|Little Red|
The wolf brought me back to his cave once Angelica deemed me fit to return. I don't know if it's just my paranoia, or the medication but I suddenly felt like I could sleep for weeks. And that made me feel fear. Before the drugs could kick in, and I could fall asleep unguarded, I had to ask the wolf for a favor. If he'd humor me.
It's worth the try.
I don't trust myself sleeping next to him.
"Wait." My voice was timid but weak. So weak, those drugs were taking over.
"What is it, my mate?"
I gulped, feeling my throat tighten as though someone had shoved something thick into it. "I can't sleep next to you. In my customs, until we're married, and I trust you, I sleep alone in a separate room." An obvious lie if I've ever seen anyone but I couldn't think of anything else.
His expression shifted to showcase pain. Like I hit him with a brick, and my stupid heart had the audacity to gallop against my chest. I was being betrayed by my body. But fuck them, I am stronger in the mind. I worried my lower lip and awaited his response. He'd possibly say no, and force me to his bed.
Are all men like this? I can't say that. Because back at the dynasty prison we had female guards too, and let me tell you- fear women more.
Whatever men can do, the women can do better. Which is a bad thing. The warden was the monster amongst all of them. Because he permitted those things to happen.
Too many rape. Too many beatens, and disgusting acts of punishments.
I shivered, and again my traitorous body showed its colors by leaning my head against the wolf's chest. He carried me in a bridal position.
I hate that I'm finding his warmth comforting. This is how dumb girls die. They fall in lust with monsters.
My cousin told me that. I live by those words.
"Okay, we'll give you your own room until you can trust me enough to share mine."
I blinked rapidly, trying to process his response. Did he just say-
That I could….
To prove that I wasn't dreaming, he turned away from his bedroom door and continued down the hall to another.
"You're really going to let me sleep by myself?"
He frowned, his face contorting into an even handsome expression. Who knew you could be good looking even while you were annoyed?
"Yes. I'm not that bad of a person. I need you to rest. I'm not saying I like the arrangement, but it'll do for now. I'll check on you every hour. What do you like to eat?"
"I can't have meat!" I quickly said. My stomach feeling queasy from his earnest confession. He admitted he doesn't like putting me in a different room, but he's willing to do. Yet he won't set me free? I swear, this one man is the most confusing person I know.
He stepped into the room, and I got a view of where I would be staying. The window was in a similar spot, but this room was almost empty aside from the nest. Like bed.
I didn't comment, because this is still better than sleeping on the floor. He laid me down as softly as he could, made sure my head felt comfortable and my neck didn't strain. When his arms left me, I felt chilly at first but I reminded myself that the only way out of this is to not forget my goal. Like the warden who wanted me for something, the wolf does too. I can't trust him. I can't trust anyone but myself.
He angled my feet so it faced upwards. Once the covers were draped over me, I allowed my body to absorb the exhaustion it's been feeling since I was taken to Angelica. My breathing evened out, and I slipped into slumber.
When my eyes came open I saw the cell against, and my chest ached to the point I couldn't breathe. I clutched my fingers together to brace myself for the ill feeling that coursed through my body.
The ghost of a shiver crawled up my spine. When I turned to the side, my cousin was there. She had a faint smile on her face.
"Do you remember when you were six and baba thought it would be a good idea to sing a song about how little girls are pedophile's favorite?"
I cringed, then bellowed out a laugh. My grandfather wanted me to avoid older men, and that song worked wonders as it scarred me for the first ten years of my life. I avoided being alone with a man older, and not related to me. Everytime I'd repeat the song in my head. My grandmother had asked what he was thinking when he came up with that song.
"Yeah, he said 'She's like a rose. You gotta protect her from all the weed'"
Eleana laughed hard, her stomach sucked in and out.
This can't be right. My brain started to pick up, slowly drifting from my panic. My cousin is dead. All of them are dead.
So this can't be real. Please, I don't want to wake and see that I'm still here with Mira's rotting corpse.
"Baba was crazy with his lessons. Remember when I said you should never fall for a monster?"
I moved my knees, and arched my back so could find a good sitting position. What memory is this? I remember my cell mates were Eleana, Mira, Mesa- Mira's twin- and Susan. Eleana's older sister. They swapped us out every time someone died. We were the last four in the family to stay together.
When I looked around the cage, the cell, I found that it was just me and Eleana.
Which leaves the question, what memory is this?
"Yes, I uh I remember when you told me that."
She laughs again, but this time it's clear that she's hurting from the tone of her voice. I reeled my eyes back to her. Her cuffs were gone.
"I fell in love, Lele."
My jaw met the floor. "W-what?" I managed to stutter out. Then my hands could move freely. My bindings were gone. This is clearly some sort of nightmare. Because this never happened, we never had this conversation. There is something definitely wrong here. "This is a trick, Eleana never fell in love."
"Sit still please. Let me get this out, I promise it can help you."
I was tense but I tried my best to listen. I don't understand my abilities. Sometimes, things don't make sense. I clutched my body. Holding my knees to my chest, and rocked my body back and forth.
