubts.

“For those of you at all uncertain on her identity, I present to you all…”

James Murphy’s arm was swept up in the air as he procured the leather pouch containing Aggie’s belongings. His charming half-smile was at its full capacity, but as his gaze swept the crowd, his smile froze and his arm slowly came down. The crowd took it as a playful suspense for showmanship, but his eyes were locked on one particular servant.

Aggie saw what he was staring at as well.

There was Arlen.

Staring at her with such intensity and fury, that she almost felt something from it...

Except she couldn’t feel anything anymore.

She stared for one last long moment, trying to feel sorry for what she knew was to come.

Without any hesitation, or shift in her facial expression, Aggie jabbed the porcelain shard in a perfect strike into Captain James Murphy’s throat.

Blood gushed from his wound, and his eyes widened as he stumbled back and slid to the ground of the gangplank as blood spurted from the wound at an alarming rate.

The screams from below started the chaos, but as Aggie turned to watch the life drain from the monster, everything else fell away. He looked up at her, and sputtered his final words.

“H-He’s safe.”

Aggie stomped her foot into his nose, driving the bones back to his brain, then spit on his mangled face for good measure.

Captain James Murphy of the Southern Kingdom, was dead.

When Aggie turned, she saw the swarm of people and Servicer’s whisking away their Masters and Mistresses, but that was all she saw before she felt the tearing pain of the knife in her back.

She fell to her knees, a hollow smile on her face as First Mate Ikes stood over her, his eye bloody, and his chest dripping blood.

“I will make sure your family suffers.” First Mate Ikes’ voice shook for the first time since Aggie had known him, his body was shivering from shock, but regardless of his weakened state, he now pulled out his sword, determined to finish the job.

Aggie tasted blood in her mouth as the pain continued spreading from her back. She knew she wasn’t going to live long regardless.

“NO!” The voice of someone she had waited for days, weeks, and months finally rang in her ears.

Aggie’s vision was slowly growing dark, but she saw the arm that wielded the sword pointed at her be sluiced from its body, and then the large body of Ikes was kicked off the gangplank into the water, to reveal a blood spattered Arlen, his brown eyes full of emotion and fire.

Then everything went black.

*

They were all in position, and Arlen made sure to situate himself as close to the beach as possible, and as far from the other Servicer’s as possible.

He had been worried that the guards would be on high alert, but the Lords and Ladies were all so rowdy that he felt as though they wouldn’t need the distraction.

He watched as the Captain stepped onto the gangplank, which immediately hyped the energy of the crowd of perhaps 200 Lords, Ladies, and other wealthy merchants that had all received the special invitation to the event.

He waited, his heart pounding in his chest; he could sense her.

She was close.

The Queen, Jed, and Keynan were situated the closest to the Servicers, and Declan was positioned in front of the line of soldiers.

They were all in position, and all trying to avoid any requests from the already inebriated crowd.

Then, she was there.

Standing on the top of the gangplank, her hands in front of her, the sleeves of a long white shirt covering her fists, and as Arlen stared he felt fear grip him.

She was incredibly thin, her hair had grown out but looked greasy and unkempt, her shirt looked to be stained with blood, dirt, and other mysterious bodily fluids, but it wasn’t any of those things that made his hands begin to shake.

Her eyes.

*

“We’re too late.” Keynan murmured to the Queen, his voice carrying a small note of panic.

“What do you mean?”

*

“Bonnie, where have you seen eyes like that?” Tork turned to Bonnie sadness rife in his chest.

“The slaves. Those that were ready to die.” She whispered her eyes filling with tears.

“The ones truly broken.”

*

As the Captain introduced the Lady Beatha, Arlen willed her to meet his gaze, and it felt like eternity before she finally found him.

When her eyes did eventually meet with his, Arlen’s insides twisted.

She wasn’t there anymore.

There was only a small flicker of emotion in her stare…

Something akin to an apology had briefly passed through.

Then with incredible quickness, she struck the Captain in the throat with a weapon he couldn’t see.

The crowd was momentarily stunned until someone shrieked;

“Blood! Blood! The whore killed him!”

Guards and Servicers sprung into full combat, and then the true chaos began.

Arlen saw the first Servicer blur towards the gangplank, but with his heart hammering in his ears, cut him off and drove a knife to his abdomen. Not a fatal wound, but one that would require recovery. He didn’t bother to look into their eyes as he immediately looked for the next assailant.

