Copyright © 2011 Melissa Collins
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 0615649998
ISBN 13: 9780615649993
eBook ISBN: 978-1-62345-694-8
Library of Congress Control Number: 2001012345
CreateSpace, North Charleston, SC
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Epilogue
Leyna could sense the panic in her mother’s movements with every step they took toward the back of the house. She wanted to ask her what was wrong, but she’d been instructed to remain silent, in fear of drawing attention to them from something, but what, she couldn’t be sure. Her mother held her, clutched tightly to her chest, glancing over her shoulder nervously to make sure nothing was following.
Upon reaching the cloak room, her mother pulled open the door to a closet there, her fingers fumbling over the latch of a large trunk settled on the floor inside. She could see the difficulty her mother was having while holding her. Not wanting to be a burden, Leyna slipped quietly out of her grasp, keeping close to her legs in fear of becoming separated. She wasn’t sure what was wrong, but the fear in her mother’s eyes was all she needed to see to know something bad was happening. She watched her mother’s hands as they easily opened the latch, lifting the lid up while motioning for Leyna to get inside.
“Come on, Leyna. I need you to hide in here until mommy says you can come out, okay?” her mother whispered. Her voice was shaking from unshed tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. Leyna gave no argument to her request, grabbing onto the edge of the trunk with her hands to pull herself inside, her mother’s arms helping to boost her up.
Leyna’s heart jumped in fear at the sight of her mother starting to tug the lid down once again. She didn’t want to be left in the dark. The trunk was small, confining, impossible to move around in without risking hitting her head on something. Her eyes gazed up at her mother, desperate for her to change her mind about the hiding place. “Mommy, please don’t shut it,” she pleaded. “I don’t want to be in the dark.”
Placing her fingers to her lips, her mother hushed her, pulling the lid down further while guiding Leyna’s head inside the trunk to prevent it from getting hit by the heavy top. They jumped at the sound of something crashing within the house. To her ears, it was like splintering wood, though from where they were, it was too hard to tell exactly what it was. Turning back to Leyna, her mother shook her head, whispering sadly as she lowered the lid down into place. “Stay here, baby. You will be safe in here.”
The light disappeared altogether with the soft click of the lid settling into the frame. She hated the darkness. It was frightening to her young mind, feeling cut off from everything. Muffled by the thick casing of the trunk, she could hear the closet door sliding shut, adding to the isolation she already felt. With a whimper, she laid down on her side, curling her legs up to her chest protectively. All she could do was wait for her mother to return. She said she would. Otherwise, how would she know when it was okay for her to come out?
She could hear the sound of glass shattering. Footsteps shook the foundation from somewhere outside her confinement, grunts and shouts followed by loud pounding against the walls in the hallway. Deeper in the house, someone screamed, the voice so shrill that she couldn’t recognize the source. It seemed too high to be her mother’s. Thinking of the other children in the house, she tightened her grip around her legs, trying not to let the frightened tears escape her eyes. Did mom put Reina in a box, too? She’s afraid of the dark…
Through the darkness of her hiding place, the screaming continued, echoing in Leyna’s head. Fear held her motionless, unable to move. Her eyes were opened wide in wait of the light that would come again when her mother opened the lid for her to escape. Eventually the clamor eased, the house filled with a silence almost more disconcerting than the screams she’d listened to for so long. Mother would be coming soon. She just had to lie there quietly like she was told. Time crawled by, her stomach aching for food. What was taking her so long?
After what felt like hours of silence, her heart leapt in her chest at the sudden realization that she could hear someone crying nearby. It was a faint noise. Barely audible from where she was hidden away. She was unconvinced that it wasn’t her imagination running wild the way a nine year old mind tended to do. But the sound persisted, rising and falling with the passing time.
Her body was growing anxious to be free. The fear of her mother having forgotten her there was suffocating, her throat tightening with the desire to lay there and cry, while her muscles became restless, yearning to move around without the restrictive walls holding her in place. She maneuvered her body around inside, ducked down to place her hands over her head. The lid was heavier than she expected. It bore down on her despite her efforts. Lips pursed in determination, she lay down on her back, pushing up with her legs to kick at it with all her strength.
Very little light filtered through the small opening she created. Her tiny legs trembled under the strain of the weight, not long enough to push the lid all the way up. Her thoughts filled with panic at the possibility of being trapped inside this awful box forever. She brought her legs back to her chest, braced for one final heave, her arms positioned to allow herself to pull her body up quickly if she was successful. With a determined cry, she threw all of her weight into her legs, taking advantage of the brief moment as an opportunity to escape presented itself. Arms up, she pushed her head through the opening. She tried to jump through, but the closet door blocked her from being able to throw herself to the ground. There wasn’t enough space. Before she could get her body through, she felt the heavy lid fall hard on top of her back.
The pain was excruciating, all the air being pushed from her lungs upon impact. Slumped over the edge, she started to cry, giving in to the mixture of fear and pain overwhelming her small body. Her own predicament distracted her from the weeping sound she’d heard while inside the trunk. At that moment she could hear nothing but the sound of her own sobbing echoing off the walls of the tiny closet.
