The Protectors: Book 1 in the Protectors Saga (37 page)

Avery stopped a foot in front of Draven. She stood
and stared up at him, waiting for him to say something. She was
hoping for a, ‘goodbye’, at the least. Draven didn’t say anything;
he didn’t even look at her. His eyes went from the floor, to
staring at the far back wall of the throne room. Still, Avery
waited, but the only response from Draven was the hard rise and
fall of his breathing, which got heavy the longer Avery stood by
him. Finally, giving up, Avery sighed and turned to leave. She
thought to herself how disappointing this trip had been.

Before Avery made it two steps away from Draven, he
reached out and grabbed a hold of her upper arm.

Avery didn’t turn her head towards him, instead he
bent his head down towards her ear, and said to her, “Before I give
you use of my army, I’m going to need to have a full briefing on
your plans, and I’m going to need to oversee it every step of the
way.”

In her excitement, Avery turned her head quickly
towards him. When she did, her lower cheek smacked into Draven’s
mouth. For a few seconds, longer than Avery would have thought
necessary, Draven let his lips rest on her cheek. This time when he
pulled away, he did so slowly, with no abrupt jerks or back
steps.

“Th…Thank you.” Avery told him in a rushed
whisper.

As Avery moved to walk out the door, she felt that
Draven was still gripping her arm. When she delicately tugged it
free, Draven’s grasp collapsed in on itself. He cleared his throat
and placed his hand behind his back.

“You know,” Avery said, turning around before she
made it completely outside the door, “I don’t think I’ve smiled
like that since I’ve been on Orcatia. So, thank you.”

Draven nodded and appeared as if he wanted to say
something, then thought better of it, then rethought it and told
Avery, “I don’t think I’ve laughed like that…ever. So, thank
you
.”

Before Avery could respond, not that she would have
known how to respond, Draven swiftly closed the door, leaving Avery
staring at a thick plank of wood, two inches in front of her
nose.

It took Avery’s brain a little while before it was
able to tell her feet to move. Her mind was spinning, trying to
take in everything that had just happened. She took a small step
back from the door, her face scrunched up in a confused expression.
Avery shook her head clear and let out a small giggle. Whatever had
just transpired, Avery was pretty sure she was going to be given
use of Draven’s army.

Avery glanced left, then right, and realized she
really didn’t have any idea exactly where she was suppose to go.
Draven had seemed to be in such a rush to get Avery out of his
throne room that he hadn’t given her instructions on where to go to
meet up with the other girls. There was no one in the hallway
besides her, so Avery couldn’t even ask anyone to direct her to the
records room. She raised her fist to the throne room door, to give
it a quick knock, but couldn’t seem to make herself bring her fist
down on the hard wood. Her emotions were already frazzled from
dealing with Draven. She didn’t know if they could take any more
interactions with him. After a quick debate, she decided to head
back down to the front courtyard and try to find the stables.

The high sun hit Avery as she walked out of the
castle doors, soothing over her entire body. The bright sun and
warm colors of the outside were in strict contrast to the cool dark
castle. It felt to Avery like stepping into another world, the real
world, and leaving the dreamlike realm of the castle behind.

The courtyard was empty, but there were still plenty
of sounds floating around the air. From the outside of the wall,
the sounds of everyday life were loud and clear. From inside the
castle, Avery could hear the shouts of guards, giving and receiving
orders. Then, to her left, she heard what she had been listening
for, the faint whinnies of horses.

Avery walked down the path she had seen the stable
boys walk with the horses. Once she had passed through the archway
in the attached building, she found herself in a completely
different courtyard. This courtyard was simply a large square green
field of shortly cut grass, surrounded by a dirt walkway. To
Avery’s right, was a low-rise part of the castle, which seemed to
be made out of wider and rounder stones than the rest of the
castle. There were three large arched wooden doors on the bottom
floor. The middle door was left partially ajar and the smells of
baking breads and cooking meats were filtering out through it.
Outside of the door was a small wooden bench with some kind of
churn sitting next to it. In front of her was a higher part of the
castle, with one of the towers attached to it. To her left, were
the stables she had been looking for. The stables were a single
level building made out of round brown and black rocks, with a
straw roof. The front of the stables had a row of twenty large
square windows, with horses heads sticking out of a few of them,
whinnying at each other and over to Avery. A large rounded open
entranceway was built into the middle of it. There was a wooden
fence surrounding the stable that went out about twenty feet. It
was split in the center by a small dirt pathway that led up to the
entrance of the stables. Inside the fenced area were three loose
horses on the right side and a few pigs and chickens on the left
side. One of the stable boys that had taken the Protectors’ horses
was in with the pigs and chickens, shoveling manure into a
cart.

