The Thorn Prison (Avallon Academy Book 2) Read online

  A bowl full of hot soup suddenly landed in front of me. The woman with blue eyes left a spoon and a big serving of bread.

  ‘When you finish your lunch, I’ll show you the way to the bed I have prepared for you,’ she said and hastily moved away.

  The soup was fragrant and delicious. It had been hours since the last time I’d had a proper meal, and yet, I hadn’t realized I was famished. I devoured my soup without taking my eyes off the girl who had now placed the broom in one corner of the hall and was getting ready to leave.

  ‘This soup! It’s very delicious,’ I shouted, almost screamed, to catch her.

  As she turned her face toward me, I felt time turning back to six years ago in the Sylvester Mansion, when the feeble light of an oil lamp shined on a pair of beautiful almond eyes. That girl was now here, standing in front of me, looking indifferent.

  ‘Thanks, I cooked it,’ she said politely before leaving the room.

  I didn’t sleep that night, nor the next. Pretending I was on the island for work, I extended my stay, hoping to have a chat with her. Alas, she didn’t seem to remember or recognize me. The days went by, and I never managed to carry on much of a conversation with her. In the mornings, she was in the kitchen cooking with her mother and in the evenings, she was helping her sister clean the place.

  ‘The food is delicious.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Those were the only words that we exchanged. We weren’t anything other than nodding acquaintances.

  I was getting discouraged, and I didn’t know our fate was sealed just yet. As usual, I had my dinner in the large dining room hall, which was packed that night. You see, that morning, a boat had come to the port full of goods and merchants, who then spent the night on the island waiting to catch the next morning’s boat. Most of them were men traveling for weeks, even months, away from their homes, their pouches full of money and their loins hungry for beautiful girls. Some of them, while waiting for the meals to be served, would try to pull Izolde and her sister away with their greasy hands. The girls would manage to free themselves from unwanted hugs and, with professional composure, continue their work. Undoubtedly, it was something they had done many times before.

  Realizing I would hardly elicit a response from her that night, I decided to withdraw to the shared guestroom. I had just started climbing the staircase when the front door closed behind me with a crack. A strangled cry could be heard behind the closed door. With fury, I opened the door and saw two dark figures struggling in a dark alcove next to the entrance. As I took a step out, a man jumped from the recess and was shoved violently away by two female hands. Having discerned my presence and ashamed by his defeat, the man fled. Rushing to the alcove where the woman was still hidden, I saw a house bonnet lying on the ground. As I bent down to pick it up, I saw the woman emerge, trying to settle her disheveled clothes.

  ‘Is this yours?’ I asked and as starlight fell across her face, I recognized Izolde.

  She nodded, took the bonnet from my hands, and thanked me politely. She moved to get back to the inn, but after a couple of steps, she stopped. She turned around and motioned for me to follow her. Hypnotized, I followed her back into the inn. Without a single word, she led me into the kitchen. Still in silence, she filled a mug with red wine and rammed it into my hands. She beckoned me to drink, and after I took a sip, she gently took the cup from my hands. After that, she drank a sip, staring at me. She left the cup on the table, grabbed my hand, and drew me into a small dark storage room, divided from the kitchen by a thick greasy curtain.

  We stood facing each other among sacks of flour, dried onions, and jars filled with salted pork. But our surroundings were not what we were interested in. She rested her hand on my chest and moved closer. Her lips gently touched mine while she took my hand and rested it over her heart. I could feel her breath on my neck, my body against hers. Our chests moved together before I sealed her mouth in a deep kiss...

  Suddenly, she moved back. She straightened her clothes, pushed the tangled hair in her bonnet and looked at me, flushed. Then she smiled, gently taking my hand in hers, and whispered, ‘Thank you for what you did for me tonight.’

  She let my hand go free and made to leave the dark storage room. ‘We should not be found together in here,’ she said.

  ‘Izolde, I have so much to tell you,’ I mumbled as she lifted the curtain.

  Unstartled that I knew her name, she gave me a shy look, which was in disharmony with what had preceded between us minutes ago.

  ‘I waited for six years for you to find me. I can wait one more day to hear what you have to tell me,’ she said with lowered eyes. Then she walked away, leaving me alone in the darkness.

  The next night, we found ourselves together again, and the next and the one after that. After everyone was asleep, we would meet each other in the storage room, or somewhere in the woods when the weather permitted. She disclosed that she recognized me the first moment she saw me. She confessed that not even a minute has passed in the last six years that she hadn’t thought of me. Her parents had received many marriage proposals for her, but she had rejected all of them under the pretext of being too young. She had always hoped that our roads would cross again. She believed that we were destined to spend the rest of our lives together. Apparently, her parents accepted their daughter’s whims and did not force her into a marriage. Their business was profitable, and Izolde, the excellent cook she was, contributed to their prosperity.

  I asked her how she could be certain I would look for her, and she replied that she knew from the moment I fled Sylvester Mansion. She heard the gossip that followed my unexpected exit. The maids in the kitchen said that my mother had confided to the other ladies that her son had to look away from a romance he knew would destroy his life.

