Trapped with a Way Out

by Jeffery Martinez

  Rage gripped William, and she shoved the basin and water dish so they smashed against the wall, and water splattered everywhere. As soon as the porcelain shattered the ghost light and reflection of the Sea Witch disappeared, and regular, humble water dripped off the bed and the nightstand.

  William stood there for several minutes, too overwhelmed to move.

  No… no, it couldn't be… they agreed… they shook hands, and everything… William picked the hand with the tattoos, not the scythe…

  'Whose blood do you think these tattoos are made of?' the Sea Witch had asked.

  William felt ill. No, it couldn't be, how… she'd planned this all from the beginning…?

  William shook her head furiously. No, it couldn't be. It wasn't true! William wouldn't let it be true. If the pain in her heart would cause her to die, then she'd suppress it with her willpower—

  William tried to take a step and the pain was so great she buckled. She tried again, but once again she fell to her knees.

  She crawled on her knees away from the nest of blankets and tried again, determined that she would use her own willpower to suppress Linda's blood. It had to be imaginary—it had to be! Maybe this was a dream—like those terrible, terrible fever dreams and nightmares she often had, when she was back under the sea and in Linda's lair and the monsters from the deep were sinking their teeth into her mum and her dad and her flesh…

  No, focus, William. That was then. This is now. Right now, right in front of her, was a smooth polished floor without so much as a speck of dust on it. There were no knives, no teeth, and no blades. Her feet were smooth and untouched. If she took a step, it would be like any other step before she felt the pain this morning.

  Slowly, experimentally, William placed the tip of her toe on the ground. It felt like a regular toe on a regular wooden floor. She then slowly lowered the ball of her foot onto the floor. While she still felt the regular foot on the regular floor, she felt… an accompanying sensation, an almost phantom sensation, alongside it. Like her foot was gently pressing against the tips of several blades (like during needlework, when William would gently press the tip of the needle against her palm, and she could feel the tip of the needle), but no pain. Then, she slowly placed her weight on the foot. She felt she was stepping on the ends of several sharp knives, and the pain was almost enough to make her buckle. She bit her lip to suppress the pain, and forced herself to place all her weight on that one foot. She then slowly lifted the other foot, placed it on the floor in front of her, and repeated the same process. The pain of dozens of blades pressing into both feet instead of one was too much for her though, and she involuntarily yelped (though without sound) and crumpled on the floor.

  She just sat there, stunned for a third time, as any trace of denial bled from her, and the true horror and inescapability of her situation dawned on her.

  'I'm going to die at my master's wedding.'

  Panic and desperation seized her. Now she was an animal caught in a trap and desperately flailing to get out.

  She started running—wincing and voicelessly crying out in pain, bucking and jerking her feet up after each step like she was stepping on hot coals, and she ran frantically as though she were trapped in a room full of hot coals and desperate to get out. She started desperately running, almost hoping that if she ran fast enough she could outrun the stabs. She only vaguely heard the alarmed cries of servants as they passed, as she slipped on the floors and banged against the walls in her haste to get out. All she could see was the space between the walls and rooms in front of her to run, all she could feel was the white-hot pain of dozens of blades sinking into her flesh with every step she took.

  She didn't know when or how she got outside. She could not have told you what the weather looked like, whether it was bright or dark or overcast. She could see the white of pain for every step she took; only hear the gasps of her own panting; only feel the soft, wet, dew-covered grass between her feet as she ran desperately through the blades, and feel the blinding agony of blades stabbing through her skin with every step. She ran, she snaked, she zigged, she zagged, she sprinted along like a frightened animal desperate to outrun something trying to kill her.

  She tried her hardest to ignore or outrun the pain—if she just ran fast enough, she could take steps faster than the knives could sink into them. But she couldn't—no matter how quickly she picked up her feet off the ground, no matter what angle she stepped on the ground (the ball of her foot, the sides of her soles), she could not escape the stabbing sensations.

  Often, the pain overwhelmed her, or her legs betrayed her and instinctively pulled or jerked up to get her feet away from what was causing them pain, and she fell down. Soon, her white ruffled nightdress was covered in dew and grass stains, and the hem of her skirt was not only wet but frayed and speckled with blood at the end. But after each fall, William gritted her teeth and forced her self to keep running again, desperately hoping that if she just ran fast enough, she could somehow endure or outrun it.

  Her panic-addled brain only vaguely noticed the servants chasing her along the grass. It was in the periphery of her mind just as the sight of them was only in the periphery of her vision. She had enough presence to run and turn and zig-zag away from objects obstructing her running path, and she was vaguely aware of noise in the world not from her own pain- and panic-fueled breathing, but it was not at the forefront.

  They tried to chase and circle around her like she was an escaped horse they needed to catch and put back into the corral, but William was too slippery. She ran too fast. Any time they got close, she turned on her heels and bounded away from them before they could catch her. It was too early for most of them. Many of them had just got up or had not yet had breakfast, so they could not rush after a spritely young girl who ran like a thing possessed.

  "Should we tell the master?" one of the maids asked fearfully.

