ARELLIA

I lie in darkness, far from the only place I have ever known, quiet as the wood that surrounds me, imprisoning my body and tightly wound limbs in this dreadful abyss that is my coffin. I cannot stand, I can hardly move. I can only stretch until my feet brush against the hardness of the wood, and I am again reminded of my predicament.

If there are Gods and Angels, then they have forsaken me.

It seems hours, days, since I heard the sound of voices. Since blood has flown into my joints and fingers. Since I have breathed fresh air. How much time has passed since I saw the world from the balcony of my bed-chamber, naïve and innocent? Since I felt the hands of my gentle father?

I press my forehead against the wall of my coffin, now damp with my blood. I had a taste of freedom, and it was as bitter as the poison that killed my father. I have no home now that everyone I know and love is dead. Vasilis reigns now as the new monarch of Illya. But he will not have me alive.

Death is the way out. To stop the agony, to stop the ache in my chest and the anger boiling under my skin.

I lurch my head forward into the wall. Sparks of pain dance in the darkness. I grit my teeth. If there is no pleasure in this world, no freedom, then nothingness will suffice. I do not stop and smash my head again into the wood. Heat pours down the side of my face.

But as I pull my head back to deliver a blow, the darkness groans like a wild beast. Rumbling and crackling like thunderstorms. Crimson washes over my vision until red replaces the blackness, like a river of blood.

I see nothing but red. My body feels weightless like I am underwater but the liquid is hot and viscous, pulling me down. Drowning me. My coffin groans like wood bending, breaking, growing louder and deeper. Then, I smell it. Burning and smoke. It is familiar.

When I open my eyes, I see it then, behind a mist of red, the dirt road and rocky mountains beyond. I smell the fresh air. Taste the freedom. But before I could reach for it, crimson takes over and I fall back into oblivion.

***

I am alone, far from the horror of my coffin, standing unbound on a gravel road by the side of a tree. The tree where I was taken and assaulted. It smells like dirt and blood. I feel weightless, free of encumbrance. The air is hot and humid. A shroud of red mist cloaks the world, making the barren, rocky landscape look sinister as if I am standing in the lands of Hell. The sky which was once blue is now deep crimson and at its centre, a large sphere of black looms where the sun once was. A shiver crawls over my skin.

The sky flashes white with lightning. I hear echoes of voices behind me and a horse whinnying.

“What the fuck is this?” A familiar voice echoes in the distance. But, no one is here. In the distance, smoke rises from the empty ground. It smells like burning wood. As I walk toward it, the voices ring louder.

“How? What the fuck?!” Someone screams, her voice is muffled as if I am listening to her from underwater. I recognise her voice, she was one of the bandits, but where is she? I stand, bewildered and alone on the dirt road that leads out of this small village. Surrounded by nothing but sand and stone and rocks, in a world coloured red.

“No… No! Please!” I hear echoes of a man wailing and sobbing. He is close, but I cannot see him. With trembling fingers, I reach toward the sound. The air warps and bends. A shock reverberates through me, leaving me breathless and panting. I squeeze my eyes shut from the unfamiliar sensation. Something electric dances under my skin, causing hairs to stand.

“Stop!” The voice echoes no longer. I open my eyes to a dark-skinned man with long black hair. Redness no longer clouds my vision. Everything is clear. He sits crouched on the ground in front of me, tears streaming down his face. He looks frightened. The man tries to back away, hand clutched tightly to his left arm. He is injured, his tunic is covered in blood. I flick my eyes to his wound.

He flinches and cowers away, “P-Please…” Snot and blood spit from his mouth. Something is heavy in my hand. I scream when I see it– a long muscular arm, dripping blood. The skin is shredded and frayed as if ripped from the socket by a beast. I see the whiteness of bone protruding from muscle and fat. The edges of the skin sizzle and smoke rises.

A piercing ache shoots through me. I hear my heart in my ears, feel the blood on my hands and taste tears on my tongue. I let go of the arm and crash into the dirt. The world distorts and the man disappears as though he was never there. But his cries still echo in my ears and I am once again in a world shrouded by crimson. I scream until my throat burns, clutching at the dirt with my blood-soaked hands.

I must be in Hell.

“Please… stop…” I plead. But, no one listens. The only sound in my ears is the distorted cries of those I cannot see. I stare at the blood on my hands, the colours blend into the world of red that cloaks me. Frantically, I wipe my hands on my tunic, trousers, but the blood remains. Viscous and thick.

DAUGHTER.

