“Wait, back up. The Guild never looks abandoned. There’s a full school in there, and close to a hundred students at any given time.”
Sinjinn looked at me as if there was a ‘but’ in there somewhere. I stared back at him, and the sick feeling inside of me only seemed to intensify. “Alden wouldn’t abandon those kids, so they have to be there!”
“Synthia, it looks deserted, and I didn’t go in so I can’t say what’s going on. It’s normally heavily warded, and Vlad said that the vamps and Shifters have never been able to make it past the wards either. Adrian said something was off about the place lately, more than usual anyway.”
“So where are they?” I asked with my heart felt as if a vise held it.
“All I know is that it’s bad, and when I circled around to the back, I was able to jump the compound wall, and I could see one of the buildings had a wall blown out. I think the wards might be down, or at least the ones on the back of the buildings are. I brought in Vlad and Adrian and stationed them outside the compound; if something moves, we’ll know it.”
“Call the guards, and place some on the children; we have to go,” I said, already standing to be sifted out and to the Guild.
“No, we have to make a plan, Synthia. We don’t know what we will find there,” Ryder said as he pulled me against him. “Let’s go to the war room,” he said and sifted us there, knowing Sinjinn would follow us.
No sooner did we arrive than every single one of Ryder’s men sifted in as well.
I watched numbly as I allowed them to plan it all.
I only added input when I was asked, or if they said something I knew wouldn’t work. None of these people had actually been inside, and I’d lived there. I began drawing a rough diagram of the Guild for them on a large parchment that Zahruk had glamoured for me.
“Okay,” I said once I had enough of the main rooms drawn on the parchment. I paused and quickly drew in the hallway and the staircases and wrote down which of the larger rooms that they led to. “The Guild’s main entrance would be my choice for our entry point.”
“The main entrance?” Aodhan asked as he looked to Zahruk for his opinion. I wasn’t upset; they normally looked to Ryder or Zahruk for direction.
“They’d never expect us to walk through the main entrance if they’re still there.”
I smiled and nodded at Zahruk’s answer. It was exactly what I’d thought as well. “Can I continue?” I asked, looking directly at Zahruk and waited for his nod.
“This is the entryway, and if they bombed the back of the building like Sinjinn said—and hopefully that’s only an illusion spell, because bombing the Guild makes no sense, at all. Zero, since it’s a smaller Guild which is basically used just to train new recruits. Why would they bomb a building they had full access to? The only thing that makes sense is that the Guild was actually under attack, and someone fought back. Anyway, this is the main area; we have a small reception desk here,” I pointed to the side where it would be. “Over here is where the higher-ups would be. The offices have iron walls, and are surrounded in lead. It’s a precaution in case the Fae were ever able to breach the wards and get inside. And if they somehow did, the paper pushers would hide in there,” I pointed to the doors on several sides of the building. “Each one of these doors leads down into the catacombs.”
I was showing the Fae how to breach the Guild, and it felt wrong. I had to remind myself that I was doing this to save Alden, Ristan, and whoever else was still alive inside. It was our only chance of getting in, since I knew Ryder wouldn’t let me go in alone. I looked around the group, and knew they were thinking the same. They nodded reassuringly, and I took a deep breath and continued.