Abditory

01

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

Abditory
(n. a place of hiding)

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

PART 1: Capture

Scene 1

"You think it's all over
Get up and try again
You've got to act your age, darling
Before you fall back in"
- Young by Vacations

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

The palace was dead quiet. The royal family asleep in their beds, giving the staff time to rest peacefully before their banter started again in the morning. All was well it seemed. The night perfect, not a cloud to cover the full moon that hung over their heads.

It should've been perfect. If you'd ask anyone in there who wasn't a royal they'd say it'd be too. Out of fear? Spite? Anger? Ignorance? Whatever it was no one had the nerve to say so, the last thing anyone needed was something else to put them at risk in these tough times.

If you asked a royal? Well you'd get two pretty opposing answers. The King, he'd tell you everything was fine. If he was angry, don't bother asking at all; meaning really never ask him. As for the princess? No one seemed to ask her things really. Not without a thick voice of fear to say the wrong thing. If you did ask her though she might sigh or laugh bitterly. No, it isn't, she'd conclude.
-
Nightmare. Those had been a regular thing for quite some time now. The brunette's chest rose and fell at a slower rate than when her head had first shot up after waking. She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair as she calmed down. The same dream, same one she always got.

Just a dream. Just a dream. She repeated it in her head over and over. Suddenly the door to her bedroom swung open and she jumped.

A man just 2 years older than her barged in and she leaned her head back in relief. His dark hair was a mess, falling over his forehead in untidy strands. "Natalie! We have to go, now." He rushed over to the princess's bed with a sword on his hip not waiting for questions.

"What? Go where?" She looked around anxiously.

Oliver held his hand out for her impatiently and she took it as he pulled her up. "There's rebels in the palace, the alarm will go off any minute, we need to get you out."

"What's wrong with the passage in my room?" She asked slipping her shoes on, feeling his sense of urgency.

He shook his head, he looked awfully stressed, "It won't work, they've infiltrated the safe rooms."

She quickly grabbed a cloak to wear over her nightgown off the door. Oliver held his arm out for her and she took it before he pulled her out into the hallway.

The dark wood made the empty hallway even more isolating. No one was around but them. They both hurried to the end of the hallway and he leaned on a section of the wall. An opening revealed itself in the ornate wood to a dark staircase down.

Just as Oliver had said, the alarm started blaring in their ears and a red light on the wall flashed repetitively. Shouting grew louder down the hall and he shoved Natalie into the room, quickly shutting the door behind them.

He leaned on the door for only a moment to catch his breath and then grabbed her arm again leading her down the steps. She hadn't seen her father leave his room, or any of her maids. "Where was everyone else?"

"They could be ahead of us, I'm sure they'll be fine."

"Okay." She trusted Oliver but even as he led them down the stairwell she felt something was off. Why had he gotten her from her room before the alarm went off? Why wasn't her father rushing out of the door ajectent to hers? And why on Earth did the guy who always knew everything seem uncertain about the whereabouts of the king?

They stopped finally where the staircase made a turn down an even steeper path. It had ended at a stone wall before it turned left, deeper into the depths of the palace. He stopped her and pushed on the rocks with his side. He didn't look very strong but he was, he was tall but nothing out of the ordinary, maybe 6 feet. He was wearing an old, worn out, brown coat she only ever saw when they'd go to the woods together in the winter. Strange. His footwear was also not of someone who'd be guarding a palace, they were hunting boots.

As he eventually moved a rock out of place, it falling with a clunk to the other side, she looked around. The princess had never been in here before. She wondered where the downstairs path had led to as she looked down the pitch black stairs.

She shivered, and as she turned back noticed the light pouring through to the floor as Oliver pushed more rocks. She tried to get a better look but he grabbed her arm before she could try to sneak on in.

"Go through, I'm right behind you." He pushed her a little and she looked out the window of space he'd made. They were outside. Back behind the palace where the kitchens were. After climbing over and out she could see the shipment area. She stepped onto the dewy grass beside the stone wall and shivered again, it was freezing. While the spring days of their kingdom were lovely, the nights could be as cold as their winters.

"Wait a minute, I thought you left last night?" She asked as he pulled himself through the opening. She though he'd left for the summer, apparently going to his family's house.

Oliver lifted the rocks back up, placing them into their old positions, and then pulled her along the dirt road ahead of them. "Yeah well I got a bit held up." The road was loop that led to the port of docks and boats. This was for shopping food and materials, hence why it was in a section of the palace she never explored.

She looked at him and asked, "Where are we going."

He didn't respond. When she looked at his illuminated face in the moonlight for the first time she saw his worried eyes and asked again, "Oliver."

He pulled her beside one of the trucks on the road and breathed deeply. She only now noticed the satchel on his side as he dug his hand into it.

"I'm sorry Lia." He moved to her side and pulled her closer to the truck, as if pulling her into the dark, hidden from the rest of the world.

"What?" Was all she got out before something covered her mouth and she fell unconscious.