"Ol?" Leif echoed. He spun around, but there was nothing there. He looked all around the room, but saw nothing strange. Still the woman stood with an expression of greatest shock and terror. Despite this terror, she rushed to the crib, avoiding Lief, scooped up the babe and fled the room. Thinking back later, Lief realized how brave the woman had been.
Taking her place in the doorway came the fearsome Doom, looking as wild and battle-ready as ever. To liefs shock, he sneered at the King of Deltora with hate in his eyes and slid his sword from the hilt, wielding it as he closed in on Leif.
"Doom!" Cried Lief, backing up. With this, Doom struck out, the sword slashing at Liefs right side. Lief ducked and narrowly missing the blade to his chest, was hit in the side of his head, yet he felt no pain, and there was no injury. Dismayed more from this than from Dooms behavior, Lief slid along the wall and out of the room with surprising quickness, ignoring Dooms cry of rage.
'Doom has gone mad.' Lief thought, dismayed. 'Jasmine will know what to do,' Lief decided, reasoning that maybe she could get through to him in his madness. With four years of palace life and experiencing the tender love for a child, Jasmine was not quite as fierce as she once was, and had grown a little closer to Doom. Though the two still respected each other as they used too, and Doom never showed it even as a wolf never shows its fear or weakness, Leif was sure that Doom loved his daughter. So Leif slipped into his and Jasmines' bedroom, expecting quiet and peaceful darkness. But what he found was a scene of terror.
At the other side of the room, in front of the large open window; its panes intricately carved into elegant symbols of the royal family, stood Jasmine, her eyes closed not so much against the cold breeze that gently ruffled the silken white curtains and gown and caused her crown of long black hair- the only dark element on a figure of white- to blow softly around her face; but her eyes were closed against the grief that welled in her heart. The simple white gown, light and frilled here and there, was ripped at the bottom where she had stepped on it during her fight.
Jasmine was being held firmly at the arms by two burly men that towered over her, their faces shadowed by hoods, their cloaks grey. A bruise was already forming on her face. Speaking to her, his back to Lief, was a third figure, smaller than the others, loosely holding a thin sword pointed at the ground.
"Now Queen of Deltora, where is your husband? Where is your son? Tell me, or die."
"Then I'll die," snorted the queen of deltora. If the situation had not been so deadly, Lief would have smiled. This was the same Jasmine he had found in the Forests of Silence not so long ago.
But Lief was far from smiling.
"Jasmine," Lief cried out before he could stop himself. The man that was speaking turned and looked at him. Leif gasped. He was identical to the man who had questioned his father when he had been imprisoned in the shadow lands, therefore identical to the man who had been the supervisor that led astray King Endon long ago. He was a servant of the Shadow Lord, and he bore the features that the shadow lord admired and had put into every traitorous chief advisor for every previous king of Deltora.
The servant of the shadow lord had a queer expression on his face at the sight of Leif, but Leif did not see this, because the look of hate that radiated from Jasmine as she looked at Lief broke his heart. 'She blames me for this,' Lief grieved when suddenly, from outside there was a bloodcurdling screech; the man gave an order that Lief in his dismayed trance never heard, and Jasmine was thrown out the window.
"Noo!" Lief screamed. He violently pushed aside the man and kicked, shoved aside the others as he threw his head out the window. The dewy rosebushes glittered far away at the foot of the palace under the window. But there was no Jasmine down there. Jasmine was flying away, as Lief could barely see even in the moonlight, on the back of a grizzly Ak-Baba.
"That is my backup plan," said the servant of the shadow lord, as Lief stood rigid, still looking out the window. "We will easily be able to find the young King of Del, and also the heir to the belt. But if not, we have the Queen as bait. I'm quite sure, certain in fact, that the foolish King will come to rescue her himself."
"It is all-" The minion of the shadow Lord continued, but could not finish, because an icy hand was suddenly wrapped around his throat.