Chapter 9

         When I woke up, I was in a room with very little light. I was wearing shorts with nothing to cover my chest. I was chained to a wall and the room reeked of vomit and some other stuff I'd rather not mention. I looked around me and saw my brothers chained on my right side. From left to right, I was on the farthest left, then Demetrio, then Timur, Irvin and then Hearst. There was a door opposite where we were chained, and I hoped that we were alone for the time being. My brothers soon woke up, and we talked in quiet whispers in Luxembourgish. I assumed that our capturers would not know how to speak Luxembourgish unless we were in Luxembourg.

         We agreed that we had been careless and allowed ourselves to be captured by Heinous Knights, but according to my dream, we should be dead by now. We wondered why we were being held captive when we heard screams. They were female screams, but worst of all, they were the screams of the girls who had come with us to London. The restraints were meant for our kind. Regular human restraints, we could have got out of easily, but we recognized them so we didn't even try. That was our mistake. When the screams became unbearable, I tried to get out, and to my surprise, the restraints shattered.

         "What in the world," Demetrio said.

         I examined my restraints and found that the Heinous Knights had given me the restraints for Demetrio.

         "Demetrio, try to break out. Everyone try to break out."

         All of the chains snapped. The Heinous Knights had mixed up the special restraints. Now the only question was whether or not we could get out of the room. It turns out, the Heinous Knights were even more careless than we thought. We combined our powers to melt the door, and we went through it to find two very surprised Heinous Knights. We knocked them out before they could cry for help. Moving quickly, we headed towards the place the screams had come from. We were able to break down the door again and saw a couple of Heinous Knights tearing at the girls' clothes.

         We bombarded the Knights with our elements and knocked them out cold. The girls were tied to the wall at both their ankles and wrists. Fortunately, they weren't hurt, just very, very scared. You can imagine how glad they were to see us. We found we couldn't teleport out of the prison, so we left the room (leading the girls) and tried to find our way out. We had to knock out several other Heinous Knights, but eventually, we saw sunlight.

         We later found out that the knights who had captured us were former Heinous Knights who had betrayed Vadrak and were on the run from him. They knew Vadrak was looking for us, so they planned to win back their honor by delivering us to him.

         When they found us, they found themselves overly attracted to the girls so they took the girls as well. Fortunately for us, they had not been continuously whipped for not training hard enough. As a result, they were careless and allowed us to escape. The other good news was that they had not yet informed Vadrak of our presence in Europe. We weren't in London anymore, instead we were in Yorkshire, England.

         "Hey, guys, we should go back and free the Heinous Knights from their curses," I said.

         "How are you going to release them?" Jessica asked.

         "There's an ancient spell that will release Heinous Knights from their curse once the spell has been chanted," I answered.

         "Ancient? Has Vadrak been around for that long?" Cari asked skeptically.

         "No, but the way that he controls the Heinous Knights is through a spell and there is one way to turn back its powers. That spell and its antidote is ancient," Hearst said.

         "But you can't go back and leave us alone," Terra said.

         "Look, Irvin and Timur can stay with you while Hearst, Aden, and I go back and release them. It won't take very long," Demetrio said.

         We left. When we came back, the girls had mostly recovered. We teleported ourselves and the girls to France.

         "Where are we?" Jessica asked when she opened her eyes.

         "Bienvenue à Paris," I said.

         "We're in Paris!" Portia exclaimed.

         Portia was the artistic type. It was her dream to see the Louvre, but I knew we couldn't get careless. We had been lucky the last time; next time we might not be so lucky.

         We checked into a hotel and summoned our things from London. Despite what they had just gone through, the girls wanted to go swimming again. Because being in the pool would restore Irvin's strength, he accompanied the girls to the swimming pool while the rest of us remained in our rooms.

         I lay back on my bed and closed my eyes. I was tired enough to fall asleep pretty quickly. I had another dream about more Heinous Knights.

         There were two of them walking down the streets in London. I realized they were heading for the hotel we had stayed in. They had caught our scent. At the hotel desk, the clerk began his usual spiel about renting a room. The Heinous Knights didn't say anything as the man tried to get their attention.

         "Have you seen anything suspicious happen?" one Heinous Knight asked him.

         "No sir, why?"

         "What about ten people? Five boys, five girls. They only stayed for a day at the most."

         "I can check the records for you, but I'm new here, so I apologize if I haven't seen them before."

