svíkja

My body quaked with pain as I slowly regained consciousness. My stomach was sore and my legs and arms felt limp. My long, ash brown hair spread across the floor. My eyes opened to a dark, empty room lit by only a few dim ceiling lights. The eerie aura of the room unsettled me. A door on the other side of the room provided an exit, but I didn’t have enough energy to even think of leaving. Exhausted and confused, I lay on the cold, hard, floor, attempting to regain the recent memories I had lost.

The most recent memory that flooded my brain was of Asher and me running, no, sprinting to safety. I remembered the two of us walking back to our current rebel base after hunting and collecting berries. However, that peaceful moment between the two of us ended abruptly when the sound of crunching leaves and the overlapping voices of men repeating words like, “We found them!” and “get them!” indicated that the animals were not the only ones being hunted. As fear and concern boiled in me, Asher quickly turned to me and told me to run. We dropped our game and ran off. Not too long after running from our predators, I remembered strong, unfamiliar hands gripping my body, and then darkness. The rest—where I was, who was after us, and what they wanted from me and Asher—remained a mystery to me. As consciousness reached me in a more swift manner, I pushed myself up into a sitting position and a soft grunt escaped my voice. I looked down at my scarlet tunic, covered in dust and dirt, looking for any serious injuries, but none were found, thankfully. Before I got a chance to observe my surroundings a bit more carefully, I heard a weak, yet familiar voice calling my name.

“Cerise, Cerise.” I quickly turned my head to see Asher, a few feet away, reaching for me. I started to crawl toward him, responding to his call. I didn’t get very far when I felt handcuffs tugging on my wrists, forcing me to stay put.

With fear in my eyes, I looked at Asher, handcuffed to the wall as well. He was covered in cuts and bruises, some more serious than others. My heart erupted with concern. My eyes locked with his. I stared into his deep, chocolate brown eyes.

“Oh my God, are you okay?” The words escaped my mouth.

“It’s okay, I’m okay,” Asher responded, trying to calm me down. A big, purpling bruise covered his right cheek and bloody scratches ran up his face and arms. It was clear that he put up a better fight against those men than I did.

Asher was always a strong fighter. True, he didn’t take much joy in injuring others, but when he had someone or something to protect, he protected them with his life.

“Where are we? Who did this?” I asked with caution, expecting the worst.

“Something tells me you don’t want to know.” He answered me with a look of dread and pain on his face.

Before he got an answer out of his mouth, our small conversation was interrupted by the sound of a door creaking open, followed by malicious laughter. Soft footsteps approached Asher and me. We both whipped our heads around to see who it was. From out of the shadows, an all too familiar face was revealed to me.

“Linden.” I addressed him with disgust in my voice.

“Cerise!” Excitement boomed in Linden’s voice. “It’s been a while.”

“What do you want with us?”Although my voice projected courage, tears were not too far from flooding from my grey eyes.

I was not happy to be here and I was sure Asher was dreading this even more than I was considering his poor condition. Linden was the corrupt king of Aspium. For decades, the rebels had been trying to overthrow him and restore freedom to the people. He took advantage of his subjects and wasn’t afraid of threatening them with violence.

I was born into the rebellion, and ever since I learned about the war, I hadn’t stopped fighting. I took up potion-making as a hobby at an early age, and when that hobby turned into a profession, the rebellion gained quite an advantage. I had no doubt that this whole encounter had something to do with the fact that our last battle left Linden with thousands of severely wounded men.

“In case it escaped your mind,” Linden continued, “Your little rebellion left me with scraps for soldiers, and to be quite honest, you’re the only one I was hoping for, but instead, this idiot...” He turned to Asher’s limp body, still lying on the ground, and forced a strong kick into his stomach. “He had to play hero and try to save the girl, but that didn’t work out too well, now did it?”

My eyes shifted to Asher, and that’s when the tears began to pour down. He let out a loud groan of pain, gripping his stomach. He attempted to shift his body away from Linden, but that didn’t prevent the blow from Linden’s leg.

“Please don’t do this,” I begged Linden in a soft, breaking voice. At this point, I didn’t care what happened to me, but I couldn’t sit and watch the only person I was certain I loved in pain and silently screaming for help.

Ignoring my plea, Linden’s olive-green eyes stared into mine. He continued, “Let’s make a deal. If you stay with me and craft a potion powerful enough to strengthen my men and free them from their misery, I’ll let Asher go, and after the deed is done, I might even let you go, well, if you even want to go back.”

So that’s what he was doing. Not only did he need me to make a potion, but he wanted me to join his side completely.

