The Zodiac

The r**e of a Duchess

In a dark, humid place deep in an ever shrinking wilderness, the groans of a man echoed throughout the warm, thick, sticky air. The groans grew fainter and fainter as time went on. Upon closer inspection, the sound of frightened horses could also be heard. Following the melody of groans and whinnies, two men slowly encroached upon a carriage which had fallen from the road above them. The two men did not offer their assistance, rather they carefully observed their handiwork. In the most ideal situation almost all of the people inside the carriage would be dead.

Inside the carriage, little hands and feet stirred. These stocky limbs belonged to a very small child, no more than four years old. She had long hair which swept just past her shoulder blades. The color of her hair was like her mother's, had it been dirtied with mud. The eyes she used to look at the world unmistakably came from her mother, however. They looked almost iridescent in the light because of how pale they were. This feature would set the little girl apart from all the other people she would encounter. The dying woman she sat on top of and the carriage driver had dark colored eyes. The two men who lie in wait for her also had dark colored eyes. It was a trait that was very common to the people of two kingdoms in Soacia.

"Miss?" a small voice cried out in a soft whimper. The young girl unaware of the gravity of the situation but still completely sure that something was very wrong. There was a lot of blood on the wood of the carriage behind the woman who the child found herself sitting on top of. The child did her best to wake up the woman. Although the child had never seen this before, she knew that the woman was not going to wake up again. The child's attention shifted to the outside. She began to realize that the driver was still awake. He was crying and the child wanted to help him. Very carefully, so that she would not hurt the young woman who lay dead underneath her, she climbed out of the window of the carriage. The soft fabric of the curtain flipping back as her head popped out. Had she been much bigger, the child would probably have been unable to escape.

The two men hiding in the shadows could not have asked for a more favorable outcome. Watching the child emerge from the carriage gave them great relief. The two of them panted, pretending to be out of breath as they approached the girl. Her wide eyes shining with fear and apprehension. One of the males went towards the man who lay under one of his horses that had fallen. "Are you okay?" the man asked as he looked around to observe the area. There was another horse kicking and prancing anxiously near the site of the crash. The man did his best to ease the rattled horse while his companion rescued the little girl.

"What's your name, little one?" The man asked as he scooped up the tiny human into his arms. The girl pushed away from him and stared at him for a moment. The man could feel her sizing him up and thought to himself that she was an audacious little kid. "Jocastia," she admitted. The man smiled, his target was confirmed. He gently bounced her in his arms as he began to walk back towards the road. Admittedly it was difficult to climb up the steep hill. The soil was loose and there was a lot of underbrush blocking the path. However difficult, Jocastia was spared the climb and within minutes the two of them were on the road which the carriage had fell off of.

The two of them were soon joined by the other man who had brought with him the horse. Jocastia kept staring towards the woods where the men had rescued her from. She remembered that the driver was still there and that he was in pain. Jocastia did not know what to do herself, so she simply let the men take her, assuming that they were good people and that they were there to help. The way they treated her gave her no reason to suspect them and, even though she did not understand it quite well, she did not have any other options. The two men introduced themselves as Alric and Otto. They told Jocastia a story about how they found her carriage on their way to another carriage.

Jocastia noted that this carriage smelled funny. It was not as well built as the one which she had been riding in previously. Perhaps, had she been in this carriage she would have been hurt much worse than she was in her own. The two men secured her into the carriage. One of them, Otto, closed the door with Jocastia and Alric inside. He hurriedly gathered the reigns of the horse which he had stolen from the crash site and fastened it with the other two horses which were already attached to the carriage. Jocastia fell asleep while resting against Alric inside the carriage. She was scared and injured, unbeknownst to Alric. As she drifted off into a deep sleep, Alric caressed her messy hair, preening it, making her look more presentable after being tussled about as the carriage fell from the road. As the carriage pulled off towards the next town, Jocastia slept with relief that the horror was over. The episode may have ended, but her nightmare was only just beginning.