DEMENTED | Romance | Fantasy | Slight Thriller

Chapter Twelve: Melody

Chapter Twelve: Melody

Once upon a time, there lived a young goddess who had yet to create a world of magick and fervor, a world of fantasy beyond one's imaginings. She did not yet know she was a goddess, and thus left her power to waste for others to use and manipulate.

They used her power for their own selfish desires, and the goddess was too naïve to truly understand why she felt empty.

But when she found out her true potential, and why those close to her were close, she grew incredibly furious and spiteful.

She cursed them with immense trauma and the pain she'd felt all those years multiplied by three, screaming with rage and tears of bloodred anger streaming down her face in waterfalls. They cowered at her feet and begged for her forgiveness, but alas, she was no longer the forgiving one they'd known.

It was on that day she declared that she would trust no one, and hold none close to her, for even the ones she loved would all fall under the allure of her magick and betray her one day. So to protect them all, she vowed to stay away from them, forever residing within Janaria's bitter and frozen palace until the day the realms would all meet their downfall.

Ebony's eyes fluttered open, still vulnerable from sleep and blind to anything but the last remnants of her dream. Why-why would she dream of one of the Goddess's tales?

Her mother had always read them from the holy scripts when Ebony and Crimson were about to rest. They snuggled with her in their large bed, their mother kissing their heads and smiling as she read them. Ebony had always been eager to hear the stories, but now they felt plain, and empty. She'd met the Goddess, who turned out to be nothing like she'd expected, and her mother, the one who'd filled her head with fantastical visions, had vanished along with them.

But why would she dream of one now?

Glimpses of a large hand covering her mouth with a poison-laced cloth flashed into her mind as she remembered what had happened to her. What? Where-

She sat up and found herself in a cell, one far different from the ones she'd temporarily stayed in before her exile at Absinthe. She was used to cold bars of iron and a view of the dank dungeon around her--instead she was in a padded cell colored white. A bright yellow light shone above her, so bright Ebony winced as soon as she felt its presence.

On the other side of where she stood was a large iron door--this was padded on her side as well, except there was a small rectangular window where she could just barely make out a dimly lit hallway. It was dusty and translucent; possibly the only thing that had not been cleaned in the place. Ebony shuddered. The neglected places were always the ones with the darkest secrets.

And she wasn't just in any place--she was in where she supposed the Aurian gang l'étoile kept its headquarters. She was in exactly the place they'd spent months looking for, only in the wrong situation.

And that's when she realized she wasn't alone.

A young girl of about thirteen sat across from her in the padded cell, bright shoulder-length bubblegum hair mussed and untidy. She stared at Ebony with the bluest blue eyes, and her small pink mouth spread wide in a smile as soon as she noticed her.

"Hello!" She exclaimed happily. Too happily. "I'm Melody! What's your name?"

Ebony was too shocked to answer right away. "I-I'm Ebony."

Melody grinned even wider. "That's a nice name!"

Ebony nodded, still in shock. "H-How did you get here?"

Melody laughed, a sound much like the tinkling of faerie bells. "I've been here!"

"For how long?"

Melody pondered for a moment. "I'm not quite sure... I'd say it's been about five years now? That's what they say, at least. I feel it's been longer."

"What?" Ebony gasped, covering her mouth in horror. She'd been living in this cell for over five years? Hadn't she gone mad?

And the fact that L'étoile had kept her there sickened her to the core. She knew this wasn't where Astrophel's gang had been staying the entire time--somewhere during Melody's five-year detainment the asylum had shut down and been taken over by the gang. And she'd been left there.

"I-I'm so sorry," Ebony told her, even though she knew it wouldn't help.

But Melody continued smiling. "It isn't so bad, you know? I like being alone. It gives me lots and lots of time to think!"

"When was the last time you were outside?" Ebony asked carefully.

"It must've been when I was eight--the night they took me." Melody's smile slipped for a second and her eyes began to tear up, but then it was as if someone had quickly flipped a switch in her brain and she was smiling again, any trace of remorse or sorrow disappearing from her face. "But it doesn't matter--I hear it's too smoky out to see the sun anymore."

Ebony didn't know how to respond to that, and brought her knees to her chest. The sky in Auria was indeed covered in machine-produced fog so thick it was a miracle light still shone onto the lands. Fog, as she'd learned during her stay in Auria, was a given; there was never a day without it.

But there was no fog in Absinthe, and when Ebony told Melody so, she burst into happiness. "Maybe we can go there one day!"

Ebony nodded. "But first we'll need to get out of this cell."

She examined the door further. The mechanism didn't seem too complicated; all she'd need to do was rip off the padding and then use a pin she'd kept in her hair to unlock the door.

It seemed easy. Almost too easy. Yet Ebony only hesitated for a moment before tearing the padding away from the cold, hard iron.

A shock emanated from the iron, so violent and severe Ebony's eyes rolled back in her head and she began convulsing. She tried to scream in agony, but found her vocal chords refused to operate.

Melody continued sitting where she was and sighed, not alarmed in the least by the events that had just played out before her. "Don't you think I would've tried that already?"

Ebony's body slowly calmed down, yet she was breathing raggedly and with labor. Her vision was haywire--she saw nearly four different Melodys, all with the same bright pink hair and nonchalant expression.

Melody turned to her. "Give it about fifteen minutes or so, then you'll be able to breathe better. But the jitters don't leave until nearly the next day."

Ebony tried to nod in response the best she could, yet she found she could barely even part her lips to speak. "H-how often do you try this?"

Melody laughed, but it wasn't of happiness. "About once or twice a week. Seems I still haven't learned from my mistakes!"

Her despair was restless underneath her, writhing to break free. Yet Melody remained impossibly calm--it was unsettling.

Then a loud sound wailed through the corridor. Ebony jerked away from the door, in shock, and Melody laughed. "You'll get used to that; it's just the guards coming down here to take someone out of their cell. It's never you-"

The door to the cell opened, and a man heavily clothed grabbed Ebony's arm. "Hey!" She protested, trying to writhe free of his grip, yet he held it with ease. "Release me at once!"

The man ignored her and dragged her out into the hallway. "The less ya struggle, the easier it is fo' the both of us."

"But where are we even going?"

"Ya'll see when ya get there." He grunted, continuing to drag her.

"Bye!!!" Melody called out, waving through the cell's small window. Ebony mustered the decency to wave back, unsure of if she'd ever see her again.

If she did, she'd try and get her out of that place.