A few quick notes to start off the chapter…

Thankyou kittenmew for your review and thankyou so much for telling me how to properly spell Nikola's name! I actually was a little worried about that.

And to charlotte, the mysterious character will appear around the fourth chapter, so you won't have to wait too long.

On with the story!

Magnus's POV

Everything appears to have gone according to plan. Henry had gracefully acknowledged that he wouldn't be coming with us to search for Ashley. Firstly, he was still looking drained by his time at the Cabal headquarters and secondly, I needed him here. Will and John were double checking all of the equipment to make sure we had everything we needed for the long journey ahead. I'd already arranged for a small jet to meet us at the airport and take us straight to Scotland. Nikola however, was another matter altogether.

When everyone had gone to begin preparations, I took Nikola aside. "So, you wanted to speak to me" he said and I nodded "I want you to stay here" He started to protest, but I interrupted him "Henry has been through a lot in the past few hours and you are the only one who is fully capable of running the Sanctuary while I'm away. I trust that you will acknowledge the full bearings of what I am asking you and not make a fuss" I took a deep breath and lowered my voice "I would trust only one other person than you at this time and he is currently under the influence of the Cabal's weapon" Nikola sighed, then smiled "Well, I suppose I don't really have a choice; after all, I live to serve"

"Thankyou" I smiled. Nikola could be a pain in the neck more often than most people would like, but he always had been a good friend to me. I walked to my room to pack, shaking my head. It had been a long day and it was about to get even longer by the looks of things. I didn't know how long we would be in Scotland for, as long as possible if I had anything to do with it. But I packed light, making sure that I didn't pack anything I didn't need, but also making sure I didn't forget anything. I was just zipping up my bag when I heard a knock at the door.

"Come in" I said, Will opened the door "Hey, you ready?" he asked. I smiled "Ready when you are" Will walked further into the room. "Hey, listen I know that we're all set for finding Ashley and all, but……" he paused. "Go on" I urged him, Will hadn't been with us for very long, but I valued his input highly, he'd saved my life already, and that was enough for me to remove all doubts.

Will sighed "I know that we're all willing to put everything we have into finding Ashley, one way or another. My only issue is, what condition we'll find her in" I stared at him, slightly confused by what he was saying. "Her mental condition…we aren't entirely sure that they didn't mess up her brain functioning or memory permanently. If that is the case, I just want you to know that it's not your fault."

Now I understood. Will was worried how I would handle losing my daughter; in more ways than one.

I thought about it for a moment. Losing her physically had been worrying, and I had been so terrified of losing her, never seeing her again that I had been lost in a whirl of panic, to finally come up with a plan to find her was like having the life breathed back into me.

I wondered though, just how I would react if we found her, but she only saw me as an enemy, or didn't remember me at all……..

I shook my head to clear my train of thought. Ashley was waiting for me, I could not afford to waste time on distractions.

I looked up at Will, intending to reassure him "I'll be fine as soon as we find Ashley, when we do we'll just take it from there." Will still looked worried "Everything will work out fine" I said decidedly "now, we'd better get cracking, the second we get on that plane we'll have time to mull over things but until then, I need a cup of tea and I need you to make sure that all of the arrangements for everyone in the lower levels are ready and that they know what's going on." Will nodded, still looking slightly unsure, and walked out.

I breathed a sigh of relief. I needed Will to keep his usual sharp eye out for anything unusual while we were in Scotland. And I most certainly didn't need him to lose focus worrying over how I would deal with the situation if we found Ashley…. in a worse state than we expected.

I realised I hadn't drawn breath for a while, so I took a slow, deep breath and relaxed slightly. We still had another half hour to go until we would be fully ready to leave, on any other day I would have spent the time in my office or lab, but I needed to move around so that the nerves would settle. As I was walking down the hallway, I heard voices yelling something indistinguishable around the corner.

Now what is all this about?

When I rounded the corner I realized exactly what was going on. Nikola, John, Will and Henry were all arguing together so loudly it would have been hard to get a word in.

Did I miss something?

After waiting another few minutes for the argument to settle (which it had not) it was time to interrupt before it got out of hand.

"Is there a problem?" I asked as Henry, not realizing that I was behind him, jumped. The looks on their faces would have been amusing….if I had an idea what they were looking at me for.

John turned towards me "I understand that you have decided to leave Nikola in charge here while we are gone." I nodded "You understand correctly"

Will stared "What were you thinking? I mean this is Nikola we're talking about; he's probably just waiting for us to leave before he turns the place up on its end!"

"Yeah, did you forget that he practically kidnapped you in Rome just so that you could give his vampire buddies a lift in the IQ department?"

"I am still here you know" Nikola pointed out

"No, I most certainly have not forgotten that Henry, which is why I am trusting you to update me on events while I'm gone. Besides, Nikola helped us to retrieve the blood from the city and I believe that that gives me more than enough reason to trust him."

Nikola clapped his hands "Well I'm glad that's all sorted, but shouldn't you three be going? I don't think Ashley's going to enjoy staying in one spot for too long, just like her father; doesn't like long standing relationships wouldn't you say Jacky?"

John slowly turned to glare at Nikola, before it got out of hand, Will quickly grabbed John's arm and started to pull him back down the hallway.

"Hmmmm, I never did know what you saw in him Helen, I suppose his violent tendencies are in their own way quite seductive, but really….." Nikola tutted and shook his head, then walked away before I could even try and reprimand him. Henry looked at me; his eyebrows raised "Well; this is going to be interesting"

Ashley's POV

Huh? Where the hell am I? "Ow!"I rubbed my forehead furiously where I'd hit it on the bottom of the bunk above me. As I sat there, letting the pain slowly fade away, I took the chance to look around.

I was in a cell of some kind; the bunk bed that I was sitting on was the only furniture in it. Walking over to the cell door, I looked out on the empty corridor and realized that I wasn't the only one in a cell. Across the corridor I could see creatures and men all stuffed into tiny cells identical to mine.

First on my list of things to do, bust out of here, later, I'd figure out how the heck
I ended up here, there were some slightly fuzzy memories lurking in the back of my head……..but I'd figure that out later. For now escaping was priority number one. Knowing it was probably a dead end, I tried the door.

It opened.

While the idea of freedom so quickly after waking up in my little prison was extremely tempting, there had to be some kind of trick to it. Maybe some kind of electric charge near the door or a motion sensor that would trip an alarm somewhere in the building. Either way, I wasn't about to sit around and find out.

Taking a deep breath, I slowly stepped through the door…..

Aha! Another chapter finished, and hopefully enough to keep you guys interested. Speaking of which, I won't be updating my story for the next two weeks, as I have other things to do and I'm going to be writing a few extra chapters. Please review and again, don't be shy, you got any ideas or anything for me I would be happy to hear about them.

*Salutes* Over and out!