I Am Royal: The Search for a Prince

Shuturanij

            

The royal physician and his entire crew of nurses were waiting for Willow and Chelsea as soon as they arrived back at the palace. There was an intense amount of activity. The doctor went to work on Willow's head, cleaning it with skilled hands. She could tell, however, that he was nervous. It was rare that any of his royal patients got injured- they were protected stringently. Before Willow, his most frequent work had been with Henry, who somehow had managed to break his arm, four fingers, and an ankle over the course of his very well-guarded childhood.

Willow had given up trying to explain. She sat, wordless, staring straight ahead as the doctor prodded her forehead with gauze. She was vaguely aware of all the actively around her. At one point, Jenny appeared, and said in concern,

"Will it scar?"

"No," the royal physician said.

Jenny sighed in relief.

Roger was there at one point, yelling. William managed to get him away. He cast Willow a disappointed look. Chelsea was talking non-stop, trying to explain. The head of security, John, was there, listening to Chelsea. He looked like he was about to question Willow, when chatter came over his radio, and he hurried away. Then activity really started to pick up, with security personnel and Met officers talking and scurrying around, in the way of palace workers who were trying to attend to the guests who were still not allowed to leave.

"No stitches," the doctor announced. "Just butterfly bandages."

Willow nodded. She wouldn't have cared about getting stitches, anyway. Dan passed by, and she grabbed his forearm. He almost pulled her right out of her chair with his weight before he stopped.

"Yes, Your Highness?" he asked.

Willow admired his ability to remain professional, even though she knew he was furious with her. She couldn't blame him. He would have been fired and never gotten a job again if something really terrible had happened to her, and even with the scratch on her head, he was probably in trouble.

"What happened?" she asked urgently. "Did they find him?"

Dan hesitated. He probably didn't want to give her any information that might lead to her to do something crazy again. Finally he said, "They didn't find the prince. They found the kidnappers."

Willow heart stopped. "What? What do you mean?"

"They found the men you described, the Lontin men, but they were all tied up. They wouldn't say much, only that they'd been robbed."

"Robbed?" Chelsea repeated, hurrying over to listen.

"Yes, my Lady."

Chelsea and Willow exchanged glances.

"Henry was... re-kidnapped?" Willow said.

Dan sighed, and made a gesture of helplessness. "We- we don't know. If His Highness was even ever in their possession to begin with-"

"He was!" Willow and Chelsea said at the same time.

Dan frowned. "Well, then, yes... it looks like someone attacked the original kidnappers and took him."

Willow's head spun. The royal physician pressed gauze to the tapped cut, and wrapped her head with bandages to hold it into place.

"Now what?" Willow said miserably. "They could be anywhere. Now he's in the hands of an entirely new group of kidnappers! Who knows what they're going to do with him?"

Dan must have seen the panic on her face, because he said to her in a gentler voice, "You were right about the tunnels, though. They should have listened to you."