It's been sooooo long since my last update. But I will finish this, even if it takes me ages. There's about three chapters left, and a short epilogue.
Also, thank you JJ (Guest) for commenting a couple days ago. Your comment is what got me to finally finish this chapter!
And to answer someones comment from a while ago, no, Moth isn't in this. I haven't read the books in a really long time, and I don't own the fourth one, so I wanted to keep the characters as simple as possible. Also, thats probably why most of this is not accurate to the faerie palace in the books. I'm mostly just making it up as I go.
"It's just around the corner. Remember the plan," Mustardseed whispered to Sabrina, his words mirroring Puck's from the previous day. But this plan wouldn't end the same way as last time. No one was going to get hurt, and she and Puck were going to be home safe and sound in a few hours.
Sabrina fidgeted with her leather belt, the only thing holding up her too-big pants. She was borrowing Mustardseed's clothes this time, and they were even more ill-fitting than Puck's had been. But her old clothes were covered in blood and water, so she had needed to borrow something else. She brushed her fingers across her belt until they reached the knife strapped to it. She squeezed the hilt until it dug into her palm, hard enough to turn her skin white. They would not fail. Not this time.
Mustardseed took the first silent step around the corner, with Sabrina a foot behind him. They could see five guards, two more than there had been the previous night. One guard looked towards them, and his eyes widened. Sabrina saw him open his mouth, about to call out to the others, but then Mustardseed was there. He blew silver powder into the guard's face, and he dropped like a stone. Seconds later, the same fate befell the others. It was over in an instant, no fighting necessary.
Sabrina released her hold on her knife and they walked over. Sabrina nudged one of the fallen guards with the toe of her boot. She could see his chest rising and falling, but he didn't stir at the touch. She raised an eyebrow at Mustardseed.
"When will they wake up?"
"They'll be out for a least four hours, if no one gives them the cure. Otherwise, they'll just wake up with headaches." Sabrina nodded in acceptance, and watched a Mustardseed walk up to the simple wooden doors concealing the treasury. He stepped inside, and she found herself involuntarily holding her breath, waiting for him to collapse like Puck had less than twenty four hours ago. But he made his way carefully to the opposite side of the small room without issue, and Sabrina forced herself to let the air out of her lungs.
Mustardseed pulled open a small drawer at the top of a vanity, and pulled out a delicate green velvet bag. He pulled the drawstring, peering in, then quickly pulled it shut. He pocketed the bag that Sabrina knew must contain the ring, and made his way back over to her.
Sabrina helped Mustardseed pull the doors shut, fairly shaking in anticipation. She wanted, no needed to see the artefact that would get them back home.
"Can I see it?" She asked, and Mustardseed passed the bag over. Quickly, she pulled out the ring.
It was just like she remembered, if a little more shiny and a little less tarnished. She felt a grin break out over her face.
"This is it!" She beamed, only just remembering to keep her voice down. "Mustardseed, this is it!"
"Good," he said. Sabrina could hear the relief in his voice, the same relief that she found herself feeling. This was it, they had the ring, and soon everything would be fixed. She slid the ring bag into the bag, and slid the bag into her pocket, the one just under where her knife hung.
"Remember, we're not out of this yet." Mustardseed reminded her. Sabrina nodded, and they made their way back to Mustardseed's room.
When they were almost there, he frowned and turned to Sabrina.
"We haven't run into any guards yet. We passed at least five on the way down," He observed, his voice laced in unease.
"Coincidence?" Sabrina guessed. "They probably think that we're in the city, not the palace, so they didn't bother with extra guards in the palace." Mustardseed nodded reluctantly at her reasoning.
"I suppose. Let's just get Puck, and get out." Sabrina made a noise of acknowledgment, not bothering to answer as they were feet away from the door. Mustardseed pulled it open, and they slipped inside.
Puck wasn't on the bed.
"Puck?" Sabrina yelled into the obviously empty room. There was no answer, except for Mustardseed's breath catching behind her.
Sabrina raced to the bathroom, yanking the door open so hard it slammed into the wall beside her. No Puck. She ran around to the bed in the center of the room, and checked under it. No Puck. When she stood up, she noticed a splash of red on the twisted white sheets. Blood. Blood that had definitely not been there an hour before. Her gaze quickly travelled to the puddle of water on the floor, still dripping from the broken pitcher that used to sit on the bedside table. She felt her heart rise into her throat, and anger surge through her skin.
