36. Raya
RAYA
“Can we trust them? Should we trust them?”
- RAYA TO KHOL
The air in the dungeon was stale and cold, a metallic taste coated my mouth and shivers danced up my spine. The smell of ash clung to my hair, I had blazed the incriminating letter about The Temple in my hand with my FireBringer magic.
“Khol?” I whispered. The words bounced off the walls. I walked deeper into the room, and prisoners stared at me from behind bars.
“Khol?” Had he changed his mind? Decided my traitorous self was not worth helping.
Voices travelled down from the opposite entrance, and I slipped into the nearest open cell.
“How are we going to get him out of the cell? Do you have a key?” a young female voice floated through the room.
“No, I’m just hoping the lock is old,” another voice sounded.
“That’s the plan? Hope the lock is old?” a third voice chimed in. The door creaked open, and three girls crept in, weapons up.
“Jameson?” The tallest girl whispered, her curved body and black braided hair swishing as she moved.
“Are you sure this is where you saw him?” The shortest girl spoke, her pale skin peppered with goosebumps as she hugged her chest.
“Raya?” Khol’s voice sounded from further down the tunnel. I closed my eyes and sighed softly. I couldn’t call back to him, but I couldn’t let him believe that I hadn’t showed up. After everything we had been through, I couldn’t allow myself to be caught now, not when I was so close to being free.
My heartbeat became rapid as he called my name again.
“Should we hide?” The middle girl with short blonde hair whispered.
Khol’s voice was closer this time.
The women fled into the only empty cell as Khol’s voice began filling the room.
The empty cell that I was currently occupying.
I cringed as the leader tripped over my barely covered form.
“What the hell?” A dirty tarp was pulled off me as Khol walked into the dungeon. I stared up at the three girls, women, all of them looking tired, scared, and worn. They reminded me of myself.
“Who are you?” the tallest girl asked me, her eyebrows raised.
I opened my mouth to speak but the words refused to surface.
“Who are you?” Khol asked back, finally walking into the cell.
“Where is Jameson?” The girl ignored Khol’s question and looked back at me. “Get up.” She held out her hand for me to grab.
I stood at my full height. A small smile tugged at the corner of the strange woman’s mouth as I rose to her eye level.
“Are you members of The Temple?” I asked, risking a glance toward Khol.
“The Temple? What is The Temple?” the woman asked.
I looked at Khol again, both of us scrunching our eyebrows. Questions turned over and over in my mind as we left the cell, all of us standing in the middle of the dungeon, staring at each other.
Now I saw them in better light, it seemed as though the two blonde girls were related or from the same village. Their hair and eyes almost identical.
“Where is Jameson?” The leader spoke again, her dark brown skin wrinkling as she frowned.
“We don’t know,” I spoke.
“How did you get in here? What do you want from us?” Khol asked, placing a hand on my lower back. I felt the fear that coated his entire body, and realization racked through me. I hadn’t felt anyone’s emotions but Khol’s and I hadn’t felt his since our argument on the field. When the lightening had struck, and the rain had soaked the earth.
Even when he hated me, he protected me. He feared for my life.
“We’re here for Jameson and once we have him, we’ll leave,” the shortest girl spoke again. Her hand firmly locked with the other fair-haired girl.
“Raya, we need to go,” Khol looked down at me. “Elijah, he’s waiting for us.” Sadness crept into my mind, I hadn’t even thought of Elijah, my dear friend.
“Elijah,” I whispered, just as the tallest girl said, “Raya?”
I turned to her. Now it was my turn to drown in fear.
“I’ve heard your name before, I’ve…” Her voice trailed off.
“Someone is looking for you,” she spoke again. “I saw him a moon cycle ago. Alias.” She turned the name over in her mouth. “I think he said his name was Alias.” Sweat began pooling in my palms. “Do you know him?” she asked.
My heart smashed around my rib cage, turning ragged and wild.
“Alias,” I whispered, relief sliding into my heart. Alias was not a prisoner. He was free.
“Alias?” My voice shook. “He’s alive?” I almost laughed.
“Well, he was alive when I saw him last. That or he was a ghost,” she shrugged.
“Who are you?” I asked, and finally, they told us their story.
Her name was Joy, she and her companions, Erin, and Jodie, had travelled for weeks in search of Joy’s brother Jameson.
“And how do you know this ‘Jameson’ is here?” Khol asked after we heard their story.
“I saw him,” Joy spoke, looking at her feet. “In a cell with a man named Rafael?” Khol’s head shot up.
“Rafael?” he whispered before raking his hands through his hair, his breath came out in slow, shallow breaths. “Did you see what he looked like? Did he have dark skin like ours?” he asked Joy, he stepped closer to her, pleading clear in his eyes.
She hadn’t seen his face, and Jameson hadn’t told her about him either. We didn’t bother asking how Joy had ‘seen’ into the cell without entering the building.
Enough crazy shit had already happened.
We began searching each cell. I knew what plagued Khol’s mind. Rafael. Was it Khol’s brother? Or just another man with the same name? Dripping water echoed throughout the dungeon, each room we ventured into bigger and wider than the last. Rust and mold made its home on all of the bars and stone walls.
“Jameson?” I whispered into each cell. “Rafael?” Murmurs and grunts were thrown in my direction. Many of the prisoners were laid, sleeping. Some of them still enough to be dead.
Some assumably newer prisoners stood at the front of their cells, arms stretched over the decaying bars.
“Hey beautiful,” a toothless man lisped in my direction. I hurried past, almost slipping on something that smelt suspiciously like human waste.
“I found them!” Jodie whisper-shouted from an adjoining room and I ran toward her voice, thanking every Goddess in existence for the chance to leave this Godforsaken place.