"Enchantments," Jason said in a voice I have never heard him speak in his life. He was too weak; his voice had left him. Jason crawled towards the cage and placed his arms on it but not through it like I had done. "Brenda, why are you here?"
I stared down at Jason in utter disbelief. What was happening to him? What would become of him if he were to spend even a single more day in this place? "Jason, are you there?"
"You need to leave," he whimpered. "This place is no place for the likes of you."
"Well the likes of me have not crawled through mud, evaded two guards I've never seen in my life, and walked down this cursed gutters just to be told to leave by the very person she has come to meet. Understand?"
Jason did not seem to be listening. Even though he was this close, it felt as if his consciousness was worlds away. "Why don't they just kill me?"
"No one will kill you. Dominic would never hurt you. What had happened there was just a misunderstanding that you took too far. Believe me, Dominic understands and now he is considering taking you out." Jason did not respond so I continued to urge a response out of him. "That means no hanging, no stoning, no burning alive, no drowning, no expelling, no nothing. PLEASE FOR GOD'S SAKE Jason LISTEN TO ME!" I screamed and lost it. I held Jason's prison bar so tight my knuckles ceased to receive blood.
Jason looked up at me. It was the first time he had made eye contact since I came down here. "It's calling to me."
"What is?" I inquired. Has he finally lost his mind? I have been here barely three hours and I have already screamed out of control because I knew that there was no way I would scream at Jason when in my right senses. Not to talk of Jason who has been here for more than seven hours because as at the time he was locked, the day had just already gone dark and I had waited for everyone to fall asleep before I made my move which took an incredibly long time because wolves were not the kind for night sleep. What more the damage that had been inflicted on Jason's soul? Weirdly enough, my mind went to the man in the other cell, the one that had gifted me this glowing orb of fire. How long had he been here? And how much of his mind had he had left? I shifted the position that I sat in to enhance my leg's blood flow. I tried to reach out to Jason again: "What is calling to you, Danny?"
Jason smiled a disturbing smile and pointed his finger deep into his cell. As if it had read my mind, the flaming orb increased its brightness, and deep in the corner of the cell, was a naked woman who was bone thin and who peered at Jason with a wicked smile and clutched a sharp bone. I covered my mouth to suppress a scream. A drop of water fell from the ceiling of the donjon and splashed on my flaming orb. It was not enough to quench it, but it dimmed it temporarily, and when it regained its strength, I stared back at the woman, she was gone with no trace of her even being there. I looked back down at Jason to still see him pointing, and on looking back at what he pointed, I saw a bone that had decayed in such a precise fashion it resembled a knife, complete with a sharp blade and a safe-to-hold handle. To my imagination, the bone resembled the one the woman I saw just seconds ago held. I told myself that that was false. There was no way I had examined that bone so closely to know that it was the same one. I had only seen the woman for a mere split second before my light went dark. Still, to think that Jason wanted to end his life, just, to me, confirmed any suspicion that this place was indeed cursed somehow.
"Dan, you will do no such thing," I warned him.
"What's the point? What is there worth fighting for anyway?"
"There are still things worth fighting for." Something came to my mind to say but I pushed it aside. I was not going to say that. I searched around my heart for a better alternative but none came. Seeing that none was coming anytime soon, I said what I had in mind. "There is me. You still love me, don't you? I am not valuable enough for you to fight for?" that should have done the trick of bringing Jason back to reality, I thought.
Jason laughed. A laugh not very different from what the other prisoner had laughed at. Soon enough, a corresponding laugh came from way down the aisle. It was the other prisoner. His laugh, though alike to that of Jason, suggested a different feeling that was not anger, fear, or a desperation to leave here. It was encouragement and approval. Jason slammed his arm against the bar and pulled back, wincing in pain but still laughing. "What are you that I will waste my time fighting for you?! What are you?!"
I was taken aback, refusing to believe my ears. The anger that had been long brewing inside my blood finally shot up and I yelled back. "I hate you! You should have just died!"
Jason banged against his cage again with the last amount of strength he had in his body. The pain he was feeling from the enchantment was evident on his face. But still, he shot back: "You bloody untransmutable being! You are as useless as a whore in a human's brothel!"
