2. Amelie
Amelie
“ A melie, get yourself together. The guards are heading our way.”
Lightning struck my spine, straightening painfully at the mention of the guards. I had already finished the last pair of shoes that needed shining, and I prayed Henrik had more for me to do so they couldn’t take me.
The guards typically left Henrik’s store alone. He lived as by the book as one could. While the guards were abusive and disgusting versions of men, Henrik, along with most of the non-Palace affiliated men in Holleberg, were just trying to survive like the rest of us.
We finish school at twelve and are expected to have a job immediately after. I walked into the shop battered and bruised the week before we graduated asking for a job. Henrik’s looked after me ever since. When my father passed, he was the only one privy to my tears.
Henrik’s shoe shop was nestled at the end of a three-way stop. If you walked straight down from the Palace, you’d walk right into it.
I pulled at the hem of my top in a nervous attempt to iron it out.
The bottom of my tattered skirt was caked in wet mud from dragging on the ground.
Tucking the stray hairs that had escaped my messy braid behind my ear, I started for the front of the shop.
The soles of my boots were so worn that they flopped against the ground with each step, squishing cold rainwater and clumps of dirt into my socks, making my toes numb.
I stepped out from the backroom, Henrik was dead on the money. The guards were walking straight toward us. Three sets of eyes were locked on the door to the shop.
The guards’ hands were resting on their daggers casually as they stepped through the threshold.
Fear cowered in my veins, my heart thundered against my chest. Heat seemed to prick at my eyes as if a match had just missed the strike pad.
The one to the left was the culprit behind my bruised face and broken satchel, Rad.
He was big and burly. His uniform looked like it would pop at the seams if he moved wrong. His hair was so greasy, it was hard to decide if it was brown or blonde.
The one on the right had bright blonde hair and looked just like the one in the middle, but younger. His muscles were on display through the navy tops they wore, and he held a stony expression on his face.
“Good afternoon.” The guard in the middle spoke first. He was the one who never reported me for thieving. His blue eyes creased at the sides, showing his age, but he was otherwise a very fit man. I didn’t know much about him, but I could see his rank on his lapel.
He was Lord Bosque’s right-hand man and head guard.
“To what do we owe the pleasure, Arthur?” Henrik replied, keeping a pleasant expression on his face.
“We are collecting profits early this month,” Arthur said. Rad was threatening me with his eyes–narrowed and fierce. His nose was twitching on one side and his jaw clenched tight. I couldn’t peel my eyes away, afraid if I did he’d pounce .
“But there’s still a week left to get them in order?
” Henrik stuffed his hands in his pockets, trying to remain calm.
The last time the Palace did this, they didn’t report what they took, so when the real collectors came, none of the businesses could match their records for payment.
Every shop on this block was still trying to recover from that.
“Lord’s orders.” Arthur puffed his chest out slightly, but not confidently. He’d always been kind to me, or as kind as a guard could be. Right now, though, it seemed like this wasn’t something he was proud to be doing for Lord Bosque.
Henrik moved to the desk and started gathering each of the detailed logs he kept, along with the monies owed. All the money in Holleberg went through the Palace, and they conveniently failed to redistribute our wages fairly every month.
I kept a keen eye on the guards, specifically Rad. He’d been the man behind so many of my bruises before that I wouldn’t put it past him to attack right here. But fuck, my eyes were on fire. I reminded myself to blink but it wasn’t helping.
“Should be all there.” Henrik handed over his records along with a canvas bag of jingling coins.
“Will this be reported?” he asked Arthur in a hushed tone.
Arthur didn’t answer and instead gave Henrik and me an apologetic look instead.
If this isn’t reported, I’ll have no wages to garnish.
Henrik will fall even further behind on what he owed the Palace each month.
It’s a trap, it always was.
Arthur and his quiet, blonde counterpart turned to leave, but Rad lingered long enough to send a fleet of spiders crawling over my skin.
All of them settling in my stomach, making it churn.
I swallowed the bile rising in my throat as he gave me another nasty smile before following his leader out the door.
I shook off the feeling that was settling deep in the marrow of my bones. Henrik bowed his head in his hands against the desk .
