by Jade White
A hand grabbed her wrist; she jumped from reflex, sending a fresh wave of pain down her back.
“Hold still,” he said as he inserted a key into her manacles. With a click they opened, and she nearly collapsed. He grabbed her, and gently dragged her over to a cot. There was a small table with water and bread on it. He laid her down, covered her naked torso with a blanket and sat down next to her. She got a clear look at him for the first time; older, perhaps in his thirties, long black hair, a thick beard, and dark brown eyes.
“Why,” she started before coughing, “why are you doing this?”
“You must renounce who you were to the inquisition, only then can you be free from the guilt of being a heretic.”
Reign had seen enough movies to know how this went, so she decided to skip ahead. “Okay, done, I’m a heretic, what’s next?”
“If only it were that simple, you see, you must believe what you are saying. Now, get some rest, he will be back soon, and you need your strength, after all, you can’t convert while you still resist.”
She was so tired, her back hurt, her muscles were numb from holding herself up. She tried to stay awake, but as he stood, she sipped into unconsciousness.
“Again,” her captor said, and the whip cracked on her back. It seemed like it had been days since she awoke here, days of torture and deprivation. The small cot held only enough warmth for her to fall asleep after she was whipped, the food held just enough calories to keep her going; she was no closer to finding an escape.
She stood now, wrists crossed above her head, legs braced, as the lash fell on her back. She screamed after the fourth one, and the tenth, her tears started on the fourteenth; after the twentieth she was sobbing uncontrollably, begging them to stop.
“She’s almost ready, I think, sire,” her torturer said to the mysterious lord who watched her day and night.
“Do you renounce who you were?”
Reign started to say yes, she would almost say anything to get them to stop, but something held her tongue. What had Loptr said, don’t get lost in the world. At the time, what seemed forever ago, she thought the fade would be a magical realm she wouldn’t want to leave, but now, she was ready to say anything to get them to stop whipping her.
“Renounce your village, your faith, tell us where your warriors are hiding, and we will stop. You can sleep in a real bed, eat real food, just say yes.” He was close to her now, almost whispering in her ear.
She’d said this the first day, and wanted to say it again, after all she didn’t mean it. Or did she? If she said what the man wanted, if she said it enough to mean it, then didn’t she? Would she trade her old life for this one, just to get the pain to stop? Reign had never taken the easy way to anything. She worked two jobs since she was fourteen to pay for her college, she studied the hardest subjects, fell in love with the most difficult instrument to master, for Pete’s sake, she was in love with a werewolf, being tortured by a reject from a Nazi film.
No, I will not give up.
She pulled violently on her manacles. “Fuck you,” she spat at him.
“It’s a pity, you have spirit, but the truth is, you’re going nowhere, so either you renounce your life, or stay here and get whipped, either way, you die soon.” She could hear the smile in his voice. It angered her, angered her beyond reason, that anyone should endure such suffering, that the woman she was, or the girl she used to be, was just a piece in a puzzle in someone else's scheme.
She wasn’t a wolf, she was just a human; she had no special powers, but she had her mind, her will, her desire to live, and nothing to lose here.
With a sudden burst of energy, she stuck one foot on the wall and pulled at her manacles with all her might. She strained as her muscles protested, but her mind was set; she put aside her pain, her worry, and focused on the seething rage that boiled under the surface. Her jailers laughed, until the pike holding her manacles to the wall gave way in a shower of dust and mortar.
They stopped laughing. Reign stood with a six-inch spike in her hand, facing two men who were not expecting a fight. For the first time, she got a good look at them. They were not warriors, not even workers, they were soft, unused to the rigors of life, protected by the walls of their castle.
Her cell door was locked, and the only weapon they had was the whip.
He tried to use it, arching the whip high to bring it down on her. She charged forward; the whip cracked, and she felt her face bleed. She drove the spike into his skull and he dropped with a scream, clutching his face and writhing on the floor.
She held her hands out as she stepped over the twitching body of the torturer. “Unlock me, or you end up like him.”
The lord was pale as a ghost. “You cannot escape, there are guards and servants, you have no idea where you are.”
Reign advanced on him, bloody makeshift weapon held high to strike again. The lord backed away from her until he hit the cell door. “Please, I have a family.”
She paused, her anger wavered for just a second. “And you think I don’t?”
She slammed the spike down. He lifted his arms to block it, the spike stabbed his forearm, he screamed. She hit him again, this time it sunk into his neck, ending his scream with a gurgle. He slid down the bars, a look of incredulity as his life's blood flowed out of him.
He was dead before he hit the ground. With no time to examine the lives she just took, Reign searched his body. Under his robes was a key ring, and she tried several before she found the one that freed her wrists, then several more before the cell door opened.
