Nadine Book 3

52. Meeting

Tre grabs onto me. "We don't know enough. She is alive. She is not hurt. We need to wait."

Omar closes the magic connection. "We need a plan before we go in and get her. We need more information. We can't help her if we all go in and end up like that."

"We can't tell Thora."

Tre wraps me in his arms.

"Ana is now moved to primary evacuation."

Tre gives me the biggest hug. "I love you baby."

We leave and Ylle is coming towards us. "We have something."

Omar takes off. "I'll get the others. Meet in the shop."

Ylle runs in the other direction.

Me, Tre, Tye, Omar, Thora, Ylle, Tanny, and Johen sit in the circle. Everyone else piles in the room.

I stare at the floor. That poor baby isn't being taken care of. She is hungry and thirsty. She needs a bath. I have to get her out of there.

"SNAP OUT OF IT!"

"Sorry. Ylle, what did you all find out?"

"Before we do anything else we need to set the escape alarm. If you hear it go off. You stop what you are doing and leave. Immediately. You may only have a second or 2 to get out. So leave, leave your stuff and go. Any means necessary. This is what it sounds like." She does something with her fingers and a very loud boom goes off. It shakes the building. "I wanted to make sure everyone could hear it no matter where they were or if they were asleep. So, if you hear that, you leave. Mind control is super fast. Get away from here. I will alert everyone to Nadine's location as soon as I can lock on her. There are many of us doing different things and working from different angles. It's only going to take one of them following us somehow to find us. Please take the alarm seriously. He can be here so fast."

Johen sits up. "What about the humans here?"

"This mind control can not be used on humans. They are all safe, including yourself. Also, everyone needs to know how to trip the alarm. Hold up 4 fingers like this. Now make an O." We all do it and the alarm trips again. People start screaming outside.

Tanny stares at the door. "Maybe we should stop that."

Ylle smiles. "Now for everything else we have found out. It is a proximity mind control. He's somewhere in the castle." She motions for the magicians to talk.

"Mind control is different, but it only lasts so long. Like the last curse you were under, it will wear off. But with this curse, we don't know how long it will last yet. It seems Mary is still under it. They usually don't last more than a couple of days."

"However, he is still in the castle. He seems to be sending the mind control curse in pulses every so often. We don't know how often. As long as he is there and continuing to curse everyone before it wears off. He could have mind control over them forever if he wanted."

Someone comes flying through the door. "I GOT IT. HE IS SENDING THE CURSE OUT EVERY 20 HOURS. THEY WILL BE MIND CONTROLED FOR 48 HOURS. IT RESTARTS THE TIMER EVERY TIME THEY GET CURSED."

Tre sits up. "When was the last curse sent?"

"I don't know that."

"How did you find out the 20 hours and the curse lasts 48 hours?"

"We found his house. All the notes, everything." He hands us a box of papers. "Everything says he will be pulsing out the curse every 20 hours. They last 48 hours. There is no way for someone to escape that."

Tye nods. "Do we know what he is after?"

"Nadine." Another man walks in with a box. "He is fully obsessed. He wants her to himself. He wants the king's throne. He will do whatever he can to take it. We found plans for a very strong love potion. If he sees her, he will attempt it."

I sit back and rub my eyes. "So, he doesn't want me. He wants to be king. I am how he gets to that?"

The man hands Tre the box. "In a way, yes. He wants to be king. He wants that power. But he is also really obsessed with you.... It's to the point where I can't tell if he wants you more, or to be king more."

Tye winks at me. "You're safe here. He's not going to get to you. Move on from that."

"We know the pulses for control are every 20 hours. How do we find out when the last one was or the next one will be?"

They all look at each other. "We know he sent it when he got to the king's office yesterday afternoon. But I assume he had to have done it a few times. Because once he controls someone, he can use their power. If he got to the king and controlled him. He would do it again right away using the king's power. That way he could take the castle. Was your king in the room?"

"There were 3 kings in the room. Dipak, Kane, and my dad. His initial pulse got all 3 of them."

Ylle nods. "It would have taken him awhile to pull the power from all 3 of them. But once he did, he would have sent the next pulse right away. It would have taken control of the entire castle. 3 kings is a lot of power. Not to mention, Dipak is insanely powerful on his own."

