Junkland by Patrick Johns

Author:Patrick Johns [Johns, Patrick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 2017-10-31T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

Alana

THE SPACE AROUND her was dark, tight, and cramped. She could barely see her hands in front of her as she crawled. Clouds of dust surrounded her. Her throat was scratchy, making it hard to breathe. She stopped every couple of minutes to let out a cough, trying to clear her lungs. No matter how many times she crawled through the tunnels, she never got used to it.

She had discovered the secret passageway when she was ten years old. It had been a tough time for her. It was shortly after her mother’s death, after they had burned her body. Her father had permanently shut the Eastern Gate and limited access to the Western Gate. He had stopped her sword lessons with Sir Mazo Dapher and told her she was to remain inside the Castle Keep—that was what had sent her over the edge.

Alana had been furious and had pouted all day inside her room after her father had told her the news. There was a painting on a bookshelf of her, her mother, and her father, all happy and smiling. She had let out a scream and ran over to the bookcase clumsily. She was going to destroy that painting of her broken family. In her fury, she had tripped over her rug. Her body had gone flying forward towards the bookcase. She had thrown out her arms in desperation to protect her fall and the bookcase caught her. For a second she thought it was going to topple over, but there was a loud click and the bookcase moved.

Alana had regained herself, taking her weight off of it. She had watched the bookcase swing away from the wall, revealing a small door behind it, just big enough for a person to crawl through. That was how she had discovered the first of many secret passageways.

She had spent most of that year exploring parts of the castle she had never been to before. Alana had kept track of all the secret passageways, mapping them out in the back of her diary. It gave her freedom to roam wherever she wanted without having Mother Claraine and her handmaids following her around. When they thought she was by herself in her room, she was really out exploring Astenpoole.

She found it marvelous that no one else knew about the secret passageways except for her. The only conclusion she could think of was that King Alas Danor had built the secret passageways back when he had constructed his plans for the castle. He must have been a secretive man, and the secrets must have died with him. Alana would have thanked him if he were still alive today. She was able to use them as she pleased—except for the one now boarded up in her room.

When her father’s men had found her outside the castle wall the night of the Hoarding, her father had been furious. She had never seen him so angry before. In his fury, he ordered his men to strip every inch of her room until they found something.

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