Crowns of Heritage

Chapter 48-Problem

(ROSEMARY P.O.V)

When I heard Nathan was still alive, I was relieved to know he was okay. I continued to listen to Count Livens' conversation and I felt my mother tap me on the shoulder. I looked up at her and she placed her hand on the side of my face.

“Is he your adoptive father?”mother mouthed to me.

I nodded my head.

“Let's go back to the room”, mother mouthed.

I followed behind her and we made it back to the basement. We hurried back to the room before the other maid could wake up. Once we were in the room, we saw that the maids were still asleep. Mother and I sat on the bed and started to discuss what we heard from Count Livens conversation.

“So, we found out your adoptive father is still alive, and he's one of the rebel leaders”, mother mumbled to herself.

“We should try to get in contact with him”, I said.

“It'll be good to let your father know about this, it'll give us more allies for the war.”, mother said.

“It seems like the Count wants him to join his side. It looks like everyone is planning for war”, I said.

Mother started pacing back and forth.

“We need to get in touch with all the rebel groups, if they all want the same thing. We should be able to join together. The problem is, each noble household has their own knightage and some of the high ranking nobles have their own military. We currently don't know which side they all support at the moment.”, mother explained, still pacing back and forth.

“Should we cut the mission short and head back to the villa?”, I asked.

Mother shook her head, “No, we must get more information about Count Livens plan.” She said.

“We should study the estate while everyone is sleeping”, I said.

Mother nodded her head.

After a few hours passed, I followed behind mother and we snuck back into the basement. We climbed into the passageway and crawled to the third floor again. When we noticed the count wasn't in his office anymore. We opened the vent and dropped down inside of the office. We went through some of his documents and found letters he exchanged with someone. Since we decided to stay for another day, we didn't take any documents with us because we didn't want to cause suspicion. All of sudden we heard someone outside of the door.

“Shit, find somewhere to hide”, mother said.

We hurried and hid in different spots in the room. Since it was a large area I hid behind one of the bookshelves. When the door opened, we saw a knight coming into the room. It was strange, he seemed like he was sneaking into the office as well.

He started fumbling through the same document we were looking at.

“Shit, where is it”, he was mumbling to himself but I could hear him.

“I have to hurry and remove the location before he sees it”, he said, still fumbling through the documents.

I noticed my mother was moving closer to the desk discreetly. While the knight wasn't paying attention.

“Found it”, he said, raising up a document.

When he started to turn around, mother hit him in the back of his head. He fell to the ground and mother stood over him.

“Fuck!”, he said while groaning, “What the hell”, he said grabbing the back of his head.

I walked over and stood next to my mother.

The knight turned around facing our direction and mother's mouth dropped.

“Valian”, she said.

The man looked up still holding his head, “Natalie?”, he said, looking surprised.

I looked at them back and forth.

“Mom, do you know him?”, I asked, in confusion.

Mother sighed and put her hand on her hip and stared down at the man.

“He's my brother”, she said.

Mother looked at him while he was still on the floor groaning and holding the back of his head.

"What the hell are you doing here?", she asked, standing over him.

He continued to hold his head, "I've been disguising as the Counts knight for the past few months" he said, without looking up at her.

(SAGE P.O.V)

After crying my eyes out, Nathan managed to calm me down. I was so exhausted from running for a long time I ended up collapsing in front of him. He picked me and carried me inside of the cabin.

“Are you feeling better now?”, he asked. He was sitting by the table cleaning off a knife.

“How long was I asleep?”, I asked.

“Just a few hours”, he answered.

I moved the blanket off of me and sat up facing his direction. Seeing that he was more muscular then before and his short curly maroon hair and light brown eyes again made me feel like I was dreaming.

“We thought you were dead”, I said, in a sad tone.

He placed the knife down on the table and looked over at me. I noticed he had a long scar on the side of his face.

“I managed to get out of the car while it was falling into the water.”, he said, “I was ambushed on the way to meet one of my acquaintances”, he added.

“How did you end up in the kingdom?”, I asked, curiously.

“I'm from the western region of the kingdom. After finding out you two were kidnapped. I managed to get on a ship that was headed in the kingdom's direction.”, he said.

“Where are we?”, I asked, “I don't know how far I managed to run, it had to be over a couple of hours”, I said.

