Chapter Eleven

 

 

 

Laura

 

Pain courses through my heart as I run into the palace, ignoring the guards that try to stop me as I go. Right now, I couldn’t care less about them. All I want is my brother.

I arrive at Eight’s room in record time, frantically beating on his door as tears begin to roll down my face again. I hate my tears. I hate the weakness that they represent, the weakness that I allowed my heart to give me. After one more frustrated punch to my brother’s door, he opens it, still half asleep and entirely confused. Without hesitation, I throw my arms around his waist and sob.

Eight doesn’t say a word, and he wraps his arms around me without any questions. We stand in the doorway like that until I am calm enough to gather my thoughts and bring myself to speak.

“You okay now?” Eight asks.

I’m not, but I nod anyway.

“Come on in then, and tell me what’s going on,” Eight says softly, rubbing his tired blue eyes as he shuts the door.

After flipping on the lights, I sit down on the edge of his bed and fold my hands in my lap, looking down at my feet. How do I even begin to tell my brother what happened? How can I put tonight into words?

“Shane—” I begin, but am cut off by my own tears. I wipe my eyes, take a deep breath, and try again, starting from the beginning this time. “I was asleep and I heard some guards shouting about trying to find Alicia, so of course I climbed out of my window to investigate. They didn’t appear to be having any luck, so I jumped over the wall…and I found her. And Shane and some other girl, carrying her into the forest.”

“What?” Eight shouts, as surprised at the news as I was when I found Shane with my badly beaten sister, leading her away from the palace.

I can’t say anything without crying, so I nod and look at my feet again.

“Laura… I’m so sorry. I know you guys were starting to get close,” Eight says, patting my back then pulling me into another hug. I cling to my brother and cry, more tears flowing from my eyes with each passing second.

This is why I don’t allow myself to care for people. All it does is make me weak. I cared for Alicia, and she nearly got my brother killed. I cared for Shane, and he set my sister free. Both things are breaking my heart. It is easier not to care.

“I just…I can’t believe that I let myself trust someone and got betrayed again. Why can’t anyone just put me first? Why am I so alone?”

“Laura, you aren’t alone. You have me, no matter what. I’m with you till the end. Shane shouldn’t have done what he did. He’s an idiot for betraying you, especially if he knows what you’ve been through in the past. I know that this isn’t making it better, though. It still has to hurt,” Eight says, still hugging me.

My brother is the one person that I have always been able to count on. He is the most selfless individual I know, always putting others before himself. From now on, he and father are the only people that I will allow myself to care for. I can’t feel this kind of pain again. I won’t.

“It helps, though. You always help.” I sigh, and lay my head on his shoulder. My sobs settle down into sniffles as my tears finally calm.

Suddenly, there’s a knock on the door.

“What if it’s him?” I whisper, eyes wide with fear. I don’t know if I can face Shane just yet. I don’t know if I ever want to see him again.

“It probably is. Pretend to be asleep. I’ll send him away,” Eight replies, standing to answer the door. I gather Eight’s comforter around my shoulders, rest my head on his pillow and close my eyes.

“What do you want?” Eight says coldly, and I assume that he’s found Shane standing in the doorway. I knew without a doubt that it would be him. There’s no one who would be visiting my brother in the middle of the night besides me.

Shane’s voice comes from the doorway, sounding sad and afraid, “I want to talk to Laura, and she’s not in her room.”

“She’s here, but she’s asleep. Anything you wanted to say to her, you can say to me.” Eight says. I hear him move from the doorway, and another set of footsteps follow him in. Eight sits back down on the bed in front of me, protective as always, and Shane stands in front of him.

Silence fills the room for a moment, and finally, Eight speaks up, “Well, are you going to just stand there like an imbecile or do you actually have something to say?”

I’ve never heard my brother speak so harshly to anyone. I didn’t know he had it in him. Oddly enough, this fills me with a sense of pride. My goody-two-shoes brother can be a jerk, after all.

“Look, I know that what I did was wrong. And I know that Laura’s probably going to turn me in, and I’m going to die, but I don’t care. I deserve that. There are just some things I want to talk to her about before she does. I’ll wait for her to wake up. I just have to talk to her,” he says, his voice shaky.

Although it pains me to admit it, I want to hear him out. I want to give him a chance. Part of me wants to believe that there’s a good reason that he betrayed me, a good reason that I shouldn’t go to my father right now and tell him what Shane has done. And more than that…I have a sense of relief knowing that Alicia escaped. I don’t know what Shane’s intentions were in freeing my sister, but I’m happy that it takes her blood off my hands.

“Yeah, like what?” Eight snaps. “What could possibly excuse what you did?”

“Nothing can, okay? I get that. I get it. But I didn’t want to help Alicia escape—”

I sit up, unable to listen to this any longer. “Then why did you? Why did you help her when you knew how I felt?!”

