Chapter 48

Kiara:

“Klaus, there’s no way…”

“Kiara, please don’t argue with me this time. Go back to the human kingdom. It is a lot safer for you there…”

“Klaus, no. I won’t leave you…”

“Kiara, this is life or death. You are with child and I will not be able to focus with you here…” Klaus cupped my cheeks and kissed me gently “Caspian, Lorenzo, guard her with your life. I will come and get her when everything is done”

My eyes widened when I saw that he had put the teleportation amulet around my neck and having ordered it to take us away, the amulet started glowing making me shake my head. I watched as my love ran out the window before everything blurred and I was suddenly in the middle of the palace’s throne room. Mother’s eyes widened when she saw me and my hands shook in fear. Father was nowhere to be seen.

“Kiara?” Mother stood up and approached me, however, me, mother, Lorenzo, and Caspian almost lost our balance when the ground shook under our feet. Mother looked at me, her eyes widening in fear, the kingdom has never had an earthquake before and I had a feeling that this was not one either.

“Where is King Leonardo?” I asked my mother who frowned in confusion at my question. I knew that he and King Verone were behind all this if I had left my love in that kingdom for his fate. I was not going to leave things here unattended.

“Kiara, what are you planning?” Prince Caspian asked cutting out the formalities, I shook my head not wanting to speak. I knew that if mother heard of my plan, then she was going to be against me to defend her husband, wrong or right; the woman didn’t care. That is something that she tried teaching me as I grew up, your father, husband, and brother -if I had one- were always right, I was to defend my husband with whatever he did or said. As she claimed, he knew better, we as females could act on emotions, they were more rational. What she didn’t realize was that what she was saying couldn’t apply to everything, especially when it came to situations like this one.

“I will ask you one more time, my queen. Where is the king of this bloody kingdom?” I asked in a threatening manner. I didn’t want to use this tone on her, I didn’t like to. But I didn’t know what damage the king did to himself and both realms by dealing with King Verone.

The ground shook once more, this time the ground cracked under our feet making mother’s eyes widen, and had it not been for Lorenzo who vampire sped toward her, pulling her out of danger; mother would have fallen into whatever abys was going to be underneath the palace right now. I looked at my mother who looked me in the eye, her eyes filled with fear as she realized the danger that everyone was in.

“He’s in the girl’s tower, he asked not to be disturbed…”

Not letting mother finish her sentence, I rushed out of the throne room and toward the tower. Both Caspian and Lorenzo were fresh on my heels as I followed the familiar path of the palace I grew up in. I knew the path to this tower by heart, having been dragged there far more times than I could remember to count. King Leonardo had made sure, time and time, to lock me up there on the smallest of mistakes. He didn’t care whether or not I cried, whether I was frightened or hurt. All he saw was him ‘educating’ or in other words ‘taming’ whatever attitude he claimed that he didn’t like.

I felt a clench in my chest as I reached the tower’s door, having had my feet hit with whips in this room, my father wouldn’t stop until my feet bled and I couldn’t walk on them. When I grew older, he would chain me to the tower’s wall like some prisoner as his guards hit me, they didn’t like it, I could see it in their eyes. But they knew the consequence of not doing something father ordered. Therefore, with heavy hearts, they were forced to do what the king asked.

I looked at the door before opening it and walking inside, the two men following close behind. What surprised me was that there were no guards, no maids, it was like the palace was initially abandoned and only the king and queen remained.

“It’s interesting, isn’t it?” King Leonardo asked casually. He was looking out the window making me frown in confusion, I looked at the man who was supposed to be my father with wide eyes. His own eyes were fixed on the window as if he didn’t know that we were here. I was about to open my mouth to speak only for Lorenzo to close my mouth with his hand, pointing at the window where he had a woman in his arms.

“One day, my love. You will be a queen over this whole kingdom and realm…” I heard King Leonardo say and a woman turned around in his arms to face him. My eyes widened when I saw that the woman was one of the maids we had in the castle. The woman leaned into his lips before catching sight of me, her eyes widened and she covered her exposed body. My eyes went wide as I looked between her and father. The king was cheating on mother?

The king turned to face me and I glared at “you”

“You caused all this damage and are here playing lover with a bloody maid?” I asked angrily. Caspian’s arm wrapped around me as he pulled me back, holding me back from doing something crazy. Which was what I was about to do.

“Did I? I don’t see any damage happening that I caused that wasn’t already there” King Leonardo said smiling. His eyes met mine and I had to force myself to hold my ground as not to end up attacking him. I could hear running in the distance and King Leonardo smirked “I see the people have started their attack?”