  "No, he's sleeping."

  The unspoken amendment to that was that he had arrived very late the night before and was drunk on happiness with his engagement, and was deep asleep now. They were afraid of how angry he would be if he woke right after his engagement to news like… this.

  "What the devil?" the butler exclaimed as he came out.

  The servants ran up to him, panting and frantic. "Oh, Mr. Dornez! We're all in an uproar!"

  "So I can see," he said, "What happened?"

  "We don't know! She just ran out of her room like the devil was after her, and now she's running out there like she's possessed! We don't know what to do!"

  "And we fear she might be hurt!" said another, "She's been tracking blood everywhere!"

  "What are we to do?"

  Walter was quiet for a moment, and then said calmly, "Let her tire herself out."

  "What?"

  "She can't run forever. When she gets tired, bring her inside. I'll call on a doctor."

  William was indeed winding down. Her panting had turned to ragged gasping, and she was visibly struggling to force herself to keep running. Whether her feet had grown numb to repeated pain or not, she felt she was getting it. She'd seen people and horses who ran so fast they seemed to be flying. She felt like if she ran... if she just ran faster enough, that it seemed like she was gliding, she could soar above the pain. For several steps, it seemed to work.

  And then she placed a full foot on the ground, and the pain was enough to make her buckle and fall into a large heap in the grass.

  The servants ran toward her.

  William struggled to push herself up, but the momentum was lost. Now that she'd stopped, all the pains and fears she'd struggled to outrun caught up with her. She felt overwhelmed with pain, and fear, and frustration, and helplessness. Unable to escape or cope, she covered her face with her hands and wept with abandon.

  The servants approached her cautiously, and they were afraid to touch her. Her sudden wild behavior, coupled with her usual unpredictable outbursts, combined with the old rumors that she had escaped an insane asylum (thanks
to her short hair, lack of clothes, seeming lack of history, and complete ignorance of how normal people lived) made them afraid to come near her. They were afraid her unpredictable temper might cause her to lash out or flee from them again, but more than that, they feared that somehow her insanity might rub off on them.

  They also had a practical reason for being afraid to move her, when they saw that her feet and the hem of her night dress were bloody and cut up, and that they were too weak to pick her up even if they wanted to. Two servants stayed near her, afraid to touch her or get too close, while a third ran up to tell Walter, and soon they started trying to find a robust young man who could carry the young lady back inside for when the doctor arrived.

  It didn't take long for word to reach Captain Bernadotte, who literally came running when word reached him.

  "Oh, thank God, Mr. Bernadette," the women sighed with relief when they saw him. "You must come immediately."

  The same closeness between Captain Bernadotte and William Hanna that had made the whole estate glare at them weeks before made them sigh in relief now. If the servants knew anything, it was that if William was going to behave docilely and cooperatively for anyone, it would be for Captain Bernadotte.

  She seemed lost to the world until he approached her, and then she had the good graces to look ashamed of herself for the first time. She blushed deeply and would not look up.

  He kneeled beside her, "Hey," he said gently.

  She would not look at him. What was the use? She would die soon anyway, and become foam on the waves.

  She tensed as he lifted her into his arms, once again, as easily as though she were a sack of feathers. Like many times before, she was struck by how strong and warm he was. She could feel rock-tight muscles under his course fabrics, and how he gave off heat like a peat marsh. Through her warm face, she tried not to notice the familiar scent of sweat, dust, horses, tobacco, and musk. They were such rich earthen scents that always overwhelmed her, but perhaps more so today than any other day. It must have been due to her despair, knowing that her life would end, that she was able to...

  She suppressed those thoughts immediately. No, it wouldn't do. She would die soon, before anything may come of it. She also thought, tearfully, as he carried her inside, of what the Sea Witch had said. How her own faithlessness had driven the sea witch to change the terms of their agreement. If she could not be internally faithful to the man she claimed to love, even when it was not convenient to her, then she would make a distasteful servant. She could see why Linda would not want her. She thought, 'If I were the Count, I would not want me either.'

  The doctor had already arrived when they arrived at the estate. Because this was a time of great modesty, however, the doctor was not quick to look at the souls of her feet. In this time, a young woman exposing so much as her ankles to anyone but her husband, in the privacy of her own home, was considered scandalous. In order to protect young women's modesty, doctors, who were all men, never took a close examination if they could avoid it.

  When the servants explained how they had found her running wild through the tall grass of the estate, they felt that they had found the likely answer. Since not only her feet, but her hem was torn, they guessed that she had run through sharp twigs, dried grass, prickly weeds, and so on. The doctor felt that this was a likely cause; and, after a cursery examination of her feet, determined that to be the cause of the bleed.

  Had he looked closer, he might have found deep gashes and lacerations from blades she never stepped on.

  As it was, the doctor replaced her torn skirt over her feet to protect her modesty, and advised the servants to wash her feet and bandage them up, and to keep her sitting until she recovered. By now, they were used to caring for a ward that was practically an invalid, and so they agreed.

