Chapter Seven
Out of fear of being noticed, Aaron didn’t dare look around the edge of the satin curtain that he hid behind to see who it was that had just entered the room. His heart was racing and he had to cover his mouth with his hand to stop his heavy breathing giving him away.
He backed slightly away from the curtain and towards the window, hoping that nobody would detect his movement and swinging one leg over the ledge.
“Just leave her in here,” came Simpkins voice from the doorway and Aaron could hear the sounds of someone roughly binding someone’s wrists and tying her to a pillar in the same corner of the room from where Aaron had found Bethan’s necklace.
Ignoring the temptation to see who was left in the room, he swung his other leg over the ledge and jumped onto the muddy banking that lay beneath it. Aaron stood up, brushed himself off and looked where he was.
Unfortunately, after jumping from the window, Aaron now found himself outside of the castle grounds and unable to get back in and rescue Bethan. He couldn’t believe that he had just let her get caught and not tried to stop it. Kicking himself with fury, he decided that the best thing to do would be to return to Bethan’s camp and hide Linchester’s diary in hope that he would be able to use it later to rescue her and his parents. He prayed that nothing serious would happen to her before he could do anything about it.
*
A watery tear rolled down Bethan’s cheek as she sat, waiting to hear her fate. She had always hated to cry and now found herself frustrated at not being able to wipe her own tears away because her hands were tied and stopping her breaking free.
The only thing that she could use to take her mind of things was the fact that there was a chance that Aaron had managed to get away. If only he had been able to rescue his parents as he went.
Several more tears fell as she thought of how she’d never managed to find her mother’s necklace, after so many years of searching. She would have given anything just to see it again.
Either by magic or a very large coincidence, Bethan looked down at the ground and saw it, lying clumsily on the floor beside her. Her jaw dropped as she saw the only thing that she had been looking for since she had lost it and she began to use her feet to try to pick it up.
Unluckily, just as she had managed to pull it slightly towards herself, the furious form of Lord Linchester and his guards entered the room.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?” Raged the Lord, kicking a helpless Bethan hard in the stomach as she sat and forcing her to drop her necklace, before turning to talk to Simpkins. “Who is this brat?” He asked.
“We don’t know, my Lord,” replied Simpkins, “We found her in the dungeons after she’d broken in.”
“How the hell did she get in?” Ordered Linchester, looking to each of his guards with an expression frightening enough to give grown men nightmares.
“Well, we found the two men who guard the main entrance to the castle unconscious,” Simpkins continued, “We believe that they’d been poisoned somehow, they’re with a doctor right now.”
“That will be all, Simpkins, could you and your men leave me and our little trespasser alone for a little bit?” Linchester bent down to Bethan’s eye level, glaring into her face, “Who are you and what are you doing in my castle?” He asked.
“I, I am-“
“Well? Spit it out!” Linchester shouted, grew impatient and spat into Bethan’s face.
“I don’t have a name,” she told him, truthfully. “My mother died when I was very little and I never learnt it.”
“What are you doing in my castle, then?” The Lord questioned, laughing at the trembling little girl.
“I don’t know, I was just-” Linchester smacked Bethan across the face and her cheek began to burn scarlet.
“I was just, I was just,” He mocked in a girlie, whimpering voice, “You were just coming to stir up a little trouble, set a few prisoners free… Steal some of my most VALUABLE POSSESIONS!”
Bethan began sobbing uncontrollably, the tears now streaming down her face. Linchester stood up and paced around the room, holding the necklace in his palm.
“Do you even know what this necklace is?” He turned back to face her, “Do you even know that this is a highly valuable diamond necklace that used to belong to some peasant witch?” He held the necklace up in the air and looked at it carefully.
“I took this necklace from the family of the witch,” Linchester continued, “I took it, not you. That makes it rightfully mine, do you understand? NOT YOURS!”
“BUT IT IS MINE!” Screamed Bethan, finally snapping as the Lord dangled her necklace right in front of her eyes and said it was his.
“I beg your pardon?” Linchester crouched down again to look Bethan in the eye. “Now, how could it be yours?”
“I… I… it… I-“ She stammered as she knew that it would be suicide to tell him the truth of how it is hers’.
“Now, this is getting interesting.” He laughed, a grin of triumph creeping onto his face, “Sleeping potions, desire for a witches necklace…”
Linchester looked carefully at the crying child that sat before him, “…And you even look a bit like that witch that I burnt all those years ago,” he smirked at her, “I think I’ve got a case of witchcraft here.”
Bethan struggled against the ropes that bound her to the pillar, attempting to break free. Linchester watched her and laughed, “Now, now, little witchy.” He mocked.
“Do you know what we do to witches around here?” He whispered in her ear, “We do a little test on them.”
“Let me go!” She screamed; her face flooded with the tears that she so often stops from coming.
“We do a little test to see if they really are using witchcraft,” Linchester continued, “By seeing how long they can survive underwater.”
Bethan’s eyes clouded with fear as she looked up at the man who was happily explaining to her how he was going to kill her.
“I hope that you’re a good swimmer,” he scoffed, “Mind you, it doesn’t really matter if you are seeing as we’re going to tie your hands and feet together.”
How could life be so unfair? Bethan couldn’t understand what gave one man the right to do as he pleases with the people around him; she was going to meet the same fate as her mother and it was all because this toad had stolen her necklace in the first place.
“Guards!” Linchester called the guards that had been watching the entrance to the room while he had been questioning her, “Take this brat to the dungeons and send a message to the government that we request the permission to trial her on charges of witchcraft.”
“Yes, my Lord,” Replied one of the thuggish guards, cutting the ropes that bound Bethan to the pillar and forcing her to stand and follow them to the dungeons, struggling and fighting them as she went.
