Luminary (21 page)
Sometimes I am sure I hear Berk talking to me. He is beside me, but I cannot touch him. He tells me he will come for me. He will break through the wall and we will escape and everything will be fine.
I don’t know if those are dreams or hallucinations. But they are not reality. The reality is I am living in a dark cell with little oxygen and no help. My rescuers are dead or dying. Helen is dead. Alex . . . I have had dreams about Alex too. Sometimes he is coming to rescue me. Other times he is with his father, part of the grand plan to destroy New Hope, thanking me for making that plan a reality.
I try to recall the words John taught me, the words he sent about being strong and courageous. But I cannot be strong and courageous. I am so very afraid. And so alone.
“Get up, girl.” The door opens and the light from a torch the guard carries makes my eyes burn. It is so bright. “Get up.”
I roll to my side, try to use my elbows to lift myself into a sitting position. But I cannot. I have no strength. What little I might have had was extinguished by the blinding light.
I feel a strong hand at my shoulder, propelling me up. I cry out from the pain of his grip, but he does not release me until I am on my feet. I fall forward and the guard catches me. My eyes are closed, but I can see the glow from the torch in front of my eyelids.
“You stink.” His breath is hot on my face. If I had energy, I would tell him that at least I have an excuse for my odor. But I do not have energy. And I am hurting all over. I cannot risk being hurt more.
“She needs to bathe.” The guard pushes me so far that I am forced to open my eyes so I can see where I am going. But the light is too bright. All I see is red. And then I land on a hard surface. One that smells terrible. Another guard. He pushes me away from him.
“I’ll take her to Melitta.” The guard keeps his palms against my back, pushing me ahead of him.
We walk through the hallway. I open my eyes a millimeter at a time until I can open them all the way without them burning and watering. I am filthy. The chamber I was in must have been covered in black dirt, because that is all over my arms and my clothes. There are holes in my pants from where I hit the sleeping platform, and there is a rip down the side from where I rubbed against the wall, trying to hear from Kristie.
I want to ask for water, but I am too frightened to speak. And I am sure that even if I tried, nothing would come out. I don’t even know how I am able to keep one foot moving in front of the other.
“Take her.” We have reached a room carved out of the chalky walls. It is moist and smells of soap.
“I clean laundry, not prisoners.” The woman at the far end of the room is middle aged, with wiry black hair sprinkled with white strands. Her face is prematurely wrinkled, and she is missing most of her teeth.
“You do what you’re told or you’ll end up a prisoner yourself.”
The woman dumps a silver tub filled with water into a
receptacle in the wall and places it under a faucet. Clear water runs out and fills up the tub. The guard leaves.
“Get undressed.”
“I cannot.” I glance behind me. The restraints keep my arms pinned behind me.
The woman rolls her eyes. “You think I am so stupid that I would remove those for you? So you could kill me like you killed the princess?”
I want to defend myself, but each word is painful, and this woman wouldn’t believe me anyway.
“Be still.” The woman has a large pair of scissors in her hand. She places them at my neck and cuts my clothing off me. She digs the sharp ends of the scissors into my skin every time she opens them, but I am too exhausted to cry out. I watch the water flowing into the tub and imagine myself drinking from it.
Soon I am in the tub. The water is cold, but I don’t care. The water turns dark brown as the dirt slides off my skin. I get a mouthful of the running water before the woman turns the faucet off. I swallow it slowly, allowing the cool liquid to soothe my raging throat. I want to scrub every inch of my body with the thickest cloth I can find. But I don’t have use of my arms, so all I can do is rub my legs together and wipe my face against my shoulder.
“All I have is laundry soap.” The woman drops a huge block of soap into the water.
“Can you help me?” I cannot even see the soap in the filthy water.
The woman sighs. “Fine.” She grabs a coarse cloth and scrubs my hair with so much force, I am sure every strand will
come out in her hands. She then shoves my head underwater. I am unprepared, and water goes burning into my nose. I come up and cough, and she shoves me down again.
“Enough.” The woman holds up a drying cloth that looks as rough as the walls. I lean forward, positioning myself on my knees and dragging myself up to my feet. She throws the cloth around my shoulders and I step out of the tub, freezing and humiliated.
