A bard, perhaps?
What had he done to be tossed into the dungeon? A small smile curled her lips as she entertained the idea that he’d been imprisoned for creating the song about the High King’s many ill-begotten sons. Then she sobered; locking someone up for such a thing seemed more than cruel. It was barbaric.
“What is your name?” she asked the boy, curious despite herself. Her voice echoed around her like a mighty chorus, and she cringed.
The boy’s tilted eyes flashed in the darkness. “Oh, this and that,” he replied quite easily. “Sometimes I am one thing, and sometimes I am another. Why do you have but one name? How silly!”
Wren shook her head, confused. “I am not quite sure what you mean. Who are you?”
“To some, I am nobody. To some, I am a lie. To others, I am the only one who matters.”
“How long have you been here?” she tried again.
“A moment, a lifetime. Does it truly matter? Time does not exist in this place.”
“I do not have time for this.” Wren sighed impatiently, turning from the boy to stare sightlessly at the water. Clearly, the boy had been trapped for a long time. He’d lost his mind. He began to recite a riddle that made absolutely no sense and she cursed her bad luck. His prattling would drive her insane. Perhaps that was what the elf king wanted?
The boy’s voice rose. “Beware the water.”
She glanced in his direction. “Why?”
“Danger,” he whispered. “And death.”
For two days the boy truly did only speak in riddles—going by the dry, tasteless meals they were brought at random intervals, Wren could only guess how much time had passed—she still did not risk touching the water. Instead, she found that she had not yet exhausted her ability to physically grieve for her family.
“So much for being too angry to cry,” Wren sniffed, not caring if the mad bard could hear her or not. He’d heard plenty of her tears over the past two days, anyway. At first, when it had become apparent that all Wren was going to think about was her family, she had tried to focus on Britta. For Britta was still alive and safe, of that Wren had to firmly believe in.
Rowen’s grandparents will look after her. You know that things will be bad for her for a while—will likely never be the same again—but Britta will recover. She can grow up and be happy. Even if you never reach her side again, even if she never ascends the throne…she will be all right.
But this train of thought caused Wren to inevitably replay the moment her mother and papa had died over and over and over again, until there was nothing but the sound of their final screams in her head and she had to hold her hands over her ears in a desperate attempt to keep them out.
“Hearing voices in your head?” the boy asked from two cells over. “In that direction madness lies!”
Wren ignored him. She knew, in fact, that his words were at least in part true. If she kept mulling over the ghosts of her past then she would go mad, and then what use would she be to anyone?
Rowen would not act like this.
Her heart stung as his image raced through her head, first smiling and delighted and so full of love Wren could have burst, and then…covered in blood, his lungs struggling as he told her to go save her sister. To save herself.
He would know what to do. He would not lose hope. He would sit and think on the matter for barely a second and then he’d be up and ready for action. That’s how he is.
Wren gulped.
How he was.
Rowen wasn’t rash. You cannot lash out again. You must think your every action through. No more mistakes.
Her tears dried and Wren vowed not to cry again. It helped no one. Dwelling on the past and stewing in her emotions would only serve to weaken her.
On the third day, when two guards brought food to the two of them for part of the time—which Wren took to mean nighttime, though she could have been wrong—a third man also entered the prison, and he did not seem like a guard. He held within his arms a large bucket, which sloshed loudly as he moved. It was clearly heavy; even with his muscled arms, his legs still bowed slightly beneath the weight of the bucket.
She watched as he entered the cell to her right and approached the water, though he kept at least two feet from the edge of it. Just what is he doing? she wondered, glancing at the boy for a moment to see what he thought of this. He wasn’t even watching; clearly this third man was constantly part of his dungeon routine that he was bored by it. Just how long had he been down here?
She turned her attention back to the man with the bucket.
Wrinkling his nose, the man stuck his hand in the container and pulled out something thick and wet, though Wren could not see what it was. Then he tossed the thing in the water and repeated the action over and over until the bucket was halfway empty. Then he dumped the rest of the contents in one go and turned to leave the cell.
He paused by the grille that separated them, the grin spreading on his face entirely unpleasant. “That was the prisoner who lived in your cell before you,” he sneered. “Just in case you were getting any ideas of escaping.”
Her stomach bottomed out.
And with that horrific remark, he was gone, disappearing alongside the two guards who had given Wren and the boy their dinner.
“Watch the water,” the boy said when they were alone once more. “Watch the water and despair. Despair!”
And, so, Wren did, thoroughly discomfited by the boy’s ominous statement and the knowledge of what had been thrown into the liquid darkness that contained something clearly unknown and dangerous. Then, before her very eyes, the water began to froth and bubble, as if it was a boiling pot upon a fire. But the water was not heating up: it was being churned up by something.
A school of little fish.
It took Wren a few seconds to discern the shape of them, but when she did, she backed away instinctively, though she was several feet away from the water to begin with. The fish were small, but they had huge, incredibly sharp teeth and made quick work of the former prisoner who had been thrown in the water for them to consume. It took barely a minute for them to eat everything, the sound of their jaws snapping in disappointment echoing all throughout the dungeon when it became clear there was no more food to be had.
And then the fish dissipated, swimming back deeper into the water until Wren could no longer see them. The water grew still once more.
Out of sight, but not out of mind.
She was sincerely glad she had not touched the water once over the past three days. She had no doubt the fish had an incredibly keen sense of smell and movement. One stray slip into the water, and Wren might not make it back out alive.
Wren’s head was left full of snapping jaws, prisoners turned into chum, and the faces of those she had lost, as she wondered how many days she was supposed to put up with the torment she had found herself in. Surely, the High King had no use of her stuck in here forever? She lowered herself to the left rear corner of the cell and leaned her head against the wall, eyelids heavy. Perhaps the king thought to break her? He would not be successful. She closed her eyes. Tomorrow, she’d begin training again. It was time to stop playing the prey and become the predator.
When she awoke, she was not sure why.
Exhaustion plagued her and the aches in her bones complained as she shifted on the hard stone, ready to go back to sleep. She could not have been asleep for longer than a couple of hours. Her eyelids closed, but something kept her from falling back asleep.
Something was wrong.
She opened her eyes and froze as realization dawned.
Water lapped at her ankles.