Marcus stood still for a moment, wondering which way is better to go. "d.a.m.n, that was quite a good punch," the young man touched his broken lip, the blood no longer oozed, but his lip was noticeably swollen and gave out the pain. Armand did not restrain himself, so the consequences of his blow were already beginning to appear on the face of his older brother. "Ah, to h.e.l.l with that," at the moment, Marcus had more important things to do.
It was necessary to prepare things for Armand"s and Polina"s escape and quietly leave them at the back door. And then think about what to do himself. The young man turned around and wandered towards the nearest medical office.
In the castle building, there were several departments where patients were located. Some were for the senior staff, some wards for ordinary employees, separate blocks for prisoners. But there were closed cells among them, where only doctors and individuals with authority were allowed. And only they knew who was inside at that moment.
Marcus went in the direction of one of these blocks, not that he had a special concern, it was simply the closest place where he could heal his wounds and continue to prepare an escape plan.
To his surprise, the medical block was so quiet as if there was not a single soul there that was not typical of this place since any visitor here was usually met by at least a few soldiers on guard.
The young man walked along several doors until he found one open among them. The characteristic smell of antiseptics and alcohol was in the room. Marcus took one of the bags from the couch, which the doctors used, and began to put everything there that he might think was necessary - painkillers, antiseptics, bandages, medical scissors, medicines - taking into account the amount of the medicaments for three people. He was planning to leave most of this to Armand, and take the rest with him.
BANG.
An incomprehensible thud came to his attention, the sound was coming from the next room, and he realized that he was not alone. Closing his bag, the young man hastened to leave, so as not to be noticed, but his natural curiosity turned out to be stronger.
Marcus left the office and gently opened the door of the next room. The inside was empty, but because of the inner door he heard a voice that he would not confuse with any other.
The young man slipped inside and hid near the door of the inner room, now he could clearly hear the conversation that was taking place there and, for some reason, this situation aroused a sense of Deja Vu in him.
"Mark, I don"t care what you will do with her, I want the pendant to be in the laboratory within three hours!" Sigmund Taubert"s voice sounded with extreme sharpness and fury. "The situation is worse, and there"s no more time to wait, if we don"t conduct the experiment tonight, then everything that we have prepared in recent years will go down the drain!"
"Sigmund calm down, firstly, we made a copy, so everything should work, and secondly, we have to wait until the baby is born. This woman has become too stubborn, but if we go too far, the baby may die," the second male voice, unfamiliar to Marcus, answered his father"s remark.
"So, if in three hours she doesn"t give you this d.a.m.n pendant, I"ll come and personally tear her belly. We need only this baby, so how it is born does not concern me. All I need is for the experiment to succeed, the lab will be ready by midnight. If everything goes according to plan, then in the morning we will leave the castle. So you have three hours, I won"t wait any longer."
Marcus heard the loud knock of his father"s footsteps approaching the door, and in a matter of seconds bounced to the side, hiding behind one of the closets. Fortunately, Mr. Taubert did not notice the presence of an outsider in the room and, slamming the door, left.
"Ha, so I was right, this b.a.s.t.a.r.d was up to something," Marcus grinned to himself. How fortunate it turned out that he decided to go here, as if fate itself had given him a chance to disrupt his father"s plans, which were for the latter a high priority, judging by the conversation that Marcus had heard earlier.
He carefully returned to the door of the second room and looked inside, an unknown man was standing like a predator over a woman lying on the floor. Her face distorted a grimace of pain, but she made no sound and only looked with hatred at the man in front of her.
The man leaned over, grabbed the woman by the hair, and pulled them to the side with force. She pursed her lips and squeezed her eyes, but remained speechless. This reaction aroused even greater fury in the stranger, he pushed the woman back to the floor, his palm went up and with a fever struck the woman"s face.
"Oh, you miserable sc.u.m, did you decide to show courage and perseverance in the end? My love, do not anger me more, my patience is running out. If you want to go to the better world painlessly, I advise you to give me the pendant. You"re a good girl, aren"t you, Clara?" At the last words, the man knelt next to the woman and stroked her cheek, which he himself had hit a few seconds ago.
Marcus"s palms clenched into fists, a picture in front of his eyes evoked childhood memories in him, when he was small and helpless and could not protect the closest person. And even though he was not much older now, in fact, he was still a schoolboy yesterday, but he was already not so helpless as then.
"Clara Teser, as your spouse and head of the family, I order you to give me the pendant, otherwise-"
"Ha, otherwise what?" the woman interrupted, "Will you hit me again? Will you kill me? Mark, don"t dare to be mistaken, among the two of us, I am the only one in whom Teser"s blood is flowing, and do not hope that I will trust you the pendant again, is it clear to you?!"
The woman got up from the floor and leaned her back against the wall, only then Marcus noticed that she was holding her lower abdomen with her hands, and this belly was very round.
