Chapter seventeen: Peaceful Wishes and Revolts

Sommi sits in a decent house at the table with a plate of food. He takes small bites in a sluggish fashion from his lack of entertainment. No noise comes from the outside world since it only goes off as nature for only a few yards before descending into the caliginosity.

“Do you like the ingredients that I’ve provided?” The ever-so-deceptive voice of Vensen speaks to him from behind the chair that he sits upon.

Sommi scoffs before responding, “It’s not really solitary confinement if you keep visiting me, besides, you didn’t do a very good job at giving me things to keep myself busy with.”

Vensen pinches the edge of the plate and drags it away from him with a hint of incense in his tone, “I could have just let you wonder around in the darkness you know.”

Sommi sits in silence as he avoids his gaze before replying with a low tenor, “What do you want?”

Vensen pushes the plate off to the other side of the wooden square and lets the food splatter all over the floor with a crash of the clay. He sits on the table close to Sommi and gives him a hostile personality. “You left the premises without permission. You didn’t think I would notice?” He leans in closely to his face. “What did you and Vila talk about?”

The fork moves around between Sommi’s fingers as he fiddles with it nervously. He refuses to answer. The ringing silence eventually causes him to tremble.

“Sommi,” Vensen’s words and tone don’t make the ambiance any lighter, “What-did-you-talk about?”

No answer.

Vensen snatches the fork from him and stands to pull Sommi up from the chair by the throat. The chair complies to the action by crashing to the floor accompanied by a thunk. Sommi’s feet are inches from the ground as Vensen lifts him up to meet his gaze and brings him in close to his face.

The fork comes close to Sommi’s obverse by Vensen’s free hand as his legs dangle and slightly kick in the air.

“You seem to be fond of this silverware here.” Vensen begins to speak in a rather irritated voice that also lets a sense of insanity creep in, “Are you trying to send me a message?” The teeth come close to one of Sommi’s eyes. “Do you want me to punish you with it?” The chilling fangs of the fork touch below Sommi’s lower eyelid under the socket as Vensen drags it down to get a better view of the red on the edges of his eye. Vensen now expresses his thoughts slowly and smoothly with his usual trace of an unnerving taste to it, “Did Kakashin ever tell you about the time when I had to take his eyes out, and fix them?”

Out of fear, Sommi begins to squirm as an attempt to escape his grasp.

Vensen lets the suspense sink in for a good while before letting Sommi drop onto his feet and crash to the floor.

Sommi buckles from the impact and sucks in air as he focuses on his hands that stay plastered onto the wooden boards beneath them.

Vensen starts to walk around the room to examine it.

After taking a few healthy breaths, Sommi says in a raspy voice, “What do you want?”

Vensen slowly takes one step at a time like a higher being around the room in a circle as he answers calmly, “You know, I could just simply have my answer from Vila.”

“You leave her out of this!” Sommi exclaims with some more force as he stands up.

Vensen stops half way around the area and looks to him with an attitude of repulse. “You’re not as smart as I thought you were. If you want me to address my issues of the matter to you, then perhaps you should obey my command, I do own your soul after all. Perhaps I should teach you obedience once again.” He then proceeds with his roaming until he reaches the table and turns the chair towards Sommi before sitting in it nonchalantly. “I know about your little plan, by the way, and your cute-little-revolt.”

Sommi’s body tenses up at his words.

One knee folds over the other as Vensen continues with his attitude, “I’ve run through this skit plenty of times, more than you could ever imagine, so having a surprise is quite rare to come by.” The snicker forms onto his lips again. “Every little thought of an escape from me, I already know about, but please don’t let that stop you, darling. I’m sure you can come up with something that will even be new to me.” He then stands up from the chair and comes close to Sommi. He grabs Sommi’s chin and leans in close to his face. His black lips speak with a calm and ghostly whisper, “Go on-surprise me.”

----------------------------

On the road to Gesh with Vila

The sun begins to hide underneath the horizon as we approach another soenara. We’re probably only halfway to Gesh, and that’s not even our main destination. Since we have to cross half the planet to reach Zemfen past Kiram, Ythem city is where we have to go because it’s the closest port to us on the east coast of Aishy. It’s been a while since I’ve traveled this much, last time it was an escape from the law with Sommi, I mean, Father. It might take me a while to get used to that. We managed to find a place that was willing to station Mueimma as a traveling animal instead of labeling her as a combat canine. We booked one room for the rest of us to save some rai.

Haru bolts into the room and heads over to the closet for the futons. “I am so ready for bed!” She grunts out loud as she pulls out the comfy mats.

Caru and I help her out since we have the same mind about resting.

Zaru makes a deep sigh for the long day and losing a good amount of his rai for this place. “We might have to camp out tomorrow or get some part-time jobs if we want to make it to Ythem.” He’s probably right about that, we do have another village to pass after Gesh, and sometimes Inns can be expensive. “We need to be up by sunrise tomorrow, so let’s be quick to get some rest,” he adds in while winding up an alarm clock.

Dinner passes by quickly as we all want to hit the hay early.

My legs shimmy under the blanket for my body to be in the futon and I try to make myself comfortable.

“Hey, Vila,” Haru’s whispering captures my attention.

“Yeah?”

“I know this late, but, sorry about what happened to your friend.”

The grief that I see in her glassy blue eyes is real, so I reassure her with a gentle smile full of compassion. “Thank you Haru, I appreciate it.” I then roll over and close my eyes with a wish for Sommi, I mean, Dad’s well-being. I want him to be safe, wherever he is. I want to see him and Mom again. I want our family to be strong like the Vielms, it would be a good way to remember them.