174- The Cage Within
POV Elowen Grimwald:
I wondered whether the grotesque scene my mind painted was born of reality or a nightmare from which I could not awaken.
The threatening voice, which had promised to send my soul straight to hell, ceased. Soon after, I heard the creak of rusty hinges and the sound of old wood slamming shut.
My captors had left. But I was still there.
I did not move a finger.
For a long stretch of time, which felt like hours, I remained hidden in the cowardly shadows of fear, incapable of opening my eyes and facing my captivity.
Pain everywhere; thirst;
hunger…
Perhaps I was already in hell, after all—a thought that terrified me, but did not surprise me.
My back and head were being punished against the hard surface and the uncomfortable position I was in.
I recognized the voice of one of the damned customers from the bar, and I was certain that the one accompanying him, planning to destroy what remained of me, was the leader of the pack. He sounded like one.
They certainly believed I would not wake anytime soon. And I preferred to sleep and never wake again. The evil plan, revealed by the deep and powerful voice of the Devil himself, sentenced me to a tragic end.
My nostrils burned, and I fought a battle against the tears threatening to run down my cheeks.
I give up.
It was about recognizing when there were no chances left. Brave, but not stupid.
It’s over.
All that remained was to surrender to death. To stay there, motionless, even as every fiber of my body throbbed, until my vital functions gave out. If the owner of that voice found me awake and laid his hands on me, I would be lost.
No one withstands so much pain for so long. No one. All those months of solitude had brought me to the limit, to the last thread of hope.
The end.
A damned tear slipped free, and I prayed that the trail of weakness would dry before anyone appeared.
I forgive you, Lunara. Or perhaps I was the one who needed forgiveness. If I cried out here, in thought, while I still could, would you hear me?
I had cursed my sister so much for abandoning me, but finding myself imprisoned and sentenced to death, all I could think was that she might be in the same situation.
And how it hurt…
For minutes—or hours—I kept my focus on the tragic mission of not straying from the rite of death, concentrating so that no more tears would escape.
The continuous silence, even of my own thoughts, made me transcend.
I was seized by an inexplicable peace, as if my soul were dragging itself out of my body, leaving me with only a thread of consciousness.
Extraordinarily, the pain began to diminish, second by second. The agony that had nearly suffocated my weak breathing faded away, like a shadow advancing over the sun.
Was this what death was like? Calm and serene? I wanted to cry again, but from relief.
At last, I would be freed from the prison in which my body was trapped.
At last…
“Ah!” I screamed at the moment my body sprang up from the thin mattress, yet no sound echoed.
What?
Where was I?
“One day, we will die, but not today,” I spoke?
The words came out, but it was not I who controlled my own tongue.
I panicked.
The place where my consciousness found itself defied all logical explanation. I seemed to have been shoved into some hollow inside my own brain.
My caged wolf. It could only be her. Damn creature!
I begged so much for her help, so much, and she did it at the only moment I did not need it. I could not yield control of my body to an unrestrained animal.
How about introducing yourself? What do you think you’re doing? If they suspect I woke up, the demon will come running to torture us! Didn’t you hear what he said? Lie back down on the mattress and wait for death! Go! Now!
“Shut up, you little coward. I have control of this fucked-up body now; you just stay quiet and watch,” she replied to me harshly, confirming that she could hear me inside our head. “Wow, we’re in terrible shape—you ruined us!” she continued.
Oh my God, you are completely unhinged.
I had heard some stories about shapeshifters who lost control of the human side to their creatures for a certain time, but I believed it to be an invention, a legend.
Apparently, I had been completely wrong about one more thing.
The pain, briefly forgotten, returned with the violence of a rifle shot. I let out an agonizing scream involuntarily, but no sound resonated through the air.
I could see through the window of my own eyes and feel the weight of my body on my own feet, but I was unable to control any of my movements.
Each time she moved, a gut-wrenching pain struck me. My neck felt as if it were being relentlessly pierced by a sharp dagger, while a truck ran me over at the same time.
My creature measured the entire environment, and the scene around me made me crave death even more—the right that madwoman was trying to tear from me.
We were trapped in a rusty cage fixed between narrow stone walls. Spiderwebs covered the entire ceiling like a disgusting decoration.
But…
Nothing, absolutely nothing, prepared me for what I saw on the floor of crushed stone, inside the bars.
A chamber pot. A repulsive chamber pot, so old. The surface, which should once have been white and enameled in a distant past, was covered with brown stains encrusted with oxidation.
The smell of that place—God—was of old urine and death.
“Sons of bitches!” my creature shouted, before finishing off what was left of our life.
In the blink of an eye, and despite my pleas for her to stop, she destroyed everything.
I was a marionette inside my own body, a spectator trapped in the grotesque theater of my mind, screaming for control while watching, powerless, my own rebellion.
To the sound of roars that had never come from my mouth before, she tore the small suspended mattress into countless pieces. The old chamber pot was hurled against the bars and ricocheted, splitting in two.
With all the brute strength she stole from me to emerge at the most inopportune moment of all, she grabbed the bars, pulling and pushing them until the steel hooks used to fix the cage to the wall tore open.
Stop! Please, stop!
The cage toppled forward, and we fell on all fours between the bars.
More pain.
The rough, jagged floor pierced our knees and hands. Part of the wall cracked, hurling sharp pieces of stone against our backs.
Not satisfied and consumed by fury, she stood up.
Even without managing to stand fully upright, she finished tearing the rest of our clothes. Not even my necklace was still around my neck; I wondered whether she had destroyed it too, or if I myself had lost it during the escape.