Through her tears, she saw the door suddenly open. Her own saliva nearly choked her in fear of who might be there. Reflexively, she coughed to clear her throat, staring in awe at the sight of a young girl standing there, her chubby face muddied and tear streaked. Her long hair was disheveled; one of the two little barrettes clipped on either side of her head dangled uselessly from only a few strands which held it in place. “Reina,” she gasped, holding her arms out frantically to the young girl. “I’m stuck.”
The girl’s hands were shaking. Leyna grabbed onto them, trying to pull herself free from the trunk’s m
outh, feeling the heavy edge dig into her skin with every inch of her body she managed to slip through. She could think of nothing but getting out. The pain didn’t matter. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to keep going through the torturous endeavor. Arching her back, she used the last of her strength to push the lid upward, the locking mechanism raking down the center of her spine as she threw her legs over the side, tumbling down to the floor in a heap.
She laid there on her stomach, feeling the dampness of the blood soaking into the material at the back of her dress. The house around her was in shambles. Portraits had been torn down, the canvases shredded to completely mar the painted faces, chunks of the walls splintered and broken to leave behind gaping holes along the hallway.
Slowly she pushed her way to her feet. She grimaced at the pain in her back, more aware of it now than she’d been throughout her escape. Reina clutched at her hand desperately, following at Leyna’s side as she made her way down the hall toward the front room. The condition of the house grew worse with every step they took. All of the furniture was overturned, the dining room table broken into pieces and scattered about the floor. Blood could be seen, smeared and splattered, across the walls, bodies of unfamiliar men lying in grotesque heaps.
Everything felt surreal to Leyna, as if she’d fallen asleep in her hiding place and was trapped in a nightmare she couldn’t wake from. She could hear Reina starting to weep softly beside her, drawing her attention away from the bloodied corpses lying at her feet. Gently, she shielded Reina’s eyes from the sight, moving out of the room to guide her to the hallway from where they’d come.
“Reina, can you stay here for me? I’m going to find mother,” Leyna whispered. A sinking feeling started to build in her stomach, making everything seem far more real than she wanted to believe. Nervously, she glanced over her shoulder. Had something moved? Frozen, she held Reina still, listening intently for any signs of something else inside the house with them. Content with the silence, she helped Reina step into the closet, watching her settle herself down on the floor next to the trunk where Leyna had been hidden. She couldn’t ask her to get inside it. The thought was too cruel to even consider.
Satisfied that Reina wouldn’t move, Leyna hurried back in the direction of the bodies. She shuffled around the floor from figure to figure, trying to make out the faces of them all. Who were these men? None of them resembled anyone she’d seen before. They were dressed like soldiers, though the color of their uniforms was all wrong from what she’d seen when the military had been in town for a parade. She stared down at one of the men, a trickle of blood dripping from his mouth onto the leather of his armor. Bile rose up in her throat at the sight of him. Falling to her knees, her stomach began to retch in disgust, dry heaving from the lack of food in her system, unable to stop. The image was too much for her. She needed to get away from the gruesome scene around her and find her mother. Mother would know what to do. Everything would be fine if she could just figure out where she went. Maybe she was hiding, too.
Clambering to her feet, she stumbled onward toward the front of the house. Near the front door, she caught sight of a woman lying on the floor, her long black hair fanned out about her face, spatters of blood staining her pale skin. She didn’t want to admit the truth of who it was, but there was no denying it. The woman’s elegantly pointed ears protruded from under the mass of black hair. Deep blue eyes gazed lifelessly up at the ceiling, the internal energy within her no longer creating the soft glow she was used to seeing there; the thin white fabric of her dress covered in blood, torn in various places across her chest and abdomen. Her face was bruised and beaten, her lips turning a soft shade of blue from the death which had settled over her.
Mumbling quietly, Leyna shook the still form of the woman, tears forming in her eyes once again. “Mother, wake up,” she sobbed, her lips trembling in grief. Lying over her mother’s chest, she wept into the crimson-stained fabric of her dress, her arms wrapped around her in a tight embrace. She knew very little about death. In her childlike mind, she hoped her mother would simply awaken with her urging and return the hug, telling her everything would be alright. But she remained unmoving; her skin cold to the touch.
Through her tears, she could hear footsteps moving across the floor behind her, too heavy to be those of little Reina. Fearfully, she lifted her head from her mother’s dress to see who approached, her shrill scream filling the room at the sight of a man coming toward her. He was dressed in the same armor as the corpses in the dining room, his arm raised with his sword at the ready. Leyna scrambled backward on her hands, trying to get to her feet, her legs frantically running about the room to find a place to hide. The man’s eyes were set on her. Anywhere she found in that room, he would see her. There had to be somewhere else for her to get away from him.
