Children of Esteria

When the person approaching became visible, Talia noticed her father's shoulders drop from their tense position. She gripped her dagger tighter as her father stepped ahead of their small group. "Roland!" he exclaimed, briskly walking towards the man and clapping him tightly on the shoulder.

"You don't know how happy I am to find you," Roland said, his eyes sweeping over them. "I have been searching for you since word spread that Solomon's men had discovered your location."

Talia slowly put her dagger away. They all knew Roland. She used to call him Uncle Roland when she was younger and had constantly been reminded that he and his wife were people they could trust, no matter what happened. Her assumption that it meant they were privy to their true identity had just been proven true.

"We must hurry. Having you out in the open is dangerous. "

She glanced over her shoulder as they started moving again, relieved that there was no sign of anyone following after them. They were travelling in the dark with no light because they had to, but the men after them had no need to conceal themselves, or so she hoped. It was during the day that they would be most likely to be unaware of people approaching.

They moved off the road and followed Roland's lead. After a short while her mother joined her father who was walking slightly ahead with Roland and she and Kian swapped places, giving him a rest from helping Ingrid. The woman glanced at her briefly as she wrapped an arm around her back and clung to her tightly. "You could not have prevented this," she said lowly.

Talia sighed and glanced over to her siblings, grateful that Ana's stag had taken them a few steps ahead of the two. "I could have warned them."

"Solomon's men still would have found you and your home still would have burnt."

A pang of pain shot through her at the reminder that their home had been destroyed. She might not have always enjoyed being in the bakery, but it meant everything to her father and had been a place of safety for them for many years. Now it was likely to be a crumbling structure and all their belongings would be gone. The loss of their home just made her hate Solomon and the people who had formed the mob more. They didn't have to assemble and hunt them out. They could have decided that they didn't want to get involved and wanted to leave them alone. But they didn't and she would never be able to forgive any of them.

"Maybe Father would have made us leave earlier," she murmured.

Ingrid gave a sigh. "The trace of magic would have followed. It'll do you no good to fret about what has happened, child. We cannot change the past. Remember that the present and future is most important."

Talia didn't reply and they continued walking in silence. Her legs were beginning to ache and part of her was grateful that she was clinging onto Ingrid otherwise she feared she might have sat down and not got up. The bakery had been hard work but that paled in contrast to having to flee for their lives. She wondered about the people that had attended the monarch support meetings. Were they true supporters or did they join Solomon's men when they ransacked their bakery? All those people they used to provide bread and pastries for and yet many were prepared to hunt them out to persecute them. How could they do such a thing?

Dawn was beginning to break when a small cabin finally broke into their sights. Her heart leapt in joy when Roland directed them towards it. Just before he opened the door, Makena and Zachary were awoken and made to climb off the stag before Ana thanked him for his help and he disappeared in the opposite direction of the way they came. Roland scanned the area before he opened the door and ushered them quickly into the cabin, making sure to secure the door once they were all in. Talia looked around and frowned.

"Roland--" her father began only for the older man to shake his head, bend down and pull up the rug, revealing a trapdoor.

"We can speak once everyone is below," he instructed as he gestured for them to begin descending the rickety steps.

Her mother went first, followed by Kian, Zachary and Ana. Talia released Ingrid and watched to see whether she could stand securely before she followed after Makena. The steps led to a rather cramped cellar and as she wondered where her mother had disappeared to, she noticed the small opening behind the stairs. So she grabbed Makena's hand and pulled her along behind her, thankful when the opening revealed a larger room that had a table her family were sat around in the centre and draping on the far wall. She took a seat next to Ana, relief flooding through her at finally being off her feet. Makena rested her head on the table as was Zachary.

A few moments later Alistair, Ingrid and her father came through the opening and joined them, followed shortly afterwards by Roland. The older man glanced at them warily before speaking. "Why don't we put the young ones to bed?" he suggested, gesturing to the drapery that was covering the far wall. Her mother rose to her feet and nudged both Makena and Zachary to their feet before following Roland, disappearing behind the cloth.

There was no noise between them until Ingrid let out a cough. "There's a protection on this place," she said, making them look towards her. "I can feel it in the air."

"I can feel it too," her father said, nodding at her. "We'll be safe here for now."