The guard pokes his head into the room. “You done yet?”
“Almost.” The woman pulls a brown shirt and pants from a pile of clothing on a counter. “How am I supposed to dress her with her arms tied behind her back?”
“Throw the shirt over her.” The guard’s voice sounds like a trombone with a battered horn. “She won’t be needing her arms.”
The woman complies. She is rough, the material is rough, but it’s clean and it smells of soap. So I choose to give thanks for these small mercies. Once I am dressed, the guard grabs my shoulder and once again propels me forward.
“Where . . . ?” I clear my throat and try to bring the words out. “Where are you taking me?”
“To the king. He’s been preparing something special for you.” The guard says these words with a horrible laugh, and my blood freezes.
Death, I can handle. I was prepared before, thanks to John. Death does not frighten me.
Dying, however, is terrifying.
I
smell what I am sure is burning flesh. It is a horrible smell. If anything was in my stomach, I am sure I would lose it all. But there is nothing, so I gag and retch, my throat screaming in pain. But I cannot help it.
I close my eyes as we walk into the open. I do not want to see who is burning. It will be one of my friends. Carey, Kristie . . . Berk. I am not courageous enough to watch any of them burn. I do not even have any tears left to spend on them, but my heart breaks with every step.
There are punishments worse than death. The king knows this. He will force me to watch each of my friends die before he kills me. I am sure of this.
I expect to hear the sound of people cheering as I enter—the cheers of those happy to see a condemned person facing her fate. But instead I hear wailing, sobbing, sounds of grief. The heat of a fire warms my face, and I dare to open my eyes. I was right. It is one of my friends being burned. But not the one I expected.
Helen.
This must be their funeral rite. I recall reading about those in history lessons. The ancients had a variety of ways to dispose of the dead. Burning, in the opinion of the State, was the most effective. This was not an incinerator, though. This was a tall pile of wood, with jewels and gold mixed in. Helen lay on top surrounded by flames, dressed like royalty.
I do not want to watch, but I cannot turn away. This is my fault. I did not discharge the weapon, but I am the cause of its discharge. The king wanted to start a war, and he used Helen to do it. Knowing he planned this before I came along does not ease the guilt I feel. What if we had run away earlier? Taken Berk when we infiltrated his cell and just ran? Would she have survived? What if the guard had missed? What if I grabbed him before he could take aim?
None of this seems fair. Helen deserved to live. She deserved to be with Peter and have a life of love and peace.
I cannot breathe, my throat is so tight. It feels like someone has stuffed a stone deep inside it. Stones line my throat, go down into my heart. I know loss. I have experienced it before. But this is so much more. So much worse.
I am falling, black spots dancing in front of my eyes. I feel the guard grab my shoulder, but he cannot catch me. I do not hit the ground. Instead I float up, up. I see Helen from above the flames. So far above, I don’t even feel the heat. She is crying,
burning, begging me to save her. But I cannot reach her. I am caught above just like I was caught below.
“Please, Thalli.” Flames hide her face. She is in torment. “Help me. Help me.”
I cannot move. My arms are pinned behind me. My feet are frozen.
Then I am drowning. Water fills my mouth, my nose, my eyes. I want the water to fall onto Helen. I do not need it. She needs it. I try to tell whoever is submerging me to help Helen. But I cannot speak.
“You will wake up.”
I open my eyes to see the face of a guard looming over me, his breath hot and foul in my face.
I passed out. The guard threw water on me to wake me. He pulls me back onto my feet, but I sway, my ears ringing. I cannot stand. My legs will not hold me.
“Leave her on the ground,” another voice shouts. “Do not let her behavior direct attention away from the princess.”
“Of course.” The guard looks above at the fire, leaving me half sitting, half lying on the ground.
I breathe in and out slowly, carefully, trying to bring enough oxygen into my lungs to prevent myself from fainting again. As terrible as this reality is, my dreams while unconscious were even worse.
I look beyond Helen, to the platform where she was killed, and I see the king and Alex. The king is expressionless. Alex is not. His face shows a mixture of grief and anger. His stare is locked on Helen’s burning form. I cannot imagine what he is thinking. He lost his mother, now his sister. His only remaining family is the king, who ordered the murders of those who died.
