The second his name left Diana's mouth, Sydney's whole body seemed to freeze, stuck in a state of disbelief and discomfort, because the blue eyed man she tried to avoid in LeHorn was the first person to come to mind. No matter how much she tried to convince herself that it was just a coincidence that he shared the same name as her alleged father, the crippling affect the mere notion of him possibly being the one was not easy to overlook. Suddenly, every time she encountered him replayed in her memories—every lasting stare, unexpected appearance, and unsettling warning. He was the only westerner that made her feel like he knew she came from the east, and he'd given off that vibe from their very first meeting.

Was it possible he met her mother so long ago? That he was the reason her view on westerners supposedly shifted?

But more important than that was the thought paralyzing Sydney's other functions.

Is Victor Martin my father?

Diana said he was quite a few years older than her when they met, but Victor had to be at least ten years her elder. It wouldn't be the most unreasonable age difference, certainly not large enough to discredit any truth her mother's story could hold. The only thing not adding up in Sydney's mind was, if the man she'd met truly was her father, then why did he hate easterners so fiercely. He did everything he could, it felt, to get rid of Sydney, yet she was to believe he was able to lay with one. Not only that, but produce a child from the act.

"Sydney?" By now, she was so overwhelmed by the possible revelation, that she hadn't even noticed when Diana turned back around to face her. "What's wrong? You look...haunted."

Haunted would have been preferred in this situation. Haunted implied that it was only a thing of the past that plagued her, but Victor was still very much alive last time she checked. 

Don't get too ahead of yourself. All she said was Victor. It's highly irrational to think it could be him.

Warding herself off the ridiculous notion, she shook her head and swallowed, wetting her throat that had dried up immensely.

"Um, I'm...I'm fine," she said, collecting her bearings. "I just...nothing"

Mentally, Sydney scolded herself on how her hunger for truth almost made her reveal a vulnerability to someone she couldn't trust. 

"You can ask me anything," Diana shared, her voice and expression sincere. The soft thuds of her boots stood out as she stepped toward the bed, sitting at the very edge of it. "I won't have all the answers, I'm sure, but I'll tell you everything I can."

There was a war going on in the young woman's mind—a battle between her two selves. One version, the one she predominately lived as, was the strong-willed, determined soldier. A woman who would die for the right cause, risk her life to save others, and never let her enemy get the better of her if she could help it. The other version, the one she buried the day she aged out of the orphanage, was not a woman, but a girl—a sad, abandoned, hurt girl.

All her life, Sydney struggled with who she wanted to be, which version of herself she would feed, and which she would starve. Usually, the woman won. But, this time, it seemed, was a rarity, because for once, Sydney chose to serve the girl.

She still kept her distance from Diana, for the restriction gave her the illusion that she would still be in control, but deep down she knew. She knew that the moment Diana started answering her life-long questions, she would be clay in her hands. And, while it was dangerous, going against every thing she'd taught herself, clay she would be.

"Where did you meet him?" she asked, her fingers fidgeting with themselves as she stared, hard yet desperate, and allowed herself this moment. 

With a soft smile of relief that did nothing to assure Sydney she hadn't made a mistake, Diana replied, "On the road. I had just left my unit, needing space and quickly found myself wandering the dirt road to nowhere in particular. The sound of hooves got my attention, and I turned to see a horse galloping toward me. My eyes, however, were more concerned with the man riding it."

Leaning back on the wall behind her, Sydney motioned for her mother to continue.

"He was older, I could tell by his facial hair, but his eyes were kind when he stopped next to me. As you could imagine, I was incredibly nervous, but once I saw he didn't know what I was, I felt a little better. He, uh, he offered me a ride to wherever I was going. When I declined, he insisted, saying it wasn't safe for a woman like me to be alone on the road," she recalled with a sad smile of nostalgia. "He had no idea that I was the very thing he should have been afraid of. Hating. But...he took me to this village, showed me love in time—the kind of thing I never saw between my parents. The kind of thing I wanted to keep."

"What village was that?" Sydney asked, her eyes raised in anticipation. "Do you remember the name?"

Please don't be LeHorn. Please don't be LeHorn. Please.

Nodding her head, Diana answered, "Maeford, if I'm not mistaken." The relief that washed over Sydney at the foreign name was short lived when her mother added, "But he always spoke of taking me to meet his parents, in his home village. LeHorn. I've held onto that name ever since he spoke it, knowing I'd need it if I ever were to find him. Even now, I have hope that one day I'll go there and...see him again."

Oh my God. It...has to be him.

Suddenly, all the haunted looks he gave her made sense. Even the looks of wonder the mercenaries gave Sydney made sense. She looked so much like Diana, Victor must have felt shaken at the sight of her.

Raising her hand, Sydney looked to the floor, needing Diana to stop. She needed time to adjust. Time to process. Victor Martin is my father. Sure, she reasoned it was not necessarily set in stone that her assumption was fact, but what little was left to possibly be argued was canceled out when her gut tightened, and she'd come to trust her gut.