He got up from the table and walked over to where I was sitting. He bent down in front of me and placed his hand on the top of my head.

“Kiddo, you managed to run all the way into the western region of the forest. This part of the forest is a hunting area, "he said.

“What?” I said, raising my voice a little. “But how?”, I asked, in total confusion.

He got up and sat next to me.

“The western region isn't that far from the central region.” He mentioned.

He held his head down for a moment before looking at me again.

“Did you manage to meet your parents?”, he asked, with a concerned expression.

I nodded my head and I could feel the sense of relief in his body language.

“How's Rosie?”, he asked.

“She misses you”, I said.

He smiled, “I'll see her again some day”, he said.

Then I suddenly remembered something, I jumped up and grabbed his arm.

“We have to go find your sister”, I said, pulling his arm.

He looked confused, “My sister?”, he asked.

“Asiana”, I said, looking at him with a serious expression.

“What, how did you meet my sister?”, he asked, with a worried expression.

“She helped me and my birth mother escape the palace”, I said.

“Where is she now?, he asked, with a concerned expression.

“We escaped from the palace and were chased by guards, she's somewhere in the forest. She told me to keep running while she distracts the guards.”, I explained to him.

He got up and walked to the door, “Are you able to move?”, he asked.

I nodded my head.

“We'll search until daylight, I'm sure my sister found a place to hide.”, he said, “If she managed to run this far, I know a place she would hide at” he added.

We walked out of the cabin, and I followed behind him. He turned and handed me a short sword.

“It's a dagger”, he said, as he noticed my facial expression.

“I'm sure you've had some combat training. After all, the Henrico Clan is one of the best mercenary Clans in history.”, he said.

I stopped walking for a second, after realizing what he just said.

“Wait, how did you know we went to the Henrico Clans territory?”, I asked.

He turned around and looked directly at me.

“My acquaintance is your uncle Valian Henrico,” he said.

I was stunned, I was about to say something until he held his hand up.

“Looks like we have company”, he said.

(PRINCE MOISES P.O.V)

Yeshiva and I finally made it back to the villa. It was almost 4 o'clock in the morning. I was hoping Sage made it back from the palace. When we entered the villa, I walked up the stairs and was going to knock on Sage's room door. When I made it to the second floor, I saw one of the maids pacing back and forth. When she saw me, she ran over to and grabbed my shirt.

“Forgive me for my rudeness, your highness”, she said while panting.

“What's going on?”, I asked.

“Princess Sage, Lord Sylvester, and Dame Asiana haven't made it back to the villa yet”, she said.

My heart sunk for a second, “Where is Duke Vernon?”, I asked, and I felt my blood boiling.

“In the office sir, he told me to tell you to come to the office as soon as you arrived.", the maid said.

I immediately ran towards the office and kicked open the door. Duke Vernon was standing behind the desk.

“Prince Moises”, he said.

“Where the fuck is my daughter!”, I yelled.

Duke Vernon put his hands up and gestured for me to sit down but I refused.

He held my head and sighed, “We have a major problem”, he said.

I slammed my hands down on the table, “What's the problem?”, I asked.

Duke Vernon sighed again.

“Your mother, Queen Malaysia, arrested Sylvester, and Princess Sage is missing,” he said.

I grabbed him by the shirt out of anger and pulled him towards me, “What the fuck do you mean my Sage is missing?” I asked.

Duke Vernon looked directly at me.

“Sage escaped from the palace again, but this time it was your mother that tried to keep her in the palace,” he said.

“What?” I yelled, “Why?”, I asked.

“When I went to visit Sylvester in the prison cell, he told me your mother tried to make a deal with Princess Sage”, Duke Vernon stated.

I let go of his shirt and balled up my fist.

“What was the deal?”, I asked, I was hoping it wasn't what I thought it was.

Duke Vernon cleared his throat.

“In order to rescind your exile status, Sage has to marry the neighboring kingdom's Prince for a peace treaty”, he explained.

After hearing my mother wanted to sell my daughter off, in my eyes she wasn't any better than my father. I was about to storm out of the room and go straight to the palace.

“Wait”, Duke Vernon yelled out.

I turned around and faced his direction again.

“We have another problem”, he said, with a worried expression.

“What is it?”, I asked, impatiently.

“The Queen said, if she doesn't marry the neighboring Prince. She's going to charge our family with treason”, he said.