Black Blood

-B2- Chapter 35

I wake up with the most intense headache I have ever experienced. My eyes dance behind my eyelids before I find a way to open them completely. It takes a few seconds before I realize that I'm in my own bed.

'You're awake,' says Alisha's familiar voice at the door. I lift my pounding head to see the blonde woman with a basket of laundry standing in the doorway. She places the wicker basket on the hallway floor before walking into the room. She closes the door behind her before sitting next to me on the bed.

'How do you feel?' she asks, her gaze fixed on my arm. I turn my head to see that the sleeve of my dress is torn and the wound is covered with bandages. Before I can answer, the realization hits me that the black veins are clearly visible.

'Novak didn't see it,' she tells me without my having to ask. A weight is lifted from my painful shoulders before I lay my head back on the pillow.

'Did you already know?' I ask without answering her question. She clicks her tongue slowly as her eyes remain fixed on the lines.

'Not because I saw it, and I wasn't sure, but given the history and the fact that you always covered your arms, I had my suspicions.' She sighs deeply at the end of her sentence before placing her hands on her lap. It is silent for a while, giving me time to get my racing thoughts in line.

'It was Elien,' is the only thing that can leave my mouth as I stare at the wooden ceiling.

'Elien? As in your blind brother Elien?' I can only nod as questions race through my head.

'Yes. The dreams weren't dreams. My father found a way to let me watch from the beginning. All the dreams I had about a boy in the dungeons, all the abuse and injections were on him.' My father is even crazier than I had given him credit for. The man found a way to let me watch while he severely abused his only son for months. He did it for a reason, Elien was here to kill me.

'He doesn't react as if he's blind.' That remark hits the nail on the head. I know what Elien was like when he was blind. The boy could barely walk down the hall without assistance, let alone chase someone in the woods.

'Where is he?' I ask as I push myself into a sitting position. Alisha twirls the silver ring she bought months ago on her finger.

'First tied to a tree, but he got himself loose pretty quickly, so Novak tied him up in the shed and gave him a sedative. You're lucky Novak didn't slit his throat when he found you.' If I had been in his shoes, I would have done exactly that, and I can't guarantee that he won't do it at any moment.

I push myself with my bruised body to the edge of the bed. Alisha stands up and offers me a helping hand. I reject it and can only point to the cloak laid on the chair in the right corner. 

Pushing myself off the bed takes more energy than I currently have. Yet despite everything, I don't want Novak to kill my brother, so I search for every bit of energy I possess, pull on the cloak Alisha holds out to me, and stumble to the door. Not only were the black veins burning, but my muscles were too, thanks to the flight.

Alisha remains watchful behind me as I walk through the halls on my bare feet, towards the front door and into the garden. Novak is nowhere to be seen yet, but as I get closer to the shed, I hear shouting.

Without hesitation, I tug at the shed door, but it doesn't open.

'Novak, open the door.' A few seconds later, I hear the lock being turned before the door is pulled open. Novak stands before me with a bleeding nose. His red blood slides from his lips to his chin.

'I don't know what this guy is, but he's strong,' is my greeting. I simply nod before walking past Novak and into the narrow crevice. 

Elien is sitting a meter away from me, tied to a wooden chair with his arms and legs bound with rope. With the morning or afternoon light, I have no sense of time, it is better visible what my father has turned him into. Sunken cheeks, black veins, scars that I know how they were created and completely black eyes.

I try to maintain all my calmness while darkness stares at me. I take small steps towards him before kneeling down half a meter away. His black eyes are very difficult to read. I can't see where they are focused or where they are moving. He is silent and calculating, that's all I can see.

'Elien, I'm sorry,' is the only thing I can manage to say.

'Elien? Is this your brother?' I hear Novak say behind me in total confusion. I want to turn around and tell him the same thing I just told Alisha, but Elien beats me to it. Without saying anything, he starts screaming and pulling on the ropes like a madman. I recoil as the chair wobbles in all directions.

'Get me fucking out, bitch,' he screams through the small wooden shed. I sit stunned on the ground before regaining myself, calculating where his hatred for me comes from.

'I didn't know, I didn't know what they were doing to you. I didn't know it was you,' I try. He keeps trying to find a way out of the ropes, but Novak knows what he's doing when he ties someone up.

'I'm going to kill you,' he screams. Although I've seen what they've done to him, I don't know the details. I don't know what they injected into him and what the consequences were. I don't know what they did to him after I woke up. In other words, I don't know what to do.

'Is that what father told you?' I ask slowly as I try to control my aggression.

'He told me enough about you,' is his finite answer as he sits quietly on the chair, only pulling on the ropes around his hands. Those things should be burning against his skin.

'This is pointless, Cel,' Novak says slowly from behind me. He's saying what I already know. Elien is in no way capable of reasoning. He doesn't remember me as his sister but as the night rider who should be dead.

'Can you see?' is the only thing I ask as I push myself off the ground.

'Enough to see which whore you are'. With that answer, I sigh deeply and walk back to the door. Alisha and Novak look at me with a look full of sympathy as I stumble past them out of the barn.