Punished by the Dictator's Daughter (The Initiation 3, Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

gestures to my head, and I wrap the dirty
scarf he has given me around my scalp, carefully tucking in my rich
mahogany hair. The shoes that he hands me are sturdy and old.
    When I have finished, he says, “You look like
a country girl.”
    He dips his hand in the ashes of the
crackling heath and smears soot on my face. His gestures are tender
and his eyes hold mine. He is almost paternal, though his
fatherliness is tinged with a border of lust. I am somewhat more
nervous at this than the actual escape. It is as if the entire
atmosphere is a tinderbox waiting to be lighted by a spark. A
premonition of dire things to come.
    “Where are Max and Greg?” I say to ease the
tension.
    “Safe.”
    “Where is Aimelie?” I know her father is
still on his execution tour around the countryside, which is
comforting. But still –
    “She’s asleep. I arranged for her food to be
drugged. You ask too many questions. Now come.”
    I follow him in haste. The corridors of the
castle are strangely deserted at this time of night. We pass a
solitary guard, but he is seated at a table with a mug of some
steaming drink, looking out of the window. I daren’t say anything
to Mansk and he too acts nonchalant, as if I am a peasant girl he
has decided to squirrel for a liaison. Perhaps he has done this
with many castle girls before, I will never know.
    We exit through a side door. The vista of
night is eerily calm, and the shadows of swaying trees throw
ghostly relief against the stark, midnight blue background.
Somewhere in the near distance, a dog howls. Voices speaking in
low, guttural tongues waft through the wind, and against a lighted
window, I see the outline of a man with a rifle sticking from his
back.
    My heart beats so hard that I am sure
everyone in the castle must have heard it. What is the penalty for
capture? Instant execution? I should be so lucky. It might be a
protracted, long-drawn affair that involves racks and other
medieval torture devices.
    Sweat trickles down my back. My skin is
flushed and heated despite the relative cool of the breeze.
    Mansk does not offer explanation or comfort
as he strides towards a copse of trees. I think part of my terror
is in not knowing fully if he will betray me. How sure am I that he
will really help us escape? This could be an elaborate ploy to
entrap me after all. Sure, his sister was executed. But that
doesn’t mean he has turned against Potchenko’s regime. The
psychology of people who have been caged for too long and who have
never known freedom is new territory for me, and I’m putting my
entire life as well as that of my friends into such a person’s
hands.
    I almost stumble over an errant root. Max
clasps my arm before I can fall down. To my credit, I have not made
a sound, even when my throat feels like decrying my surmounting
tension. He does not say anything either as he pulls me along by
the hand. We delve into the trees until we come to a clearing.
    What I see makes me take a step back.
    A huge cart drawn by two horses awaits us
there. On it is a large stack of hay – so high that it rises to the
higher branches of the trees. The driver holds a modern day
flashlight. He shines this onto my frightened, black-streaked face.
I blink and hold my hands up to shield my eyes from the glare.
    Mansk says something in a low voice to him,
and he retorts. He does not take his eyes off me, and I catch that
predatory glint in them again that I have encountered in so many of
the guards and grooms here – the sly urge of a child who sneaks
candy out of a jar when his mother is not looking.
    Mansk ducks under the cart, the bottom of
which is about only two feet above the ground. He beckons to me
and, after a moment’s hesitation, I follow him. The driver shines
the flashlight for both of us. I can see his smile in the
half-darkness – a gap-toothed, stained apparition that would have
made me run for the cliffs had I met him under different
circumstances.
    In fact, I’m not entirely sure I