Other than the whip, they had no weapons, and she had no idea how to use a whip. She found her tunic, shredded and bloody; it barely covered her breasts. She ripped some cloth from their breeches and tightened the strips around her chest, to make her look less like a woman. Unfortunately, her ancestor, or dream version of herself, looked very much like a woman, and it was hard to hide that fact.
She pulled his cloak off and put it on, tied the collar closed and arranged the hood so it was low on her face. If she was careful in the way she walked, she could fool someone at a distance. She had to move, her burst of energy was fading and the malnutrition she had suffered was sapping her strength.
Once out of her cell she found the main door, which led to a set of stairs up to a main hallway. It really was some sort of dungeon; cell doors lined the hall on either side.
She quickly moved down the hall, she could hear the moans and cries of other prisoners. One of the cell doors groaned as it opened behind her, she ignored it and kept walking. She could hear the jangling of keys as the man locked the door. By the time he was done, she was up the next set of stairs.
Her stomach nearly heaved when she got to the top; she had to put one hand on the wall to support herself. The smell of warm bread and meat wafted through the air. With a loud growl she was sure would alert everyone to her position, her stomach let her know she needed to eat.
The door opened to an archway, which led to a courtyard. There was a keep across the way, castle walls, a barracks, some stables and horses. The guard would be coming behind her any second. She couldn’t wait and see, she had to make a decision. There was a low building, with a chimney, away from the keep; some chickens were kept in cages outside of it, that had to be the kitchen.
It was late in the day and the shadows were long and dark. Reign decided to risk the direct approach, and headed straight for the kitchen. She walked with a slow, deliberate stride, that belayed the terror she felt. If they caught her, they would certainly kill her-or worse.
The trek across the way was brief, and thankfully, no one saw her. Once at the door, she slipped inside. First thing's first, she needed some real food; her stomach was so loud she was sure the guards could hear it on the battlements. A dozen loaves of bread stood on the counters cooling in the afternoon air.
She grabbed the first one and tore into it. The taste was heavenly, rough, course, but flavorful, not at all like the bread she was used to. While w
olfing down bite after bite, she rifled through the kitchen for a bag, found a smock, tied it together on its ends, and stuffed all the bread she could find in it.
Once that was done, she looked around for some clothes; there wasn’t much, but an old cook’s tunic replaced the shredded one. Food in hand, she went out the back and froze. She was in a castle, no idea how to get out, and they would be looking for her soon. She took a moment to examine her surroundings carefully. What she needed was a diversion, something to keep them busy until she could find a way out.
CHAPTER NINE
The stables were not far from the kitchen, and in the failing light no one paid attention to the serving girl carrying a bucket from the kitchen to the stables. After all, the horses needed to be fed.
Reign wasn’t carrying apple cores or carrot peels, though, she had a bucket of hot coals. She used the few moments needed to walk along the walls to the stables to plan her escape. Once the commotion started, she would slip along the opposite wall, away from the well and the kitchen, to the main gate, across the drawbridge and out into the fields. Once there, she could find her way home, and to Richard.
That thought stopped her cold. This wasn’t real. Richard was real, her love for him, her baby, those were real. This was a waking dream that was trying to convince her it was real. She didn’t need to find Richard, she needed to find the spell that was holding her hostage, that was keeping the baby from being born.
How? I don’t even know what it looks like.
In the meantime, she decided to continue with her plan as before, dump the hot coals into the hay, and get the hell out. The haystack went up far quicker than she could imagine; one second, nothing, the next it was seven feet of raging flames and heat. She dropped the bucket and ran. The alarm followed, the commotion was massive. Every door opened, every available person came to fight the fire. They had no organization, no hierarchy; everyone simply grabbed a bucket or threw dirt on it. She used the confusion to slip away.
The main door was within sight; she could see the drawbridge was down, the portcullis was up, and no guards were present. She couldn’t see the whole of the bridge, though, but she decided to risk it. After all, the castle was on fire, no one would be standing by doing nothing while that happened.
Terrified that someone was behind her, and near out of her mind with fear from being whipped again, Reign ran for it. Her bare feet dug into the dirt as she charged for the gate. Too late she saw the guard. She slammed into him at near full speed. He didn’t budge, she bounced off and onto her ass.
“Sorry miss, I didn’t see you...hey,” his kind words turned to alarm.
Fear ran through her veins like an icy claw. If she were caught, she would be held until she died. There would be no second escape. She had to silence him. No sooner had she thought of this, than she felt a rush of energy, her skin tingled and her skin flushed. The guard started to scream then clapped his own hands over his mouth. His eyes widened in fear as he looked at Reign. She didn’t stop to think too hard, she got up and ran. The bread had given her energy and she used it.