The smell of animals began to mix with the scent of
cooking foods already in Avery’s nostrils, causing Avery to feel
slightly queasy. She puffed air out of her nostrils and headed over
to the stables. She walked up the small path, through the entryway,
and into one of the largest stables she had ever seen in her life.
Not only were there twenty stalls of horses to her right and left,
but the stable went much farther back than was visible from the
outside. Avery ambled down the hay strewn pathway, past two tack
rooms on either side of her and stopped in the middle of another
row of horse stalls.

In back of the main stable area was small walled in
courtyard where there were more horse stalls built. These stalls
were larger than the inside ones, and had both inside and outside
access for the horse. In the largest stall, was a tall completely
ebony black stallion. He was just as tall as Phantom, but not as
bulky. On the outside of his enclosed stall, a gold plaque read,
‘Drako’. The large black horse was on the inside area of his stall,
munching on a large pile of green hay. Avery clucked her tongue and
the horse lifted his head, a few straggly pieces of hay hanging out
of his mouth. He finished munching on the hay already in his mouth,
and then slowly meandered up to Avery. He stuck his large head over
his circular wooden stable door and straight into Avery’s face.
Avery moved her body slightly to the left, to avoid being knocked
over by him, and took his giant head in her hands. She scratched
under his chin as he nibbled on a wayward lock of her hair.

“You remind me of my boy.” Avery whispered into the
horse’s ear.

“Um, excuse me, Miss,” Avery turned and saw another
one of the stable boys she had seen before, addressing her, “that’s
the King’s horse.”

Avery got the implication that meant, ‘hands off’.
She gave the horse one more pat on his neck, then stepped away from
him.

“I’m guessing my friends haven’t come back, yet?”
Avery asked the boy.

“No, Miss Avery.” The boy said back to her.

Avery sighed, she wondered if she was going to have
to have this same conversation with everyone she met, “Just call me
Avery. No, Miss, alright?”

The boy looked completely confounded. He just stood
in front of her, staring at the ground, not sure what to say next,
or how to address her.

“Fine,” Avery said, taking pity on the boy, “call me
whatever you want.”

“Thank you, Miss Avery.” The boy told her, already
more at ease, “Did ya want me to bring out the Protectors’
horses?”

Avery smiled, “That’d be great.”

The boy whistled and two more stable boys, one whom
Avery hadn’t seen before, joined him. They ran back to the last few
stalls in the walled in courtyard and fetched the Protectors’
horses from them. The stable boys hitched the horses up to the
outside fence, and then Avery, sensing they all intended to wait
out there with her and the horses, told them it was fine for them
to get back to their work.

Avery sat on the top rail of the fence, in between
Steel and Phantom, and waited for the others. She had to
continually push Steel’s mouth away from her, as Jade’s horse kept
trying to nibble on her leather belt. After about ten minutes, the
rest of the Protectors came walking through the same archway Avery
had come through. They were being led by Ferris, who smiled and
nodded his head slightly when he caught sight of Avery.

“I hope you haven’t been waiting long.” He told
her.

“Not too long.” Avery said, hopping off of the
fence.

Jade walked past Avery quickly, without acknowledging
her. Before Avery could turn and say something to Jade, she noticed
Bunny had a large satchel slung over her shoulder that she hadn’t
had the last time Avery had seen her.

“Are those all of the records Gumptin asked for?”
Avery asked Bunny.

Bunny nodded, “Yes, Jade made me carry them down.”
Bunny shifted the loaded down satchel strap on her shoulder,
cringing a little under its wait.

