The Abduction by B.C. Burgess

Author:B.C. Burgess [Burgess, B.C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Young Adult Paranormal
Publisher: Bandit Publishing

Layla couldn’t hold it anymore. She was an idiot for thinking she could get away with not peeing while locked in the cell. Now she hurt from holding her squished bladder, and the exposed toilet looked pretty damn good. She paced the cold, stone floor with crisscross steps while eying Zio’s profile, wondering if his first time looking at her would be while she relieved herself. Then she wondered how much she really cared.

“That’s unnecessary,” he said, still staring at his book. “You should just use the latrine and be done with it.”

She stopped pacing and glanced at the toilet. Then she moved to the right so she could see Zio’s face. “You won’t look?”

“I won’t even listen.”

He seemed to mean it, so Layla gave in to nature and rushed to get the job done. He kept his word, keeping his eyes on his book, and he didn’t speak again until the bed creaked beneath her weight.

“Feel better?” he asked, flipping a page.

“My bladder? Yes. Everything else? No.”

“Would you like some water now that you have room for it?”

“Is it poisoned?”

“No. They’d never poison you.”

“They?”

“The guild.”

She furrowed her eyebrows at the ceiling. “Are you not one of them?”

“I am.”

“Then why did you say they?”

“It doesn’t matter. Do you want some water or not?”

“My babies do.”

“Then you better give it to them.” Keeping his eyes on his book, he reached to his right and touched the magic sealing her cell. A small hole opened in the red fog, and he blindly slid a glass of water through the bars before patching the magic.

Layla cautiously made her way forward, and as she knelt to pick up the water, she glanced over his shoulder to see what he was reading. After returning to the bed, she drained the glass and set it aside. “Thank you.”

The guard looked up from his book for the first time since they’d been left alone, but he didn’t look at her. He stared straight ahead. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you thanking me?”

“For the water. And for not watching me pee.”

“You truly were dropped from Willa’s womb, weren’t you?”

“No. My birth mother’s name was Rhosewen.”

“You don’t take pride in being Willa’s handiwork?”

“No. It steals credit from the people who’ve lived and died for me.”

“I see,” he mumbled, going back to his book.

“I didn’t know magicians read hexless authors,” she added, wanting to know more about the only person between her and the exit.

He replied without looking up, as if he could read and converse at the same time. “You talk like you’re not one of us.”

“I wasn’t. Not until seven and a half months ago. I was raised in a hexless home.”

“And now you find yourself in a world of trouble that blows the fiction books away.”

“Yes,” she whispered. “But I didn’t do anything wrong... I don’t think.”

“That’s the problem. You did everything right, and when you’re that right, everyone wants a piece of you.”

“So I should have been an awful person?”

“Maybe. It lessens the heartache when you don’t have a heart to break.

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