It was only when she noticed the sun beginning to set through the open window that she realized how much time had passed since she'd been taken—since Brooke was taken. As much as she had other questions she wanted answered, she accepted this was more than enough and it was time to get her head back in the game. She had to escape, but she couldn't sensibly formulate a plan with the queen of her captors in the room with her.

As fate would have it, she wouldn't have to. The two men outside her door knocked before entering, both wearing expressions of surprise and confusion.

"Your Majesty," Holden spoke up with a lowered head.

"What is it?" Diana sighed, annoyed by the interruption.

"We just received word that one of the guards at the south perimeter spotted something unusual. It has yet to be confirmed, but he believes he saw someone, maybe multiple."

"What?" she scoffed in disbelief. When the men stood their ground, nervous but sure, her attitude changed from dry humor to serious and alert. "Call for Carter. Have him meet me in my office immediately."

"Yes, Your Majesty," the two men said simultaneously before bowing and leaving.

"I'll be back to finish this talk as soon as I can, Sydney," Diana informed her, her tone once again shifting from brooding, intimidating queen, to gentle mother. "There are so many things I want to share with you."

But I won't be here when you return.

As soon as Diana left, the sound of the bedroom doors locking echoed off the cold walls, canceling that out as a possible escape route. Sydney immediately began sifting through her mind for alternatives.

She had the knife still, which she quickly retrieved from under the pillow she hid it under. Tucking it into her back pocket, like it was before, she took a step back from the bed, stumbling as her heels tripped on something laying on the floor. Something that once held her bound.

The rope!

Picking it up, she held it high by one end, measuring it out with her eyes. It couldn't be more than a handful of meters, but she hoped it would be enough, because, if her memory proved correct, she should only be three stories off of ground-level and she had a window she was anxious to escape through.

Rushing to the sill, she cautiously peered out of the old-fashioned window, which had no glass or bars restricting her from crawling through. She could see why they would see no need for such precautions when she saw how high up she actually was. The high ceilings of the castle lengthened the stories of the structure, and that rope was starting to seem shorter and shorter the longer she looked.

There has to be something else I can use.

She racked her brain for something, anything that would better her chance at surviving the fall. The rope was not enough. It was a start, but she needed more. She thought back to the times she would sneak out of the orphanage after curfew to meet up with Liz when they were younger. She was only on the second floor of the building, and even then, her bedsheets barely kept her from twisting her ankle when she'd have to let go and land on her two feet. How was she to do better in this situation, when she had less to work with?

But, then she remembered where she was.

A bedroom.

The bedsheets!

Sydney mentally praised herself for thinking of the fix, while simultaneously insulting herself for taking so long to come to that solution. Either way, she made haste in pulling the light cream sheets off the mattress and tied them together, starting from the leg of the bedframe closest to the window and continuing on until both sheets and the rope were connected by tight and secure knots. All that was left now was to leave.

But leaving meant never getting the answers she craved.

Sucking her teeth, Sydney took one last glance at the room she was being held captive in, accepting that with great strength came even greater responsibility, and she was willing to take it on. She knew she was strong enough to handle never knowing the truth about her parents. What she didn't believe she could handle was the loss of another friend, no matter who it was, so she determined not to test her limits.

She had to find Brooke, get them both out of there, and then come up with a plan to save the rest of the women, but only after they regrouped with Jasper, Casey, and everyone else.

With no more hesitation, and confidence that the knots would hold, Sydney climbed out the window and started her slow descent down the side of the castle. Her grip was secure for the first few seconds, and her feet were flat against the stone walls, but eventually the smooth sheets began to slip from her grasp, and she struggled to stop herself from falling. The fabric burned her hands, but she tightened her fists until she felt her fingernails digging into her palms and used her feet to lock the rope in place, just in time. She was just a few inches shy of running out of rope.

Looking down, while catching her breath, Sydney knew a couple of seconds longer and the only thing able to stop her fall would have been the concrete below.

That was a close one.

Still recovering from the near-death incident, Sydney hadn't noticed that she was dangling right outside a second story window. The sound of heated voices was what alerted her, and with a quick gasp of surprise, she wedged her heels against a protruding stone on the exterior of the building and held herself out of sight, all while hearing the men getting closer.

"I've never seen the queen respond like that!" one of the men exclaimed, his hands resting on the window sill, in Sydney's line of sight. He was leaning onto it ever so slightly, and she held her breath, sweating with caution. "Lord Carter couldn't even finish his sentence before she slapped him! All he was able to get out was that there was a possible perimeter breach before she hit him."

"I believe that may have something to do with how the disturbance at the south gate put's her daughter's security at risk," an older man replied calmly, his age evident in his voice. "Queen Diana is thinking as a mother, now. I suspect she'll make more missteps for the sake of her child, but we should not speak of her in any ill light. She's done great things for our kingdom. Understood?"

