Hade's Rose

Chapter 14: "I didn't ask you to"

For the last half hour, the barge had chugged down the river at a steady pace. The warning toll of the bell echoing behind me. No doubt we'd be stopped and searched at the city border and all that effort to escape would be for nothing. Although, hypothermia might kill me first. I was deathly tired, and I could barely focus on my surroundings. Despite my cramped conditions, I was moving in and out of consciousness. Drowsily, I leant my weight against the logs. My heartbeat sluggishly drumming in my chest. Soaked clothes freezing my skin.

"Slow your vessel." I heard an order. I couldn't tell from where; it seemed to be far away. Stamping feet. Men shouting. "I'll miss the market." Dream and reality mixing together like a kaleidoscopic tube, making me feel dizzy.

After some time, we seemed to be moving again. I couldn't remember who I was hiding from, only that I was uncomfortable, and I needed to warm up if I wanted to live. Shifting aching bones that begrudged my movement, I crawled out of the tiny space.

A door. I remembered a door.

All I could think of was to get to the cabin door. Unaware and uncaring if anyone was watching me, I crawled on my hands and knees like a blind mole, snuffling towards this distant memory.

My vision had narrowed to just the few feet in front of me, and miraculously I found myself pressed against the entrance to the cabin down below. Panting heavily, I leant against the door only to be sucked in as it swung open. I slithered down the mercifully short staircase, into the living quarters of the barge.

Nothing but survival mattered to me now. I had given dying a lot of thought this last year. But, in this moment, I resented such a prospect with every fibre of my being. Still crawling, I pulled myself towards a low cabin bed that rested next to a little log burner. With the last of my strength, I pulled myself in under the covers and curled myself into a wet ball. The heat of the bed next to the burner causing the water in my hair and clothes to become stickily warm.

I don't know how long I lay caught between snoozing and small bouts of wakefulness, but in a small moment of strength later that morning I managed to pull off my tunic and lightly toss it away from me. When I tried pulling off my trousers, I found a small, soggy and rumpled sock still in the lefthand pocket. Crying now to myself, I held it up to my face. There was hardly any smell left, but a small whiff of butterscotch managed to send me finally into a deep, coma-like slumber. The world around me dead to my senses.

- & -

Sunlight bathes the garden in a warm glow, saturating its surrounding hedges and walls in golden light. Birds tweet idyllically in potted ficus trees and the tranquil trickling and plinking of the fountain could be heard. I was sat on a bench, wearing an ivory dress and a large, woven sunhat to shield my eyes. My arm was stretched out gracefully along the bench's back as I waited. Waited for him to arrive.

I don't know how long I was sat there. Long enough for the afternoon's light to fade and turn to dusk, casting pink and grey shadows instead. My serenity began to fray and dread pooled in my stomach like the churning of butter.

At the height of my internal calamity, he finally arrived. Birds were silenced. Shadows shifted like the writhing of eels, blackening the fountain and grass. Looking up, I could see nothing but his form: a dark, hellish shadow; hades incarnate.

"You won't have me?" snarled the monster. What was once a paradise had transformed into a place from the Underworld: weeds shoved their way through the cracks between cobblestones; black mould stretched up the fountain, now clogged with dead leaves; and the hedges had turned a motley yellow.

"I was trying to save you." I cried, reaching out my hand in an offer of supplication.

He stamped toward me, thrusting out his claws to grab my throat. "I didn't ask you to." In a show of strength, he lifted me with just one hand, "Now, who's going to save you?"