Kings Game

Chapter 60 - Diminished

(1)

It was dark and cold. So, so cold. The floor felt like it was made of ice. Kell tried moving but she felt sluggish, as if she were bound by something. Kell struggled against it, desperate to free herself. She lurched around in the dark until she found a wall. It was made of bricks slicked by a layer of frost. She was back in the cell.

She was back in Uhlara, locked in the prison suspended on the side of a mountain. Kell pounded on the wall. She needed to escape. She needed to get out of here before they came back. She smacked her first against the wall but it didn't do any good. She tried again with both her fists but yelled in surprise. Her left hand was missing.

Some part of her said that was normal, that she should be used to it, but it didn't connect with the rest of her mind. Her hand was missing, leaving just a bloody stump behind. Kell felt a sob bubbling out of her throat.

"Let me out!" she screamed.

She pounded against the wall again. Her etchings had all been cut, rendering them useless. She was small and helpless, once more trapped in a dark cellar filled to the brim with filth and despair.

"Let me out!" she cried again.

From off in the distance she heard someone call her name. The voice sounded familiar but it was too far away. Kell banged on the wall again. She struggled to breathe. The cell was suffocating her.

In desperation, Kell reached for her etching, flooding them with power. It didn't matter if they were cut or broken, she'd take whatever they had to offer.

Rearing back, Kell slammed her good fist into the wall using every ounce of strength she had. There was an explosion as the wall shattered, her fist tearing through it. Cool air rushed in, washing over Kell's body.

"Kell! Kell stop."

Karyn was clinging to Kell's waist, trying to pull her back from the wall.

Kell took a deep breath, breathing in the scent of the cool summer air and the city outside. Another breath brought back the scent of clean linen, steel polish, and incense. The scents of her room. She was home. And she'd just punched a hole in her bedroom wall.

"Kell?"

Kell looked back at Karyn who was still clinging to her. Her face was a mask of fear and concern.

"I'm..." Kell foundered, unsure of what to say. "I'm here."

"Gods Kell, it was just a nightmare."

"Sorry, I know, it was nothing."

"It wasn't nothing, you could have killed someone. You could have killed me!"

"Look, I didn't mean to! It's these damn nightmares, I can't control them."

"Kell..."

"Don't look at me like that. I told you I didn't want to sleep inside, especially not in the dark."

"You can't spend the rest of your life camping outside. We need to work through this."

"I can't!"

"So what are we supposed to do?"

"You don't have to do anything. This isn't your fucking problem. I'm the one that has to deal with this bullshit."

"You don't have to deal with it alone."

"Then please tell me, oh great and powerful priestess, how am I supposed to just forget the number of times I've been brutally tortured in a dark and filthy cellar?"

Karyn winced. She let go of Kell and stepped back, hugging herself.

"That's the first time you've acknowledged that outloud," Karyn said softly.