(Warning: this chapter contains disturbing content and actions that may be upsetting to some readers) POV Aiden Where am I?
I blink and try to sit up, but despite my efforts, I feel extremely weak and can only manage to prop myself against a wall.
My senses come back little by little.
First hearing: I hear crying, but not sad crying crying born of despair.
Then comes the smell, a mix of urine, blood, and semen.
Then, finally, sight.
What I find in front of me is a cage, in some kind of dark room lit by only a few torches.
Looking inside the cage, I see several people curled up, their faces empty of life, and above all painfully thin, as if gnawed by hunger.
But what nearly makes me throw up is the smell of decay coming from the bodies piled up in this same cage where we’re being held.
There are so many bodies, all different people women, children, men, old and young.
I also feel an overwhelming exhaustion and intense hunger: touching my own body, I realize I’m in a state of extreme starvation myself.
I’m nothing but skin and bones.
At that moment, a door opens.
I see two guards dragging the corpse of a young naked woman, fluid leaking from her body but it’s her face that’s the worst part: a face completely emptied of life.
— General POV The men began to speak casually, as if having a normal conversation.
“Don’t you think the younger ones are better for sex?” The other man laughed and said, “Not at all.
Imagine you want to beat or strangle her a child wouldn’t be able to put up a fight.
Plus, I’m sure their pussies are too shallow.” The other man opened the cage and tossed the woman’s body discarding it like trash onto the pile of corpses, even though she was still alive.
He continued, “You have no taste; I really prefer little girls.
When they call out for their mom…
mmm, I love forcing their mothers to watch.” The other man laughed and said, “You’re a monster.” One of the men looked into the cage and spotted a small girl curled up.
She looked young, but what stood out most were her ashen hair and her fierce eyes, full of hatred.
He walked up to her, slapped her, and pulled her by the hair with contempt “Stop looking at me like that, you royal bitch; if the chief hadn’t said you were sold to a rich merchant, I’d have already fucked you in my bed.” The girl spat in his face, shouting: “Bastard!” In response, the man threw her against me, slamming her back into the wall and making her cry out in pain.
As he was about to continue, the other man stepped in: “Stop it if you damage the merchandise, the boss won’t be happy.” Then he looked at a young couple, grinned with yellowed teeth, and grabbed the woman by the hair she screamed in despair toward her husband.
The husband tried to intervene, but the other man seized him and beat him to death in front of his wife, with extreme violence, smashing him against the bars of the cage until pieces of brain matter flew out.
He threw the man’s body onto the pile and rejoined the other man as he shut the cage.
“Let’s take her together, I feel like unwinding,” he said.
Then the two of them left the room, leaving nothing behind but the woman’s despairing screams, fading further and further away.
— POV Aiden I’d closed my eyes and was trying to hold back my vomit, even though I had nothing in my stomach only stomach acid would have come up.
Everything I’ve just witnessed… Am I in hell?
Am I a coward for pretending to make myself small?
As all these self-deprecating thoughts echoed in my head, a pained whimper from the girl beside me pulled me out of my thoughts.
In an extremely strained voice, I said: “Are you okay?” The girl looked at me, and the first thing that caught my eye was her bright green eyes and her ashen hair falling over her face, damp with sweat and blood from the shock.
She tried to smile and said: “I’m fine, I’ve had worse.
I always sneak out of my castle by climbing, so I’ve fallen more than once.” She sat down next to me and said weakly, but with a hint of desperation: “Do you think we’re going to make it?” I couldn’t answer.
After all, I was still disoriented myself: in my mind, I’d gone from my classroom, in the middle of an exam, to the hospital, and now here, in this warehouse that reeked of corpses and every kind of horrible smell.
Ironic, really we were already starting to get used to it.
Seeing that I said nothing, she gave a small, bitter laugh and said weakly: “I know your answer… I’m scared of dying, you know.
But mostly I’m scared I’ll never see Grandma’s tears again, or Uncle Mousesack’s.” Trying maybe to reassure her after all, she must have been about my little sister’s age I said, my voice still weak: “I’m sure your grandmother’s already looking for you.
After all, like the other man said, you’re someone royal, aren’t you?” She nodded weakly, her gaze still fixed on a wall, her head resting against it, and said softly: “I hope I can believe that… You know, sometimes I wonder if she wouldn’t rather I just disappeared.” I shook my head and answered gently: “I’m sure that’s not true.
Whatever the family conflicts, anyone would be ready to help family.” She smiled slightly and said, looking at me: “My name is Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon, but call me Ciri.
I still don’t get why I have such a long name…” she said, pouting slightly.
I smiled slightly and said: “My name is Aiden, I’m…” true, what was I?
Was I even alive?
Was I in hell?
Where was I?
Still thinking it over, I finished my sentence with: “I’m… a traveler?” She laughed softly: “Why aren’t you even sure what you are?
You’re weird.” She looked at the pile of bodies and said, in a mix of anger and hatred, but weakly: “We’re the last children.
The others were either sold, raped, beaten, or killed in front of their parents’ eyes.
I can still hear their voices, you know.” I couldn’t remember if I’d heard them myself honestly, I didn’t even know how I’d ended up here.
I said simply: “My brain must have just wiped that part out to keep me psychologically stable, I guess.” Then, for a while that seemed to exist outside of time, we talked about everything and nothing.
Ciri loved galloping on horseback, or secretly practicing swordplay her grandmother refused to let her train, since according to her, a proper princess shouldn’t do that kind of thing.
