"The mission is cancelled," Dean firmly said.

"I agree. The risk is higher with twelve children," Jaice said wiping away tears.

"No. We can't give up," Mageia said.

They all stared at her with eyes screaming how crazy and foolish she sounded.

"Are yuh some god we don't know about?" Dean taunted. "Because I'd love to hear yer ideal plan on stealing twelve children from a building built to keep people in."

"We have a few hours left," she said. "And Trek already had done his part."

"The plans has changed."

"No. Faebrin did you sketch out the new Taefo yet?"

"I did. Plus, I scaled the forest side a few times," he said glancing at Dean guiltily.

"Good. Let's look over it and readjust the rescue plan."

"You've gone mad," Dean said eyes blinking at her as if trying to see if she was herself.

She glared at the boy hating his constant need to belittle her authority and mentality in front of the others.

"Dean. We need to talk. In private. Now!" She said and stormed to her hut without looking back.

She paced the grass wishing to punch something or someone. When Dean stepped into the clearing she lashed at the boy.

"What happened to you, Dean?"

"What're you talking about?"

"You used to be on fire for these rescues and defying the impossible, but now... now... you just make me look stupid in front of everyone."

Dean flexed his jaw and gave a long sigh. "I've grown wiser, I assume."

"And I haven't?" she said.

"It's not like that."

"What? Did you lose your heart along the way?"

"That's not fair, Geia," he said. "I do not want to risk the family we have now."

"So, you're just going to allow those twelve children to die?"

"What if they're so sick that they aren't transportable? What then? We don't have twelve backs to carry them out." He said and when she had no decent response, he continued. "I doubt the gods would be pleased to leave them behind while we take the others."

"We will have to chance it," she said. "I believe in my heart that everything will be fine if we plan well. Dean, we must encourage the others to be brave and yes be smart about it, but also willing to risk their own life to save another. To at least try and save another's. I know we cannot save every Strange in the damn kingdom, but there is this feeling deep in my soul, telling me we shouldn't turn our backs on these children."

Dean's harden expression softened and an unusual look grew in his eyes. He closed the distance between them and placed a gentle hand on her cheek. She froze waiting to see what he was doing.

"I love this about you," he said thumb brushing her skin as if she was a fragile piece of glass.

"What?"

"Yer passion. Yer big heart. Yer stubbornness and those beautiful eyes."

Mageia beamed, heat rising in her cheeks. She swayed on her heels. "You're too kind," averting her eyes to her feet.

"Yuh know I love you, right?"

"I do," she said. "And I love you too."

"Yuh know, I'd do anything for you?"

"Same here," she said.

"And yuh know, whenever you start mentioning yer heart and yer soul rather than yer gut, I just know somehow that it's the right thing to do."

His gaze dropped to her lips, and she gave an innocent smile.

"Alright," he said almost faint on his lips. He sharply inhaled and stepped away to rub the back of his neck. His cheeks were red as cherries, but he kept his strong stance.

"We're going to do this rescue," he said. "And when we've succeeded, we're leaving this forsaken kingdom once and for all."

Mageia grinned and nodded. "That sounds good to me."

"May the gods bless us and be on our side for once," he beamed, and they returned to the Pit to readjust the plan.

Their rescue group of seven, scurried through the underway listening to the rise of celebration above in Midlaan and Strana. Nightfall had arrived an hour ago and they knew time would speed up in their dire need to be ahead of it.

"Okay. Let us pray that Junet did what Trek had instructed. We will work swift and silent," Mageia said. "Dean, Gavin, and Gibby you're with me."

They ascended to the ground on the westside of Strana within a dark alley perched behind a line of stores and the high scale of Mideri Wall. To their relief, no one was around and by the sound of voices and music, the celebration lied further down the street, promising to extend within the hour. With stealth, they passed three stores to Junet's carpentry shop. The smell of wood hung strong in the air and no lights were on upstairs. Piled neatly around the back of the store's cutter stations were scraps of wood and barrels of wood shavings.

