– … –
"Yes… your excellency?"
The figure in the red robe hovered in front of me, the hood pulled over his face entirely, and black mist seeping out of the opening. It was shaped like a human; moved and spoke like one, but there was something wrong with it. It evoked some… primal fear from deep within me, overriding my logical thought with a fight-flight response.
"FoH. How fairs the over-realm?"
"In the absence of FoL and FoR, progression on their fronts has been halted. The spark system has stopped advancement and so have the people."
Slightly worrying news, but not the worst.
"How goes the search for the lost ones?" I asked, reminding myself of the topic.
"Conclusive. I shall return with definite knowledge at a later date."
So, it's finally found them.
Time to prepare.
– Aeryn –
The heavy stirven and iron gate smoothly rose and disappeared into the prison camp walls, revealing the inside of the desolate courtyard. Our prison carriages jumped over the slits of the gate and the rocks that lay over the ground as we were taken further inside.
Closer towards that tower.
I glanced around at my fellow prisoners. They all sat in their own separate prison carriage, looking frightened but determined to stay strong for each other's sake.
I caught a glimpse of young Elvia's worried face, and the way her hands tightly gripped onto her empty scabbard — lost, alone, scared.
The horses' clopping slowed to a stop, and the guards filed out of the front sections; proceeding to silently unlock the carriages and herd us into a line.
Like Animals.
We marched along with our heads bowed low. We were forced to continue even when they had stopped walking, keeping up with their heavy footsteps and long strides.
The only sound apart from our footsteps being the occasional bird or animal that lurked out of sight.
We marched across the entire courtyard, towards a low, bunker looking building.
The holding cells.
It was dark in there — not dark like midnight, but enough to make shadows giants upon the walls, given life by the few torches that extended in two directions.
It wasn't an old shelter; the iron wasn't rusted and the wood still had a shine, but the air had an almost tangible staleness to it.
A single torchlight shone upon the stone wall to the side of us. They stopped us here, forcing us to wait.
A guard materialised from the darkness and walked towards us, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. He looked down at us; scanning our faces.
Everyone had their eyes looking down.
But me.
Fear instantly seized my mind as he drew closer.
When his eyes rested on mine, fear.
As he drew closer, fear.
It was the fear of being in the presence of a higher life form. My bones shuddered and my body attempted to empty the soup we had been given earlier multiple times, but the feeling quickly faded after I broke eye contact with those burning red eyes.
"Follow."
He turned around and started moving deeper into the prison. We were pressed to follow him.
Eventually we were stopped outside of cells that looked exactly like the ones we had passed a minute ago, and the ones we had passed five minutes ago, and the ones that we passed right after entering this place.
All were empty, but at least this area was better lit.
We were forced into these cells.
Two people. One Cell.
They placed me with Elvia, as we were the only two women captured.
I guess the escort guards were too tired from the battle to notice me taking over the vessel from Lewis.
There was almost no room in the cell, there wasn't even space between the bars. The bars were so close together it might've been easier to make it a wall. The cell was… small, but that didn't stop me from finding a spot where I could sit comfortably.
Elvia did too, sitting beside me without saying a word. She just stared straight ahead, staring blankly at nothingness.
And so we waited.
For what? Who knew.
But it seemed we would have plenty of time to find out.
After some hours, another guard seemed to materialise in the hall; handing food through an opening slit in the bars. He was young, too young. He'd probably ran away from home to join the war. Courageous Kid.
He forced a smile at us as he handed the slop to us.
"I snuck some spice on it… hope you guys aren't allergic to Cavro…" He whispered.
What were they afraid of?
Why didn't they speak?
I eyed the brown and beige mash on the platter, suspicious of the food. After what happened, I wouldn't have taken any chances.
Suddenly, Elvia moved from the position she had been laying in since we got here, raising her hand above the food.
I could've sworn I could hear her heartbeat drumming faintly as she began to emit a glow of green and red.
A moment passed in silence as the glow strengthened, then faded into the darkness of the cell.
"The food is fine… I think… give me a few more moments to completely check." She remarked, grimacing at the slop.
I looked over at the guard. He was still there, but now he was looking at us with an expression of fear and wonder.
"What are you doing?" He asked, his voice full of curiosity, and caution.
"She's trying to find out if the food is poisoned or not. It seems safe enough, but I don't know about you." I replied, showing no concern for what the guard thought. As long as he stayed outside the cell, I wouldn't care.
"And no, we're not allergic to Cavro. Thanks for asking."
"Alright.." the guard says, still curious about what Elvia was doing, but getting my tone of 'kindly, screw off'.
I looked back over to Elvia, who was attempting to stare some colour into her food.
"It's a bit dry, but It's just palatable…" She mumbled.
She stared at the food for a few seconds, then looked up at me.
"There's no poison." She said, I could've sworn she sounded a little disappointed.
I nodded, and began to slowly eat. I filled my mind with fictional stories to distract myself from the horrid sliding sensation coming down my throat.
It didn't take long before I heard a groan coming from Elvia. She had noticed the uncomfortable feeling the food left.
"Guess we're both okay then." She said, not sounding happy about it.
We were both silent for a while after that, and soon fell asleep.
***
A few days passed like this. It was peaceful, if you ignored the rest of our circumstances.
***
I woke up with a groan, and tried to move. My body felt heavy, and I could feel my muscles were sore. I couldn't remember why, funny how just a few weeks ago I was feeling like my body could do anything.
Every day brought a new adventure to this eventful prison life.
Some days we would see… the sun!
For an hour, we would be able to see the light of day, and then the darkness of the prison would swallow us once more.
One day, we saw the moon; the guards had brought us out for a nightly walk. I assumed they didn't want us completely wasting away.
The moon was huge, hanging low in the sky, casting long shadows over the ground. The moon cast a soft glow across the walls of the prison, and the guard who walked through the area had to cover his eyes from the light.
The next day, there was a flock of birds.
They were large, black and white, and flew high above us, circling around the tower. Reminded me of the birds I saw from my home long ago.
What excitement would today bring?
..
I'm losing my mind.
Sleep is now a dream that floats out of reach, and the waking hours are like a broken record; Repeating and Repeating.
Lewis went into the Mental Plane and hasn't returned, stopping our brain from actually resting.
Days blended into weeks, and the weeks became months.
I never knew what time of the day it was, or how long we had been here. But I could tell that it was getting colder.
Winter was coming.
And so were the guards.