Free Sorceress' Blood by Carl Purcell Page A

hadn’t seen or heard a peep from
the pilot. The plane sat motionless.
    “Where are we going, again?”
    “China.”
    “Is it far?”
    “Yep.” Rebecca smiled. “All the way over the
ocean.”
    “How long will it take to get there?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Where abouts in China will we live?”
    “I don’t know that, either.” Rebecca said, feeling
a little stupid.
    “We’ll be safe there?”
    “I’m sure we will.” Rebecca said with a smile. But
she didn’t know; that was the problem. She turned to look at
the little girl. She had n idea what was going to happen. Ashley was
still gazing out the window. Oh God, she hoped this is the end of it.
The plane jerked forward suddenly. Ashley’s skin went pale.
    “Is the plane meant to do that?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “You don’t know much, do you?”
    “No.” Rebecca replied. “Ashley, I don’t know
what’s going to happen. But this plane is going to take us away
from the people who are chasing us and I’m sure we can trust
Lord Sebastian’s family. I don’t know what we’ll do
once we get to China. We just have to hope that Edward has planned
everything for us. And if he hasn't…” Rebecca paused to
collect her thoughts. At least that was the idea but the truth was
she didn’t have any thoughts. She had never before had to take
care of anyone other than herself and she never had to look after
kids. She had never worked as a babysitter and she didn’t even
have a little brother or sister that she had to look out for. Rebecca
tried to give Ashley some kind of honest, comforting answer but she
didn’t even have answers. All she had were more worries, more
fears and more questions of her own that she still couldn't answer.
“If he doesn’t, I’ll take care of us. Don’t
worry.” And that was all she had. Even though she was
struggling to get by on her own in her own country, and the thought
of being stranded in another country where no one would understand
her appalled her, she couldn’t bring herself to say anything
that might make the little girl as frightened as she was. Somehow,
that gave her confidence. She didn’t have a clue what she was
doing, but having Ashley there gave her something more than survival
to struggle for. Something inside Rebecca drove her to take care of
Ashley – even though she was a complete stranger a week ago and
even though she didn’t know her last name or even how old she
was, Rebecca knew she had to take care of her and nothing would get
in the way of that.
    Ashley was quiet. She’d stopped looking out the window and now
she was looking at Rebecca. The two stared silently into each other’s
eyes.
    “Alright,” Ashley said with innocent, childish simplicity
and looked out the window. Rebecca sighed and let her head rest on
the seat. The plane was moving now. Finally the pilot’s voice
came over the speakers letting the only two passengers know that they
were taking off.
    Rebecca and Ashley passed the hours by talking, reading magazines and
looking out the window. At some point in the flight, they’d
lost complete track of local time, Rebecca got up and walked up and
down the aisle. Passing by a seat, she spied a pack of playing cards
tucked into the pouch on the back of it.
    “Want to play cards?” Rebecca asked as she took her seat.
    “I don’t know how.”
    “Well there’s lots of ways to play cards. I’ll
teach you.”
    “Okay.”
    “I’ll teach you to play Go Fish.” Rebecca named the
first child-friendly card game that came to mind. It wasn’t
until after she’d said it that she realised she didn’t
know how to play Go Fish.
    “How do you play?” Ashley asked.
    “Well. First I shuffle the cards like this so they’re all
mixed up.” Rebecca felt a familiar feeling, the same feeling
she’d had when she was trying to tell Ashley a story –
the feeling of having no idea at all. “Then I deal out the
cards like this. We both get two cards to start with.” Rebecca
dealt the