Marry or Kill

34

S O L

I lie sprawled on the frigid ground, the memory of the knife's cruel carving lost in the haze of my own screams. The searing pain lingers, a bitter taste in the air that I can't quite grasp.

Blinking away the disorientation, the surroundings remain a blurred disorientation. The ceiling above me seems to undulate with every attempt to make sense of my reality. Each blink is a struggle against the fog that clings to my senses, a desperate plea for clarity.

A single drop, heavy with despair, lands on my skin from the ceiling. Turning my head, the droplet slides off my face and onto the floor, and I lock eyes with a white-haired man standing just beyond my cell in the dim light. His thin-lipped expression reveals nothing, offering nothing, only a silent acknowledgment of the agony.

Summoning strength I didn't know I possess, I lift myself from the cold tiles using my bloody elbows. My hair, now an unholy blend of blood and strands, clings to my face.

My voice, reduced to a raspy whisper, bellows, "Pray tell, how long have you had the honour of seeing them cut open my back?"

I don't recognize my own voice, let alone hear it, but I sense the primal anger seething through my lips. A defiance that I can't sense in my own body anymore, like it's been carved out.

"I guess not long enough," he grimly says, his voice laden with a heavy weariness. "I'm your designated cell guard. I told you that before you strode in there on your high horses."

"I'm assuming," I bitterly drawl. "That it wasn't a matter of option."

A cold silence settles over the atmosphere, and I begin to wonder if he's still there or if I've imagined him in my disoriented state. The stillness makes me question the reality of his presence. Then, breaking through the quiet, I catch a faint, resigned sigh.

"Malia put me on duty here," he answers, and I feel him near the cellar bars, wrapping his fingers around it. Quieter, he says, pressing his head against the bars, "You see, Atticus enjoys breaking things." His voice carries a weight of resignation. "It should be very evident by now that Atticus finds those who are less theatrical to be duller."

"Why are you bothering to tell me this, considering the clothing you're wearing as a guard? I retort, feeling my elbows begin to burn. "As if you hadn't delighted in watching them etch the number twelve on my back—" My voice catches in my throat like a net.

The white-haired guard's voice becomes raw, a slight anger coursing through his words. "I despise every moment of it. I never do, and that's why I'm precisely telling you to get off your damn high horses," he grumbles.

"Oh, really?" I drawl, sarcasm lacing my words. "What a saint you are."

I hear an annoyed sigh.

Slowly, the faint shuffle of his departure echoes, and a surge of desperation propels me onto my hands and knees.

I crawl toward the unforgiving metal bars, desperately inching away from the encroaching shadows. The cold tiles grate against my palms, each movement fueled by an urgency to escape the looming darkness.

My fingers tighten around the icy bars, moist with a cold sweat. "If there's even a shred of honesty in you, then tell me your name," I rasp, the muted glow of the dim yellow light casting upon my face.

His gaze pierces through me, and I detect a flicker of shock in his eyes as they meet mine. I attempt to straighten my back, but the pain amplifies, refusing to be ignored as it ripples like multiple lashes.

"I'm Castiel, and believe me, I'm being brutally honest with you," he answers. "I've seen a damn enough."

I shake my head in disbelief, and as I do, my dishevelled hair, matted with blood, comes unstuck from my face like a tangled veil. "Why would you be such a fool spoiling Atticus's amusement?" I ask in a hushed sigh.