The burnt scent of grass, wood, and trees filled the once-calming and beautiful state of the town square. The tulips trampled by the debris, the statues chipped and broken; most had scattered into bits, while some flew from the center of the square.
There lie the unfortunate three, caught up in an unprecedented assault from an unknown enemy. On Nicolas's mind, the culprit must have been the people who had been sending death threats to the royal family, but this was not his immediate concern. He was shaken from the shock of the explosion and his orientation were still out of order. All he knows is that Alisa is relatively safe behind him, being the farthest away from the blast. Arthur, on the other hand, had been hit gravely. He sheltered the prince as much as he could in order to protect him, as part of his primary duty.
"Arthur—" the prince coughed as he inhaled the smoke-filled air. He called him again and again but no reply was given, except for the ruckus coming from one of the statues beside Nicolas; it was so close that it might have crushed his tiny young body if he had been an inch closer.
"Nicolas—" a voice came from the ruble.
"Arthur, is that you? Where are you?"
"I'm fine," the gentleman abruptly replied before coughing. Fine is the last thing that he can be described, Alvor must have liked him so much that he decided to hug the poor old man. He was sandwiched, blood dripping from his head, his arms barely even moving, and everything from under his waist is a tomato paste.
"I had served during the war; I never thought that." Blood gushed out of his mouth as he desperately tried to converse. "This will be the way I'll die."
"You're not gonna die. I'll get you out," Nicolas started his futile excavation of the ruble, only to be painted red from his butler's blood. Arthur stopped him. He knows that he's already far from being saved and there's no need to look to know that he's beyond saving.
"It was an honor to serve you, your majesty. Forgive me for not fulfilling my role properly, but you should listen to me," he said, placing his trembling hands on the prince's shoulder. "Take Alisa and go back to the castle; let them know what happened and—"
"And what?" his vision started clouding, "Leave you here? To die? I can't, Arthur."
"I am not asking you, my prince. This is an order."
"No!"
Arthur watched as the prince struggled to hold his tears, which finally poured down his cheeks. It melted his heart; he had always been the one who kept an eye on these children more than their parents had actually found time to. The invisible punctures in his chest had reached his heart, more painful than his injuries. He gathered the last of his strength and screamed from the top of his lungs.
"Go Nicolas, take Alisa. You need to leave. The kingdom needs you. If you die here, it will be a big loss, so go; I don't need your sympathy!"
Nicolas felt even more torn; there was only one instance that Arthur had ever raised his voice in front of them, and it's also the only time that he had looked and sounded serious. This was the second time and, sadly, probably the last. His butler's eyes are full of determination, despite the trembling that gets worse every passing second as he slowly feels cold. He could not do anything but cry as he slowly collected himself from the ground, his tears falling like rain as he turned his attention to Alisa, who's now starting to recover. He quickly grabbed her by the arm and ran without looking back, keeping his tears to himself.
"Where's Arthur?" Alisa looked back.
"We can't go back for him."
"No, Nicolas, we need to go back for him. He needs us!" She tried to break free, but the boy's grip is tighter than a pickle jar's cap due to adrenalin.
"Alisa, listen," Nicolas squealed as he tried to prevent her from going back, grabbing her again by the hand. They played a tug of war, except there was no rope, and life is what's at stake. They only came to a pause when another explosion obliterated the place they had been just a minute ago. They both fell to the ground, eyes wide, tearful, and devastated.
"We could have saved him," Alisa cried.
"Enough, Alisa," his voice wavering and weak, "We would not even be able to help him."
"But…"
"No buts, he wanted us to survive and reach the castle. Would you really trample over his last wish?" He lost control of his temper, leaving her speechless and with no other choice but to cry her eyes out as they fled.
Explosions here, there, left, and right. Anywhere they set your gaze, destruction is the only thing that will meet their eyes—loud bang for the hearing and suffocating smoke for the nose and lungs. The colorful lights that's illuminating the deep, dark sky did not help their faint hearts. House, stores, libraries, and other buildings and structures—none were spared. Whoever was behind the attack must have hated Gregoria with every bit of his soul. This is no mere attempt for the royal family's heads but a sharp blade to severe the Kingdom's leg. That's what Nicolas thought as he and Alisa traversed their way through the sea of flames. It should have been a peaceful night while gazing at the fireworks.
"If only I never left the castle," guilt started to climb up his throat as he started regretting his decision.
Despite the incident, one thing is still fortunate. Fortunate enough, all the citizens are drunk and merry inside the castle, oblivious to the fact that as the sun rises tomorrow, only ash and rubles will be the only things that they can call home. On the other hand, the two unfortunate children lost in hell had reached a dead end. Two buildings had collapsed and blocked the way, leaving no way to climb or squeeze themselves through.