"You and this person, you do not understand what you have done. I loved you and trusted you, you knew that you can not use knowledge about the future for your own benefit! But you not only did this, but you also used the pendant to control the souls of other people after death! Mark, do you even imagine the consequences of all this?!"
The woman"s voice sounded with contempt and disappointment. She thought that the man in front of her was the closest and dearest, but it turned out that she had nursed a snake in the bosom, the snake which had ruthlessly manipulated her all these years.
"You violated the main ban, the price of which became millions of innocent lives, and your worthless life and that man"s life will not be enough to pay for it!"
"Hmm, don"t worry about that. As soon as we finish today"s experiment, all this will not be important. Our government will have the strongest creature on the planet, which will have no equal and our descendants will rule this world with it, as it should have been for centuries," the man replied, in his opinion, his wife was stupid and short-sighted, she didn"t understand that potential of power which she possessed and all he did was just he only restored justice.
The strongest should rule this world, and the previous descendants of Teser were naive fools since they did not use the power over time and people given to them by G.o.d or by someone else there.
"If you do, you will awaken a demon who will devour everything in its path," said Clara and looked away, Marcus felt his body go numb for a moment when his eyes collided with the eyes of a woman. Her gaze was filled with uncharted power, even though physically she was powerless.
"Mark," she again looked at her husband, not giving the appearance that she noticed another person nearby, "I warn you the last time, you cannot use ancient artifacts to change the essence of a person. Those to whom they belonged were swallowed up by time, without leaving a trace. If you break this taboo, then the one who you want to rule the world will only destroy it!"
"Ah, my dear Clara, that all sounds interesting, of course," the man shook his head and looked at her as she was a stupid child, "But the thing is, I don"t believe in your family tales. So," the man"s hand squeezed the woman"s neck, why she began to suffocate, "Don"t dare to look at me with a look of superiority, is it clear to you?" He pushed her against the wall and cast a look of disgust,
"I advise you to ponder your decision again. I"ll be back in half an hour and I hope you will be a good girl and give me the pendant," he said and left the room after Marcus"s father.
Marcus stood behind a cupboard, where no one noticed him, thoughts rushed through his head, one stranger than the other, but he had more questions. This man, although he saw him for the first time in his life, evoked a feeling of anger in a young man no less than his father.
Mark Teser. He seems to have heard that name before, but where?
"Are you there? If yes, please help." He heard the woman"s voice from the room, it didn"t sound as confident as before, as if she had said those words, overcoming severe pain.
"Please..."
"d.a.m.n, this is clearly not the good time," Marcus thought to himself, time was not in his favor, and he was stuck here more than he planned. On the other hand…
The two were talking about some kind of pendant and experiment that was important to the twins" father. Besides, Mr. Taubert ordered a gorgeous dinner to be taken to Armand. Were these two events related to each other?
If so, then Armand could be in serious danger.
Marcus looked out and made sure that the corridor was empty. After that, he opened the door of the room and went to the woman, "Can you go?" he asked. She was very pale, drops of sweat appeared on her forehead as if she was forcing herself to fight something serious.
"Please help me go out. My man will find me, just help me. They should not get my baby," the woman asked Marcus in an imploring voice. This boy, unknown to her, who was no longer a child, but had not yet become a man, was her last hope. In this cold and terrible place, full of hatred, cynicism and heartlessness, only a young soul could lend her hand.
"If I help you escape, will it interfere with their plans?" Marcus asked. The risk was too great and he should have known for sure that it was worth it.
The woman"s breath was knocked down, and she only nodded her head in response. That was enough for him.
The young man found a key to the lock, which was attached to one of the woman"s legs and did not allow her to move. Leaning on Marcus, she got up and slowly followed him, it seemed that every movement hurt her.
"Sorry, but we need to hurry. Soon there will be a change of guard, and we should have time to go down to the underground exit," Marcus urged her, he saw that she tried her best, but something was wrong with her.
It was a great success that no one had caught them along the way, and Marcus successfully led her out through the underpa.s.s beyond the outer wall of the castle. Three years ago, Armand allowed that beloved couple to escape, and here Marcus himself did the same, helping an unfamiliar pregnant woman.
No wonder they say that the twins are similar to each other, that even the life situations they fall into can be the same.
The cool night air slightly relieved the inner tension of the young man, he looked around, it was quiet around and could not hear a soul.
"Where is your man? Can you go further yourself? I need to leave," he asked the woman.
But instead of answering, she fell to her knees and grabbed her stomach, Marcus barely managed to close her mouth with his hand, otherwise, her cry would be heard by all the guards.
"What are you doing?! Do you want us both to be caught?!" he shouted at her, but in response, he heard her heavy breathing and stifled moans. "W-what is it? You feel bad?"
"I-I can"t stand it anymore, please help me," she said through gritted teeth.
Marcus fell into even greater confusion, he was not a great connoisseur of medicine, but even his knowledge was enough to suggest that...
"I think my labour is about to begin," she said.
"Wh-what?!"