  Her master did not find out until later that day. He had stayed out at the ball until almost dawn, reveling in the company of his fiance, shaking hands and being congratulated by all the gentlemen there. He slept most of the day, was still glowing with joy when he awoke. None of the servants had ever seen him so happy. His smiling face beamed like the moon and lit up every room he was in. His booming voice burst with happiness, like festive drums that livened a party. He was in such good spirits that he gave most of the servants an extra day off, and a bowl of punch.

  When he heard of William' mishap, he was mildly alarmed until he learned that the cause of her injury was running through brambles in the field, and he was satisfied. Still, he decided that they should call on his new, soon-to-be grandfather-in-law, Dr. Abraham Van Helsing, to look at her, just to ensure she was safe.

  When he checked in on William and saw that she was unhurt, he could not contain his joy. As soon as he saw William, he walked right up and lifted her into a tight embrace. Before she could recover from that, he set her down and kissed her full on the forehead.

  "Oh, my little foundling, I am the happiest man in the world!" he told his little mermaid. "My fondest dream - that which I never dared to hope - has come true. You will share in my great joy, of course, for you love me more than anyone does."

  Her soul shattered, and from the fragments she forced a smile. The little mermaid kissed his hand and could feel that that her heart beginning to break. For the morning after his wedding day would see her dead and turned to watery foam on the waves.

  The next week passed in a miserable blur. Unsurprisingly, no one let William walk on her feet since she had cut them up so badly, which she was fine with since she knew that walking would only renew her wounds, and she was not sure she had the strength to pretend that she did not feel pain, nor hide the blood.

  The female servants bandaged her feet snugly in soft cloth bandages, and they had her sit in a rolling chair or recline in bed to pass the time. She was relieved that she did not have to listen to wedding preparations except through the servants' gossip, which she could often ignore or openly scowl at.

  She knew that she could probably tell them through writing, but who would believe her? And if they did see her feet magically cut up after they witnessed her walk for a time on a smooth marble floor, how would they react? Would they think her a witch? Burn her? Hang her? Ship her off to an asylum like they wanted to since she arrived? And William doubted it would stop the wedding anyway, because she could see that the Count rarely thought of anything else. It would only cause a brief commotion that would make her already miserable life even more difficult, before the inevitable wedding came and she died the next morning.

  She saw that the Count was not his own person anymore. His eyes, his smile, his every move and gesture… they were all for her.

  She remembered what Helena had told her about love the night before, as Captain Bernadotte had left to find a cab.

  "There are different kinds of love in this weary world of ours, my dear," she had said. "There is a love so fleeting that it passes by as a mayfly. There is the kind that lasts, a day, or a year… And there is love so deep that it changes your smile. Look for the smile."

  William saw the smile, now. She saw that the Count's very smile had changed, when the church girl made him the happiest man in the world by agreeing to marry him. Even if William did confess her life and her love for him, it would not make a difference.

  No, it's better this way, she thought.

  She could see now that she was never meant to be happy. She thought miserably of her long life and realized that the only time she had ever been happy was when her parents had been alive. She thought of long sunny days swimming happily in that colorful coral reef, surrounded by dozens of species of brightly colored fish, not far beneath the golden surface. But then monsters had emerged from the deep and devoured her parents, and turned the waters of their home red with blood. She thought of how she had woken up, cold and alone and afraid in the middle of the night, swaying in the dark waters of an empty tide. Her world had been an endless night since then—always searching, always reaching, always yearning for the light.

  She thou
ght of how she had traveled with the eels through the cold current that brought her to the Sea King's palace. She remembered how the smiling faces of the royal family always melted when they saw her face; how she had worked there alone for many years, without any friends or family to love or comfort her. She had been tolerated, but never wanted.

  She thought about how Schrodinger had followed her endlessly beneath the waves, keeping her company but mocking and jeering her every flip of the way. She'd thought of kind Harkonnen offering to help her sing for his concerts, but now she felt sure he'd never meant it. He was just being nice to her, or only felt like he should because he had loved her mother. He got her to be free labor to decorate his stages for the real princess's singing, or… he had been sincere, and the royal family's bigotry kept her in the shadows. Either way, William never felt she could leave the dark.

  She'd felt… she'd thought she could finally find brighter tides on the surface. How the surface had been her one chance to find happiness, and then she saw the Count, and she realized now that all her hopes of happiness fled when she fell in love with him. She could have stayed living in the surface for years, happy to bask in the sun on the rocks, combing her hair as she listened to the gulls and the sea mammals gossip as they came up for air, just like her mother had always wanted for her. Just like she and her mother had always planned. But then she had fallen in love with the Count, and all was lost.

  For a year William mooned after him from under the sea, and she had felt that the only way she could be happy was if she was by his side. What a fool she had been. Once Linda made her human (after the Sea King destroyed everything, she thought miserably), she felt for a year that the only way she could be happy was if he loved her back.

  'He'll never love me back,' she realized. 'He never would have.'

  Long before William joined his side, he pined for a girl whose face he already knew, whose character he already admired. William was just a place-holder until he could be with the girl he truly loved.