They scanned the area for the two planks supposedly placed for Trekon to pick up, but they were nowhere to be found.

"Crap," she heard Dean say on the other side.

"Can we still do it without the planks?" Gibby asked, one of their seventeen-year-old collector.

"No. We have to go with plan B," Mageia said already hating the thought of it.

The back door popped open with the sound of scrapping wood on wood. Interior light flooded parts of the alley. Immediately, they all scattered for the shade of darkness, feet light on the ground and hearts racing wild. Mageia and Gibby ran to the side of the shop and slammed against its side while Dean and Gavin dropped behind a cutter machine, slowly easing backwards to the other side of the shop.

Junet, the carpenter, mumbled annoyingly to himself as he carried two long planks from his shop. Mageia glanced around the corner and quickly snapped back seeing him approach. She felt the hilt of her dagger and prayed to the gods she didn't need to use it. The man continued muttering his disapproval of his present task and propped the planks against the wall. A part of the planks edged outward into the intersection threatening to expose their hideout, but Junet gave up on making things look tidy. He grunted and stomped back inside.

"That was close," Gibby whispered.

Mageia couldn't respond thanks to the knot in her throat. She gestured for him to follow. With swiftness, in case Junet returned, they hauled the planks back to the grate down-alley and lowered them to those waiting below.

They followed a specific route underway, leading to wet walls and streams of water. They rose from an abandoned well in a small section of the Napan Forest. Mageia knew that during the day this specific forest on the westside of Ardania was always busy with berry-pickers, guards, and soldiers. Despite the well's untended presence, people did know about it and she thanked the gods no young people had decided to use it as a hangout spot for the nightly festivities.

"I can smell the Lower River," Jaice said with a pleasant smile.

Indeed, they all could smell the fresh water of the lower region of the Ardanian River a yard away. If only they could go to it and enjoy its beauty for a while, but they had an important mission to complete.

"Focus, you guys," Dean said and pointed ahead. "There it is. The Taefo."

Also, a yard away was the five-level castle, built with brickstones black as coal, a flattened roof with seven pointed chimneys. Smoke puffed from three of the chimneys adding to the building's dark and gloomy appearance. It sat at the end of Mideri Wall, however on the Midlaan side. It's west wing partly disappeared into the woods, with trees that grew to the height of its roof.

"Okay," Mageia said. "Faebrin said they're keeping them in the children's quarters. Thank the gods they did not decide to relocate or change the room after the amended law."

"It's the same room we were put in," Esa said glancing at her brother.

"Same here," Mageia said swallowing a sharp pain in her chest from the memory.

"I can only assume they had closed up that way of entering and exit after your rescues," Dean said. "So, we will try Plan A. If anything goes wrong, yuh know what to do."

They all nodded.

"Let's go," Dean said.

They approached the back gate of the Taefo and followed it downhill towards the river. No patrollers were around to Mageia's surprise. For a place to be so sacred, one would think it'd have better security. They stopped at a large drain tunnel dividing the gate that led to its own fence at the opposite end. Over the years, a thicket and vines had formed around the drain tunnel and instead of entering it, they climbed on top of it. Staying low they walked along the tunnel transitioning into a hillside and stopped at the lowest part of the wall protruding from the trees.

Dean gave a quick wave. They froze and knelt low to the ground as a patroller walked the top of the wall. Thankfully, he was walking in the opposite direction towards his post perched at an awkward turn of the wall. By the time he would reach his post and sit down for a break, they had at least thirty minutes to an hour before he returned.

"Move quickly," Dean whispered.

They climbed the strong limbs of a tree onto the wall. Mageia scanned the rooftops of the Taefo as Jaice did the grounds below. The boys carefully slid the planks across the small clearing, using the tree limbs and placed the planks on the rooftop. Once they tied and secured the planks between two nuggets on the wall, Dean was the first to test out the treacherous walk across, holding one end of a rope.

Once on a dipping portion of the roof, he secured the rope to a chimney and waved for them to continue. Mageia held onto the rope and walked across the planks with Gavin and Gibby while Boras, Jaice, and Esa stayed behind to receive the children and lower them into the forest.