His gaze finds mine. I want to communicate concern to him, but when he looks at me, I see hatred. Pure, burning hatred, directed right at me. He speaks to his father, points to me. The king nods and whispers something to a guard standing beside him. That guard walks toward us.
I try to catch Alex’s gaze again. Surely he does not believe I killed Helen. Surely he realizes this was the king’s actions, his plan. But as I continue to watch him, I see that his eyes are clouded, blank. His is the look of one who has been drugged.
“The king has ordered that the prisoner be removed,” the king’s guard says.
“Very well.” My guard glances toward the king. “Do I return her to the chamber?”
“No.” The guard glares at me, hatred blazing in his eyes as well. “The trial begins when the funeral ends. Go put her with the others.”
The guard pushes me forward, away from the fire and the platform. We walk toward a rectangular tower that stands out from the main palace. The door opens and my guard stops. “The orders are for her to stay here until the trial.”
“Fine.” A guard inside speaks, but I cannot see him. No lights illuminate this place. My eyes cannot adjust quickly to the changes.
I feel a hand on my shoulder, and I am pushed into a room that smells like the laundry room. But there is no moisture here. High up, a window allows just a tiny slice of sunlight in. I see shadows at first. Then I hear a door slam.
“Thalli?” Berk. I know his voice, but I still see only shadows. “You’re alive.”
I feel Berk near me. His arms are bound also, but we lean
against each other. He has been cleaned, like me. I smell the laundry soap on his coarse clothes. I want to wrap my arms around him, to touch his face. But I am content to hear his heartbeat. To know he is alive.
“What did they do to you?” Fear invades Berk’s voice.
“I am all right.” I step back, look at Berk until his features become clear. His face isn’t as bruised as the last time I saw him. His scratches are healing. The stubble on his cheeks has grown into the beginnings of a beard. “They left me alone.”
Berk sighs. “Good.”
“Carey and Kristie?” I look around. “Are they—?”
“They were allowed to leave.”
“What?”
“The king released them. He even gave them transport back to New Hope.”
My mind races. Why would he do that? They were next to me. I heard Kristie shouting. I did not hear guards take them away. Perhaps I was sleeping when it happened. “Are you sure?”
“I saw them go. I was held in a room above this one. I watched out the window as they left.”
“They will tell the people what happened,” I say, the pieces coming together. “They will bring others.”
“I know.” Berk closes his eyes. “I tried to call out to them as they left. I wanted to warn them. But they didn’t hear me.”
“They are wise.” I swallow hard. “They know the king. They saw the lengths he will go to, to deceive his people. They will not walk into a trap.”
“I would.” Berk sighs again.
“What?”
“If I knew you were in danger, I would come.” Berk gazes at
me, his green eyes full of emotion. “Even knowing I’d be walking to my death.”
And I realize that is exactly what he did. “Let us hope Carey and Kristie aren’t as emotional as we are.”
H
ow dare you allow them to be together!” Alex’s voice pierces the room. I hear a guard being slammed to the ground. “They conspired to murder the princess. Who knows what other atrocities they have planned. They get no mercy. Nothing. Do you understand?”
The guard grunts. “Sorry, Your Majesty. I was not aware.”
“You are fortunate I came,” Alex says. “They would likely have killed you and escaped.”
“Yes, sir.” Fear fills the guard’s voice. “Thank you, sir.”
Alex’s frame fills the doorway. I never noticed how tall he is, how muscular. How frightening.
“Alex.” I want to break through the drugs he is under. I want to find the Alex I know. “Please listen.”
“I have listened enough.” Alex looks at me, his eyes a dark blue, darker than I have ever seen them, the whites of his eyes tinged with red—from tears? From the fire? From the drugs? “I befriended you. I believed you. I cared for you. And you used me.”
“No, Alex.” I take a step toward him. He holds his arm out, palm up.
“No more.” Alex lowers his arm, but the message is clear: Stay back. Keep quiet. “Father is right. About everything. My weakness cost Helen her life. I will not be weak again.”