That was the final nail in the coffin for him and I decided to hurt him as much as I could with as many words as possible since he was too senseless to recognize when someone truly cared. Not like I ever did. "I said I hate you! I never loved you! All the times we talked, I always pretended to care because I did not want you to feel like the shit that you are!" I was very furious now and I wanted to take it all out on the traitor wolf that so deservedly laid before me in the freezing cage with no coat, no food, and no water. "No girl in the pack will ever choose you! Not even if you stood side by side with Aariv's skeleton! I wished Samantha had killed you! You are a traitor! I will always pick Dominic over you! You know what? I have already chosen him over you a long time ago and every night, I tell him about all the deepest things you share with me with a laugh in my tone, a pleasurable smile on my face, while I moan to his cunnilingus which he gives very perfectly well! I will never in a thousand years leave all of that for you! You, you dirty lone traitor wolf! Just answer that call and do the world a favor!"
It was not until I was done that I realized just how loud I had been and how my voice echoed badly around the place. So much so, that the words I had said sentences ago still lingered in the cave before they disappeared. Jason did not respond. He laid back down in silence and never said a word again. I, too, did not try to convince him to listen to me again. My loud echoes finally dissipated away and as if fuelled by it, the flaming orb that glowed beside me went off completely, leaving in its place smoke. I stood up from the icy floor and began my walk back out of the way from whence I came. I felt a pang of hatred towards Jason. He was a fool, he was selfish, he never thought past his next move, his head never functioned well, and he was delusional for thinking he was going to be Alpha. If he was ever to be Alpha over any pack, they would slaughter him for his stupid leadership skills. I was not and never will be ready to be led by a person like that. As I walked past the maze, past all the obstacles I had gone through to get to Jason, I felt the heat in my heart diminishing but not quite quenching. I continued to curse: Jason was conceited, he was arrogant, he was jealous, he was… he was… Jason was… Jason was my friend, the anger had emptied out completely the moment I stepped out of the cave and was back to the open air. I could not find the hate anymore and it feared me. Back in the donjon, I could swear that I hated Jason, but now, I did not anymore. I turned around to go back but decided against it. There was no assurance I would be lucky a second time so I went back to my room.
As I lay down on the bed, I recalled everything that had just happened minutes ago. I and Jason had gotten into a fight and we both had said some terrible things to each other. But what I said to him was worse not just in the sense of its magnitude, but considering our current environment. I was up here, if I needed support I'd run to Dominic or Aariv and they'd say something comforting and even though I did not like the fact that he brought up my inability to transmute, I knew it was true. However, he was down there, in a place as cursed as hell itself, I was sure of it. If not, why did I get the feeling that I would go there? Why did I feel things I've never felt before towards Jason and once I got out, those feelings disappeared? The things I said still floated in my head and I was wishing desperately now that I had not said it. Who was to support him now after what I had said? I had even lied and told him that I laid with Dominic and laughed about the things he told me. Why would I ever say a thing like that? What demon had possessed me to do it? I prayed silently that somehow, anyhow, Jason could just hear my voice telling him that I had not meant any of those things I had said. To make it more achievable, I whispered out loud "Jason, I'm sorry. I didn't mean any of those words I said. Some of them were not even true. All of them were not true!" a lump grew in my throat and I was finding it even more difficult to talk. Even with my apologies, the burden of my words did not go away, as a matter of fact, they amplified. Especially the last ones: 'Just answer that call and do the world a favor!' No, no, no. No one deserved to be told a thing like that not to mention Jason who had been such a good friend I had confided my entire life and feelings to and he had not for one day judged me. The eerie force that operated down there was enough to kill a man, not to talk of when that man had developed suicidal thoughts and was on the brink of executing it and was now urged by the woman he loved he was doing the world a favor if he acted on that thought.
I could not bear to think of all of this anymore. If peradventure it was announced tomorrow that Jason had taken his life while in the dungeon n people would think that he did it as a cowardly attempt to escape his trial whereby they would have no idea that he had done it because I had urged him to do it. If Jason dies in the donjon, I am to be blamed, but no one will know and I will have to live with that guilt and scar for the rest of my life.
With that, I buried my head in my pillow and shed tears, accepting the fact that I was a bad person who could not even support a friend when he needed it even though he had always supported me when I needed it.
Towards the end of the night, I had barely slept and my eyes were burning red. I turned restlessly and thought continuously all night until eventually my body tired out and my mind weakened. Only then, with a heavy heart, did I finally fall asleep.