If I could burn the palace down, along with all the guard’s in it, I would.
“You should be on your way home.” Henrik’s voice was muffled by his palms.
I grabbed my bag off the hook and gave Henrik a soothing touch to his shoulder. A shaky breath escaped him and I took that as my sign to leave. Nobody in Holleberg wanted to be caught crying. Tears were wasted water, life was miserable whether you cried about it or not.
I walked out of the store, feeling the humid August air on my face.
Taking a good look around and making sure it was safe from any lurking guards, I started on my way home.
There were usually two guards patrolling this street at all times and others that lingered just to prey on us but I didn’t see anybody.
The bakery was one shop down so I discreetly looked over my shoulder, most women kept their heads down when they walked anywhere. At this point we knew the way home better than our own heartbeat.
A mother, father, and child were walking into the bakery and I sent a silent prayer up to God that there were a few more patrons inside. If it were even a few weeks later into the year, I would need my cloak and could hide under its hood but unfortunately my face would be on full display today.
Keeping my eyes trained on the toes of my boots, I walked into the bakery as another walked out.
Good start. The child that walked in before was begging his mother for a sweet, the checker was talking with the father.
I went straight for the shelf that had the spare ingredients and acted like I was browsing.
When my eyes landed on the small glass jar I spotted earlier, I swiped it and tucked it into my bag with ease.
“Can I help you find anything?” The checker called from behind the counter. I took in a sharp breath, turning to give him a halfhearted smile.
“Just looking,” I said, trying my hardest to not make eye contact.
It was horrible to steal, I knew that. Henrik let me take home shoes I’d made from spare materials for the boys and that felt icky enough.
Stealing from someone who was under the same ruin as the rest of the shop owners and villagers in this town just felt wrong.
But it was for the birthday boy.
I spun on my heel to head back for the door when a haunting face in the window took the breath clean out of me. I couldn’t move.
Rad’s huge, greasy body was stealing any natural light from pouring into the bakery. My heart thudded in my ears.
His eyes were hungry, antagonizing. He stared at me but his lips were curled up in a way that made my gut roll in unease.
“Do you have a back door?” I called back to the checker. When I turned toward him, I noticed the pale coloring and fear etched across his face as he stared at the guard outside. He nodded subtly at me, the innocent family now caught in the crossfire.
I noted the door behind him that appeared to have sunlight poking through the cracks.
In a dead sprint, I swung the door open and jumped down the three stairs, hitting ground and stumbling for a moment.
I took a hard left, running parallel to the backs of the shops until the dilapidated homes came into view.
“You can run, but you can’t hide,” a breathless Rad shouted from behind me. My heart crashed wildly, my lungs were burning from the inside out, and my shoes were barely holding together.
I could see a large body in the spaces between the homes. My only hope was to cut through someone’s yard and throw Rad off my trail.
Running between two houses, I took a sharp turn toward my own. Down the way, I could see Wren carrying Tildan inside. I tried to shout to them to get inside quickly but my winded lungs were void of sound.
Only a few more–
Ow. Fuck.
What was that?
My hair was yanked from behind me, picking me up from the ground I’d apparently collapsed onto.
My head bobbed backward as the pain settled at the nape of my neck.
The last few seconds came back to me, and I realized I had taken a blow to the side of my head.
My body was being dragged in between my home and the neighbors.
“I love the chase, whore,” a slimy voice whispered into my ear. I looked at my home, through the kitchen window, I saw Wren staring at me with glassy brown eyes. Hansel was bouncing behind him, trying to see, but Wren wasn’t letting him watch as Rad dragged me away.
My brain was telling me to close my eyes, to concede. Let Holleberg win. I never wanted to kill myself, I had people depending on me. But that’s not to say if Heaven opened its pearly gates and God himself came down and said, “If you’re ready, you may come now ,” that I wouldn’t go.
Just before I could fully let go, I heard something I wasn’t sure I’d ever hear again.
“Mama?” Hansel’s voice was loud and full of excitement. It encouraged me to take one last look at my home before the guards finally took my life.