“Mother”

“Oh, mind you, dear. She is destined to die down there. Just like the guards have before her, did you know. People can be vicious” the king said calmly, I looked at Lorenzo and nodded at him to head to father. Following my order, Lorenzo vampire sped toward father who tried running away to no avail. The man was trapped in the tower, it was either the window which was about twenty stories high. Lorenzo was prepared to drain him of blood.

“Lorenzo, follow us when you’re done. Caspian, we need to go save mother” I said and the prince nodded. The two of us running out the door and rushing down the stairs, I prayed that we weren’t too late. Had the people entered the palace, the first thing they would look for would be the throne room, and knowing mother, I knew that she wouldn’t be able to fight one of them, let alone a group.

I could hear the crowd’s voice from out the gates forcing me to gulp as I feared the worst. The idea of my mother being harmed frightened me more than I could speak to describe. Yes, she has done her part of mistakes, but the woman was not a monster, I understood her point of view. The woman had learned to follow the simple steps of one, two, and three. She had tried teaching them to me as not to be harmed. She didn’t know that Niklaus had taught me to break every rule that said following steps, I was to follow my heart and go where it lead me, and that always ended up home. Back to him, my love. I knew that it was the opposite case for mother, had she got the chance, she would have done anything to get away from her father and for known reasons. The man was nowhere near being sane.

“Mother?” I called once we entered the room. Caspian’s hand was on mine in a second as he stopped me from going deeper inside the room in case there was any danger. I could hear whimpers of fear and Caspian’s grasp loosened for the two of us to walk inside to find mother trying to conceal herself behind the throne “mother”

The scream that she let out made both Caspian and I flinch and I was aware that she was in danger, and was currently having a panic attack “mother, my queen, it’s me and Caspian”

I leaned toward her and put both my hands on her shoulders making her look at me, I took a deep breath indicating that she follows in a suit which she thankfully did, the two of us looking one another in the eye before she wrapped her arms around my neck, hugging me tightly as she sobbed. I kissed her cheek and helped her stand up, Caspian having taken a step back to give us privacy.

“Mother, we need to get you out of here, you’re in danger…”

“Your father? He doesn’t know if the people being in here, they would hurt him…” my heart ached at her worry for him and I was about to open my mouth to speak, to tell her not to worry about him

“Lorenzo already took care of him, my queen. He will be back to help us out” Caspian said and I turned to face him to find him shaking his head at me. He was right, we wouldn’t be able to explain to her that her husband was cheating on her with a maid. She wouldn’t believe it and now wasn’t the time to argue when we needed to save her life.

“He is safe? You got to him?” Mother asked and I stayed quiet letting Caspian do the talking as the voices of riots went out in the city. This was going to be one bad, long night…

“We got to him, my queen. Now we must get you out of here, there are no guards in the castle. We’ll have to fight our way out” Caspian said and mother shook her head.

“Where are we to go? The whole kingdom is a mess and in danger…”

“We’ll find a way and a place. For now, let us just worry about getting out of here alive” I said stopping mother. There were ancient armors spread around the throne room, father had once told me that they belonged to the knights and kings who have fought wars for this kingdom. They were polished and renovated, I wasn’t sure how sharp the blades of their swords were but they were better than not having any weaponry.

“Kiara, the people out there could have guns, are we going to fight them off with swords?” Caspian asked and I nodded taking out a sword from one of the knight’s armors and handing it to him.

“Yes, as you can see, we don’t have guns. We’ll need to fight them somehow and judging by the circumstances, swords would be a lot better than fighting them by hand” I said taking out one of the swords and holding it in my hand.

“Kiara, how are you going to fight? You don’t even know how to use the sword…”

“You would be very surprised to know what I have learned and how much I have changed, mother. But now isn’t the time to talk about this” I said looking out the window. There was a clearing if we break the window…

“That might attract attention…” Caspian said and I nodded.

“But it’s the best we can do…” I said as Lorenzo walked inside the throne room. The man’s shirt had blood on it and he nodded at me letting me know that it’s done.

“Lorenzo? Is the king safe? Did you get him out?” Mother asked quickly. Lorenzo frowned in confusion and I nodded at him.

“Yes, my queen, the king is safe. But the kingdom is a mess…”

“We are already aware of that, we’ll talk about this later. But right now we need to get the queen out” I said looking at Lorenzo who rushed toward me.

“Does she think…?”

“Yes, and we’d like to keep it that way for a while. She won’t move if she finds out otherwise” I whispered looking at Lorenzo who nodded, the two of us looked at the queen then he looked at me and Caspian.

“What is our plan?”

“For starters, we’re breaking this window and getting the queen out of here. Anything else would be discussed later”