She ran until the sky turned from pink to grey to black. A sliver of silver rose into the sky offering poor illumination. The countryside was hilly, with sparse copses of trees in between massive farms. Once the fire was under control, and the prisoner reported missing, the first place they would check would be the farms, and then the trees. She figured whoever ruled this land was
pretty ruthless to whip a nineteen-year-old girl to near death, so the farmers probably weren’t the helping sort.
Up ahead she spied a ravine, at least the lip of one, beyond it the soft glow of fire light. With the prospect of heat, she realized how cold she was. At some point after the sunset, and the immediate danger passed, Reign went from warm to freezing. She was shivering, her fingers ached, and her feet were numb. Perhaps she could trade some of her bread for a spell at the fire.
Not without caution, she crept up on the ravine with all the stealth she could muster. After escaping the castle and running in the wild for an hour, she was near exhausted, but managed to stay quiet.
The fire burned low, several men sat on stumps around it, mugs of ale in one hand, bows on the ground next to them. A wild animal turned slowly on the spit.
As she was about to make her way down, a hand grabbed her from behind and dragged her to her feet. Unwillingly, the large man held her off the ground and marched back to the campsite.
“Well, boys, looks like tonight’s entertainment has arrived.”
Reign’s body jumped and writhed on the couch, Richard leaped to her side; he patted her head, whispering to her that it would be all right.
“Is this normal Loptr?” He gestured to her. Sweat beaded on her forehead, small cries of pain slipped from her lips.
“There is no normal with the Fade, she’s in a world that the spirits decide to make for her, they will do their best to convince her of its authenticity, and the moment she believes with her heart, she’s lost forever.”
Richard turned back to his love. His heart sank, small welts formed on her shoulders, she was being hurt, and there was nothing he could do to help her. Her fate was in her hands. He stormed to the kitchen, found a bucket and filled it with ice water. Armed with a rag and water he returned to her side, and used the rag to mop the sweat from her brow, and keep her cool. The whole time whispering to her that he loved her.
“You truly love this mortal, do you?”
“With all the pieces of my heart.” He couldn’t say it without tears spilling on his cheeks. Never before in his thousand years of life had he loved anyone so deeply so madly, as he loved Reign.
“You can do this darling,” Richard whispered to her. “You are strong, smart, clever, and you can beat this. Hang in there.”
In the Fade, Reign could hear none of this, she could only hear the barbarians who had captured her quarrelling over ‘who got to go first’, and she could only assume that meant who got to rape her first. The thought sent a chill up her spine and icy claws down her skin. They’d bound her hands behind her, and staked her to the cold ground. The fire was too far away for her to feel, and her hands and arms were already going numb.
Come on girl, think. There has got to be away out of this.
She would give anything for her Taser, to teach these heathens what’s what.
Wait, I keep doing this, I keep thinking this is real. Loptr said that it was a dream, a shadow of what was, then if this is a dream, it’s the worst one I’ve ever had.
The largest fellow, the one who captured her, settled the argument by smashing his fist into the face of his rival. He turned and smiled a lecherous grin at the girl.
“I’m gonna enjoy you,” he grunted as he moved toward her, discarding pieces of armor and clothing along the way. Reign cringed, she could smell him from here, and if he was going to defile her, she doubted it would stop with him. She panicked, started kicking her feet, pulling at the stake, anything to break free. She simply wasn’t strong enough.
Wearing just his breeches, he dropped down to the ground next to her. He started pulling at her clothes, freeing her breasts; he pulled her hair with one hand and leaned down to force a kiss on her.
This isn’t real, this isn’t real.
The fear was, the panic was, the feeling of his hand pulling at her hair was real. For a heartbeat, Reign wavered on belief. What if this wasn’t a dream, but a real world, and she had been transported into it. Her resolve crumbled and as she was about to start screaming in panic she remembered something.
The bridge, the guard at the bridge. If this is a dream, then I can control it.
There was a massive snap of electricity, the barbarian screamed as he flew across the camp. The bonds on Reign hands disintegrated, she stood, rubbed her wrists and glared at the others.
“Play time's over, leave.”
They looked to their leader, smoldering unconscious against the rocks, and they left. It was a dream, and she could control it.
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In the real world, her body relaxed, the sweat stopped and her breathing slowed down.
“Is she okay?”
“She either accepted it as a dream or that it’s real, we won’t know unless she wakes up, prepare yourself, Richard, I told you, magic has a price, and it’s hers to pay.”
The remaining bandits looked torn between charging her and running away. She held her hand out, electricity arced between her fingers. “Choose wisely,” she said.
They ran.
Reign smiled to herself, as a little girl she used to fly in her dreams, like Peter Pan. Now all she had to do was find the source of the magic inflicting her, destroy it, and she could go home. Reign focused her thoughts. She thought of Richard, the baby, of whoever or whatever was keeping her from giving birth. A trail of light appeared in front of her, it headed in the direction she came from, back to the castle.