"Listen," a man's voice echoed from somewhere, and the only thing they knew was that it was getting closer and closer, so they hid themselves to the closest thing they can find.
"I don't want to hear any complaints. We only have one objective and I don't want anyone getting sidetracked. Find the prince, make sure to bombard everything as you make your way towards the castle. He must be sitting somewhere fancy inside those castle walls, so look for him. I want him alive. By alive, I mean well and breathing," a man dressed in an all-black cloak came marching together with another 20 men or so.
"And what about the others, sir?"
"You may do as you wish, behead them, gouge their intestines out, I don't care. Just give me the prince and we'll be out of this place," he added before dispersing, leaving a wave of confusion to Nicolas and Alisa.
"They're looking for you, do you know any of them?" she asked before pulling him to the ground just before another explosion shook the ground.
"I don't know them nor have I seen them before, but from what he said, I guess they are unaware that I'm outside. If I'm right, they don't even know what I look like," The prince tried to cover his fear but his trembling lips and slight stutter had said it all. "If we want to stop them, we should beat them to the castle first."
With no other choice, they decide to circle around the dead end and find a more viable route, which gives a pinch of hope to their hopeless hearts. Nicolas took the first step while watching the castle grow closer and closer when Alisa stopped him on his tracks.
"Did you here that? I think someone is still here with us," she scanned the surroundings.
A little later, he too had picked up a faint yet audible cry. "Mother, help, anyone..." it sobs and sobs until it's close enough to properly trace the direction it was coming from. To both of their surprise, it was Hunter, one of their playmates from earlier.
"What are you still doing here? Didn't you leave with the other kids already?" the prince began throwing him questions. "Do you have a death wish or something?"
"It's not my fault," he cried even more.
Alisa had lost the prideful and leaderlike view he had with him earlier, she would have never expected that Hunter, of all people, would be the loudest crier she had ever met in her almost 7 years of existence. Crybaby, she thought. "Why are you still here then?"
"You see, I found a little kitten on the way back. I wanted to keep it but she ran away."
"But you're too simple-minded enough that you still chased after it, and now you're in this mess with us, with no guarantee that we would even see the light of day again," the prince brushed lemon into the already wounded boy.
"Your being too harsh Nicolas," Alisa reminded him that a prince should not say those kinds of things.
"I just want to see mother." Hunter tried to cry again but was immediately hushed by Nicolas through a not-so-considerate muffling with his hands.
"Did you hear anything?" Two of the cloaked men came cruising by.
"I don't know. It must have been the wind. No one is here, remember? they are busy chomping down lamb's leg at the castle grounds, lucky peasants."
"I'm not crazy; I swear I can hear kids mumbling from over here".
The two unidentified men began their search in the vicinity, still arguing as they checked every nook and cranny, listening closely to the faint but occasional ruckus. Their every step can be heard as they draw nearer, and to make it worse, straight towards where they hid. All hands to the wall as they prayed that their seekers would turn around at the last minute. Nicolas was already debating if he should trade his life for the sake of the other two, Alisa is worried that Nicolas would do so, and Hunter is already turning purple from being muffled on his mouth and nose.
He tapped and tapped and tapped, but the sweaty and trembling prince only tightened his hold with each heart-pounding moment while every kind of possibility ran through his mind, Alisa was the same.
"Ni—co—las," he desperately removed the prince's hand as he started to reach the end of his lung capacity, when Alisa finally noticed his struggle.
She tapped Nicolas by the shoulder and gestured to the poor boy, which snapped the prince back to the living world. His breathing finally went back to normal as he apologetically freed Hunter, who immediately took a deep breath.
"What the hell!" Hunter cried to both of them. Taking no consideration to the state of the situation. All the hair stood up from their bodies as they slowly turned their heads, stemming from Hunter, towards the other side of the wall.
"I told you there's someone here," the man said, calling for backup, leaving the three with no choice but to run.
"What do we do? Will we still be able to get out of here," Hunter cried.
The other two just threw him some sharp gazes, "We could safely have," Alisa started.
"If only you did not squeal, asshole!," Nicolas finished the statement.
"Words, Nicolas," Alisa reminded him but he did not care. If burning Hunter with offensive words could save them, he would gladly do so, free of charge.
"Catch them; Don't let them get to the castle, kill them if you must," one of the men ordered as a humongous man emerged from the smoke and ash.
He was so big—no, he was gigantic—that the long black cloak looked like a shirt for him. Although his face is not visible, parts of his body had large stitches, and his proportions had little to no symmetry at all, like a jigsaw puzzle that had been forcefully mended together.