"So, I fell in love. In this stupid place. You're the strongest out of all of us. It made me jealous. You stayed strong for years, refusing to eat any meat even though it pissed off the warden and people called you snobby and a princess." She had no spite in her tone. Only admiration.
"Okay?" Where is this going?
Eleana looked up, then she looked down. "I'm the only one who didn't go up, Lele."
That's not true. I bit my lip, and tried to remember the day she died. She was wheezing, going into some kind of shock though I can't figure out why that had happened. The guards dragged her out, she died before her legs left the cell. I never got to see her spirit leave, but I always assumed because of the others that she went up too.
Up to wherever. But I'm sure it's a better place.
"Why didn't you go up?"
"You remember, those weeks when I was dragged away and you didn't see me at all. Then I was suddenly brought back?"
I nod, of course I remember. It's hard to forget anything that happens at dynasty. When your entire life is out fo your control, you memorize even the detail of the walls.
She paused, as if asking me to really remember what she was talking about.
"Yes, I remember. I can't forget those days."
"Now do you remember when that stopped and I was in the cell with you guys every freaking day, there were no more breaks where you didn't see me. And every week the warden demanded I be-"
"Stop!" I shout, nausea creeps up my throat. "Where are you going with this? I remember all…" my throat clamped, and I felt bile reach up to my tongue. I held it in.
The vivid image of Eleana's punishments could not be forgotten.
She was forced to eat…..
"Yeah, you remember that was after I gave birth to a boy?"
Of course. The warden's hatred whenever he got a male child was crossing the line of inhumane. But what am I saying, he's scattered that line ages ago.
How could one man be worse than the devil?
"Well, that was the warden's baby."
Now I know this is dream. I laugh, "The warden doesn't impregnate. He leaves that to his prisoners." The prisoners who were here for theost heinous crimes committed. Their cells were on the other side of the building, away from us. They got to eat three times a day while we ate three times a week.
"I know. But he took my virginity, and somehow I fell in love with him."
I winced, and shuffled far until my back slammed against the wall. "no. That…." I gripped my hair. "That would the stupid. You can't love…." Ugh, my throat was fighting hard to keep me from hurling. Fuck.
There's no way.
I'm being messed with. It's the medication.
Or my eyes, they're a curse after all so maybe-
"Lele, listen to me! I'm trying to tell you what I took to my fucking grave. I fell in love, or I attached myself to the warden. He never let anyone else touch me. He took me to his home. I met his family. Those days I was away I was experiencing life. And he promised me marriage if I had a girl for him. That was what I wanted. I was going to abandon the whole family if that child had been a girl. But it was a boy. Then my dreams crumbled, and-"
She broke into sobs and I felt ice flowing through my veins.
If this is just a dream, why does it feel…. Feel like it's the truth? Like Eleana reached out to me from beyond the grave so that she could confess. So that the guilt could let up.
She was going to abandon us? For the warden…..
The warden…..
The man who took our freedom. The man who made us slaves for his personal amusement. The man who made us tools to be siphoned for war.
She fell in love….. with him. And if she'd birthed a girl, she would have turned away from us. Turned a blind eye, and gone off to live happily ever after.
While we rotted.
"Lele, say something." Her hand stretched out to touch my feet, and as if she were a leech I shot up.
"Don't touch me." My chest was failing as my lungs expanded, trying to force air in.
How does one breathe? I bent to plant my hands on my knees. Sucking in a heavy gulps of oxygen.
"Lele, I'm sorry. I fucked up. I was ….. I wanted anything but this. And he loved me. I swear he did until-"
"WHY ARE YOU EVEN HERE?! WHAT DO YOU WANT?! MY FORGIVENESS?"
I'm going to be sick from just looking at her. Mira at least tried to cling to life for my sake, even though the pain would have made it so much worse if she lived but she tried. Susan got her throat crushed, and could no longer speak all for the sake of prolonging Mesa's life. And Mesa, she volunteered to be the weapon when the warden first heard of the werewolves. He wanted to use Eleana, but Eleana was my age at the time. She was too young. She'd have died. Mesa returned wounded with a chunk of her body missing. The warden allowed us to watch her bleed to death.
"How could you do that?"
Eleana couldn't look at me anymore. I can see guilt as it wrote itself all over her face.
How do I get out of this nightmare? I can't…. be next to this thing.
Let this be a bad dream. Let's this be my mind making stories up.
"I'm sorry, Lele. But I came to warn you, because my soul is attached to the dynasty prison. Stay away from the berries, and the warden will never see you. Just don't go anywhere towards the entrance. He's planning on searching the outer part of the forest. You're the only one who's ever escaped, I just want you to-"
"Save it. If you're the real Eleana, and you reached me from the dead then you need to stay the fuck away from me. You're attached to the prison for a reason. Who knows if the warden can use the dead."
"Lele, please. I'm trying to rewrite my wrongs."
"You were going to abandon done us." Can she not see hot wrong that is? How can she think that it could be fixed?
I'm not even upset at her for making the wrong choice of falling in love. The gods will smite me first before I make that same mistake.
She wanted to teach me a lesson. Oh I've learnt alright. Love is an emotion that turns you blind from your morals.
I'm no genius, but I'm certainly not a fool.