Chapter 17: The Dungeon Disturbance – The Night Before My Sister's Transfer
750words
Raccoon burst through the door like a storm, tripped over his boots, and collapsed face-first onto my map table.
The quill in my hand jerked, dragging a jagged ink line across the mountain sketch like a cat's claw.
I exhaled. “You crash into rooms like a chicken, not a wolf. You sure you weren’t born in the wrong nest?”
“Cut the jokes!” he waved a crumpled paper under my nose. “Look! An official Transfer Order from the underground post. Signed by—guess who? He You, your mother’s personal executor!”
I grabbed the paper, my heart suddenly tight in my chest.
There it was.
My sister’s name.
Slated for transfer from the Gray Tower Dungeon to the Evershield Vault.
A place worse than exile. A grave disguised as a fortress. No one came back from there—at least not breathing.
“When?”
“Midnight sharp. They’ve got a 30-minute window. Using the western tunnel to bypass the central square and trial field,” Raccoon said, voice dropping low.
I stood, brushing the ink from my fingers, and reached back to check the dagger hidden under my belt.
“They really think I’ll behave just because of the trial?”
“Wrong move.”
Operation ‘Foxhole’ began at dusk.
Three core Gray Tower members:
Raccoon: mapman, signal relay, and general menace with a slingshot.
Amy: trap-maker, smoke-bomb artist, and queen of chaos.
Firewood: pest-handler turned distraction specialist—this time, assigned to unleash a horde of agitated mice at the tunnel entrance.
And me?
I needed one more edge.
So I found Coren, sharpening a blade under moonlight.
“This isn’t your fight,” he said, not looking up.
“I’ve skipped a lot of fights I should’ve taken,” I replied. “But not this one.”
“She’s my sister. And my mother chose her as a pawn.”
He finally looked at me. “Alright. I’ll cover the rear. If they catch up, I’ll hold them off.”
I smirked. “You die, I won’t cry. But if my sister lives, I’ll make her drag your sorry butt to scrub every pot in the Gray Tower.”
He laughed. “Then I guess I better stay alive. I hear she hits harder than you.”
“She does.”
Midnight.
Wolves howled in the far cliffs. The wind cut through the dungeon yard like a razor.
I wore my black cloak—the one stitched with shadow lining—and clipped into my hair the ugliest thing my sister hated:
A rose-shaped hairpin.
I’d once promised her:
“When I come to break you out, I’ll dress ugly. Just so you know it’s me.”
The guards didn’t see us coming.
Firewood’s Mouse Swarm Bomb exploded right on schedule, triggering panic through the western corridor. The escort team barely held their formation when we slipped into the shadows.
Inside the deep cell block, everything looked the same—mossy walls, rusted bars, the stale air of forgotten prisoners.
Except for one thing:
Two extra guards.
I didn’t hesitate.
Three seconds.
One dropped with a knife to the ribs.
The other? Amy dragged him into the shadows before he could scream.
I kicked open the cell door.
But the room—
was empty.
My sister—gone.
“No.”
I rushed in, hands frantic, searching behind the cot, inside the water basin—
Then my fingers brushed against something tucked into a crack in the wall.
A paper.
Folded. Wrinkled. Torn.
But unmistakably hers.
Don’t come for me.
She doesn’t want me. She wants you.
If you rescue me, she’ll use me to control you.
You’re already walking the right path. Don’t turn back.
Live.
The words blurred for a second. My throat tightened.
Amy’s voice echoed down the hall. “Boss! They’re coming!”
I gritted my teeth. Crushed the note in my fist.
“Fall back!”
We made for the exit. Coren had already knocked out two guards and dragged their bodies into the drainage ditch to serve as decoys.
We slipped through just as the alarm bells started.
By the time we reached the top of Gray Tower again, the sky was pale with dawn.
I sat on the roof, the city still asleep beneath us.
Raccoon handed me a flask. “Drink. Your sister’s clever. She’ll survive.”
I stared at the crumpled note in my hand.
“She’ll be okay,” I whispered.
“But my mother…”
“She thinks she can use my sister to shackle me?”
I stood.
Tossed the flask into the air.
“Let her try.”
“If she wants to play with kings—”
“Then I’ll hijack the whole board.”
“I’ll drag her future rulers down into the same dirt she spat on.”
