A/N: Sorry for the slightly longer wait; I was pretty busy. Here's Chapter Fifteen!

*Chapter Fifteen*

SARAH SIGHED as she wrung the bottom of her tunic, biting at chinks of her no-longer-so-lustrous pink-tinted hair.

I hope Keefe's okay, she thought dismally. Who knew what the Neverseen was doing to him?

Torture.

Blackmail.

...Or murder.

No! Sarah refused to think like that. I'm sure he's fine, she assured herself, he's got a talent for surviving in times like these. But even as her thoughts drifted around, there wasn't much positivity to focus on. She was hungry. Tired. Sleepy. And she was worried.

As she closed her eyes and tried to think about something nice, like cupcakes and rainbows, but maybe not that extreme, there was a slow creak in the room.

Sarah opened her ice-blue eyes and set her gaze on Alvar, who was holding a twisted vegetable in his arms. It looked to be about one foot long. "I figured you were hungry," Alvar said cheerfully, walking over to Sarah, who was piteously lying down on her rather uncomfortable cot.

"You figured right," Sarah mumbled, grabbing the vegetable and devouring it, though it tasted like grime from the tiles of a bathroom floor. And it definitely didn't help that it had some sort of fungus growing on it. Alvar had obviously tried to pick some off, by the looks of the scraped edges, but unfortunately, not all could be removed. She gulped, trying to make the retch-worthy taste fade away.

"Thanks," she reluctantly said, rising to her feet. Dearly hoping that the fungus on the vegetable was not poisonous. She had a sudden realization hit her like a baseball. She. Was. Bored."So, uh, what do you do around here? Other than think up evil plans and stuff." She bit her bottom lip and her eyebrows knitted together, because, well, it was true.

Alvar looked away as she said this. "Well," he said after a moment's thought, "we do chores. Like now I'm supposed to take out the laundry."

Laundry. Yeah, the Neverseen looked pretty kooky right then.

"Laundry? Ew. Does Gethen sweat?" joked Sarah.

Alvar chortled, but then glanced around, as if worried Gethen was actually around. Finally, as if satisfied by the results, he said, "Sometimes," in a hushed tone.

Sarah giggled. Then her face regained a serious façade. "Can I go with you? I'm sooo sick and tired of having nothing to do but lie around on this stiff bed." True story. You can get tired of too much rest, thought Sarah with a teensy chortle escaping her lips.

Alvar bit his lip casually, making blood stream out in various lines. "I'm not sure if...Orders say you're supposed to stay here." He ran a hand over his hair to smoothen it. Sarah noticed it was styled pretty fancily today. It appeared as though Alvar had used lots of hair gel to make his hair slick back perfectly.

"Nobody will ever know," winked Sarah. She tried a charming smile to see if it could help "persuade" him. One of those smiles she always saw on soap operas back when she was six. When her current foster mom would have told her she was too little- No, that was the past. But it affected the present, and the future. The past was a part of her. And Sarah knew she had to embrace that. She couldn't pretend she had a normal life. A normal childhood. Because it didn't happen. And who was she kidding? Lying to yourself only works for so long, she thought. You need to start telling yourself the truth.

She looked up to see Alvar's reaction.

"Fine," Alvar consented. "If we stay on the down-low, you can come help me."

"Great!" Sarah never thought she'd be so excited to do laundry.


Keefe breathed raggedly. "Focus, Keefe," he muttered to himself.

He glared at the dull grey floor, kicking it. Was his sister even alive?

Did the Neverseen kill her out of mere spite?

Or did she still have a chance?

Fintan stepped in the dungeon, tossing a moldy and far-too-soft fruit on the ground for Keefe, just as if he was a dog.

"Having fun?" he asked coolly, laughing at Keefe's stony face. "I guess not," he grinned. As if slightly disappointed by Keefe's lack of response, he left the room.

After glaring at the locked door and his chains for a few minutes, Keefe bit into the fruit, cherishing each and every bite.

He wished he could escape.


"So, how do you wash it, exactly?" Sarah frowned down at the cloak splayed on the grass, its dust evident.

"Well," Alvar gritted his teeth, "I'm not sure. I guess we'll just toss it in the water and hope it washes well." He threw the cloak into the lake, and Sarah ignored Alvar's preposition, instead kneeling in the shallow water, and scrubbing at it. "Wow, you wash well. What's your secret?" Alvar flashed at her.

"Changing from foster family to foster family," Sarah said quietly. At least, until she was finally adopted. Then she was kidnapped. Just a month afterwards. Right when she was settling in. And she was finally accepting them.

"I...thought you had a family." Alvar seemed uncomfortable. He touched the hem on his dark tunic, holding Sarah's gaze.

"I did. I tried to only think of them as my real family, even though they adopted me. Authorities checked and there was no record of my birth happening. No record of my parents. They assumed maybe they were foreigners. And, well, I finally accepted the fact that I'd never find out who my real family is." She stifled a small cry, and looked down. "But I can't deny the obvious." Sarah pursed her lips, absentmindedly biting into her pink hair. Ahhhh. The bristly threads ran through her teeth, soothing her.

"What's that?" Alvar whispered. The cloak lay forgotten in the water.

"I'm just meant to be alone," Sarah sniffled. Then she turned to the side, explosions happening under her skin. Wow. Talk about worst thing ever to say to a Neverseen member! she thought. She couldn't show her weakness to her very kidnapper!

But Alvar didn't seem to be completely awful.

And, well, he was funny and nice and made Sarah feel like she wasn't alone.

"Hey," he said quietly. "Don't cry." He walked to Sarah's other side, met her eyes, and wiped away the group of tears that were slicking down her face. Uhhh, what did he just do? "You're strong." Alvar added, "And you'll never be alone if you join the Neverseen."

Sarah was not sure about how to react when Alvar touched her. He was a kidnapper! But... it felt nice.

Alvar hesitated for a moment before enveloping Sarah in a slightly stiff hug. He hadn't hugged anyone in a long while. But... it felt nice.

Sarah hugged him back, her arms squeezing him tightly. She breathed in the scent of dirt and his shampoo. "Thanks, Alvar," she murmured into his ear.

"What for?" Alvar asked as they pulled away, both blinking rapidly. She gave a slightly teary smile, and she threw her hair over her back, out of her ice-blue eyes.

Locking her gaze on Alvar, she said, "For helping me realize my destiny."

A/N: Thank you all again!

Also, to the reviewer who asked for longer chapters- I WILL TRY! Xd. I find it hard to fit in a lot of things in one chapter, so typically they end up being 600-1,500 words long each, but, I will DEFINITELY try harder to squeeze in some more words! :D.

Thank you,

every reviewer,

every reader,

EVERYONE!