Talia looked across the table and took note of how Kian was sat with his head in his hands and Alistair was staring down at his lap. Next to her, Ana looked lost. She couldn't blame her. They remained in silence until their mother and Roland came back in the room, the former sitting next to her father and grasping his hand tightly.

"There is much we need to discuss but looking around this table, I think it should wait until after a night's sleep," Roland said.

Kian raised his head. "How are we supposed to sleep?" he asked.

"You're tired," their mother pointed out.

"I couldn't sleep, not even if I tried," Talia interrupted. "What are we going to do?"

It seemed as if her father had aged within the space of a few hours. He looked old and tired. "That's not for you to worry about."

"The hell it isn't!" Kian exclaimed wildly.

"They destroyed our home," Ana added quietly.

The mention of their home made Talia remember something and she looked at the old man in horror. "Where's Gwendolyn?"

Roland took a seat and made them all look at him. "My wife is fine, so that's nothing for you to worry about," he reassured her before going back to addressing them as a family. "As you know, we're below ground and as your mother saw, there are various tunnels that connected to this room, and while most lead to rooms designed to be living space, one leads elsewhere. What you four must remember is that your parents chose to live in the town closest to the border for a reason, and that reason was to be a great distance from the throne. It's such a distance away that you have been able to live peaceful naivety; however, we knew that Solomon would not give up. So while you became the McCormacs, those of us who knew - and that's a very small few - took it upon ourselves to ensure that there were emergency provision in place should you ever be discovered."

Talia had only been told that Roland, his wife and Ingrid were the only ones to trust fully in their town, and that there was one person to trust in the next town over: a woman called Johanna Browne. It was only once she was older that her mother had explained that without Johanna, they would have struggled to make it away from the castle when they did. She wondered what they were going to do with only those few loyal friends. For all she knew, mostly everyone else wanted them dead.

"There has been talk of his men having found a way to detect magic going on for far longer than you are aware," Roland continued. "The moment we heard that his men were travelling to the town next to yours, we realised that they had probably detected you and so we began making preparations to smuggle you from your home in the dead of night. Of course, that didn't happen as they arrived before we were ready. There was one good thing that came from their arrival, though; we discovered that there is a fairly large group of people in your town who are monarch supporters, and I approached the leader a couple of days ago for support."

The look Alistair was shooting at her didn't go unnoticed by their mother and she eyed them suspiciously. "What do you know?" she asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Talia replied briskly.

She turned her stare onto Alistair. "Don't you give me lip."

"We might have been aware of certain meetings that were going on," he admitted sheepishly.

"You better not have been in attendance!"

It seemed that Kian had suddenly awoken because he chose to pipe up with, "Talia was attending for a while."

She shot him a glare. "Kian and Alistair both attended too."

"Did not!"

"Don't lie!" Ana shot back.

That made their mother rise to her feet and shoot a look at all four of them. "You all attended those meetings? What were you thinking!" she chided, looking between each of them in turn. "Do you have any idea how dangerous just attending those were? I did not raise a bunch of foolish children."

"It wasn't foolish," Talia retorted. "Those people love both you and Father. After all these years, they still had hope that you were alive and would one day receive word of all the loyalists and return."

Their father placed a hand on their mother's arm and coaxed her back in her seat before turning his attention back to them. "We were once Esteria's rulers, and we chose to make each of you aware of our linage, but we are no longer who we once were. Your safety means more to us than being royals."

It was then that Roland cleared his throat and stood up. "We should be receiving visitors any moment now," he announced, and each one of Talia's siblings rose to their feet in preparation, clutching their daggers out of habit.

There was the sound of several approaching footsteps before the drapery was moved and the opening was crowded with several people, one of whom stepped forward. "My King!" he exclaimed, clasping eyes on their father.

Talia watched as her father rose to his feet and stepped towards the man before engulfing him in a hug and clapping him tightly on the shoulder. "It's good to see you, Tobias!"

They drew back from one another and both had smiles on their face. "The tunnel leads back to our manor. We've been waiting for such a long time for this moment. There is much we must discuss in preparation for the rebellion, and there are many who will be overjoyed to see their King and Queen," Tobias announced, looking around the cramped room. "We have everything you need to take back your crown."