When Taeui opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was Amber's worried face. Right then, he felt a throbbing pain in the back of his head, and the events that put them there passed through his mind. His hands and feet were bound, and the car's movement made it hard for him to sit up.
The next thing he noticed was Scarlet sitting right behind Amber, both girls with their hands bound.
'That's weird.'
As far as he remembered, there were two cars, and Amber was next to Christoph and the second car when they were attacked. Not only that, but they were now in the back of a moving van.
"You weren't waking up," said Amber, sobbing.
"I'm awake now." He sat leaning his back on the side of the van next to the girls.
"Are you hurt?" he asked. The girls shook their heads in sync. "That's good."
Taeui had a plethora of questions to ask, but he kept his mouth shut and smiled at the girls, trying to ease their panic.
"Are we going to die?" Amber asked, her lips trembling.
Taeui shook his head with a tense smile. "No."
She nodded. Being kidnapped wasn't new to Taeui. It wasn't something he was proud of, but his luck, or lack of it, just made it happen. Nonetheless, he had experience with this sort of thing, and didn't feel too worried, he knew that Ilay would find him, no matter where they took him. And he just needed to escape and survive until that happened. However, the logistics of it became trickier, having two small children to take care of.
"This is because of the next heir, right?" Amber said, scratching her nose with her tied hands. When Taeui nodded, she continued. "Then, when the elders reach an agreement, they will let us go, right?"
He nodded again, but his instincts told him it wouldn't be that simple; if it were, they wouldn't have been moved to a different car. A bad feeling grew in his gut. If this was about the candidates' selection, whoever kidnapped them only wanted to provoke Ilay and make him act out, but in that case, there would be no need to change to a new car, since Ilay would undoubtedly react right away.
For a moment, Taeui imagined Ilay and the state he would be when he realised what had happened. He imagined the mansion drenched in blood, bodies scattered through the grounds, and that sent a shiver down his spine.
Taeui knew for a fact that the second Ilay learned they were taken, he would go rampant and mindlessly kill anyone stupid enough to try and stop him, so his imagination might not be that far off.
"But we need to be ready to run if we get the chance. The first thing is to try and get our hands and feet free."
Amber and Scarlet listened quietly as if taking mental notes.
"If we get separated, don't attempt anything unless you are sure you can escape. Hide, and keep hiding, until I find you. And if you have a good chance to run away, do it and don't look back, find someone and ask for help."
The girls nodded, still focused on him.
"But most importantly, keep yourselves safe and don't do anything rash."
Taeui smiled again, and his expression eased some of the girls' panic. Then he looked around, trying find anything that could help him free his hands. They had been driving straight without stopping since Taeui regained his senses and he guessed they must have been driving in a highway, and he raked his brain trying to remember which highways were closer.
Amber, remembering his words, began crawling around in the van. After some time, she crawled back to Taeui while he tried to cut the zip ties on his wrists with the door hinges. She showed him a piece of sharp plastic that fit in the palm of her hand.
"That looks perfect," he said, smiling at her. Shortly after, their hands were free.
The van turned right, and after a few turns, the path became bumpy for a long time until it finally came to a stop, and people's voices emerged from the outside.
Taeui crouched closer to the back door, trying to hear, but the sound was too muffled and there were too many voices to make out what was being said. Soon the door opened, revealing men in combat wear and armed, showing how much he was outnumbered, but there was no way he would go without a fight.
*****
Every family member returned to the mansion feeling safer, far away from Ilay, who remained locked in the cellar. Nonetheless, the pressure in the air stayed with them. The Riegrow direct line gathered in the main meeting room on the second floor, but for a long time, no one dared speak.
Richard already had people looking through the footage of the mansion, trying to find where Taeui and the girls were taken, and Kyle was investigating who had disabled the security. Helena didn't enter the room until later with Daniel by her side.
Kyle tried his best to calm her down, not with senseless words like 'calm down' or 'everything is going to be okay,' or 'take deep breaths.' Instead, he simply held her close and patted her back, just like he did when they were little and Nana passed away, letting her cry and calm down by herself.
Once she calmed down enough, Helena sat in the back of the meeting room, eyeing the back of each of them as if they were targets.
"Karl!" A woman burst through the door, panicked. "I can't find him anywhere!"
Every pair of eyes turned to her in surprise and dread. Thomas stood up, his eyes bulging and his mouth slack. "Who took my boy?"
The eyes jumped to him.
"Are we sure he is missing?" asked Richard to a staff member who stood behind Karl's mother.
The staff member nodded. "We are double-checking everywhere, but haven't found him yet."
Thomas walked over to his wife and hugged her for a moment. "I'll bring him back home safely."
Richard and Kyle fiddled with their phones for a moment while some of the family gave Thomas and his wife their support. Daniel seethed, watching it happen, his bloodshot eyes similar to a wild animal. Helena patted his hand, the one that held hers tightly and shook her head. She wasn't expecting any support from that side of the family, and she didn't want it; she knew it in her heart that it was one of them who took her girls.
"Why are you so sure he was taken?" asked Kyle, standing next to Helena and Christoph.
Thomas' eyes turned sharp, filled with venom as he stared back at him.
"I haven't seen him since before the others were kidnapped," bawled Thomas' wife.
"Is he the type to run away from home?" asked Richard.
"No," she said. "He is a shy little boy who likes to read in quiet places. We searched all the places he usually goes to, but there's no sign of him."
His wife wailed in incoherent sounds as he tried to console her. "It's going to be okay, just calm down and go drink a cup of tea."
Karl's mother was taken away by the staff member, and Thomas sat back in his chair, holding his head quietly.
With chaos running amok in the mansion, the elders decided to settle the inheritance conditions quickly, so they could look for the children as soon as they got news. The elders and Richard moved to a smaller and private room, and in the space of a couple of hours, they reached an agreement and signed the papers.
"Every direct member of the Riegrow line has to be here before we announce the conditions agreed upon," Richard explained when he and the elders rejoined the meeting room. Fear was palpable when they understood it meant Ilay had to be there too.
Christoph and Kyle took up the responsibility to escort Ilay to the meeting room, unsure if Ilay would even stay long enough after they unlocked the door. Christoph opened the door and took a step back, ready to fight. In the cellar shrouded in darkness they saw two slits with deadly black eyes slowly open.
Ilay remained motionless. His expression gave nothing away, and if it hadn't been for what they saw earlier, they would think he was just like always.
"An agreement was reached. All of us have to be there to hear the decision," said Kyle.
Maybe it was from the ludicrous situation of talking about inheritance when people were kidnapped right under their noses, or maybe it was from his own fear, but Kyle swore he saw a hint of a smile in Ilay just before he stood up.
The way to the meeting was in stark silence, and all the murmurs in the room ceased when they heard the trio walk up the stairs. Ilay stood in the back, a few steps from Kyle, Helena and Christoph, hands in his pockets as he looked outside the window, his eyes dazed and detached.