  ‘I knew it was me your mother talked about,’ she said. When I asked her how she knew, she replied, ‘I was very young when we first met, but when we looked at each other, I saw the lust in your eyes, and I felt my heart thudding in my chest. I noticed you peering at me in class and got goosebumps all over my body, something I never felt again until I saw you in our pub.’

  This is Izolde. She is woman and girl, shy yet bold, strong yet romantic.

  A few days later, I asked her father for her hand in marriage. What happened next, I did not expect it.

  Her father, Mark, threw me out of their house with no explanation. I felt as if the ground had disappeared from beneath my feet. He was brute, rude, and he acted irrationally. That was what I thought then. Only after many years I would finally learn the truth, the reason why he acted so disrespectfully to me, and I understood what his motive was and even forgave him.

  I do not remember much from the days, or rather the months, that followed. Maybe because I was drunk. I could no longer fit in Connecticut, so I took a horse and wandered around the East Coast. With my body soaked in alcohol, I did odd jobs to ensure my flask was full. As I did not have the courage to end my life, I hoped that death would eventually find me where I roosted drunk. Death didn’t meet me, and after months of wandering, I arrived in Exeter, New Hampshire, where undeath was waiting for me.

  It was one of the countless times I had fainted from the booze. When I woke up, I did not feel hungover, but rather an irrepressible appetite for something that I could not identify. I was in a dark room with little furniture and a fireplace full of burning coals.

  I soon realized that the fireplace was used more for light than heat. My body was cold, and the fire had no effect on it. I placed my palm over my heart, but I did not feel any beat. My hands were pale.

  The door opened suddenly, and a stunning woman appeared on the threshold. It was Margarita, my creator, the woman who one night found me lying unconscious outside of a brothel. She started feeding herself with my intoxicated blood, but something stopped her from taking my life. It was not the taste of liquor running through my veins, it was the taste of sadness and hopelessness that made her feel sorry for me. That was the reason
she decided to turn me into a vampire and gave me the opportunity of eternity to find the vindication my mortal life had deprived me of. She did not give me a new life, but she gave me a new existence.

  The first months after my transformation were awful. I could not stand the idea that I should take away lives to feed myself. It was against the moral values with which I had grown up, against the beliefs that I had developed in my adult life. Gradually, with the help of Margarita, I learned how to control my passions, to feed on animal blood, and to move at night to avoid being scorched by sunlight.

  Life with Margarita was exciting, and our love life was enjoyable. We lived in the luxury and licentiousness of her villa in Exeter. We had mortal servants, and though they knew the truth, they worked for us with willingness, as they felt secure and were paid handsomely. The villa was always full of people, living and undead, who spun to the rhythms of the orchestra playing from morning till evening, enjoying orgies and expensive meals.

  But the pain in my soul remained strong. My heart ached, though it did not beat. I plunged deeper and deeper into depression, and it was Margarita who saved me from surrendering to a vampire’s deadly enemy: sunlight. I was standing naked under the hot summer sun, my cells combusting, and it was Margarita who covered my body with her heavy velvet cape. It was she who gave me the hope to stay undead.

  I was lying on a sofa, watching my newfound scars heal when Margarita walked into my bedroom.

  ‘I can’t stand watching you suffer,’ she said. ‘I now understand the magnitude of the love you had for Izolde. I admit that I cannot understand this kind of love, but I understand how much I care for you. For this, I decided to offer you a gift I hope you accept.’

  She opened the door, and a woman with exotic beauty entered the room.

  ‘Beware, this young lady is not your dinner,’ she said and left, closing the door behind her.

  The woman grabbed my hand and knelt at my side. I could not determine her age. Her body showed the maturity of a middle-aged woman, though her face was wrinkle-free, and rich hair fell over her shoulders.

  ‘Who are you?’ I asked.

  ‘My name is Gráinne.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Margarita asked me to help you. She loves you so much, but she knows that your heart belongs to someone else.’

  I lowered my gaze. ‘Are you a vampire?’ I asked her.

  ‘I have not been granted eternal life,’ she replied with her gentle voice. ‘I need something that belonged to your beloved one.’

  I pulled off my finger the golden ring that I was going to offer to Izolde and handed it to her.

  ‘What are you going to do with this?’

  With her fingertips, she gently touched my lips.

  ‘Silence,’ she whispered and closed her eyes. She mumbled incomprehensible words, repeating a chant I will never forget.

  ‘Iwissak Niano Ennoa Odakozik Dizaio Araskwicoq!’

  As she chanted, her body pulsed, my palm firmly holding the other.

  ‘Iwissak Niano Ennoa Odakozik Dizaio Araskwicoq!’

  Two tiny red dots started flashing on my ring.

  “That spell triggered my ring,” I said.

  It was so cold that I had lost the sense of touch. My fingers could not feel anything. My eyelids were heavy, and I could not control my breathing anymore. I felt so tired, that I did not notice immediately that a sudden bright light dimmed down.

  “You just solved the riddle. Buckle up for the ride.”

  The ice melted surprisingly fast before everything became black and both Tristan and I whirled down into a black vortex that dragged us down into darkness.

  CHAPTER 5

  *

  Was that a sand dune we were trapped in?