Avery grabbed the heavy satchel off of Bunny’s
shoulder, slipping it over her own, “You know,” Avery told Bunny,
“just because Jade tells you to do it, doesn’t mean you have
to.”

Bunny sighed, “Jade’s still not over the whole, me
hitting her with a rock, incident yet. I figured I’d just try and
be nice to her and do what she tells me to do for a little
while.”

Avery smiled to herself; she wasn’t sure if that was
going to be such a good idea. She could only hope Bunny’s mostly
meek personality didn’t get trampled over by Jade’s strong one.

“Well,” Avery said, “if Jade tells you to go jump off
a cliff, which she probably will at some point, just try and
control yourself, alright?”

“I promise.” Bunny laughed sweetly, smiling at
Avery.

Before mounting up on their horses, Avery thanked
Ferris for showing the other girls the records.

“Of course,” He told Avery, “just following orders.”
Ferris shut his mouth, then after a slight hesitant look, said to
Avery, “Orders that the King doesn’t usually give. I don’t remember
the last time he allowed visitors into the records room. In fact,
I’m not sure that he ever has.”

Avery wasn’t quite sure what Ferris was trying to
say, “Well…” she said, “we’re Protectors, and Gumptin sent us. So…”
That was it. That was all Avery could think to say.

Ferris stared hard at Avery for a few seconds,
smiling slightly, “I’m sure that’s it.” He waved goodbye to girls,
“Have a safe trip home.”

Avery jumped as Skylar, who had, unnoticed by Avery,
come up and stood beside her, wrapped her arm around Avery’s
shoulder.

“That, Draven,” Skylar said, slyly smiling down at
Avery, “was the
tastiest
thing I have laid my eyes on…maybe
ever.”

“Skylar,” Avery groaned, shaking Skylar’s shoulder
off of her, “you think every guy you see who is even mildly
attractive is
tasty
.”

“Oh, come on,” Skylar teased, following Avery to the
where the horses were hitched up, “don’t tell me you didn’t think
he was gorgeous?”

Avery shrugged, “He was alright.” She turned her head
away from Skylar, making sure she couldn’t see the blush of a lie
forming in her cheeks.

“Whatever,” Skylar shouted, pushing Avery in the
shoulder slightly, before walking over to mount her horse, “I don’t
believe you for a second. Now, tell me what went down in that
throne room, woman!”

As Avery approached Phantom, she saw Jade leaning up
against Steel, arms crossed, one eyebrow up, staring Avery
down.

“What is your problem?” Avery asked, laughing. She
was too shocked by Jade’s look not to laugh. For a minute, it
reminded Avery of the look her mother gave her a few years ago when
she had been caught sneaking back into the house after going to a
concert her mother had told her she wasn’t old enough for.

“I don’t have a problem.” Jade said in a clipped
tone, shrugging her shoulders, “I’m just waiting for you to answer
Skylar.”

“Nothing happened.” Avery said slowly, mounting
Phantom.

Jade didn’t move; she just stared up at Avery, a look
of suspicion on her face.

“Nothing.” Avery said again to Jade.

Jade shook her head, then turned to mount Steel.

It suddenly occurred to Avery, that while she had
been so busy protesting that nothing had happened up in Draven’s
throne room, she had completely forgot to mention to the girls the
most important thing that had actually happened in his throne
room.

“I almost forgot,” Avery said loudly, “I did get him
to give us permission to use his army.”

Jade, who was halfway through mounting Steel, fell to
the ground as her foot slipped out of the stirrup.

“What?!” Jade shouted, wrapping her arms around
Steel’s neck, and picking herself up, “And exactly what did you do
to convince him to do that?!”

Skylar let out a little wolf whistle, “That’s my
girl!” She giggled.

Sasha was looking at Avery like she had just sprouted
a second head.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Avery said defensively, “I didn’t
do
anything.”

“Oh,” Said Jade, mounting up fully this time, “so he
just, out of the blue, decided to give us his army, which he so
adamantly had to think about.”

It was time for Avery to calm everybody down and
clear the air, “First off,” she said, “it wasn’t out of the blue. I
kept pushing him about it. Second, it comes with conditions. He
wants us to bring him a full plan, and he wants to be involved in
everything we do with his army.”