They had taken Puck. They had taken Puck while he was injured, and she had not been there.
"Sabrina!" Mustardseed yelled, and she whirled around, hoping that he had seen something, anything that could help her. But the yell was not one of victory. It was a shout tinged with fear, defeat, and anger. Her heart sank when she saw the reason for his distress.
There were guards marching into the room, and one of them was already holding Mustardseed down, pulling his hands stuck behind his back. The others were advancing on her, and she backed up into the corner.
Sabrina pulled out her knife.
"Where is he?" She demanded. "What did you do to Puck?" But none of the faeries graced her with an answer other than the glare one shot her before they all lunged. She struck out with her knife, raking the blade across someones arm before pulling it back and hitting someone with the handle. They were moving quickly, all four attacking at once. She struck out with a kick to someone's crotch, tried to swipe at a guard's eyes, but she felt a hand grab her shoulder and yank her back. She stumbled.
Something connected with her head, right next to where she had previously hit it. Her head exploded in white hot pain, and black danced across her vision.
No.
Not again.
She couldn't black out. She needed to save Puck! She reached out with her knife, one last time, but something grabbed her arm and pried it from her fingers. She tried to yell, fight back, do something, but another blow connected with her head and everything went dark.
Sabrina woke up shivering, with something sharp digging into her side. She shifted and tried opening her eyes, seeing nothing but gray in the instant before pain burned through her head. She squeezed her eyes shut and grit her teeth, but couldn't hold back the whimper that spilled from her lips.
"Sabrina," She heard from somewhere to her right. She did her best to force down the waves of pain, and peeled her eyes open again. This time, she didn't try to move at all, and just stared at the gray stone wall in front of her.
"Sabrina, are you awake?" The same voice asked. It took her mind a second to catch up to the question, but she realized that she knew that voice.
"Puck?" The name fell out of her mouth, more a question than a statement, more a whisper than the yell she meant it to be, but somehow he heard her.
"Are you awake? Are you okay? What did they do to you?" The questions poured out of his mouth, and Sabrina remembered what had just happened. They got the ring. Puck was missing. Guards. Then blackness.
Sabrina pulled one arm underneath herself. Mindful of moving her head, she used the support of the wall to pull herself up to a seated position. From there she could turn and see her surroundings.
She was in a small cell, with two stone walls and two walls made of metal bars. One wall of bars seemed like a door, and Puck was behind the other in a cell of similar size.
He was pressed up against the bars, as close to her as they would allow, his green eyes wide in concern and his golden hair even messier than normal. But her concerned eyes were immediately drawn to the red seeping through the bandages wrapped around his chest. She could see them even under his ripped and stained shirt, and knew that they were not supposed to be that color.
"Your wound," She pointed out. "You… What happened?" . She squinted at him from across the cell. Even from a few feet away in the dim lighting, she could see that he was holding himself up at an awkward angle, and being careful not to move his torso at all.
"I'm fine," He said. "But the guards came in, soon after you and Mustardseed left. They grabbed me and dragged me here." He waved to the bars surrounding them..
"But your wound…"
"I've had worse." He brushed it off. "More importantly, are you okay?"
"I just got hit in the head a few times. Just a little dizzy," She said, not mentioning the intense pain every time she moved. "But are you okay? Can you move at all?"
"I think my wound opened up again, when they dragged me here." Puck admitted. "But I haven't moved at all since they left me here, so I don't think I agitated it too much." Sabrina pressed her lips together. That wasn't good. They didn't have medical supplies down here, not even any water she could see. It was also freezing cold, and Puck's wound could get infected.
"Puck…" Sabrina said. "I'm going to come over there. I can only reach through the bars, but I want to look at it." She pulled her legs under her, and dug her fingers into a crack between the stones in the wall. She pulled herself up, slowly, blinking back stars, but her slow movement didn't bring back the same pain as before.
Then she remembered.
"The ring!" It slipped out of her mouth before she could think, a panicked haze passing over her mind. She reached into her pocket. Nothing was there. She searched her other pockets. Empty. It, as well as her knife, must have been taken after she was knocked out.
