Chapter 1: Taken Away

1290 Words
The sounds of mops and sponges filled my eardrums as I straightened the apron on the front of my dress. It was a sound I had more than gotten used to, yet still not one that I had grown to care for. An exasperated sigh left my lips as I ran a hand through my thin brown hair, letting it fall to my mid back in its normal ponytail. I wrapped my aching fingers around the stick of the broom and handed it over to the head maid. Yes, I had the wonderful privilege of being a maid. The house in which I worked and stayed at was one of the largest in the town of Crosston, with the owner being the oldest and wickedest woman I had ever met. I could complain as much as my mind could handle it, but the choice to work for the witch wasn't mine. It was either be her slave and sleep down in the servants’ quarters or sleep in the dark alleys without so much as a scratchy blanket. My choices weren't only obvious, they were pretty much non-existent. You had no choices as a maid; none, and I had spent the whole seventeen years of my life knowing this to be true. I was following the exact same footsteps that my mother had taken before me. I wiped at my emerald eyes with the sleeve of my dress, mustering up the strength to not dwell on the past. My mother had lost her life in the disease outbreak, and ever since that painfully memorable day eight years ago, I had been a maid with no one to raise me besides the other ladies whom I worked side by side. Where my father was, I had just as good of an answer to that as the hay bales outside the window. My mother had said he was a blacksmith, but had jetted off the moment the mother's skin on her stomach had started to stretch. I cleared my throat, smoothing out the old maid's outfit I'd had since I was thirteen years old. "Can I take a break?" my voice came out weak as I asked Carla. Carla was a young maid, of course older than I, but nevertheless she was one of the only human beings on the planet I thought cared even the slightest whether I was dead or alive. She smiled weakly at me, a fake smile, something she had been trying to perfect ever since my mother died. Carla hated my abandonment and the mere fact that I had been an orphan since the age of nine. She tried not to offer me pity, very much knowing how much I despised sympathy, but I wasn't a kid anymore. It was obvious to everyone how much grief the woman had for me, and all she could do was give me her best fake smiles. "Of course," she nodded as she took the sopping sponge out of my hand. I whispered a thank you and stepped outside into the shimmering summer sun, letting the powerful heat warm my cheeks. My tired eyes glanced around at the horses and carriages, none of which I had the liberty to ride in. The world had only existed for a short amount of years, and I wished all of it would just end. I sat down on the pile of hay beside the porch and let my legs rest from an already long day of work. "Janice Fields?" My head shot up, my glance landing on a tall man hovering over me, his face crinkled from his middle age. "Janice Fields?" he repeated my name again, as if I had been incapable of hearing him the first time. "Yes?" I answered. I rose to my feet slowly, all the while trying not to stare at the King's crest pinned to the man's chest. "May I ask you to come with me?" he held out his hand, gesturing for me to enter into the carriage behind him. The carriage was an extravagant creation, one that the other maids and I would point at and marvel over from inside the house as it passed. My hands pinched the dirty material of my dress as my dry mouth opened slightly to speak. "Janice, the boss is looking for--" Carla's sentence came to an abrupt stop as she stepped through the door. Her eyes stared hard at the man standing before us, his face still blank of any expression. I wondered if that took practice. "Ma'am, I was ordered to send for Miss Fields," the guard explained. His eyes never left mine as he spoke to Carla. Carla's young, worried face grew pale and she sucked in her cheeks as she took a deep breath. "And why is that?" The guard hesitated for a moment, as if the maid's question had somehow thrown him from his well thought out mission. "That is information I am not in a position to give," he said. I slinked my arm through Carla's, careful not to remove my gaze from the King's guard. The stare-down had begun the second the man stepped out of his carriage, and it would not end by my backing down. My tongue licked the front of my teeth as if I thought that would hide my fear. "It is quite alright," I told Carla, not looking at her, but I felt her eyes burning into the side of my head. She chewed her bottom lip, and I didn't think it possible, but more worry flooded across her face. "I want her back by tomorrow." She held her chin high for a woman whose arm was shaking violently. He took a step towards us, "I am in no position to make promises, but information will be sent to the lady of the house by tomorrow." Carla pulled me into her, wrapping her arms around me in a strong embrace. It was hug that only a mother would provide, and it was only then that I realized that that was exactly what Carla was to me. I felt as if everyone needed a mother, or at least a mother figure, and at the age of nine I certainly did. I banished the thoughts from my head and pulled back from Carla before following the guard into the carriage. I sat down onto the wooden bench decorated with a blue cushion. As the door closed behind me I realized that after the hundreds of carriages I had watched in admiration as they passed by over all the years, I had never before been inside of one. I clutched onto the seat as the carriage jolted forward. My body lurched against the back, but I struggled over to the window where I stared out at Carla. Our gaze seemed to last for eternity, my head finally resting against the side of the carriage wall as the distance between us increased and she was nothing more than a speck in the distance. My lungs seemed to squeeze together as the carriage pulled across the city limits, also the first time I had ever set foot outside the border of Crosston. My gut told me that by the time I returned, I would have a lot of ‘firsts’. I bit hard into my lip and glanced at the back of the guard's head. He didn't even flick his gaze back at me. It was almost as if he was afraid to meet the eyes of the girl he had been sent to capture. I could do nothing but lean my head against the back wall and watch out the window as the horses pulled forwards to my unknown destination.
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