The Halfing

Chapter 2: Nightmare and Daydream

The sound of dripping water was all that was keeping him sane.

Callum counted it in eights, using it to keep his mind from wandering to his imprisoned wife and missing child. Granted, he was imprisoned, too, but Claudia wasn't torturing him—nowhere nearly as badly as the elves were treating Rayla. He gripped his chains in fury at the sound of her screaming in pain. Rayla's training as an assassin and her upbringing among the Moonshadow elves had taught her not to show pain. The last time he'd heard her scream like that had been when she was laboring to bring their precious Sarai into the world almost six years prior.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

Solitude made up most of his existence in this underground dungeon. Claudia was the only person he ever saw and she was less than welcome. His former friend brought him food, trying in vain to get him to abandon Rayla and join her and her father. There was no way he'd do that, though; dark magic was vile and twisted and evil. It had almost killed him the one time he'd done it. Even now he hated the fact that he'd been driven to that extreme in his efforts to protect the love of his life. And when she wasn't trying to turn him against his wife, she was attempting to get Sarai's location out of him.

"Please, Callum. If you tell me where she is, I'll bring her here and she can live in your cell while we figure things out."

"I'm not letting you touch my daughter."

"But..."

"Sarai is pure and good and shouldn't be forced to deal with the likes of you. And if I can do anything to keep her out of you and your father's hands, I'll do it. Even if it means I have to die."

"She's not natural, Callum! She's a halfling—a disgusting cross between a human and an elf!"

"Then why bother trying to find her?" Callum fixed Claudia with a murderous gaze he'd picked up from Rayla over the years. "Leave me alone."

Claudia bit her lip.

"Because... because she's important to you. And I care about you, Callum. Why do you think I didn't kill you and I'm not letting the elves near you?"

"The feeling isn't mutual. Go away, Claudia."

"Fine. But I'll be back."

Rayla's screams reached his ears again and he covered them, fighting back tears. He was powerless, really and truly powerless against Claudia and her little elven army. The shackles that bound him kept him from using magic, though they did give him more mobility than ones he'd seen back in Katolis when he was a child. Callum had no way to escape, no way to find Sarai even if he could use his power. Part of him hoped she'd gone to the Storm Spire, but something told the mage his daughter had run as far and as fast as she could. If she'd gone to Zym, the elves would've found her already. No, Sarai had left the area entirely and he hoped that she was safe and healthy, wherever she was.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

"Here."

He looked up as Claudia shoved a box through the door meant for his meals.

"You must be bored in here. And you draw when you're upset, right?"

Inside the box was his sketchbook and charcoal pencils. He fixed her with a look of suspicion.

"Prison is boring. And I have no intention of releasing you, so..." She smiled sheepishly. "No thank you's are necessary. Your drawings will be thanks enough."

Callum waited until she'd gone, then he grabbed the sketchbook. Furiously he began to draw, first Rayla and then his daughter as he last remembered them before all this happened—a mother and child holding hands as they returned home from the market. God, he wanted those days back, but it had been a month since he was imprisoned. His chances of seeing Sarai or even Rayla again were slim.