Mageia and her companions tippy toed across the roof of the west wing to the entrance of an old chimney now used to transport laundry. Dean used his hammer to break the lock and the latch and opened the metal door. The shoot's supposed ladder was broken and partly gone, as expected, when she peered down into the darkness.

"Ladder," she said.

Gibby took off the ladder he wore across his torso and they dropped it into the shoot and secured it. Mageia silently prayed as she went first down the shoot, sweat dribbling into her eyes and her arms sticky with nerves. Dean followed in suit, but Gibby stayed, staying low to the roof to prevent being spotted.

Time was of the essence as she passed the fifth floor and halted at the fourth floor. A door had been built to the back of the chimney and to her relief it possessed no lock. She placed an ear to the door, listening intently and heard children whimpering. Remembering her own unfortunate time in this very quarter, there were no supervision. Placing a foot on the ledge and holding the ladder, she pushed the door open. She cringed as it creaked, but she chanced it and peeked in. A new chimney had been built beside the shoot due to the fire's bright light and massive heat.

She caught eyes with a child sitting by the chimney. He couldn't be more than ten with a very small head and boney shoulders. Trails of tears decorated his dirty face and his lips opened as if he wanted to cry out. She placed a finger to her lips, and he nodded rising to his feet. Mageia crawled into the room and stood seeing no supervision.

Unable to sleep in their ordeal, the children sat up in their beds, faces crusted from hours of nonstop crying. Mageia knew a few hours from now, guards would enter with basins of water and sacred robes for the children to change into. With the level of celebrating rising outside the front gates of the Taefo, a decision could be made to prepare the children earlier.

So, they had to move fast.

"Are you here to save us?" the ten-year-old whispered.

"Yes," she said as Dean crawled inside.

"I need you to gather everyone, silently," she said and the sorrow in his eyes quickly lit in strong determination.

He went to each child, all of them under the age of ten with various ailments and deformities. Mageia thanked the gods seeing no one was sick to the point she'd have to leave them behind. They ushered the children to the laundromat shoot and one at a time they climbed up to the roof. One of the smaller ones had a very bad leg that curled inward. Leaving his crutch behind, the ten-year-old offered to carry him on his back. The rescue was going fast and smooth, to her liking, but the hairs along her arms sat on ends. Any sudden sound could have a guard enter within seconds.

With soft feet, Mageia went to block the door with a chest of bed linens and toiletries. Beyond the only exit in the room, she heard men talking and laughing down a hall amidst the wails of the condemned. A slight whimper arose to her far left within the darkness and she froze. Sitting in the corner of the room was a wooden crib. That's when she realized, she had counted only eleven children when it's supposed to be twelve.

Gods in the Serene, she thought approaching the crib. Lying asleep inside was a baby girl. The structure of her skull was unnaturally squeezed, a defect that automatically marked her for a mercy death.

She waved Dean over and he glanced inside. "Great gods. We can't take her."

"But she's a baby."

"Ay. A baby that cries. Plus look at her skull. She has to have some type of brain damage."

"So, what," she said.

Mageia's eyes watered staring at the beautiful baby upon whom the Fairest would call ugly and unworthy to take care of. Did not this baby have a right to live, to grow, and to die free?

She shook her head and carefully wrapped the baby from head to toe. "I can't leave her."

"Damn Geia, she's going to weigh us down."

"Just make sure everyone else gets out okay." She picked up the baby and it stirred for a second causing her heart to skip. When it stilled, Dean helped to tie it around her torso.

Dean went to the last child, a girl, eyes coated white from blindness, and placed her on his back and began to climb up. Mageia waited, until Dean and the girl was out of the shoot and all the children were across the planks before she ascended. As she quickened her pace, her foot slipped on the ladder causing her to partially fall. Her body swung and slammed against the shoot and the thud sound echoed downward.

The baby stirred awake as she clutched her close to her bosom and the shoot erupted in wails.