Page 61 of Dawn of Hope
My two captors laugh loudly as they walk away, and I’m left here alone.
Oh no.
Hopefully they will be too excited to have caught a ‘Castaway’ that they won’t leave me in here overnight. If Dane goes back for me and I am not there, surely he will come looking for me. Though I doubt he would think to look in their own prison.
But what if he thinks the Castaways took me, after only just warning me about them?
Please please please tell him tonight.
I don’t want to be locked up in here alone all night, all because of a misunderstanding and a bunch of children who won’t listen.
My hands and feet are still tied, and every time I try to move them, the ropes bite harder into my skin. I listen for a minute, trying to hear if anyone has stayed behind to guard me. Voices in the distance confirm I am alone, and I reach up and push the blindfold away. The gag is harder, tied much tighter than the blindfold, and I can’t reach the knot at the back to get it off.
Great.
I roll onto my back and rock until I am sitting upright so I can take in my surroundings. I am in a wooden cage, one I hadn’t seen in the clearing last night, but it still must be within the confines of camp.
I guess this is it then. I just wait to be rescued.
I shake my head at my stupidity. I easily could have avoided meeting everyone like this if I had just listened. Now, I get to wait them out, because trying to escape before Dane returns would only convince them I am a Castaway, and who knows what they would do then?
I have nothing more to do to pass the time other than to think about all I learned from Dane this morning. I am so grateful it wasn’t the Castaways that attacked and captured me, even though I know I will have a huge bruise from where the boy kicked me earlier. I’d take that rather than having my chances at finding the elixir ruined.
The elixir is hidden, and it doesn’t seem like anyone has found it in years.
According to Edmond, there hadn’t been any mysterious cures in a very long time. Could it be because of Weston? Because he is trying to keep the elixir to himself but can’t get off the island? Dane mentioned that Weston and the Castaways had been slowly kidnapping people he had brought here. Was Weston so cruel that he would take away the hope of those by force, only to trap them on the island and let the loved ones die?
I shudder at the thought. If Dane hadn’t already painted him as a monster, he definitely is in my mind now.
I need to find it and bring it home to my mother, Weston be damned.
As long as you don’t stay tied up like this for days and can actually get started.
A small glimpse of the pink sky peeks out from the trees above the cage. The suns are setting, and soon it will be dark.
Those bastards are leaving me here.
I don’t know how long it normally takes Dane to answer a summon. Mine took a while because I completely doubted who he was based on our prior friendship. He may be back already and is out searching for me, oblivious to the fact that I’m actually waiting for him to rescue me here.
The grumbling of my stomach distracts me. As a princess, I’ve never been without a meal unless it was of my own choosing. If those children wanted to play games and leave me here starving, I will not be so nice to them when I finally am released.
Children…can I even call them children? Some of them could be two or three times my age, despite looking exactly as they did the moment they left our world. If time doesn’t move here, and no one has found the elixir in years, I could be the youngest and most inexperienced out of everyone. That doesn’t justify them treating me like this.
The excitement turns out to be too much for them, and only moments later, I hear a barrage of voices, talking and shouting over each other.
“We got one! We finally got one!”
“Dane, you’ll be so proud! We pulled the vine and SPLAT! She went down like a tree!”
“We finally have a lead on where they’re hiding! If anyone can get it out of her, you can!”
The commotion gets louder as they get closer, but that means only one thing.
Dane is finally back, and I am about to be set free.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“Everyone stay back. I’ll handle this.”