Onbekend(94)

“I thought you weren’t keeping me here,” Leila asked suspiciously.

“I’m not, but in order for you to be brought into the jail, you must be a captive. No one apart from the king can walk into the jail with a guest and demand to see someone being held there,” Gabor explained. “Anatolio will take you there and put you with your friend, but that’s all he’s allowed to do. Jail will give you some time to think over everything we talked about,” Gabor said as he smiled at her. “May we meet again, child.”

Anatolio pushed gently on her arms to force her to begin walking. This time around Leila didn’t test his resolve. He would take her to exactly where she wanted to be. Leila took no notice, though, of the change in her guard’s mood which was now gentler. She was caught up in her own thoughts.

Why did he tell me these things? What does he know of my future? Can I really be happy again without Erich? Leila questioned herself. She tried to get their conversation out of her head. I need to focus. Plan an escape. What does it mean? Leila began to trail off with her thoughts from the seer again. How did he know about Erich?

“We’re almost there,” Anatolio said to Leila breaking her thoughts. “I can get you into the same cell, but that’s it. I don’t have any more authority than that.” Leila was shocked to hear him speak.

“There are two guards on shift at one time inside the jail and two guards outside the gate,” Anatolio continued to explain. He let go of her arms, and she turned to face him. “The guards only change one person at a time so that there’s always someone here. Right now there’s only your friend in the jail and no other prisoners.” Gently, Anatolio turned Leila back around and took hold of her arms again. “Good luck,” he whispered in her ear as they approached the guards at the gate.

“Open,” Anatolio ordered. “I’ve one prisoner here to be placed with the other prisoner.” The gates opened. Two men immediately jumped up from their card game as Anatolio approached. The portly guard’s mustache failed to hide the smile that crossed his face. He was always fond of having beautiful lady prisoners under his watch in his section of the jail.

“She’s to be housed with the other prisoner,” Anatolio commanded.

“I’ll take her there,” the prison guard offered.

Anatolio replied, “I’ll take her myself.” He changed his grip to hold back Leila’s arms with one hand. Leila played along like she could easily be held with one hand. Anatolio took the keys and led her down the hallway. He approached a room and unlocked the door. Leila walked through the door.

“You’re on your own now, so be careful,” Anatolio warned before locking the door behind her.

Leila walked into the dim room. Though she hadn’t noticed, it was already dusk. The room had no light in it except for the last rays of sunlight streaming in one window. This is bad, she thought, noticing they were not in the women’s quarters of the jail. Through the dim light she surveyed the room. The room was sparsely furnished. There was one window, a bed with a blanket in one corner, and in the other corner, staring at Leila with a tear-streaked face propped on her knees, sat Kay.





Acknowledgements




As with any work of fiction, there are many people to thank along the way.

To you, the reader. Thank you for taking the time to read this story. If you liked it, please leave a review on Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, your own blog, my blog, twitter, facebook, etc. The greatest help you can do to keep a writer going is to support them by spreading the word about their books and leaving them encouraging words.

Also I would like to thank my editor and cover designer. A good editor is essential to getting the story correct. Thank you so much Kathie for catching all those errors. I will be working hard to better my writing through seeing everything that I have to work on. A thank you also to Ravven for such a pretty cover. I greatly appreciate all those that can do what I cannot, like editors and cover designers. Thank you also Kathy McMichael for your financial and promotional support.

I’d also like to thank my hubby for continuing to push me further down the writing road. I really never planned to let anyone ever see my writing. I have written tons of stories over the years for my own enjoyment. Writing is a great creative means that you can do alone. This particular story was written two months before Twilight came out, and I laughed when the vampire craze took over. Vampires were always a creature I thought you ran from, not kissed! I never considered going further with this story until my hubby asked me to try and put myself out there. So thank you, B. for pushing me off the deep end (or the cliff as I see it sometimes).