"With that much power... He may have control over the village as well. Did anyone check it?"

Everyone shakes their heads.

"I'm going to go do that." Tanny runs out the door.

I cross my legs. "What is everyone's best guess as to when the next pulse will happen?"

They all look at each other. "The absolute best guess would be sometime around lunch today."

"But the only way to know for sure would be to send someone in and mark the exact time they get controlled. Then we would know every 20 hours after that."

"Anyone have anything else?"

"Yes, I found charms. They are very rare. But they do block this type of mind control curse. However, there are only 10 left."

Tye about falls out the chair. "Can we put someone in someone whose cursed and pull them back?"

She shakes her head. "Afraid not. But if you could get one in, say, Dipak. The new pulses of the curse wouldn't affect him. He would only be cursed for 48 hours after the previous pulse."

Tye sits back. "So the charm would block the count-down from resetting."

"Exactly."

"We also found out that even though they are mind controlled, he is not controlling them to do anything. They are standing around. Yes, I used door magic to find that out."

The magician that talked about him being obsessed with me looks at Omar. "They are being controlled to search for Nadine. Any sign of her, he would be alerted immediately. He could be anywhere almost instantly. That's the only thing they are told to do. Also, be careful with doors please. If one of them got through to us, he would know exactly where we are. He could be here within seconds and send off another pulse. He could get us all."

"Where are these charms?" Ylle hands me a little box that has 10 charms in it. "Does this mind control curse have any effect on a baby?"

All the magicians and Omar say "No" at the same time.

"An infant brain isn't developed enough. No one can control that. All they know is hungry, sleepy, and stinky. An infant can't send an alert, they don't even know they have thumbs yet. It can't happen."

"Boys, I need those blow darts to blow charms this time." They all chuckle. "We'll get them in the kings... hopefully. And as many at the table as we can."

Ylle nods. "Hitting the kings, would reduce his power greatly, in 48 hours."

Tanny runs back in. "He has the village as well. Everyone is standing around."

"As of right now, we have 2 primary missions." Tre puts his arm around me. "Get these charms in the kings and Dracul hopefully. And to get Ana out immediately."

"Whose Ana?"

Thora starts sobbing. "MY BABY."

Omar sits up. "We know for sure that we are going to use door magic to get her. There are 2 servants in the room that we saw."

"YOU SEEN HER? IS SHE OK?"

I look at her, and she falls on the floor.

"PLEASE LET HER BE OK."

I go to the floor and wrap my arms around her. "Thora, she's crying. She must have been playing when the pulse went off. But she is alive and doesn't appear to be hurt at all. Now we need to make a plan to get her out. You have to be strong."

She jumps up. "I'M GOING."

"Thora, you need to let us make a plan."

"SHE IS MY BABY. I WOULD RATHER DIE THAN LET HER BE HURT." She stares at Omar. "OPEN ME A DOOR NOW."

One of the magicians shakes his head. "The pulse could go off. We can't waste the charms on you. They need to go to the kings."

"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE CHARM. I WANT MY BABY SAFE. OPEN THE DOOR."

I stand up. "You'll need a door back. I'm going with you."

Tre jumps up. "THE HELL YOU ARE."

Omar shoves Tre back down. "Nadine, there are servants in the room that will alert to you being there. He would be in the room nearly instantly. You can not go. I will go."

"You can't go, Omar. We need you for the door magic. And every other type of magic." I cross my arms.

Thora nods. "Charm Omar. You're right. You need him. I will be in and out. I will grab her. Omar can make the door. We will be right back."

Omar rubs his eyes. "Ana wasn't very far from the door and the servants shouldn't alert to either of us being in there."

I get a charm out of the box and put it up to Omar's arm. It absorbs right in.

"We're going to get Ana back first. Then we will work on getting the charms to go through the blow tube thing."

Johen stands up. "Let me see how big a charm is. I can start working on it now."

I open the box and show him.

"I'll use a coin and try to figure it out that way. They're not very big."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Omar takes Thora's arm. "Let's go to my room."

Tre puts his arm around me.