Roe woke up to the sound of Shane cursing. She bolted upright in the bed and said, "What is it? What's going on?"
Adrian sat up beside her at the same time.
"Look at this!" Shane exclaimed, standing by the bed. He was holding his wrists up, with the detached chains dangling from them. "They broke in the middle of the night. I don't know how."
"You couldn't break them before, because of the silver, right?" Roe asked.
"Yeah." He answered, confused.
"Try breaking a different part of the chain."
"Why? It'll burn my hands."
"Maybe, maybe not." Roe replied. "And even if it does, you'll heal in a matter of minutes. I just want to see if you can break them on purpose."
"Okay." Shane said, skeptically. He then took hold of the chain hanging from his left wrist, and pulled. They could all see the metal of the cuff slowly bending, before the chain snapped. "Holy shit!" Shane exclaimed in wonder. "I've never been able to do that before."
"How are your hands?" Roe asked him.
He looked at his hands. "They're a little red, but not like they should've been." He got a far away look on his face for a minute. "Shadow said he tried to break them when he was in control, but couldn't. He thinks it's because of marking you, that we got a slight immunity to silver from you."
"That's entirely possible." Roe said. "Various things have happened as a result of marking a member of my family." She shrugged. There's no telling what side-effects are going to pop up.
"That's awesome!" He exclaimed.
"I would keep it as quiet as you can." Adrian cautioned him. "Who knows what lunatics there are out there besides this Major Marsden fellow that might want to study you. And Roe, for that matter."
"Oh." Shane said, frowning. "I hadn't thought of that."
"I think things through, it's how I've stayed alive for so long." Adrian replied, dismissively.
"I think things through too." Shane said, defensively.
"I'm sure you do." Adrian said, reassuringly. "I've just had a lot more practice."
"I'm sure you have, old man." Shane said.
Adrian nodded. Not bothering to argue with Shane, since he was old.
"How old are you, anyway?" Roe asked Adrian.
"I don't really remember. Somewhere around eight hundred or so." Adrian shrugged. "After a while the years just blend together."
"You really are an old man." Shane said.
"Well, yes." Adrian replied, nonchalantly. "I am."
Roe grinned at him. "So, I seem to have found myself a sugar daddy, huh?"
"A what?" Adrian asked as Shane started laughing.
"It sure seems that way." Shane said. "But it only counts if he has money."
The confused look on Adrian's face had both Shane and Roe laughing so hard they couldn't breathe.
"A.. ha ha ha... sugar ... aha ha" Roe tried to explain what they were talking about, but couldn't quit laughing long enough to talk right. She finally gave up and tried telepathy. A sugar daddy is a rich old man that young women date for the guys' money. The young women are called sugar babies.
"So, a mistress?" Adrian asked.
Roe finally stopped laughing long enough to speak to him. "Kind of. But a sugar baby is usually only in it for the money. Mistresses usually want to be the wife, but aren't."
"Oh, a strumpet." Adrian said.
"Well, sort of. If I remember right, a strumpet is a prostitute."
"Yes." Adrian agreed.
"That's still not exactly right." Roe said, thinking. "Do you know the term gold digger?"
"Yes. A woman who tries to date the richest man she can find in hopes of money or marriage."
"A sugar baby is kind of a cross between a gold digger and a mistress. They get paid to date a rich man and hope it will turn into a relationship."
"Why?"
"A lot of men these days are working so much that they don't have the time to spend trying to find a wife, so they hire dates for social events." Shane said, helping Roe explain. "Or they just don't want to be bothered with dating, so they find a woman who's looking for a rich man to take care of her, and hire her to date them."
"Okay." Adrian said. "I understand the concept, but why call me that?"
"It was a joke." Roe said, smiling at him. "I meant that you're a lot older than me, and probably have money."
"I do. Does that matter to you?" Adrian asked curiously.
"No honey, I don't care about that." Roe answered, reassuringly.