“If I didn’t, the rebels would’ve killed my little sister!” he says, putting his face in his hands. “They hold her over me, threatening to kill her to get me to do what they want. She’s seven. I couldn’t let her die because I want to disobey orders.”

I remember the way his face lit up when he told me about his sister, Lainey. After his mother died, she was left in his care. Of course he’d do anything to protect her, even betray me. Of course. But how can I believe him? How can I know for sure that everything he’s told me about his past isn’t a lie?

“I’ll give you one chance to explain,” I say, shakily. “Come on. We’re going back to my room, and you can tell me your story.”

“Laura, I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. What if he tries to kill you or something? We can’t trust him. You can’t go alone.” Eight says.

“He’s had plenty of opportunities to kill me, and he hasn’t. Besides, if he tried, he’d be easy to stop,” I say. I wouldn’t want to fight him, wouldn’t want to kill him, but if he tried to kill me, I’d come out the winner.

“Fine, but be careful,” Eight says, as I stand to leave.

“Come on, Shane… If that’s even your real name,” I say, exiting Eight’s room and hurrying to my own. Shane trudges along behind me, looking at his feet, seeming entirely devastated. I don’t think he’s lying to me.

“It is my real name,” he claims, following me into my room. I sit down on my bed cross-legged, and Shane does the same, facing me.

“Okay. Here’s your one chance to explain. Make it good,” I say, attempting to sound cold and heartless, but failing to sound any way but broken.

“I told you the truth about my mom being a rebel. And I told you the truth about hating the rebels, but there’s more to it than them being what killed her. When my mother died, she owed some kind of debt to the rebels, and instead of accepting her death for their cause as payment, they forced Lainey and me to remain with them and serve them for the rest of our lives instead. If we’d tried to escape, they would’ve killed us on the spot. I didn’t want to stay with them, but I couldn’t let them kill Lainey. She was only one year old, so I stayed.”

As Shane continues telling me his story, he stands up and begins pacing in front of my bed. “Then, they decided that I would be of good use working for the Royal Guard as a spy. They told me that if I did a good enough job, in two years, they would let Lainey be free. And that’s all I wanted. She isn’t old enough to risk her life for them yet, but one day she will be, and if I can help free her by then, I will. But then, two days ago, they ordered me to help free Alicia tonight. I didn’t want to do it,” Shane continues, looking right into my eyes. I see desperation and honesty in his own, and for a brief moment, his eyes brim with tears. “I tried to refuse, but if I had, they would’ve killed Lainey. I don’t have a choice but to listen to them. I promise I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to betray you, especially after what you’ve been through with your sister. I mean, I know I’ve only known you for a little while, but I do care about you. I didn’t want to hurt you. I just didn’t have a choice.”

It is not often that I am speechless, but right now I am at a complete loss for words. If I were in Shane’s position, if I had to protect Eight, or even Alicia, from people who could’ve easily taken their lives just because I didn’t want to follow their orders, I’d do the same thing. I’d do whatever it took to protect my family, no matter who it hurt.

“Okay,” I say, sighing.

“Okay? What does ‘okay’ mean?”

“It means that I believe you,” I begin. I don’t filter my thoughts, I just let everything out. “I shouldn’t believe you, but I do. I mean, this is legitimately the stupidest idea I’ve ever had in my life, but I’m not going to turn you in. I understand. You had to save your sister. I’d be a hypocrite if I hated you for that.”

Shane doesn’t say a word, but he throws his arms around me, surprising me. I surprise myself even more by returning his hug, thankful that he’s still here, thankful that I was the one who caught him instead of some guard who would’ve brought him straight to my father. I am supposed to turn him in, supposed to hate him, but I can’t. As hard as I may try, I’m just not good at hating people. I once thought that if I tried hard enough, I could be the cold, ruthless warrior my father wanted me to be. I know now—for good or bad—that will never be who I am.

“I really am sorry, Laura. I mean it,” Shane whispers, and I know he’s telling the truth.

It is a hard truth to accept, so different from everything I’ve been raised to believe. Rebels are supposed to be nameless, faceless enemies that I am to kill without question. But Shane has proven to me otherwise. Regardless of who he’s fighting for, he’s a kind person with a good heart who would do anything to protect the people he cares about. And I, despite my ties to Karkonia’s royal family, am one of those people. So I will protect him too, and his sister, no matter what.

“I forgive you,” I say, meaning it with everything I have. “I’m kind of happy that you helped Alicia escape anyway.”

“You are?” he asks, eyebrows furrowed.

“Yeah. I don’t want her to die,” I admit, looking at the ground. I don’t know what’s right or wrong anymore. The lines between good and evil have been blurred more than ever. I’ve always believed that my father was Karkonia’s perfect ruler, that he could do no wrong. But executing Alicia, his own daughter, seems wrong, especially because she only did what she did because she believed it would protect our country. I don’t know who to believe anymore. My father or my sister.

Maybe it’s time to ignore them both and believe in myself.