Arlen almost didn’t see the secondary Servicer coming at his back, but he didn’t need to worry, because a short spear was lodged into the Servicer’s throat before he could make an attack.

Arlen drew out the Queen’s half metallic spear from the body, and hurled it through the crowd of Lords and Ladies that had all run screaming back to the palace.

The Queen caught the spear and clicked it back together in time to block a blow from one of the Prince’s guards. She guessed that the Prince’s Servicer had been the one Arlen wounded.

She hoped he was with Aggie by now.

The Prince was trying to find a way through the guards and assailants to flee, but then his eyes fixed on the gangplank.

“Gods, finally! First Mate Ikes has gotten her!” He shouted to his guards.

The Queen’s eyes snapped up to the gangplank to see Arlen slice off the arm of the Beast Awares attacking Aggie, and heard the Prince suck in a sharp breath at the sight. He was completely oblivious to the Queen’s presence in his focus on the fight in front of him, so the Queen gave the chair he sat on a sharp kick and he toppled over.

The guards immediately turned back their attention to his majesty, as the Queen was already off at a sprint with Keynan at her side towards the beach.

She heard the calls of guards after them, and knew they were in pursuit.

*

Arlen removed the knife from her back and dropped the blade with a clatter, grabbed the pouch that was sitting strewn on the deck, and then picked up Aggie’s limp body with ease. He immediately charged back down the gangplank to the beach where Tork stood waiting. He grabbed Aggie from Arlen’s grasp.

“I’ll get her to the boat, you take care of those soldiers.”

Arlen didn’t have time to argue has he turned, his sword drawn and immediately began cutting through them, clearing a path for Tork. Occasionally blurring his attacks to more efficiently cut through the dozen of men that stood between them and the lifeboat.

They splashed into the water where a long rowboat with 2 sets of oars bobbed waiting with Bonnie, Jed, Keynan, and the Queen already in it and positioned.

Tork stepped in, making the boat sink down a foot in the water, but he settled quickly into the middle. He then hastily picked up a set of oars as Arlen hauled himself into the boat, and began to row.

Jed stood at the bow, as the remaining 10 knights that had emerged from the front of the palace late to the fight, charged towards the water.

His eyes flashed brightly, and suddenly, each knight stopped with the water at their shins, and stared lost at the gentle lapping waves as the Prince screeched behind them.

Between Tork, Declan and Keynan on a set of oars, the boat flew across the water. They pulled close along the mountainside, where a large boat didn’t have a chance of getting near due to all of the jagged rocks near the surface.

“There! Aim for that small opening near the waterline, and on my signal, everyone crouch down as low as you can!” The Queen called as she pointed out an opening that looked no bigger than 2 feet high.

No one argued as they pulled hard, trying to time the waves with the opening, and when the Queen shouted;

“Now!” ducked down beneath the rail.

They boat popped into a dark grotto large enough for them all to sit back up, and where to their left, they saw a rocky slope that lead back out to a small outdoor opening in the mountain.

As soon as the bottom of the boat scraped across the rocks, they all jumped out hastily, splashing the clear shallow water.

Arlen grabbed Aggie’s bloodied body from Tork, and immediately bolted up the hill to the small hole in the mountain, where the top opened to the sky. The occasional tree grew out of the rocky walls leading up to the cloudy daylight, and there was a cave nearby they were meant to make their escape back through, but Arlen felt the rigidness in Aggie’s body, and stopped as soon as they were in the light.

He laid her down breathing hard, and his hands shaking. Her eyes and mouth were half open, lips and teeth were stained with blood, and her gaze was vacant.

“My Lady? My Lady please we can heal you!” Arlen called as the Minkies Queen knelt down beside Arlen, and rested her hand against the side of Aggie’s head and neck.

She waited an entire 10 seconds before allowing her hand to fall away.

“Arlen,” The Queen started softly, but he ignored her as he cradled the Lady’s head in his hands despite her staring unseeing at nothing.

“Aggie! Come on… we have you now. Please!” Arlen called as he stroked his thumb across her pale face, streaking it with dirt and blood.

“We can free all the Servicer’s and see the world now! We never have to see Sean O’Farrell again. Aggie please!” Arlen turned with tears in his eyes to the Queen.

“Save her! Now!” He ordered desperately as Keynan, Jed, Bonnie, Tork, and Declan stood around them, their heads bowed.

“I can heal her body, but her soul has left Arlen. I can’t heal that.” She said softly touching the Lady’s limp hand and resting it on the Lady’s chest.

“Aggie Beatha is dead.”