CHAPTER 5 - THE BLOODSTAINED TIE
LOUISA

The room was as quiet as a sepulchre, Louisa thought grimly from where she was stood by the doorway, and she couldn't blame them. Only the growl of engines from beyond the window and the occasional honk of a horn broke the silence. London never slept by the sounds of it. Louisa checked her watch discreetly. It was gone midnight, but none of the entourage looked even mildly like they were prepared to go to bed.

The room was elegant, crimson walls and a vermillion carpet, an open fire crackling in one corner, the light flickering oldly as the King paced up and down before it. King Maxim of the Mashaki Islands was usually the most unflappable man on the face of the planet. The man was built like a tank with a stern face and dark hair, and so seeing him so discomfited was enough to set her back up. It was like watching a lion in a cage, dangerous yet helpless...

But the Queen, her charge, wasn't in much of a better state. She was sat, stunned on the sofa, and she hadn't said a word since the news had been brought to her. She'd just sat down and stared into the middle-distance, twisting her handkerchief between her fingers, while her cousin, Lady Marisa sat beside her, muttering soothing things that she surely couldn't know for certain. Louisa had had to stop herself snorting out loud when she'd assured the Queen that 'everything would be alright'. What part of this would be 'alright'?

Louisa hadn't worked for the Royal Family long, but even she was stunned. Alexi was a good kid. A little bit wayward and petulant at times, but with a heart of gold and a sharp sense of humour. She'd heard the other guards talking about how stupid an idea it had been to let Alexi out to go to school, but she understood. Alexi always had been the energetic one, and being cooped up all the time would have driven him and every-one else here mad. And plus, he'd been with Dimitri. Every-one had been so certain that he was safe where Dimitri was concerned.

That was the other reason she was stunned. Dimitri was still in emergency surgery, but Jonas... She swallowed. No-one deserved this, especially not Jonas, or Dimitri. She pitied whoever had to make that call to Jonas' family. They all knew it could happen, it was what they were paid for, to jump in front of a bullet, but...

They all looked up as the door opened and Chen entered.

"What news?" The King demanded instantly.

Chen shook her head.

"We've got some internal footage," she said precisely. "Alexi made a good run for it, but they'd taken out the camera between the playing field and the carpark, we don't know what happened either. We did sweeps of the area, but no-one saw anything, or if they did, they're too scared to come forwards." She swallowed, and gave the King a look. "Sir, I should tender my..."

"If you're going to say that you tender your resignation then take a jump off the roof will you?" The King snapped. "It wasn't your fault any more than it was Jonas or Dimitri's. Save me the apologies and guilt and find my son."

He swallowed and pinched his nose.

"Apologies Chen, that came out sharper than I intended."

"No apology required Sir," Chen said formally.

There was the sound of running footsteps, then the door burst open. Prince Nage appeared in the doorway, panting slightly. They all did a double take at him, then the King gave an uncertain smile. Nage was Alexi's twin brother, younger by about 10 minutes, and he always looked a little sickly, the same dark blue eyes as Alexi shifting behind his wire-framed glasses.

"What news?" he demanded, looking straight at Chen.

Louisa frowned slightly. It wasn't that she didn't welcome Nage's concern for his brother, it's just the two hadn't been getting on recently, or ever for that matter. Identical on the outside, polar opposites on the inside, it's just it didn't seem quite like concern, more like... excitement.

"Nothing," Chen said.

"Oh," Nage bit his lip. "I'm sorry... I just thought..."

He tailed off, and the Queen finally looked up.

"Come over here," She said quietly, opening her arms for Nage.

Nage hesitated, then walked over and sat beside his mother taking the hug with an kind of awkward pleasure. Louisa took a breath and schooled her expression. Just because you personally don't like him doesn't mean you should think that he's got a hand in this. He's a sinister git all the time, and he's probably revelling in his brother being out of the way, it doesn't mean he's part of it. You never know, he might actually be concerned for his brother, she told herself grimly, then gave a mental snort. Yeah right.

"So what's the plan Chen?" The King asked.

"Well we've informed the Police and we're trying to keep it under wraps," Chen began. "But it's only a matter of time before..."

There was a knock at the door and a wide-eyed young man appeared at the door.

"Sorry to disturb you Your Majesties," he said awkwardly. "It's just..."

"What is it Lee?" The King demanded impatiently.

Oh that was it, Lee, the undergardener. What was he doing in the house?

The gangly teenager stepped through the door, then swallowed and held something out.

"I found this on the railings," he said awkwardly.

