6 #2
We stop in front of an iron door that resembles the entrance to a well-guarded prison. Its rust-brown color merges into the purple light of the cave. Darya opens it effortlessly. I hesitantly step inside, and when I see a massive bed frame, I pause.
“No,” I insist. “I won’t sleep here…”
The iron door slams shut. I spin around.
“No!” I scream, throwing myself at the door. Desperately, I start hitting it with my fists. He has left me alone in a dark room. Alone.
“Darya! Let me out! No!”
He’s locked me in. Locked me, locked me, locked me.
“Calm down.” The cold voice comes from the other side of the door and I pause my rage to hear what he says. “Once the poison clears from your system, you can leave your room. I give you my word.”
“No… Please, don’t leave me here. It’s dark, and…”
The space suddenly lights up with small oval lamps.
Lights extend on the floor, the brown wall, and the ceiling.
I don’t know who needs such a large bed.
The mattress, topped with blood-red pillows, is supported by four pillars, each resembling a tree trunk.
Carved snakes twist around them, reaching up to the ceiling.
I clutch my fist to my stomach and take a step back, my shoulder hitting the door.
“You promised to take me to a place where they can’t lock me up,” I whisper.
“Your blood needs to clear for the demons to sense you have demon blood.”
“But the monsters…”
“They won’t attack you. They can’t come in here.”
I turn to the door.
“They attacked me in the barn !”
“The room is secure,” Darya insists. After a brief pause, he adds, “but if I were you, I would stay in bed. You won’t need to be locked up once the poison no longer suppresses your abilities.”
What damn abilities is he talking about? Do they really need an interpreter this badly?
“So, you’re leaving me here to starve for two days?”
“There’s food in your bag. You’ll survive.”
I shake my head and direct my gaze to my bag placed against the wall. I didn’t notice Darya putting it there.
“Don’t worry. No one will harm you,” he repeats. “You will only mean more to me dead if I see you on the side of the angels . Two days, and you’ll be out.”
The footsteps slowly fade away, leaving me alone.
Leaning my back against the door, I slide down to the floor. I recall what my psychiatrist taught me about what to do when I have a panic attack. It feels like a rope is tightening around my neck, and I sense the airway constricting. I can’t shake off the belief that someone is watching.
To calm down, I should think of something that connects me to the present, but the here and now are the problem. I’m locked in a creepy room, and a monster’s head could appear on the wall at any time. There’s no sound to focus on.
The crimson light seems to ripple.
I hug the bag closer, digging my nails into the fabric.
Darya’s last words present a new threat to me, one I can’t process yet.
You will only mean more to me dead if I see you on the side of the angels.
I mean something to Darya, and he won’t kill me until I am with the angels.
Filizi is Darya’s realm, and Herebu, if it’s real, belongs to the angels.
Oh my God. I’m thinking about angels and demons. Is this why I struggled for fifteen years, only for the demons to then be sitting in my room when I open my eyes? What do they want with me?
“I will wake up,” I whisper to myself. I will wake up, and then everything will be fine. There will be no Darya, no angels. I’ll take my medication, and everything will be fine.
Darya said the medication suppresses my abilities. Did he really abduct me to be an interpreter? Faint hope creeps into my confused thoughts. Maybe if I finish everything Darya asks of me, I can go home and be a translator without needing to actually learn any languages?
“This is good,” an inner voice says, in the tone of my psychiatrist. “Focus on this!”
I imagine Maya’s face as she sees how much better her depressive sister is doing. My parents’ faces come to mind, and I see how they finally embrace each other now that they no longer have to worry about me. I think of Nathan’s longing gaze.
“This is good,” the voice says again. “Concentrate on the thought!” I try, but it doesn’t work. The lights are so red, and there’s no sound at all.
Food. Darya said I have enough. I open the bag I’m clutching in my lap.
I reach for my medication, but the pockets are empty.
I expected that. My parents sometimes took them when I couldn’t keep control.
That’s why I came up with the secret pocket at the bottom.
However, something is wrong; the little pocket is torn, and the place where the pills used to be is empty.
No. No, no, no, no.
Darya doesn’t understand. I have to take them, otherwise I won’t calm down. My heart… My heart will stop, and I will die here. Die of a heart attack, and…
I jump up. I pound on the door, shouting for my medication. I scream that I can’t handle it. I promise to do anything if he just gives me a little. I swear on my parents’ lives just to take half. I bang my head against the hard door.
The medication. I have to take my medication.
I imagine the pill in my mouth. I always let it dissolve on my tongue, like a ritual.
I scream until my throat dries out. I beat my head rhythmically against the door.
I feel nauseous. Somehow, I hoist myself up while continuing to grasp onto my bag, and step toward the bed.
I pause. Something isn’t right. I feel on my skin that something has changed.
Standing between the door and the bed, I lift my head. I look around, scanning.
“Just drag yourself to the bed,” I mutter to myself, but as I take a step, I feel something move again – not behind me, not in front of me, but around me. The black circles in the oval-shaped lamps follow my every step.
I stop in shock. They are not lamps. They are yellow eyes surrounding the room, tracking my every move!
I flee to the bed. The black pupils follow, and the eyelids blink moistly. Like a child, I pull the blanket over myself, as if it may protect me from every monster.
Then I hear something behind me. My hand tightens on the blanket. For a moment, there’s only my own wheezing breath and the sound behind me – a liquid sound, like someone closing their teary eyes.
I turn slowly.
Above the bed frame, another pair of huge yellow eyes fix their blood-black gaze on me.
I scream, desperately trying to crawl out from under the blanket, but suddenly bars slam down around the bed. I grab them with both hands and scream again, crying for someone to help. But no one comes for me. I am alone.
The eyes just peer, scrutinizing with their bloodshot, yellow sclera. One, then the other, closes its eyelids. The sound is similar to saliva dripping.
I tug at the bars, perhaps for hours, slowly exhausting myself. My heartbeat quiets down. There is no way out of this prison; no one will come for me.
The cold reality hits me, and my own eyes slowly close.
I never imagined them. They exist.
And now, I am not the captive of humans, but of demons.