Chapter Two
1143 Words
"The bearer returns."
Valeria’s lungs seize as air tears into them. She coughs, choking on water, vision switching between darkness and light.
The world is wrong. The trees around the lake shimmer like they’re dusted in glass.
She drags herself onto the shore, mud slick beneath her palms. Her dress clings, heavy with water. The mark on her shoulder, thrums, like a heartbeat beneath her skin.
“What is this place?” she whispers. Her voice sounds small, stolen by the wind.
Branches claw at Valeria’s arms as she pushes through the forest.
Her pulse is a drumbeat of anger, every breath coming ragged.
Tears sting, but she wipes them away with the back of her hand. “Stupid. I’m so stupid.”
The night is heavy with mist. The moonlight breaks through in slivers, painting the path silver.
Selena’s voice echoes in her head...soft, pleading, false. "He forced me."
Valeria grits her teeth. “Filthy liar.” She hurls a stone into the darkness. It skitters away, swallowed by leaves.
She doesn’t know where she’s going, only that she has to move. If she stops, the image of Ethan and Selena will return, and she’ll break all over again.
Behind her, the forest shifts. A faint whisper, too rhythmic to be wind.
She stops, listening. Nothing...just the thud of her heart.
“Pull yourself together,” she mutters. “There’s no one here.”
But someone is there.
Elsewhere in the trees…
Three shadows move in silence. Dark leather, drawn hoods, steel glinting in hand.
“She came from the northern ridge,” one whispers. “No scent of the Dominion on her.”
“That doesn’t make her safe,” says another. “Could be a spy. They’re using new tricks.”
The third; tall, scar across his jaw nods. “We take her to Darius. Let him decide.”
A twig snaps behind Valeria. She whirls. “Who’s there?”
No answer. Just darkness thick enough to breathe.
Her skin prickles. The forest feels alive, listening. The hair on her neck rises.
Another rustle, closer this time.
“Okay, not my imagination.” She backs away, scanning the trees. “Show yourself!”
A flicker of movement to her left. She takes off running to the right.
Branches whip her face as she runs. Her shoes slide on moss, her lungs burn.
Something moves with her, too fast, too quiet.
“Leave me alone!” she shouts, though she doesn’t know who or what she’s talking to.
The ground tilts ahead. She skids to a stop just in time.
A steep drop yawns before her, a jagged ravine veiled in mist. One more step and she’d be gone.
Boots crunch behind her.
“Got her,” a rough voice says.
Valeria spins, eyes wide. Three figures emerge from the dark, cloaked and armed. Their faces are hard, unreadable.
“I don’t want any trouble,” she says, backing toward the edge.
“You’re already in it.”
One lunges. She ducks, but another grabs her from behind, pinning her arms.
“Let me go!” she screams, thrashing. Panic and fury crash together in her chest. “I didn’t do anything!”
“Spies always say that.”
“Spy? I don’t even know who you are!”
The man holding her tightens his grip. She drives her head back, cracking him square in the nose. He curses and tumbles off her, blood streaming between his fingers.
Valeria turns to run, straight toward the ravine but before she takes two steps, a heavy blow lands on her head.
Pain explodes, white and searing. The world tilts.
The last thing she hears before darkness swallows her is someone muttering, “Bind her quickly, we need to move before the patrol gets here.”
Later...
Voices drift in and out of her consciousness.
“Still breathing?”
“Barely. She fights like a feral.”
“Good. Darius will want her alive.”
The ground bumps beneath her. She’s being carried. Rope cuts into her wrists, and another binds her ankles. Something rough is stuffed between her teeth, a gag.
She tries to move, but her body is too heavy, her thoughts too fogged.
The journey feels endless. The forest sounds change, the whisper of trees gives way to muted camp noises; the clang of metal, a distant murmur of men.
Then cold stone beneath her. A door creaks. She’s dropped onto something that groans under her weight, a narrow bed.
The gag is removed from her mouth.
“Orders are to keep her here until Darius returns,” someone says. “If she screams, gag her again.”
Bootsteps retreat. The door shuts. A lock clicks.
When Valeria wakes, her mouth is dry, her head pounding.
The room is small, windowless. A single lantern flickers on the wall, throwing long shadows that crawl across the floor.
She’s tied to a wooden bed, wrists bound to the posts, ankles lashed together. The ropes are tight enough to chafe.
She tugs once. No give.
Her breath catches when she sees movement in the corner. A figure sits half-hidden in the dark, silent.
Her voice cracks. “Who’s there?”
The figure doesn’t answer.
Valeria’s heart thuds. “Please, if you’re going to kill me, just hear me out, I...”
The silhouette shifts. A glint of eyes in the lantern’s glow was watching her, unblinking.
“Kill you?” The voice is low, calm. “Not yet.”
She stiffens. “Then what do you want?”
“To know what you are.”
“I’m...” She swallows. “I’m no one. I was lost. I didn’t mean to...”
“What were you doing in the forest?” The tone isn’t cruel, but detached, like he’s weighing every word.
She tugs against the ropes. “Please, I just want to go home.”
A pause. Then: “Home isn’t on this side of the forest, girl.”
Something cold slips down her spine.
“Who are you?” she whispers.
The figure stands, stepping into the thin spill of light. She catches only the outline, a man, tall, leather-clad, a blade resting against his thigh.
“Your guard,” he says simply. “Until Darius returns.”
The name means nothing to her, but the way he says it leaves no question: Darius is someone to fear.
The guard turns toward the door. “Rest while you can.”
“How can I rest when I'm tied up like an animal?”
He glances back, and for the first time, she sees a flicker of pity. “You need to, because when the commander comes, he’ll decide your fate.”
Somewhere in the distance, a wolf howls. The sound is low, mournful, and for reasons she can’t name, her heart answers.
- Writer