Hanging from his hand was a tie. It was patterned with blue and gold diagonal stripes and had St Leon's School's logo on the bottom. Worse than that, on the label was written; Alexi Borrin. The Queen went shock white and then Nage's voice cut uncertainly through the stunned silence.

"Is that... blood on it?"

And the total horror in the boy's voice was enough to absolve him of the crime in Louisa's mind, the trembling shock and nausea that he couldn't have been faking.

"Get the police in here," Chen ordered, taking them all by surprise with her usual precise air. "They'll need to take prints off it, if you can get prints of it, and they'll need to check it for DNA."

As she took it off him, carefully holding the tie with her sleeve so as to not leave any trace of herself, something fell to the floor and slid across the carpet, landing by Louisa's boot. She bent down to look at it.

"What is it?" The King demanded.

Fishing a handkerchief out of her pocket Louisa picked the object up carefully.

"It's a memory stick Sire," She stated.

"I can run and get my laptop?" Nage offered, sitting up instantly.

"No, we need to get it checked first," Chen said firmly.

"She's right," Louisa admitted. "It could be a bomb, it could contain a virus, it could be anything. We need to wait for the police."

The waiting nearly killed her, so she couldn't imagine what it would be like for the family, but finally they clustered around the computer screen...

A figure flickered onto the screen. It wasn't a great image, the video quality grainy, but Alexi was instantly recognisable. He looked God awful, his hair stuck to his face, bruises bluing his right cheek, strapped so tightly to a kitchen chair it was amazing he could breathe. The King leant forwards, hands balling into fists, face dangerous as he saw the predicament his eldest son was in, and the man toying with his flick knife behind him.

Louisa scanned him carefully. It didn't look like he'd been hurt too badly, nothing looked broken, and he was still dressed, if dishevelled, white school shirt stained with dirt, tie pressed tight against his neck. Alexi took a deep breath and looked up at the camera, his dark blue eyes surprisingly steady as he braced himself, then looked beyond it, a small frown between his brows as he clearly read something behind the screen.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, Mother, Father," He said, voice steady but slightly rasping. "As you can see I'm alive and..." He hesitated, then cursed in Mashakan as the man behind him cuffed him over the back of the head, then persisted, eyes sparking with anger. "Alive and well in the hospitality of my ever charming hosts."
Louisa had to resist a smile at Alexi's biting sarcasm. It was nice to know he wasn't a terrified wreck.

"They want you to know that I am perfectly safe, for now," Alexi pulled a face at that and winced as he got slapped again. "And this is your first proof of life..." He paused, clearly waiting for whoever was behind the camera to tell him what to say next, then continued. "A ransom demand will be sent in due course, with another proof of life. Meet their demands and you'll soon have your son back alive. If you..." Alexi swallowed, then pressed on, a slight tremor in his voice now. "If the demands are not met then we'll send your son back in pieces. Shit." He closed his eyes, sitting back for a moment, then opened his eyes again. "And to prove to you that we are serious..."

Alexi stopped suddenly and stared, then the man beside him gave a low, spine chilling laugh. Alexi recoiled as far away in the chair as he could get, but the man just stepped closer, his switchblade glittering. Alexi gave a cry of pain as the blade was drawn across his cheek. Blood spilled up, red beads gliding over Alexi's faintly tanned skin, and the man ripped Alexi's tie from his neck, pressing the material against the wound. Alexi hissed in pain as the man wiped it across the wound again, then wiped his knife clean on it.

"You son of fucking bitch," Alex snarled.

Alexi went very very still, not even daring to swallow as the silver blade touched his throat. There was a soft command from the man with another sinister laugh and the blade was retracted. Alexi took another unsteady breath, then looked back up at whoever it was behind the camera.

"We'll be in touch," he continued. "Don't try to find us, or the only reward you'll get is the knowledge that you were too late to save me."

And the video cut out, leaving them all staring at a little pop-up on the screen. 'Play Again?' The King staggered back and all but collapsed into a chair, the Queen walking towards him. She murmured something to him, then he sat up and almost fell into her arms. Louisa watched her monarch cry in the arms of his wife and found a rolling anger burning in her chest. If she found out who'd done this, she would flay them alive, she swore.

By pure accident, she looked up and saw Nage and Chen standing quite close to each other. That wasn't unusual, Chen was quite often Nage's bodyguard, and her face was totally unreadable as always. It was Nage's face that made her uneasy. Nage's face, the perfect duplicate of Alexi's battered face, was twisted into a derisive sneer.