Chapter fourteen

Bryony groaned quietly and brought a hand up to touch her head as she slowly opened her eyes. She had to blink a few times before her vision cleared, and when it did, she found herself staring up at a ceiling. She turned her head to the side to see that she was in a bed in a small room. There was a couple of wooden chairs next to the wall and curtains hanging over the two windows in the room. Flower pots were decorating the windowsills, and the room smelled of citrus. There was a small table next to the bed with a cloth covered in blood next to it. Bryony stared at it with wide eyes.

Was that her blood? What happened? Where was she?

Bryony sat up in the bed, immediately regretting it as her head throbbed with the sudden jolt.

"Ow," She groaned and touched her head again.

She looked up at the wooden door across the room as she heard people talking. Where was she? Who were they? Where was Aven? Bryony suddenly noticed that Aven wasn't there, and she tried to remember what happened before, but she couldn't. Why couldn't she remember? Why did her head hurt so much?

Bryony swung her legs over the bed and scooted towards the edge of the bed to stand up, but stopped when she noticed a little kitten looking creature curled up in a ball, sleeping peacefully on the floor next to her feet. Its tail was wrapped around itself and its face was buried so she couldn't see it.

"Devlin," Bryony said a little too loudly, because the little Kit jumped awake, standing up, and back arched up as he hissed. When his eyes landed on Bryony, he immediately relaxed and then jumped on the bed and curled up on her lap, purring.

"Hi you," Bryony said as she pet his soft fur. He was probably the softest thing she had ever touched in her whole life. "I thought you were gone. Did you come back? Did Aven find you?"

She only remembered that Devlin had ran off, but she didn't know how they found him. Was she in here when he was found? She didn't remember finding him so she was probably in here. Devlin looked up at Bryony with his adorable eyes and Bryony smiled. "Do you know what happened?" The tiny creature just tilted his head to the side and Bryony laughed and touched his nose, making him lick his nose as soon as her finger was gone. "Yeah, probably not, huh?"

The door suddenly opened and Bryony jumped as Devlin suddenly ran and hid behind her. Bryony looked up to see a woman walk inside the room, and she smiled when she saw Bryony awake. "Hello dear, how are you feeling?"

The woman looked fairly old, but still beautiful, with long white hair and beautiful crystal blue eyes. She was wearing a long purple robe and she was holding some books in her arms. She had some kind of tattoo symbol on her right wrist but Bryony couldn't make out what it was with the books she was holding covering most of it.

Wait... didn't Aven have something like that on his shoulder? How come Bryony never noticed it after when she first saw him? It was so obvious. She needed to pay attention to the little things more often.

"Where am I?" Bryony asked the woman. "What happened? And who are you?"

The woman chuckled, setting the books she had down on a small table next to the door. "My name is Marjorie. You are at Eabakigia, it's a small kingdom protected to keep the evil out so don't worry about anything coming and finding you here."

So they made it to the kingdom, but where was Aven.

"Where's Aven?" Bryony asked.

"Who's Aven?" Marjorie asked.

Bryony gave her a look. "I am pretty sure he was with me when we got here. He must've brought me here when I passed out, but that's all I remember. He has to be here, who brought me in this house?"

"Oh yeah, I know who you're talking about," Marjorie said. "Boy? About, maybe, sixteen? Kinda short, but not a lot? Cute?" She smirked when she said cute, but Bryony just wrinkled her nose and scowled at her which only made her laugh.

"Yeah, him," Bryony said.

Marjorie sat down on one of the chairs next to the wall close to the bed and folded her arms as she leaned back. "Haven't seen him since he gave you to us. Pretty quiet if you ask me, barely said a word. All he said was that you needed help and so we took you in to treat you. Is he family... or something else?"

"Friend," Bryony said, ignoring the look Marjorie was giving her.

Did Aven just leave her? Why did he give her to strangers? What if they happened to be bad? Marjorie didn't seem bad, she actually seemed like a pretty nice and funny woman, but still. Where did Aven go? Was he coming back to get her so they can find Elon like they planned? Wait...

"Is Elon here?" Bryony asked.

Marjorie frowned. "You know the prince here? I've never seen you before last night, how do you know him? Well, I obviously shouldn't ask that since literally everyone here knows him because he comes down from the castle to get to know everyone here. So what I should ask is, what do you need from him?"

"Um, I need help," Bryony said. "He knows me, he was going to help me and tell me what to do, for a, um, a mission?"

"Hm," Marjorie said and leaned forward. "A mission eh? What mission?"

"I-I don't know. To save my parents," Bryony stammered. This woman was making her nervous, and she hated being nervous.

Marjorie smiled. "Don't worry child, I know what you're talking about. In fact, Elon knows you're here. He's waiting for you to wake up, which, here you are right now, clearly awake."