If she went too deep into the house, she risked the armed man’s attention being drawn to where Reina sat hidden in the closet. She needed something closer, out of the way, but he was on her heels, his long strides easily keeping up with her frantic pace. Moving toward the hall, she found the door to Reina’s father’s study, ducking inside just as the man swung the blade of his sword downward, narrowly missing her.
There was no time to close the door. Her eyes scanned the area for somewhere to take cover, spotting a narrow opening at the bottom of a table near the desk in the back of the room. It was just large enough for her to slide under. Sweat mixed with the blood on her hands, the moist surface of her palms slipping over the floor while she tried to push herself further under the table and against the wall. The man’s footsteps were already inside the room, his face appearing where he knelt down next to the opening.
“Get out here, you little brat!”
Hunching her shoulders, Leyna rolled her stomach against the wall, desperate to put as much distance between her and the man as possible. She could hear the metal of his sword scratch against the floor, his arm waving wildly through the small gap to strike at her. There wasn’t enough room for her to get away. A sharp twinge of pain erupted along her back, setting her into a panic, the sword slicing at her skin, swipe after swipe.
Unable to reach her sufficiently, the man took to pulling at the table, the legs creaking across the floor over her head. His progress was halted at the arrival of someone else to the room. Leyna’s screams trailed off, curious to see who had come to her rescue, but too afraid to move from where she lay pressed against the wall. The sound of clashing swords caught her attention. Someone was fighting him. Maybe mother woke up after all? It was a foolish notion. One she wanted too badly to cling to. A sickening crunch ended the fight abruptly, the man’s body landing on the floor in front of the table with a heavy thud. After a moment, his face slid away, replaced by the familiar eyes of Reina’s older sister, Nasha.
“Leyna, come out. We need to leave,” she stated calmly. Her arm stretched out to Leyna, beckoning her to take it. Accepting her hand, Leyna allowed the girl to pull her from under the table and back to her feet. “Where is Reina? Is she still here?”
Leyna nodded, aware of the painful grimace over the girl’s young features. Her upper body was slouched, her hands blood-covered from a wound in her side. “Nasha, what’s wrong?” she asked innocently, heeding the girl’s urging to move closer to the door. “What’s happening?”
“These men killed father. If they know you are still alive, they will most likely kill you too. Now come. Show me where Reina is. We need to get you both out of here before he wakes up.”
With hurried steps, Leyna moved away from the girl, making her way to the closet where she’d left Reina. What if she wasn’t there? The thought quickened her pace to the door, afraid of opening it to find the closet empty. To her relief, Reina was still sitting there, her knees hugged tightly to her chest, rocking back and forth. Quickly she grabbed her under the arms, lifting Reina up. The position was awkward under Reina’s weight. Both girls were nearly the same size, her mass causing Leyna to stumble back. “Nasha said we have to le
ave,” she groaned, taking a few steps for balance before lowering Reina down to her feet. She was too heavy to be carried, and the strain only served to stretch the wounds on her back.
Leyna snatched a cloak down from a hook in the closet, wrapping it over Reina’s shoulders and securing it in place. It was a few sizes too big on her, the bottom dragging along the floor with every step they took. Upon reaching the back door, Leyna motioned for Reina to stop, waiting for Nasha to reach them. They couldn’t go anywhere without her. It was too dangerous.
Nasha appeared at the end of the hallway, her face pale and drawn from the loss of blood. She stumbled about drunkenly as she approached them, her steps uneven, barely able to hold herself up long enough to get to the girls before collapsing to her knees, the strength in her body finally giving out. “Do you remember the way to the boats, Leyna? The ones to the mainland?” Her bloodied fingers fumbled over a coin pouch, struggling to slip it over Leyna’s slender wrist.
“I don’t want to carry it,” Leyna argued, shaking her hand to try and slide free of the pouch. Nasha grabbed her hand, pressing it firmly with her own to keep her from moving.
“You don’t have a choice.” Nasha’s voice was strained from the effort it took to speak. She stared deeply into Leyna’s eyes, the desperation in them sending a cold chill down Leyna’s spine. With a heavy heart, she realized what Nasha was saying. Her energy was fading fast. It took all her strength just to hold her head up. “Take Reina to the boats. These coins are all I can find, but they will be enough to pay the dock workers and get you some food. Can you do this for me?”
Before Leyna could answer, Nasha’s hand reached out to the handle on the door, pulling it open to let a cool breeze filter into the room. She didn’t want to do what was being asked of her. There had to be some way Nasha could come with them. “Nasha, come on,” she begged. “Get up. Reina is too heavy for me to carry.”
A final breath escaped Nasha’s body, her fingers slipping away from the door handle as she slumped to the floor, leaving the two girls in absolute silence. Fear gripped at Leyna’s heart again to see her lying there. It would be so easy to just sit down and cry. To mourn the loss of her mother and everyone else she’d considered family for the better part of her young life. But now wasn’t the time for that. She needed to take care of Reina; to get her away from the macabre sights inside the house.
The Myatheira Chronicles: The Vor'shai: From the Ashes (Volume 1) Page 1