“No!” I instantly replied to his offer without pondering the situation. Hot tears streamed down my face. A soft, red tint began to invade my eyes, bringing out the blues and greys in them. I couldn’t betray the rebellion, let alone Asher. If I did, Asher would hate me and probably never forgive me. I probably wouldn’t forgive myself. I couldn’t live with that.

Linden reacted to my response with a harsh slap to my face. The blow was hard enough to make my cheek feel like it was set aflame. The taste of metal invaded my mouth. I touched my finger to my lips and observed the thick, crimson substance.

This wasn’t my first encounter with Linden. I already knew he took pride in torturing others. He would do anything to make sure everyone knew that he had power over them, even if that meant killing innocents. In fact, I was surprised he didn’t bestow upon me any fatal injuries. Not only was I surprised, but I was confused. He must have been begging me for help.

My face cowered away from his as he knelt down in front of me and gripped my chin, ensuring that we made eye contact. “I hope you realize that right now, I can do whatever I want to you,” he threatened me. “You can say ‘no’ as many times as you’d like, but that won’t prevent me from torturing you to insanity.”

I responded to him in a weak voice. “You’re a monster.”

“We all are, Cerise,” he whispered into my ear.

Linden let go of his grip on my chin and began pacing around the room. My eyes swept back onto Asher, making sure he was okay, but at this point, I couldn’t tell. The tears continued to drip down my face. He was definitely still alive, but his body faced away from me. I wouldn't have been surprised if he was unconscious by now. My head turned back to Linden’s attention as he continued to attempt to convince me.

“You know, as much fun I would have torturing you...” he said with a twisted grin. He began to approach me again. “How much easier would this all be if I just killed you, right here, right now?”

My heart began to beat violently inside my chest as he knelt back in front of me and positioned a silver dagger in front of my heart. He gripped the mahogany handle with strength, but fear did not consume me.

“Do it, kill me and see what that does for you, DO IT!” I yelled at him with the courage of a thousand lions.

“If that dagger goes through my heart, you don’t get your precious potion, all your men die, and I’m quite certain the rebellion will do just fine without me, so if this will make things easier, then do it, Linden, kill me.”

“No, please, Cerise, don’t do this,” Asher’s faint voice expressed only pain and suffering. I could tell that he wanted to get up and defend me, but he could barely breathe.

The smile on Linden’s face immediately melted away. He took the dagger away from my heart and grazed my cheek and arm with with enough force to break my skin. A soft yelp escaped my voice. Stings of pain escaped the cuts. However, I knew Linden would not stop until he won.

His eyes shifted from me to Asher, and he began to approach him. I immediately charged toward him on my way to defend Asher, but nothing could be done on my part when the harsh tug of handcuffs begged me to stay put. I collapsed back onto the ground, praying that Asher and I would make it out alive.

Linden forced Asher’s helpless body up, held him in a limp, standing position, and raised the dagger up to his throat. “If you’re so hell-bent on dying, then we should have no problem sending him to a better place.” Linden wasn’t playing around anymore.

Panic erupted from my heart, “NO! NO, PLEASE, NO!” I was breaking. I couldn’t lose Asher. If I lost Asher, I would have lost myself. I didn’t care about anything else anymore except saving him. I pulled myself toward the two, expecting the handcuffs to shatter each time I attempted to yank free. Drops of blood fell from my cheek onto the floor.

“What’s it going to be, Cerise?” Linden continued to taunt me in a booming voice. “Your potion, or his life?” Out of energy, I dropped back onto the ground, sobbing. Blood and tears dripped from my face. I tried to think of a way out of this, a way to get both Asher and me out, but Linden was right. It was my potion or his life.

“I w-will do a-anything you ask.” My broken voice was barely audible as my face stared at the ground. “Just please l-let Asher go.”

I begged for his life, even though I knew Linden would agree perfectly with my decision. Linden had an evil grin back on his face.

“Good.” He dropped Asher’s body and started towards me with his dagger still in hand while a group of guards pushed Asher out of the room and out of my sight. I didn’t know what Linden was about to do to me, but as long as Asher was okay, I was too. I let out a grunt as he slammed my right forearm on the floor and went to work with his dagger. As the blade sunk into my skin, unexplainable terror erupted from the wound. I tried to stay strong and silent, but I couldn’t help but let out a small yell, which grew and grew until I let out piercing shrieks of pain. I refused to look at it; the sight of blood spewing from a wound never sat well with me. When Linden was done with his carving, he got up and walked towards the door. Before he exited the room, he looked towards me and smirked. “Welcome home, Cerise.”

TO BE CONTINUED