I laughed a little watching her pout as she told me this, and little by little, she rested her head on my shoulder.
Despite everything, I gently stroked her hair to comfort her I saw her a bit like my little sister.
She said softly: “If we make it out, what do you want to do?” I thought about it, but I honestly had no idea myself I didn’t even know if I was still in my own world or not.
I shook my head and said softly: “I don’t know.” She looked at me, smiling: “Then you’ll be my personal servant!” I laughed lightly and said kindly: “So I’ve been promoted to servant?
Should I call you ‘Your Highness’?” She shook her head, laughing: “Only when Grandma’s around, otherwise she’ll cut off my dessert.
Otherwise, just call me Ciri.” Then she told me all sorts of things, like a little girl dreaming out loud about activities we could do together wandering the capital, training with swords, and so on.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed we were the only ones talking like this.
Judging by the looks from the few survivors, seeing two children talk seemed to ease their hearts a little.
After all, I think a little gentleness is sometimes all it takes, in moments like these.
After a while, as we kept talking about everything and nothing, we heard shouting and the clash of metal.
Ciri looked toward the door and jumped up like a child, saying: “That’s Grandma and the guard, I’m sure of it!” Just as I was about to say something, the two previous guards came running into the room.
One of them took an arrow to the knee, crying out in pain, and a woman in armor arrived with two guards.
She beheaded him without a moment’s hesitation, then went after the other guard, who was fleeing toward the cage.
I was trying to hold back my vomit seeing already-dead bodies and witnessing a death happen right in front of you are two different things.
But I didn’t have time to dwell on that thought: the guard rushed in and took Ciri hostage, a knife pressed to her throat.
He’d dropped his sword behind him, right where I was, since a sword would have put him at a disadvantage while holding a hostage.
— General POV The man shouted: “Back off, or I’m taking her with me!” Ciri fought back like a lioness: “Let go of me, you bastard, you piece of filth!” The man struck her to keep her still: “Shut up, you little brat.” Then he looked at the woman who had stopped along with her guards and said, desperately: “Promise to let me go, and I’ll let her go!” Ciri shook her head and screamed: “Grandma!
Don’t do this, he rapes children!” Ciri’s grandmother looked at the man coldly: “Let go of Ciri, and I’ll promise you a quick death.
But I will never let you leave.” One of the grandmother’s men began casting a spell, but the man’s knife nicked Ciri’s throat slightly.
“You bastard, I see you, mage stop that incantation!” Ciri screamed: “Uncle Mousesack, do it!
I can take it!” With a wave of her hand, the grandmother signaled Mousesack to stop.
As she was about to continue negotiating, a figure picked up the sword the man had dropped behind him.
— POV Aiden I saw everything.
I wanted to get up and defend her, but I felt my strength was completely gone.
What could I do?
Why should I get up?
Why?
What could I possibly do?
Honestly, I think I’m a coward… The girl I’d been talking to, and I didn’t even want to defend her.
I was scared, that’s normal, right?
But… But when I saw the blood running down Ciri’s neck, I don’t know… Everything went blank… I’d already gotten up with difficulty, without even realizing it.
I’d picked up the sword without thinking, and I was already running at the man, the blade pointed at his side.
In one motion, thanks to my speed and the element of surprise, I drove the sword into his side.
He fell backward onto the pile of bodies, dragging me down with him, and dropped the knife next to me, freeing Ciri.
I picked up the knife, and before the man could even react, I plunged it in again… Again… Again… Blood splattered across my face, my hands, as I sat on that pile of corpses.
One of the queen’s guards pulled me back, tearing the knife out of my hands, and said urgently: “Calm down!
He’s dead, it’s over!” Little by little, I came back to my senses.
My body started to shake, and this time I couldn’t hold it back: I threw up stomach acid, since there was nothing else in my stomach.
I had killed someone.
The noise around me faded away slowly, just like at the very beginning, when my senses had come back to me one by one in that cage.
I stayed sitting there, on that pile of corpses, staring at my own hands.
They weren’t even shaking anymore, really they were just red, foreign, as if they no longer belonged to my own body.
Every time I think about it, I… Footsteps approached me.
I looked up and saw Ciri, still out of breath, a thin line of blood drying along her neck.
She stopped dead a few feet away from me.
Her eyes moved over my face, my hands, the blood that was no longer the guard’s but truly real on my skin, and for a moment just a moment something froze in her green eyes.
She, who had barely trembled with a knife at her throat, suddenly looked just as lost as I did.
Then she threw herself against me, both arms wrapping around me, and I felt her cry against my shoulder, repeating broken thank-yous between sobs.
The grandmother sheathed her sword and approached me with Mousesack.
“Thank you for saving my granddaughter.” I shook my head, wanting to say: “I didn’t…” The grandmother cut me off: “No need to be modest.
You saved her, and judging by the vomit on the ground, I’d guess this was your first time.
What do you want?” I didn’t really know.
I watched Mousesack directing the guards to help the last survivors, and Ciri answered for me, arms crossed after pulling away from me but her smile, this time, trembled a bit too much to be entirely happy: “He’ll be my personal servant, we promised each other!” The grandmother froze slightly, sighed probably out of habit and said: “Ciri, you don’t get to choose for…” I cut her off.
I didn’t really know why I said it maybe just to have something, anything, to hold onto after what I’d just done: “I would like to be her servant.” — (Hi everyone!
First time writing a darker chapter, I hope it turned out okay!
Feel free to leave comments, and by request, POVs will now always be shown!)