A MAZE OF GREED

After ten more minutes of argument and heated retorts from Ruth, she and Thea stood a little away from the gate with a frown on their faces. While the guards stood tall, crossing their hands over their chest and glaring at the two women, who had given an earful to them.

"What now, Ruth?" Thea asked in frustration.

With every passing moment, the uneasiness in her heart grew by an inch. She could feel the danger and the tension lingering in the air of the O'Dell property. She wanted to see behind those giant brick and stone walls. She wanted to see what had happened with Rees.

Why the O'Dells had restricted entry of any person in 'the great manor' except specified personalities and their servants?

"I am so sorry, Thea. We have tried our best but those chauvinistic men are so dense to understand anything. I don't think we can enter in there today." Ruth glanced up at the dark sky. The coldness in the air had increased than the daytime.

"I think- I think we should return back now. We will wait-"

"You can go. I am not coming with you." Thea was too stressed to manage her tone of speech that came rudely.

But Ruth didn't mind it. She had asked the same question that Thea had asked her about an hour ago.

-"Would you have stopped if you were in my place?"-

Thea had asked her this. That time Ruth didn't know the answer. But an hour that had passed after that question gave her time to ponder over it. And now she had an answer.

If she was in Thea's place and her loved one had disappeared without any notice then, she would have not stopped. She would have done everything in her power to reach that person.

So, she understood Thea. She understood her state of mind and her worries.

But she also couldn't see another way to reach Rees. It was already dark, and the eeriness of the place was never her favourite thing. Every time Ruth was in the premises of 'the great manor', she felt peculiar.

There was something about this place that made her nerves jumpy. Something in this place brought out the unknown side of hers. She felt brave, bold and stalwart in a newfangled way.

A part of her repulsed from this place, but a tiny part felt an anonymous pull. This place gave her chills. After deciding to not step the foot here, destiny's roguish tricks didn't fail to drag her there time and again.

"Thea, you can't go inside. Please come with me. We will try again later, I promise!" Ruth tried to convince Thea, but that woman was too obstinate to listen.

"Ruth, I want to see if Rees is safe or not and I am not leaving before trying everything in my power to reach him. I know he needs me. I can feel it here." Thea pointed at her heart with a broken face and teary eyes.

Ruth gulped down the realisation that she could not talk Thea into dropping the idea of meeting Rees.

"Then what do you suggest?" She asked gently.

After a momentary pause, Thea knew what she needed to do. "This left us with only one option!"

Her words raised Ruth's brows as she looked at Thea with widened eyes. "Thea-"

"I suggest you to return back home, Ruth. I have already put you in a trouble once and I don't want to repeat that mistake. I will take care of me, I promise!"

Ruth passed her an incredulous look. "You think that I would let you sneak in there again and that too alone?" She scoffed, not believing her friend.

"But-"

"I have not come this far for leaving you alone like this, Thea. If you are going inside then I am coming with you too. If you get in a trouble then you will find me right beside you. We have promised each other to always be there in a time of need. I am not breaking my promise! Now you decide for yourself."

Thea was stunned. Her heart got bewildered with a bunch of emotions. Ruth was a fragile flower for the world, and at some times, she indeed was. But when it came to her loved ones, that flower could sustain any storm like an iron shield.

"Let's go then!"

Taking a longer route and with the advantage of the darkness, Ruth and Thea trod on the light feet towards the dense bushes on the remote corner of the defence wall of 'the great manor'.

They entered those bushes as discreetly as possible while removing the small plants and branches out of their way. Their feet took them in the right direction in the familiar place. Coming out of those bushes, they heaved a sigh.

Both women were timid, but they had set their minds on their goal- meeting Rees. The sky was painted in black with twinkling stars and a crescent moon peeking from behind the dark clouds.

The crickets and the bugs cheered for them with various noises. The place was the same as months ago. And to both of their surprise, the wall still had that gap just above the ground. The only difference was it was now covered well with branches and hay as if someone had intentionally hidden it from the outsiders.

'Why he didn't close this gap with stones and cement?' Ruth wondered as well as Thea.

But whatever the reason was, it had come to their benefit.

"Are you sure about this Ruth?"

