His hand went slack around her neck, and she slipped to the ground, coughing as he took a couple of steps back, watching her gasp for air on the floor, trying to regain what she had been deprived of.
"E--li--"
"Silence!"
The words snapped something in her and she looked up at the man she loved.
What happened?
"I do not want to hear my name on your lips."
Bewildered, she stood up slowly, his cold gaze weighing heavily on her.
When he spoke again, his voice was like a deadly whisper.
"I do not want to hear you repeat to me the poisonous dictates of the Bride Thief."
Her heartbeat was slamming loudly in her ears now.
"I don't understand," the words slipped through her lips, the shakiness of her voice failing the firmness she was trying to hold onto.
Something told her she did understand what was going on, but she was hanging on to this denial.
Maybe if she held on to this ignorance long enough, everything would fade away.
She was losing him.
She could feel him slipping from her fingers, like sand.
This wasn't happening. This just couldn't be happening.
Her mind kept swaying back to her dream this morning, how she had felt herself get yanked out of it, how she would never be able to dream about the Bride thief anytime she was with Eli.
Could that be why she had been pulled out of the dream?
Had Eli been to her study this morning?
Did he get some things from her study to confirm that she had been going to places through her dreams? She hadn't seen her dagger in a while.
No. It couldn't be.
Was that what he had confirmed with the maid he had met earlier?
Her mind flashed to how his grip had tightened around her wrist when the maid had given him a confirmation of whatever he asked.
The more she thought about it, the more she arrived at the conclusion that he knew.
To be in denial was better than to accept such truth though.
"You have been dreaming of him."
The words she had been dreading.
They had finally been spoken.
"I was in your study this morning."
By Ignas, he knew.
"I can explain."
That was the dumbest thing to say, but she found herself saying it anyways.
He chuckled, the sound drained completely of its humor.
"Don't."
There was a heavy silence, their gazes unwavering, unasked questions swindling in Eli's eyes, Belladonna's answers pleading for an audience... more silence.
"I was trying to help stop the Bride Thief."
Something ticked in Eli's jaws, his cold gaze becoming deadly at the sound of her voice.
"Be Quiet!"
But she wouldn't be.
Not now.
Her brain was working fast like a clock, words rolling off her tongue before she could even process them.
All she knew was that she needed to speak and say the words fast.
"I didn't tell you because I knew you would think me under a mind control and---"
He was pacing back and forth, his hands running through his hair like he was losing his mind, the more she spoke.
"Not another word!"
The mental distance between them was growing more and more, and she yelled so that he could hear her voice against his order for her to be quiet.
If he could just listen.
"Kestra has a hold on you, on everyone! She is the---"
"SEAL THOSE LIPS!"
A blade cut swiftly through the air, into the wall, right next to her head. Her scarf slipped off from the cut the blade had delivered on its journey to its destination, some strands of her black curly hair following the silky fabric to the floor.
That blade had been her dagger.
Still from shock, she stood. Her lips parted in absolute surprise.
For that moment, she felt numb.
Even when he approached her at a swift speed to pull the dagger he had thrown in her direction, out of the wall, she didn't move.
It was all so quiet and so loud at the same time.
She had forgotten who he was, that he wasn't just a human like her, that he had a dragon in his command, the seven villages at his feet. He was feared for a reason, many reasons.
She was always forgetting that.
"I do not want to hear another of the Bride Thief's poisonous dictates from your lips." He was so close, but she couldn't find it in her to look up at him. The betrayal his eyes accused her of would wreak her, her helplessness was already destroying her as it was.
She felt a leathery feeling over her lips, as he placed a finger across them.
"Seal them."
She felt him holding her neckless then.
"Useless," he muttered.
He pulled away from her, leaving her in the dark. His shadow as he departed through the door, a blurry image for her tears-filled eyes.
When the door slammed shut, her legs gave way beneath her and she slipped to the floor.
Soon enough, two guards came in, chaining her to either side of the wall with long chains, ball chains attached to her ankles, and a piece of cloth around her mouth so she couldn't speak.
The guards left after that, shutting the door firmly behind them.
It wasn't until she was alone that it crashed on her.
This was exactly what she was trying to avoid.
She hadn't told Eli about her dreams because she believed he would believe that her words were corrupted, and that the Bride Thief was manipulating her.
Because she knew he would throw her in the same special room where the other Brides had faced their dooms.
Like another sheep waiting for slaughter.
Like another Bride waiting to be a sacrifice.
Here she was.
It hurt that what she had been trying to avoid was what eventually happened.
But maybe if she had spoken to him about it earlier, maybe if he didn't have to find out on his own.
Maybe.
Maybe.
The words Eli had said many months ago rang in her ears.
The reason why she had kept this from him in the first place.
Even if she had told him earlier, he would have still put her in here, the so-called cleansing room, and Kestra would have started working on her - that is, preparing her soul in a pretense of cleansing her of the "bad magic".
Now that he knew, he believed the Bride Thief was controlling her.
By Ignas, how could she ever get out of this in time to save everyone?!
Belladonna shivered, the coldness of the chain finally getting to her, the bondage she was in finally hitting her with the implications.
Every other Bride had been discovered, every other Bride had been thrown into this room, every other Bride had met their doom in Kestra's hands and now, it looked like she would be meeting hers soon.
Her screams were heart-wrenching, muffled by the gag. She struggled against the chains, her energy wasting in futility. Her tears burnt her cheeks as they cascade down, her lungs hurt with the screams that couldn't go past her mouth, everything was pulling her under.
Eli.
That was the only person she had and now, she had lost him.
Now, he was a stranger.
A dangerous one.
If nothing was, the blood that ran down her forehead from having been slammed into the wall earlier, was proof of that.
She was alone.
This was no dream, and Alaris wasn't coming to save her.
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((Bonus Chapter because I'm so happy and it is a new month. Thank you for your support thus far, I really appreciate it.))