A voice booms in my mind, causing pressure to build inside my head. My ears pop, my mind twists. Pain shoots through me as I scream and collapse into the dirt, breathing in dirt and sand. I feel a sensation of something opening up inside me, like the maw of a great creature. Wild, hysterical and utterly terrifying. I fear it may swallow me whole. Erasing who I once was, who I am and who I can never be.

MY DAUGHTER.

But, that voice is not my father's. It is deep and dark, menacing. Thunder rumbles in the distance followed by a flash of light and I am once again back on yellow sands and grey rocks. Surrounded by blue skies with light white clouds, humid air and trees with green leaves.

I retch into the ground beside a pair of feet. Pain has subsided but all that remains is a vague queasiness. I wish I could understand. I have prayed to Gods and Angels, but have the Devils answered me instead?

When I look up, I see the man with long black hair. His arm lies limp beside his torso. Dark blood pools under his limp body. I have seen this before. An image of the warden flashes through my mind.

I stand on shaking legs. But, as I look down upon that man, I see that his limbs have been severed. Legs and arms and head ripped from the socket, lying grotesquely beside the swollen lump of meat that was his body. But, it is not just him. The ground is soaked red with blood, and in that dark pool, limbs and body parts lie scattered. The sight brings me to my knees. Have I truly descended into madness?

A wet slopping sound of fabric against skin brings me back, “W-witch!” I hear a man spit from somewhere within the carnage. But, I do not have the courage to look. I do not have the strength to stand. Instead, I stare at my hands and listen as he wheezes his last breath.

I hunch over, curling into myself and squeeze the wound on my arm as I wail into the dirt. But, my arm does not ache. The wound has closed. As if it never existed. Desperately, I claw at my arm, splitting the skin and screech. Without the pain, how will I wake from this Hell?

I am in a nightmare. My teeth chatter together and then all at once, my head splits from pain so blinding that my vision blurs.

When the pain subsides, I pry open my eyes. Feel the wood against my shoulder, smell the burning. I am back in my coffin, hands and feet unbound. There is a gaping hole in the coffin where I have smashed my head against. The wood burns, smoke rises. I hear voices. Hooves.

I take my arm and pry open the splintered wood and crawl until I fall into the dirt with a thump.

“What the fuck is this?” A man exclaims. I look at their sweaty faces and begin to count. Ten men, one woman and a horse with a wagon that was dragging my coffin. Before I am able to stand, arms grab me.

“Let me go!” I spit into a man's face but he pushes me back, holding my neck tightly just as Vasilis once did in his study after my father passed. Now, I remember anger. It burns inside me. I grab his neck and squeeze and feel my nails dig into his flesh. Feel the warmth of blood travel down my arm.

It feels ecstatic, electric, as I watch his eyes bulge, watch a man twice my size convulse and gag. As I feel my fingers pierce flesh and feel the bones beneath. His neck sizzles, his flesh disintegrates, his bones dissolve like paper in water. Then, his head rolls off his neck and plops into the dirt like a toy ball. It reminds me of Yhana.

“How? What the fuck?!” They all panic. Screams and shouts ring in the air. It is almost orgasmic, this feeling. The power. The brutality. I do not feel like myself. Men unsheathe their swords and sprint toward me, animosity and fear alight in their eyes.

I have seen men spar but I have never been on the receiving end. I watch as their blades pierce through me. I feel the sharpness enter me, feel the blood run down my legs. I wait for pain but it does not come. Their hands tremble, holding tight to the hilt of their swords. I do not feel a thing.

I feel tears flow down my cheeks. I think I am crying. I pull the blade from my torso. The men collapse into the dirt, aghast. I have never held a sword before. It is heavy in my hands. My gait is clumsy and shaking as I chase a man on the ground as he backs away.

“No… No! Please!” He pleads. When I drop and straddle him with my legs, he screams and flails, just as I once did when I was taken by the very same people I am slaughtering. I throw the sword aside and grab his neck. I squeeze tight and pull until I pluck his head from his spine.

“Please… Stop…” I plead. But, no one can stop me. They scream and cry. But, it is not enough.

I annihilate them. Faces and arms and skulls, scalped by the sharpness of my nails and the edge of their own blades. Men fall over themselves to avoid the teeth of the steel in my hand. It is all a frenzied blur, which I approach with horrific detachment. My body cries from the horror, but my mind screams in euphoria.

When they are nothing but blood and bone, I collapse into the dirt and retch until my stomach caves. My throat burns.

“W-witch!” A man cries.

I listen to a man wheeze in the distance as he takes his final breath. It is only then that I fall into the blood, close my eyes and wait till I wake from this nightmare.