"They took the ring," She whispered to Puck, eyes wide. "Mustardsed and I, we got it, and they took it from me."
She took the five steps across the cell, and sank down across from Puck. He reached through the bars, and grabbed her hand.
"They took the ring," She whispered again. Puck rubbed his thumb across the back of her hand.
"There's no way you could have held onto it, Sabrina. They knocked you out."
She looked up, but didn't meet Puck's eyes.
"Can I unwrap the bandages?" She asked, changing the subject. He looked away.
"I don't think it would make a difference."
"I can just check to make sure it hasn't gotten any worse. And we could find a way to clean it. Mustardseed showed me how to wrap it properly, so I could probably…" she trailed off when she noticed how shiny Puck's eyes had become, how he refused to look at her while she was talking.
"Sabrina, I don't think that's going to make a difference." He repeated. "We don't have any medical supplies or anything down here with us, and in the next hours or days, my father is going to have us executed for treason." He said it all in the least Puck-like way imaginable, as if everything he stated is inevitable and they couldn't even try anymore.
"Puck," Sabrina heard her voice crack on his name. "Don't say that. Don't say something like that. We still need to get home, and we will!" Puck finally turned to her, and she could see how his eyes were red now too.
"We won't," He said simply. "It's impossible."
"Mustardseed-"
"He was caught too!" Sabrina wished he shouted. Shouting, she could deal with. Arguing? That would work. But his flat voice, saying that their fate was inescapable, that they would both die soon? She couldn't handle that.
"Puck!" Burst out of her mouth at the same time the tears started flowing down her cheeks.
"We've always made it out! How can you say that? We'll make it, Puck, I know we will."
"How?" He shot back. "We don't have anyone here! The Old Lady can't come save us, none of your friends are here, and Mustardseed was caught! This is it, we're done now!"
Sabrina was ready to argue back, to try and say something that would give Puck hope, but then they heard the creak of a door being opened. Then the rattle of keys and armour, and finally footsteps. Footsteps coming closer.
Sabrina huddled closer to Puck, realizing that she hadn't lost her grip on his hand throughout their conversation. She squeezed their palms together, and he squeezed back. Whoever it was, they would face them together.
A figure came into view. With their hood up and walking in the shadows, they couldn't make out any facial features.
The person stepped up to the bars, so that they were facing Puck. The hood came down, and Sabrina bit down a gasp. Standing in front of them, staring down Puck, was the younger version of himself.
"I am here to hear you out," He said in an uncharacteristically serious voice. "If you lie to me," he stated calmly. "I will not stop my father from having you executed at dawn."
Mustardseed was pacing his room, back and forth, as he had been doing for the two hours he was locked in. After he was caught aiding a criminal, the guards arrested him but instead of sending him to the dungeons with Sabrina and Future Puck, he was locked in his room. Perks of being a prince, he guessed.
But he hasn't received any news, and had no contact with anyone whatsoever. For all he knew, Sabrina and Future Puck were already dead.
But they couldn't be, so he had spent his hours of pacing also planning. Very quickly, he had figured out how the guards had known to take Puck. Oberon must have placed a secondary spell on the treasury, one that would alert him to who went in if they opened the doors. Mustardseed had been stupid to think that the only precaution hus father had taken was extra guards, and he would make sure to never underestimate his father again.
But that left the issue of what happened to Sabrina and Future Puck, and what would happen to him. He knew that he would be fine, especially if he told his father he was being blackmailed by Sabrina, or put under a spell. But he didn't want to leave Puck and Sabrina to die. He liked Sabrina, even though he had only known her for a few short days. He admired her determination, and especially her ability to deal with his brother,
And his brother. Puck. The brother he had always thought of as being younger than him. That brother, growing up, having a relationship, loving someone. Because even though he had never heard the Future Puck say it, Mustardseed could tell in every action, every word, how much Puck loved Sabrina.
Mustardseed knew he had to help them, but he wouldn't be able to do it alone. He was still under suspicion, even if he pleaded mind control or blackmail. That was obvious simply by the fact that he was still locked in his room. But, if anyone came to see him, then he would convince them to send Puck. If he could talk anyone in the palace into helping Sabrina and future Puck get out, then it would be the twelve year old Puck of his time. He just needed to get his brother to hear him out.
Thanks for sticking with this! I love you guys!