         "Name would be Jenkins," the other Heinous Knight said.

         "Well, there's a Jenkins here. Jenkins rented two suites, but hasn't checked out yet. May I ask who you are?"

         Neither of the Heinous Knights answered him. They peered over the desk just before the desk clerk covered our name with his hand.

         "Now sir, you really mustn't pry into other people's business," the clerk said nervously.

         The Heinous Knights turned and ran off to our rooms. When they found we weren't there, they left the hotel. They were wearing regular civilian clothes, but I knew they were Heinous Knights anyway. This was bad news. They were on our trail. Suddenly, their radios both started beeping. They answered them and what came through was bad news for us.

         "Attention all Heinous Knights. The five brothers of Sergius have been spotted in a hotel in Paris. Transport there immediately, but do not let anyone see you. This is an order."

         I woke up and jumped out of bed. I woke Demetrio, Timur, and Hearst and told them that the Heinous Knights had found us. We teleported to the pool and got Irvin and the girls out.

         "What is it?" Irvin asked.

         "The Heinous Knights are coming, but they're going to try and sneak up on us. We need to get out of here fast," I said.

         We threw the girls some clothes and they jumped into them.

         Irvin stiffened and then said, "You're right. Even now, I can feel the Heinous Knights closing in on us. Listen, let's grab the girls and teleport to Căuşeni, Moldova, because it's obscure and we can work out a plan from there. Right now, we need to move."

         We saw that he was right. The Heinous Knights had closed in on us from the street and were walking up the stairs and riding up the elevator. I grabbed Jessica and swung her on my back. She clenched my shoulders, and I teleported us to the other side of Europe.

         "Aden, this is getting crazy. Where are we now?" Jessica asked.

         I set her down and said, "We're in Căuşeni which is in Moldova. Jessica, I really am sorry about all of this. I truly am." I hung my head in shame and continued, "I know I should have left you alone. You probably would have been much better off with James. My kind aren't supposed to mix with yours."

         Before Jessica could say anything, I sank to my knees and began the formal apology that my kind say to each other. When I had finished, I stood up. Jessica burst into tears and flung herself into my arms.

         I had known that this would be stressful, but I hadn't meant to make her cry. I had gone too far, and now I couldn't get out until Vadrak and his Heinous Knights stopped pursuing us.

         "Aden, your apology was so sweet," Jessica said.

         "What?" I asked, backing away from her.

         "I said it was sweet. You don't have to be sorry, I just hoped we could've stayed a little longer in France, you know, maybe cruise on the Seine or something like that."

         "Jessica," I said, my voice hardening, "you don't understand. This isn't some tour of Europe that I'm taking you on. This is life and death. We got lucky last time. The ex-Heinous Knights were careless and didn't lock us up properly. We were all lucky we weren't killed. I truly am sorry for this, but neither of us can back out now. I have to protect you. If I don't they'll either torture you to death, or they'll use you to get me which I can't let happen."

         "Can I have you promise me something, Aden? No matter what it is?"

         "As long as it's reasonable, then yes. But if I can't do it, then I can't."

         "Promise me, that you will never abandon me. Promise me that you will not let the Heinous Knights have me if it's within your power. Promise me that if you do have to leave me, it will be against your will. Promise?"

         "That is not one thing but three. On the other hand, I will promise you that I will never let the Heinous Knights take you if I can help it. I also promise that I will never leave you unless there is no other option."

         "Thank you Aden."

         Jessica stepped forward and hugged me. I held her in my arms and tried to relax. But something was wrong. My brothers should have been here by now. I was sure that I was in Moldova. This was the place we had agreed on, right? Yeah, it was. So why weren't they here? A few seconds later, the four of them arrived gasping for breath.

         "Move," Hearst gasped.

         "What happened?" I asked. "What took you guys so long to get here?"

         "Heinous Knights attacked us. They're coming here too. Teleport to Dhaka, Bangladesh. Don't look back," Irvin choked.

         "Hold on to each other," I commanded.

         The girls clenched tighter to my brothers' backs, and I swung Jessica over my shoulder. The five of us swung together and grabbed each other.

         "On the count of three okay? One, two, three."

         As soon as I finished the word 'three' my brothers and I teleported the ten of us to the capital of Bangladesh. The reason I told my brothers to hold on to each other was not because I thought that they couldn't teleport themselves and the girls to Dhaka, but because I didn't want to take the chance of our being separated.