Getting the hint, the younger man sighed and agreed. "Understood. I suppose I should be going, anyhow. She's ordered more guard detail to the princess' room. I've been told to wait inside the room with her, just in case something happens."

"Well, then, off you go."

Sydney's eyes widened at that peice of information. She'd been distracted, trying not to scoff at the impression the men had that Diana would care for her safety as much as they thought. She viewed herself as nothing but a political pawn Galdon and the mercenaries wanted to use as they willed. What did catch her attention, however, was the snippet about guards entering her room. That meant they'd soon find out she escaped, which would lead to them scrambling to find her.

Time was ticking at double the speed before.

Looking down, Sydney gaged that she was about ten to twelve meters off the ground, and while she wished she had more cushion to break her fall, the ground below would have to do. Mentally preparing herself, she bent her knees as she let go, her chest tightening as she dropped down.

The first thing she did when she hit the hard concrete was hiss in pain before rolling back onto her bottom. She hadn't landed quite as smoothly as she'd hoped, but upon wiggling her hurt ankle to and fro, she concluded that nothing was broken, fractured, or strained.

Must have just landed on it wrong.

Still, she cursed at the situation, knowing the small hobble she'd gained would slow her down, and the slower she moved, the more time she gave someone to possibly recognize her. Pulling her hair out of the misshapen ponytail it'd been in, she shook it until it fell in a way that slightly concealed her features, hoping it would help her avoid attention. This was her one and only chance, and she'd be damned if she didn't do everything she could to make it count.

Calling on her memory, she retraced the steps her captors took as they dragged her through the compound. She took a left at the pub, a right when she reached the market place, and another right once she came across the old hollow Oak tree, all while keeping her head lowered in a way that didn't look too odd. A pleased feeling fell upon her when the large ivory rock came into view, its mystery drawing her in, but she was content with just knowing she was headed in the right direction. Sydney was the type of person that took the saying, 'Curiosity killed the cat,' as more than just idle talk. Whatever the etchings on the ivory stone were, she planned to never find out. Hers, and every other captive life here was more important than her insignificant desire to know more about the place her mother lived.

Just as she was walking past the monument, a group of mercenaries rushed by a few meters ahead of her. Among the brigade was Raegan, along with the man she was arguing with earlier. Looking at the position of the sun in the sky, Sydney noticed they were headed south, which was the direction of the apparent disturbance the two men were talking about earlier. Swiftly turning to the side, Sydney peeked through the hair that fell in her face, letting out an exhale when she saw they didn't notice her. Quickly getting back in action, she pressed forward, which thankfully was north, and minded to stay in the shadows wherever they presented themselves. Unfortunately, judging by the speed the group was moving, and the amount of time she'd been gone from the castle, she assumed the whole camp would know of her escape within the hour. The good news was, an hour was plenty of time for her to do what needed to be done. There was just one problem. She was now essentially blind in a camp full of enemies.

Up until this very moment, Sydney had some kind of idea of where she was going. How was she going to find Brooke when she had no way of knowing where the brothel was or what it even looked like? She was in uncharted waters, in a high-pressure situation, with a limited amount of time before any type of success was rendered impossible.

"She couldn't have gotten far! Check those buildings! We'll check these!" she heard a man order not too far behind her.

Slightly panicking, Sydney ducked into a shaded alley between two rows of metal-sided houses. She could see a couple of guards run past the dead end alleyway, one of which looked a lot like Holden, who physically brought her in when she first arrived. That was all the proof she needed to know exactly who was hunting her at that moment. She didn't think the castle guards would be as dangerous combat-wise as the trained mercenaries, such as Raegan or her team. However, as Sydney heard the other half of the group searching the houses to the side of her, she focused on getting out of there without being compromised.

The pocket knife she carried was better than nothing, but its small size was definitely a disadvantage id she were forced into a fight. She'd have to get close, too close, if she were to do any affective damage. Scanning around her, she saw nothing weaponizable other than a rusted crowbar leaned up against a pile of tires. The deep orange was the only reason she was able to spot it in the dimmed lighting, due to the height of the structures around her. That will have to do. Shifting with stealth, after checking that no one was looking, she moved to grab it, stepping out of her hiding spot and completely exposing herself for just a handful of seconds.

But, sometimes that was all it took.

It was only when her hand fully grasped the dirty metal bar that an uneasy feeling ran down her spine and she sucked in a sharp breath.

Someone was watching her.

And she was cornered.

Author's Note:

It has been months since my last update, and for that I'm really sorry. Truth be told, I had writer's block on how to write this chapter. I knew what I wanted to happen, I just had a hard time putting the words together. That being said, I'm fairly satisfied with how it came out.

Thoughts? Or anything you want me to know?

-Mac