Awoken (Ilea, Book I) (COMPLETED)

Chapter 5

Everything was blurry and distant, I didn’t recognise the person’s arms that were holding me. I could hardly open my eyes; all I saw were quick flashes of colour. My thoughts immediately went to Jacob and Johanna, but I couldn’t see or hear them, I tried to shout out and call their names, but no sound came from my lips, only a breath of air. I felt lost not knowing where they were, not knowing if they were okay, not having them close to me, they had been with me my whole life and I felt a part of me missing when I realised that they weren’t there. I struggled against the arms that were holding me and tried to get free, I felt them tighten slightly, but I had used up all my strength and couldn’t even attempt to do anymore. A soft, cool hand wiped my brow and the little consciousness I had left slipped away from me as I went back into a world of dreams and nightmares.

I heard a flute-like voice in my head “Thank you for all the power you gave me when you played here while you were young, I’m dying, I don’t need it anymore, have it back and use it well.”  Images flashed in front of my eyes; the seasons of the forest, a picture of summer, then of autumn, then one of winter with the snow covering the trees and then of spring where new shoots and buds erupted into life. Slowly the light in my dreams turned dimmer as I watched the trees from spring die and turn grey, the grass on the forest floor die and disintegrate into dust, then a dark figure came towards me, with electric blue eyes. I felt a current shoot down my spine as I noticed that the eyes were not blue completely; just around the pupil there was a deep ring of crimson fire, the figure smiled as he watched me sanding alone in the dead forest, “I will use you to get to her.” He said and then slowly walked away back into the black. The darkness came closer and closer to me, enveloping me and covering everything, I was drowning in it, I couldn’t even scream. I thrashed my arms around trying to escape the onyx ocean that was swallowing me up, crying as I felt no hope, then slowly the blackness began to fade and light came seeping back into my world.

I cautiously opened my eyes and realised that I was lying on my back in a bed of fine linen, the covers tangled around my feet. Gradually I remembered what had happened in the clearing with Johanna and Jacob and the building. I did not get up but sat on the bed with my arms around my knees, hugging my legs. I thought about everything that had happened and about my nightmares and slowly realised that the images I had had in my dreams were not my own, but the building’s. The images had been dragged out of my subconscious and the building’s story had been told.

I took a deep breath and slowly moved out of my sitting position; carefully, I stood and walked to the window of the light room that I was in. I touched the walls of this room, hoping that it would take back the nightmare that had been real and that I would be standing in our room in the House with Jacob and Johanna, before all this madness had happened. I closed my eyes and wished it with all my heart concentrating on how it had been before we’d gone into the forest, I felt the wall slide beneath my palm. I concentrated all of my being on going back to our little room, concentrated on the walls, the carpets, how our beds were lined up against the light green walls. The floor started to move beneath my feet, then a hard cold hand came down on my shoulder, “I don’t think so!” came a gruff voice,

I span around to see who had called me, it was a man, a soldier who was tall and strong, with a hard look in his eyes, but I also saw pain, the pain from the loss of a loved one. I had seen it many times before in the eyes of children who had come to the House when they were older and actually knew their parents before they had died. “I’m sorry.” I whispered looking into his brown eyes, a tear welled up in mine to see the pain that it had caused him.

He stood there for a moment staring at me with a sad look on his face. “What are you sorry for, trying to escape?” he asked in a softer voice.

“No, I want to escape, I’m sorry for what you lost, she was a very pretty girl.” I said, not even being able to understand how I knew that it was his first daughter, not knowing how I saw her run down the street with her arms out towards me and a big smile on her face, she was still a child, barely thirteen.

He looked at me and a tear rolled down his cheek. “I hadn’t realised how young you were, how old are you?” He asked me.

“I am a teenager as well.” I said, I could see how it hurt him to know that I was close to his daughter in age.

“The same age group, no one that young should have to ...” He stopped and looked at me, slightly worried that he had said too much. I slowly put my hand on his arm and felt his sorrow wash over me as I took it away and left him with only the memory. I fell down onto the bed, my legs weak with exhaustion. He looked at me, trying to work out what I had done to him.

“Thank you,” he said and I could see more hurt in his eyes.

“What hurts you now?” I asked him, I had meant to take it all away, so that he was not suffering and could work to support the rest of his family.

“You are so innocent and I do not know what he will do to you, but I cannot let you go, in fear that my own family will pay the price, forgive me.” He pleaded looking to me for reassurance, images of two little boys playing in a garden and a woman stood with a babe in arms flashed across my mind as I looked into his eyes. “Yes.” I whispered, wondering if he would have done the same for me if our situations had been turned, but knowing that I could do nothing else.

He left the room and I stayed on the bed, worrying about Jacob and Johanna, were they alive? Were they hurt? Were they safe? Where were they? I walked slowly to the door of this room and asked the guard if he would answer me a question, he said he would answer me three questions but could not do anymore than that.

“Are my friends alive?” I asked him desperately

“Yes they are alive.”

“Are they safe?”

“Safe enough for now, they are under the protection of the Elders and have been excused for breaking the forest law.”

“Where are they?”

“That is something I cannot tell you, as I do not know.”

“Thank you” I whispered and walked back across the room to the window, I saw a bird fly across the sky in the distance and wondered, not for the first time, how free it must feel to be able to go anywhere at will, with one swoop of a feathered wing you could be anywhere.