Chapter Two
CHAPTER TWO
Light, sound and heat assaulted her. The hustle and bustle of drivers going to market, the sound of children’s laughter and gossiping washerwomen swamped her senses as she worked to maintain her illusion. She was one with the air, the ground, she was—
‘Shit!’ she yelled, grinding to a halt before she was nearly trampled by a moving spice cart. She sprinted across the road once it had cleared and heard shouts. But her magick had slipped. She had no idea where she was going, only that she had to lose the guards. The scent of exotic flowers, fragrant spices and freshly washed laundry wafted her way as she twisted and turned. It was too much, too overwhelming for a woman who hadn’t set foot outside her own realm before. Finally, as she hurtled down yet another alley, she was met with quiet, and shade. The shouts of her pursuers faded.
A sharp pain in her head told her that she’d used her magick too strong and too fast, her well depleting. She looked around desperately, and it was only when she was assured that she was completely alone that she leaned against a cool, terracotta wall, gulping in lungfuls of arid air. She only allowed herself three before she hitched her dress up, awkwardly angling herself so that she could pull her dagger from its hilt around her thigh. She placed the hilt in her mouth as she sawed her bindings upon the dagger, its blade glittering as deep and blue as the starlit sky of home. When the last threads finally snapped, she breathed a sigh of relief, rubbing the obsidian and sapphire crystals embedded in its hilt out of habit, before sheathing it once more.
Her thick, powder-blue dress was heavy in the heat, not to mention covered in drying blood. She couldn’t have looked more conspicuous if she tried. From the few glimpses she’d seen as she’d ran past, Helion fashion certainly wasn’t modest, and Elara cursed, before tearing the dress off, corset too, leaving her in her thin, white undergown, saved from blood by the thick wool of her overdress.
She dumped the sullied dress in the alley and began to walk. She passed various piazzas, ones decorated with extravagant fountains and surrounded by white, dazzling houses. Some were filled with people, others quiet. She ventured into one that she saw was empty, turning in a circle. All she had to do was find out the direction of the border, and keep walking. Whether her feet bled or her body gave out, she had to get back home.
It was as her thoughts wrapped around home, of the scene she had left behind, her mother’s scream, her father’s roar—the starlight, the laughter—that she realized too late who was approaching.
There were shouts, the draw of steel, and as Elara made to run, more guards entered the small square.
She turned to another alleyway. Soldiers in golden armour marched out of that one too. She realized she was completely entrapped.
‘Looks like a little birdy’s trying to fly home,’ grinned one soldier.
Some of the others whistled and twittered. Her hand longed for her dagger, but it was strapped to her thigh, too far from reach as another man with a nasty scar upon his cheek advanced. ‘I say we clip her wings,’ he said, displaying yellow teeth with his smile. She didn’t recognize him from the cart. He had to be a city guard.
‘They weren’t General Leonardo’s orders,’ piped up a younger soldier.
‘Well, General Leonardo isn’t here, is he?’
Elara began to back up a step, but felt a blade at her spine. Her head was still pounding, but she dragged up the last available droplets of her illusioning power, as the scarred man advanced, tossing his sword between his hands.
‘Hold her, lads.’
Though every instinct inside her wanted to scream and cry, to beg, she forced herself to be calm.
She said nothing as rough hands grabbed her shoulders, excited guffaws from the small group ringing in her ears.
‘Don’t you think this is all a little cliché?’ she sighed.
The soldier frowned.
‘Big, bad scar? Dark alleyway? Little man given a dram of power, decides to accost a woman with it?’ Sofia would have been proud of the unruffled tone.
‘Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?’
Elara tilted her head as though considering. ‘Well, from the smell of yesterday’s beer on your breath, I’d guess an alcoholic waste of a city guard, who’s never made it up the ranks past being the general’s lapdog.’
The scarred man’s face contorted in rage. ‘Oh, I’ll make you pay for that,’ he snarled. ‘Drag her down there,’ he ordered a soldier, nodding to the dark alley she’d come from. She was hauled along to jeers and taunts, though she did not struggle, keeping her eyes on the scarred soldier.
One cannot see clearly through stormy waters , she reminded herself. One of her many, many tutors had tried to drum the sentence through her skull during Elara’s various outbursts. When she was pushed against the wall, she spoke.
‘I’m going to give you one more chance to be a gentleman and let me go.’
A different soldier, this one stocky and short, gripped her hands behind her back.
The scarred soldier’s laugh was empty. ‘Shut the fuck up, you entitled little bitch,’ he barked. His dirty hands tugged at the fabric of her white gown, ripping the neckline. His lips came close to her neck.
You control your emotions, they do not control you.
Yet another lesson from another tutor.
He drew his slimy tongue across her throat, and she forced herself to remain still as her magick swirled and snapped until it poured out of her—the final drop in her well.
Into an illusion. This time, a nightmare.
She felt her magick rear behind her, blocking out the Light above them, as the guards all around her stiffened. The hands at her back fell away, whimpers sounding. Before the inevitable screams.
Elara’s illusions were a magick of will. And what she willed was to show the soldiers their worst fear.
‘I wonder what you see,’ she said softly, to the scarred guard now backing away. ‘Is it a wraith? A soulless monster?’ She advanced, as more screams sounded, like music. ‘Is it your own reflection?’
A tear trickled down the guard’s face. ‘Please.’
‘Is that the sound you wanted me to make?’ she whispered. ‘Do you enjoy preying on women? Defenceless? Innocent? I wonder if what you see is a man doing what you just tried to do to me, to your daughter.’
He sank to his knees, eyes wide with fear. She vaguely noticed some of the other guards on the ground, wailing and crawling, or curled up in a ball. All so easy to terrify.
She gritted her teeth as she forced one final bout of power into the alley. She willed her nightmares to haunt these men’s sleep for the rest of their miserable lives. And smiled, at the faint scent of ammonia as a wet patch spread across the scarred man’s crotch.
A bloodcurdling scream rose from the man’s gaping lips, and she clamped her hand firmly over his mouth. Tears streamed down his face as he shook against her, muttering hysterically.
‘This is for every woman you’ve preyed upon, every girl you have accosted and taken from without asking permission. I know I’m not the first.’ She leaned in. ‘But I will be your last. If you or your men ever try this again, you will pray for these nightmares. Because they will be nothing compared to what I will do to you.’
Footsteps pounded and she turned to see Leonardo arrive in the alleyway, a look of shock on his face, and two guards in tow. He surveyed the various soldiers slumped on the floor, or wailing, or praying.
His eyes widened, and she tried to force her nightmares upon him, enough so that she could run. But that piercing pain scorched through her head, as the last of her magick sputtered out. She swayed, and Leonardo launched forwards, catching her. She felt rope—soaked in shadowsbane—bind her wrists. She almost laughed. The dampening venom made no difference when she couldn’t even wield the most common, and powerful, of Asterian magick.
However, she didn’t have any energy or any other magick left to fight back as she was marched out of the alley.
An elderly woman hiding in her doorway blanched when Elara walked past her.
‘Who are you?’ she breathed, fear sharp in her eyes.
Before the last of Elara’s bravado left her, she winked. ‘Just an entitled little bitch.’