"I can give you some, if you'd like me to." He said, sounding confused.
"No, thanks." Roe replied. "I am doing just fine on my own."
"What do you do?" Shane asked. "Besides being a witch."
"Well, being a witch pretty much is my job." She shrugged. "My degree is in public relations so I can help the different supernatural species cooperate with each other. But for right now, I'm working in my aunt's herb shop."
"Okay." Shane replied.
"All right, I think we've spent enough time in here bonding. What do y'all say we get out of here?" Roe asked them.
"Sounds like a great idea." Shane said.
"Okay, first we need to get these chains off of you, Adrian. Have you tried breaking them since you marked me?"
"No, I can try." He replied then paused. "But what about the spell on them?"
"Give me just a second." Roe said. She picked the chains up in her left hand, and waved her right hand over them, muttering a spell under her breath. "Try it now." She told Adrian, dropping the chains and rubbing her hand on her pants.
Adrian pulled on one chain until it broke close to the cuff. Then he repeated it on the other chain, breaking it too. "Done, now what?"
"Try to get the cuff off, or at least break all of the loose chain off. On Shane's as well. I have an idea, but jingling down the hall isn't going to help any." Roe replied, rubbing her hand on her pants again.
"What are you doing?" Adrian asked her.
"What?"
"You keep rubbing your hand on your pants."
"It's kind of irritated." She replied. "I don't know why."
"Let me see it." Shane said, holding out his hand.
Roe put her left hand in his, palm side up. "It's red." Shane said, looking at her hand. "Are you allergic to silver?"
"No, or at least I didn't use to be." She replied. "But since your allergy to silver has diminished, it stands to reason that I inherited it a little."
"That's interesting." Adrian stated in a very clinical way. "I wonder what else we'll find out about ourselves."
"I don't know." Roe said, shrugging. "The only person I know of that has done this before is my aunt, and I couldn't exactly ask her before we did it."
"It's okay, Roe." Shane said. "We'll deal with whatever happens."
She smiled at Shane. "Thanks."
"I didn't mean that critically." Adrian said. "I do apologize if it came out that way. You told us beforehand that you didn't know what to expect. We went into this knowing that."
Roe smiled at him too. "It's okay, thanks. I may have overreacted a bit."
Adrian finished getting the cuffs broken off of him and Shane, then asked "Now what do we do?"
"Now that y'all aren't attached to the walls, let's see about getting this door open." Roe said, retrieving her grimoire out from under the bed where she had left it. She placed the book on the bed and opened it. Then she waved her hand over it and the pages turned, following her hand. Once it was open to the spell she wanted, she spoke again. "This is what I'm thinking. I'm going to cast a spell to unlock the door, but we're not going to open it right away."
"Why not?" Shane interrupted her.
"Because there's a guard outside that will probably sound an alarm if we just bust through the door. I'm thinking something a little more sneaky than that."
"Like what?" Adrian asked.
"I found another spell that I think will help. It's an invisibility spell. That's why I wanted y'all to get rid of thoses chains. It will make us invisible, but we'll still be able to be heard. If I unlock the door, then cast the invisibility spell, then call the guard in here and lock him in, we should be able to make it out without anyone knowing."
"How are we going to get his keys?" Shane asked.
"That's a good question. Do either of you know how to pick pockets?"
"No." Adrian answered.
"Me either." Shane said. "Why don't we combine your plan and Adrian's? Call the guard in, hypnotize him and take his keys, then cast the invisibility spell. Then we can lock him in and escape."
"That sounds like a great idea. I'll still need to put my grimoire up, after I cast the invisibility spell." Roe said. "Adrian?"
"I think it will work." He replied. "I don't see any reason it wouldn't, but we'd have to be between the guard and the door when you cast the spell, or lock him in one of the bedrooms. If I disappear right in front of him, it may startle him enough to break my hold on him."
"That'll work. How about you send him in Shane's room to look in the refrigerator for something? Maybe see if he can figure out which meat is drugged and which is not. That should take him a few minutes." Roe said.