  First it was ice, now it was sand. First it was water, now it was earth. Did the riddles have something to do with the Five Elements?

  I remembered something that I read in the old book Arthur had given me. The Five Elements were Fire, Water, Wood, Metal, and Earth. If that was the case and we had already encountered Water and Earth, I did not even dare to think about what would be next. Fire? But first we had to solve the riddle in this sand cell before we got to know what our next challenge would be.

  We were dipped into an abyss of sand and it was hot as if we were in the Sahara desert. A chill ran through my spine when I thought how hot the Fire element challenge would be.

  “Are you okay?” Tristan asked.

  “I’ve got sand in my panties. That is not okay,” I groaned.

  “Do you want to know what is not okay? You landed on my head, that is what is not okay!” That was not Tristan’s voice.

  “Where are you?” I shouted as I started digging with my hands in the sand under me. If I were correct, the man whom we were now trying to save was our passport to the next riddle. And if we were able to solve it, then there would only be two more challenges to go.

  “Who are you?” I asked in a loud voice as my fingers touched his fingers through the sand.

  “I am freaking Pally. And you are the last person on Earth that I wished to see.”

  It took me a few seconds to realize that it was not me he was talking to.

  “Tristan, you son of a gun, what are you doing here?” the man said as his head popped up from the sand dune; he did not sound content.

  “Palamedes Safir, so not happy to see you.” Tristan dropped the man’s hand so abruptly that he would have dived in the sand again if I had not grabbed his wrist on time.

  “What is this? A cockfight?” I yelled. “Or should I say a vampire fight?”

  “Me? Vampire? Freaking no!” Pally yelled. “I am a freaking werewolf.”

  Even dipped in hot sparkling sand, I could smell it in the air that it was a triangle situation.

  “So if you are Edward and you are Jacob,” I said pointing to Tristan and Pally consecutively, “then who is Bella? Izolde?”

  “No freaking way,” said Pally. “Izolde is not a human. She is a fae.”

  “She is not just a fae; she is my wife,” Tristan said. “That is the reason we were both thrown in Thorn Prison.

  It was getting better and better. “Whoa, Tristan, you did not mention that you two eventually got married.”

  “We eloped,” said Tristan. “It was Gráinne’s spell that brought us together and Izolde was finally able to explain to me what she really was and where she came from.

  King Mark had repeatedly endeavored to have us tried for treason to our kinds, but with a potion Gráinne made for us, we succeeded to preserve our façade of innocence. Gráinne's potion eventually wore off, and we were locked in Thorn Prison.

  Izolde's father used to be King Mark of the Irish Kingdom of Fairies until civil war broke in the kingdom and Mark was dethroned. In order to protect his family, Mark vowed that they would live the rest of their lives as humble humans exiled in the colonies, making their living as inn owners.

  Every night, I had horrible dreams about the future, until Mark learned of our whereabouts and sent to capture us. The Council of Fairies acquired what seemed proof of our guilt to them and sentenced us both: me to be hung and Izolde to be lodged in a leper colony. I managed to escape on my way to the gallows and rescue Izolde. We found shelter in a small village in France but without Gráinne's potion, we knew that we would not stay safe for long. Mark discovered us again and handed us to the Council of Wizards hoping that they would treat us with more kindness than the Fairies did. After all, Izolde is his daughter and he did not wish to see her abandoned in a leper colony.”

  Then it struck me. “Tristan, how long do you think that you have been in the Thorn Prison?” I asked.

  “Weeks? Months?” he kept guessing as he noticed my negative nodding.

  “You know, leprosy is now called Hansen’s disease and the word leper is considered offensive. Furthermore, it is a disease that can be treated with antibiotics and patients do not live in absolute isolation anymore.”

  “Wh
y are you saying these to me?” asked Tristan.

  “Because I think that you have been in this prison for years, if not decades,” I said.

  Pally agreed. “Gwen is right. You have been incarcerated for more than a hundred years.”

  “Thank you, Pally,” I said. “And that brings me back to you. How can you help us solve the five riddles and get the heck out of here?”

  “I have heard of the five riddles,” Pally said. “Believe when I say that if I knew how to even solve one of them, I would have already done it.”

  “I think I can offer you some help,” I said. “Why don’t you start by telling me what your personal story is and how you found yourself in this cell?”

  “Decades have passed since the last time someone asked me to tell them my story.”

  “Are you afraid you have forgotten?”

  “None of it has faded from my memory. These memories are the only reason I still exist on Earth. But I am afraid that if I tell you the whole story of my life, you will get bored. You see, my life’s story is centuries long. So, what exactly do you want to know?”

  “How are you and Tristan connected?”

  CHAPTER 6

  *

  “My father, Esclabor was an exiled king of Babylon,” Pally started. “After his exile, my father traveled to Ireland; there, he befriended King Mark and helped him and his family escape after they lost the Civil War of the Irish Fairies.

  Years ago, I do not even recall how many, I went hunting with my four-legged friend, Ramin. My precious dire wolf. For three centuries he was my faithful companion, the fear and terror of Nimrud. You know, he was even given a nickname. The dire wolf of the Deadly Sand dunes.