The irony was Ruth had asked the same question to Thea months ago, and her answer was the same as Ruth's.

"Yes. I am!"

Sighing deeply, Thea nodded. "Okay then! Follow me!"

She crouched down after gathering her dress in her hands and crawled to fit into that gap. Ruth followed her suit and gathered her dress in her hands. But before crouching down, her eyes wandered to the distance in the direction of the woods.

She could only make out random outlines of the tall trees, but something stirred deep inside her and goosebumps formed on her skin. Shaking her head to get rid of that feeling, she followed Thea, and soon she stepped into another world.

A world that didn't belong to her, yet it intrigued her!

"Come on!" Thea whispered, and tugging at Ruth's wrist, they both sprinted to seek shelter from the eyes of the guards on the duty.

Not much could be seen in the dark. But the atmosphere within the large security wall was way different than what they had experienced the last time.

This time, there was no music, no chattering of hundreds of people, no smell of exotic dishes and perfumes, no bright and colourful lights and… no life.

The place seemed stagnant as if no one lived there. The skin-crawling quietness was nothing less than a graveyard's for Ruth, and that thought made her shudder.

"It's strange that there are less guards than the last time, isn't it Ruth?"

"Yes. I also find it strange. I have heard in the market yesterday that something has happened here but nobody knows what." Ruth soon realised the slip of her tongue when Thea's head snapped her way in speed.

"WHAT? Why didn't you tell me this before?" She whisper-yelled with panicked eyes.

Ruth shook her head and tried to calm down her friend. "It was just a talk between two women, Thea. We don't know if it is true or not. You know how people always have something to say about the O'Dells."

"I-I don't know!" Thea struggled to keep her voice low.

To divert her mind from the dreadful possibilities running in her mind, Ruth asked, "We are inside 'the great manor'. But what now? Where we should look for Rees?"

Thea scanned the area around, trying to figure out the layout of the place. But everywhere she looked, it felt like they were right in the middle of a maze.

"Erm… that way?" She pointed in a random direction unsurely.

Ruth's brows knitted in the middle as she looked at the direction which Thea had pointed. "Are you sure, Thea?"

"Then that way?" Thea pointed in another direction.

But before Ruth opined her thoughts, she knew that it was useless to wander in any direction without a knowledge of the place. The property had spread in the thousands of yards. It would probably take them days to walk the whole property.

"God! I don't know where to begin with Ruth." Thea groaned. "Why don't you tell the right way? You have been here in a bright daylight."

Ruth bit the insides of her cheek in nervousness. "Yes. But I didn't see even a part of this enormous property, Thea. I entered through the main gate and then went to the fountain and… I don't remember it correctly." This time both women sighed dejectedly in unison.

Thea had started losing hope, her façade of confidence crumbling down slowly. Ruth couldn't see her friend like that. She had to find some way.

"Thea, please don't be sad. We will meet Rees. I promise!"

"But how?"

Reckoning her brain for a while, Ruth finally came with a plan. "We can't cover the larger area together. So we have to go separate ways."

"But Ruth-"

"Shhhh…" They ducked down when they heard a guard near them. They waited, holding their breaths till the guard was out of earshot and their sight.

"We don't have time, Thea. We have to do this. There are more lights in that way, it means there will be more guards and it is not a safe way for us. And-"

"Ruth look there!" Thea cut her in between her plan to show her two tall figures walking at a distance.

Ruth narrowed her eyes at the two silhouettes. The dim moonlight didn't help much to figure out their identities.

"I think the person on the left side is Rees!" Thea exclaimed in excitement.

Ruth saw the familiarity- the tall height and muscular physic were definitely Rees's distinct features. But they needed to be sure before doing anything.

"Thea, I don- Ohhh God! Are you crazy, Thea?!" Ruth's heart jumped to her throat, and with a speed of a leopard, she closed Thea's mouth with her palm before she screamed her lungs out to get Rees's attention.

"Ummm…Errmm" Thea struggled to lose free, but Ruth tightened her hold on her idiot friend.

"Thea! Shut up! Do you want to let the whole manor know about your not-so-honourable presence?"

Thea stopped struggling as the two figures disappeared behind the rows of the birch trees.