"Good idea." Adrian said. "That should buy you enough time to cast the spell. Especially if we lock the door behind him."
"Okay." Roe said. "It sounds like we have a plan. Y'all stay in here until I get him through the door. Let's do it."
"Okay." Adrian agreed.
"Oh, one more thing." Roe said. "Your boots are behind the bed in your room, Shane."
"Great, thanks." He said, then went to get his shoes. He quickly returned with his boots on. "I'm ready." Shane said, excited at the prospect of being free.
Roe nodded her agreement. Then she walked into her room and over to the hallway door. She knocked on the door then took a step back from it, so the guard could see her.
The panel in the middle of the door opened again, and the guard said "Yes?"
"Could you help me out for a minute? I can't figure out which of the meats in here are drugged and which are not." I've never seen this guard before, so hopefully I can con him into coming in here.
"They're supposed to be marked." The guard replied.
"If they are, I can't figure out how." Roe said truthfully.
"I'm really not supposed to come in there." The guard said.
Shane, Roe mentally called. Make sick noises. Moan or something. Out loud to the guard, she said "I think something's wrong with him again. He's been throwing up, and he's moaning like something's hurting him." As she said that, Shane moaned and started coughing and gagging like he was going to throw up. "I think I've given him too much drugged meat. I need to find out how to tell them apart."
"I really should go get someone else."
"Fine." Roe sighed, then started sniffling. "If you're scared of a little human female, drag someone else down here to see that I'm not capable of keeping these guys alive. They'll probably kill me for not doing my job."
Good job. Adrian said in her head. You sound totally pitiful.
Thank you. I'm trying to guilt him into coming in here and not telling anyone else.
The guard thought about it for a minute. "Are they still chained up?"
"They're perfectly harmless." Roe replied, putting a little hope into her voice. "If they weren't, they would've eaten me by now."
Harmless? Shane asked in her head.
You're harmless to me. Roe replied to them both. And you don't intend to hurt him, so you're harmless to him too. At least right now you are. Also, I'm not lying. Some people can subconsciously tell when you are, and I didn't want to tip him off.
Good point. Adrian told her.
"All right." The guard said. "No funny stuff, though."
"I promise you I'm not going to do any funny stuff."
"Okay." The guard said, unlocking the door. He walked in the door, shutting it behind him and putting the keys in his pocket. "Which room's he in?"
"We're right here." Adrian said, walking out of his room, and startling the guard. He looked him straight in the eye and said "You will do as I ask."
The guard immediately replied. "Yes , sir."
Adrian narrowed his eyes at him. "Hand me your keys."
The guard started pulling keys out of his pockets. He handed Adrian a set of car keys that looked like his personal keys, and a set of keys that looked like they were to the cells. Then he handed him another set of keys.
"What are these to?" Adrian asked him, holding up the last set of keys.
"They're the door keys to the wards and the outside doors." The guard answered.
"Do you have any way to get in touch with the other guards? Like a radio?" Roe asked.
Adrian scowled at her. It breaks their concentration on me when other people ask questions. He told both her and Shane.
Sorry. She said.
He turned back to the guard, ready to ask the question again, when the guard answered. "No. Nothing other than cell phones, and they don't work in here."
How do we get out of here without running into any other guards? Roe asked Adrian, intending for him to ask the guard.
Adrian did, and the guard replied. "I'm not sure how to explain it to you. It's a maze in here."
Can you look in his mind and see it? Roe asked Adrian.
I've never been able to before.
Try, please. Anything you can get would be better than running around here blind.
Adrian shrugged. "Think about the way out. Picture it in your mind, leaving from this room." He told the guard.
Adrian and the guard were quiet for a few minutes. "It worked." Adrian said, wonder filling his voice. "I could actually see what he was thinking."
"So you know the way out?" Shane asked.
"Yes, I do." Adrian said smiling.