Bryony gaped at her. "You knew why I was here? Why did you mess with me like that? I get very nervous when someone asks me so many questions. It's not funny." Marjorie was laughing when she said the last part.

"I like messing with people child," Marjorie laughed. "It's fun. Nothing fun happens here very often, so better have some fun when the time comes."

Bryony opened her mouth to speak, but she stopped and shrieked as something suddenly jumped up onto her shoulder, and was about to jump up and smack it off, but then she sighed in relief when she saw what it was. She put a hand to her heart and let out a shaky laugh.

Devlin, the little devil.

She had forgotten he was here. He hid behind her when Marjorie came inside this house, and she had forgotten all about him because he didn't move or make any sound, until now. Devlin chirped up at Marjorie, and the old woman smiled. "Hello cutie, and who might you be?"

"His name's Devlin," Bryony said as Marjorie scratched Devlin behind his ear. He seemed to like that a lot.

"Well, he certainly is very cute," Marjorie said and Bryony nodded.

"He is," She agreed. "But he is a stinkpot." She gave him a look, but he only rubbed his face against her cheek. She could feel him vibrating against her from the strong purrs escaping him.

Bryony smiled and leaned her cheek on him as she looked up at Marjorie. "So, can I go now? Or do I have to stay here? I need to find Aven, and then we need to go see Elon."

Marjorie nodded. "Of course, just please be careful. You were bleeding internally and it messed up your head quite a bit. If your friend hadn't gotten here when he did, you might not be awake right now. You would have gotten way worse." Bryony didn't like how she said 'friend' because it was in a teasing tone.

Bryony nodded. "I'll be careful, I just don't feel comfortable here. I mean, you seem like a really nice woman, but I want Aven."

It took Bryony a moment before she realized what she had just said, and her eyes widened as Marjorie gave her another smirk. "I mean, I didn't mean I want him. I meant that I need him. Wait, that doesn't sound any better. Oh no, I mean I know him more than you and I want to be with someone I'm more comfortable around. I mean, no, ugh! I just want to find him, he and Elon need to help me, I can't do this alone."

Bryony knew she was probably going to die of embarrassment at one point in her life.

Marjorie laughed a little. "Don't worry child, I completely understand."

Bryony sighed, feeling a little now better. "Okay good."

"You like him."

"What? No!" Bryony said and Marjorie laughed.

"Okay, maybe not right now," Marjorie said. "You're right, but I know things you don't." She gave Bryony a knowing look.

"What, so you can see the future now?" Bryony asked and folded her arms.

"Something like that," Marjorie said raising an eyebrow. "Yours has a lot of sadness in it."

"Um... okay?" Bryony said. She was starting to get freaked out by this woman, and she wanted to get away. Sadness? Really? This woman didn't know anything. She was wrong, yeah everybody gets sad, but her future had a lot of it? She was fine, nothing was going to happen.

"And a lot of love," Marjorie said after a moment of silence.

Bryony looked back up at Marjorie, and the woman gave her a warm smile. Bryony gave her a small smile back. Okay, maybe she wasn't so bad after all.

Devlin suddenly jumped off Bryony's shoulder and ran to the door, whining and scratching on it. Marjorie and Bryony exchanged looks. Bryony stood up and walked over to him. "Hey cutie, what's wrong?"

Devlin kept whining and scratching at the door, so Bryony opened it, and as soon as she did, he ran out.

"Wait!" Bryony called after him. She turned around and smiled at Marjorie. "Thank you for everything, but I need to go after him. We lost him once, I don't want to lose him again."

Marjorie nodded. "Of course, go after him."

Bryony thanked her again, before she ran out the door and chased after the tiny Kit.

"Devlin wait!" Bryony called after him. "Where are you going? Come back."

Devlin disappeared into a crowd of people, and Bryony shoved past them, apologizing and saying 'excuse me' so she wasn't being rude. Some people gave her rude looks, but others didn't mind and moved out of the way for her. Bryony spotted the long fluffy tail of the baby Kit not too far ahead of her, and she squeezed past people to follow him.

"Devlin!" Bryony called. "Come back."

Someone slammed into her, knocking her over. Bryony fell to the ground with a gasp, and then looked up to find a man glaring down at her. He had two kids next to him. "Watch where you're going." He snapped at her before pulling his kids away from her and into the crowd of people.

Rude, Bryony thought.

She shook her head and stood up, before brushing herself off. She heard a howl and she looked up to see Devlin running back to her. He was jumping around, howling at her, and he looked pretty scared. Bryony kneeled down next to him. "Hey, what's wrong?"

Devlin bit down on the leg of her pants and growled, pulling on her. He must want her to follow him, but why?

"Okay Devlin, I'm coming," Bryony said and he let go of her pants leg to run off again, but this time he didn't run so fast so she could catch up with him.

