Chapter 5

296K 12.1K 1.4K
                                    

She was on the roof.

She couldn’t exactly remember how she had gotten up there—the past two days had been a blur of terror and confusion.  Too many faces, too many people trying to touch her and people, yes they were all people.  Not beasts.  They smiled like they weren’t beasts, and had small, adorable looking children like they weren’t beasts, and gave her gift baskets like they weren’t beasts.

They’d been so excited to see her, to say a few words while she stared, wide eyed, with her heart in her throat and in the back of her mind preparing herself for any one of these things to kill her.

And that man—god, he never left her for even a second.  His chair was pulled up beside her bed and he’d tried touching her at first, just his hand on hers, his fingertips on her arm, but she’d swatted him away and cursed until her throat was raw and he was yelling at her not to curse and she cursed him for telling her not to curse.

He was beautiful, in an aching sort of way, like if she looked at him for too long she’d just break.  His dark hair was short and chopped and his face, cut so clean, dark hairs rising up on his chin to his hair line.  And his eyes, she’d gotten too lost in them before.  He’d say something and she’d look at him without thinking because sometimes it felt natural to converse with him, to be so close with him, for him to touch her hand.  And his eyes would hold onto hers and she’d forget to breath.

She liked the doctor, though.  They called her a healer, and she was kind and old and smarter than she could ever hope to be.  She patched her arm up in a cast and when it was hurting, so unbearable she could only close her eyes and grit her teeth and ignore the man when he begged her to tell him what he could do to help, the healer would put a salve into her cast and she’d feel better.

But now she was on the roof, and in the house and the fields surrounding the house, she could hear the commotion of her captors.

The man had gone to the bathroom, telling her before he left like he always did, like he thought it’d distress her to not know where he was.  She hated that she’d wake up sometimes and he wouldn’t be in the room and she could feel the distress bloom in her stomach.  Like she needed him in there.

It’s why she pulled herself up when he left on that second day and to her feet, even when her ankle screamed at her.  It’s why she shuffled to the window and pulled it open with one hand and pulled herself out, sweating now because her body was screaming at her, something in her side ripping again.  She closed the window behind her and took in a deep, deep breath of the cool morning air.

She was on the second floor of an old Victorian house, and there was another floor above hers.  She was standing on the roof overhanging a large porch.  Charlotte wasn’t stupid enough to attempt escape.  She’d seen a hundred people come through to see her in the past two days, and from her perch on the roof she could see the tiny, compact town bustling with people on the streets.

It was—beautiful.  A place cut out in the trees with dozens of old, magnificent houses.  She could see kids chasing each other just like in her own town, and parents chasing the kids, and men picking their women up and spinning them around, even when the women were squealing.

They didn’t act like a bunch of beasts.

So she couldn’t escape, not with everyone everywhere, not with her ankle so busted and only one arm.  But she needed air, she needed to breathe, and that room wasn’t allowing her that.  She moved so her back wasn’t to the window and sat down, laying so her head was against the rough tiling of the roof.  She stared up at the sky, clouds tinting a beautiful orange and pink from the sunrise. 

King of BeastsWhere stories live. Discover now