Ahead of them was a big crowd of people, and they were all shouting. It was loud, Bryony couldn't make out what they were all saying, but she heard two people shout clearly.

"What is he doing here?"

"He doesn't belong here!"

Wait what? What was going on?

"Excuse me," Bryony said as she squeezed past two woman who were whispering to each other. Devlin had stopped running and was jumping up and down, growling at some people in front of him.

Someone bumped into Bryony and she fell over onto her knees. She scowled up at the woman who knocked her over, before she just shook her head and started crawling past the people when the woman didn't notice her. This way was much easier then having to push through them, although it wasn't very comfortable.

When Bryony finally managed to get to the middle of the circle of people, she stood up, but froze when she saw the scene in front of her.

There were two young men, but one of them was holding someone else in his grip as the other one beat them up.

Aven.

"Hey!" Bryony yelled. She ran forward and slammed into one of the young men, making him stumble forward a bit. She glared at him. "What are you doing?"

Aven looked up at Bryony when he heard her voice. He looked horrible. Blood was sliding down the side of his face and he had cuts and bruises all over him. The biggest bruise was right on his cheekbone, and it was already starting to turn purple. There was blood on his shirt, and his left eye was swollen shut as well.

The young man that Bryony had shoved over stood up and pointed a bloody finger at her. "Don't mess with me girly."

"Leave him alone," Bryony snapped, pointing at Aven.

The young man holding Aven snickered. He grabbed his neck and squeezed it, and Aven immediately clawed at his hands with wide eyes as he started choking. The young man held him up so only the tip of his shoes were touching the ground and Aven's eyes widened even more as he struggled to get away from him.

"No!" Bryony screamed at him and ran forward to stop him, but the other young man grabbed her. She immediately kicked him in between his legs and he gasped in pain, letting go of her, and falling onto his knees.

"If you move one more step, he dies," The young man holding Aven warned her as he held up a knife.

Bryony stopped as he brought the knife down to Aven's throat. "Don't."

The young man smiled. "Dorian will give me a whole load of money when he finds out I have this beast."

Bryony shook her head. She didn't understand anything. Beast? Dorian? Money? It didn't make sense.

"Please," Bryony said, taking a small step forward. "Let him go."

The young man shook his head, pulling Aven closer to him as he loosened his grip on his neck and set him back down on the ground. Aven immediately started coughing and taking huge breaths of air as he tightened his grip on the hands around his neck. Aven didn't seem to be fighting back. Bryony knew he could beat them up like he did to the mountain lion and everything else, but for some reason, he wasn't. It was almost like he was letting them hurt him. But why?

The young man holding Aven pointed a finger at his friend who stood up and was glaring at Bryony. "You! Get in contact with Dorian, tell him we have the beast."

"And how do I do that?" The young man said, throwing his hands up in the air. "Nobody knows where he is."

"Esgar's old castle," Aven managed to get out, but his voice was really quiet.

Bryony's eyes snapped over to him. Why did he tell them where Dorian was? Did he want to get himself killed?

The two young men seemed just as surprised as Bryony did, and they were just staring at him with wide eyes. The one holding him turned to the other after a moment. "Well, you heard him. Go send word out to him. Now!"

The young man Bryony had kicked immediately ran off and the other turned to her. "You. You can leave and pretend none of this happened." He started walking backwards and towards the forest, pulling Aven with him.

Bryony shook her head. "No. Devlin, get him!"

Devlin immediately ran forward, so fast, that it caught everyone off guard and some people gasped or cried out in surprise and jumped away from him as he ran past them. He jumped up onto the young mans face and started clawing at it. The young man immediately let go of Aven, taking a step back, but tripping over his own feet, and falling over. He was yelling, trying to get Devlin off his face, but he wasn't budging. Bryony ran over to Aven as he slowly rose to his feet.

"What are you doing here?" Aven asked her quietly as she wrapped her arm around his torso, and then put his arm over her shoulder to help him keep his balance.

"Hey, I helped you, you're welcome," Bryony told him as she shook her head. "Why did you tell them where Dorian is? Do you want to die?"

Aven shook his head, but didn't say anything.

"Devlin, come," Bryony called to the Kit behind her shoulder and she heard him run up to her.

Everyone was watching as Bryony helped Aven walk out of the crowd. Some of them were watching with hate, while others were smiling and nodding their heads. Most of them hated it. Why? Why did they hate Aven so much? They never met him before. What did he ever do to them?

"Aven, I know someone who can help you," Bryony said and shook his shoulder a little.

Aven lifted his head up to look at her. "Just a day ago, I was the one helping you."

Bryony shook her head, laughing a little. "Wow, we always seem to get ourselves in trouble don't we?"

Aven gave her a look. One eyebrow was raised and his lips were curled up in a small lopsided smile, and she found that cute. She smiled back at him. "Come on, lets you get cleaned up."