Brilliant Disguise

Chapter Seven

Sophie closed the door softly behind her and leaned against it, head back, eyes closed, relief and idiocy mingling together with the sweat and grime covering her to make her want to cry. How could she have been so stupid to grow so lost, especially after all of her warnings to Heather about the dangers of doing so? And then to go and lose herself, only to have to be rescued by the blasted king of all people?

With a low groan of disgust, she slid down the door and sat there, face buried in her hands. She didn't know how long she sat there for—long enough for the sweat that dampened her back to dry.

"You fool," she whispered, letting her hands fall away from her face. "How can you ever look him in the eye again? He had to talk you down as if you were a child, and hold you whilst you sobbed as a baby would."

You are a baby, Josephine. Her mother's voice was as loud and clear as if the woman herself was in the room with her. And a fool and you deserved to be left there to rot with those corpses.

She's right, you know. Sten's face floated before her, his smile condescending and cold. Afraid of dark and things that go bump in the night. You are as much a child as that brat you claim to be mine.

"Leave me be," she whispered to the phantoms in her mind. She had grown so very weary of Sten's doubt that Heather was his, of his insinuations that he knew of her many affairs, all of which existed only in his mind. Still, he berated her at every turn, as her own mother did as well. They mocked her fear of the dark, and Sten took a perverse pleasure in looking her in a dark room when he was cross with her. He would laugh at her cries to be freed, to please, please let her out, her promises to never set a foot wrong again.

"He is gone," she whispered, rubbing her tired eyes with both hands, "and he will not trouble you again."

Still, those phantoms haunted her. Hovered about her to eat away at her newfound confidence, her newfound peace. To remind her that the past was never really behind her as long as she let it interfere with her present.

Sophie shivered now. Not a single, rational soul would fault her for being so horrified, so upset. When she tugged open that door and stepped into the room, it was only by the weak light of the torch in the corridor that she could see the hideous sight. In her shock at seeing the dead, all strewn about like life-size dolls, she'd let go of the door. She'd spun about to try to grab it, only to have it slam shut behind her and plunge her into horrifying, thick, suffocating darkness. She had no control over that fear, which was every bit as thick as the darkness, as it wrapped about her like a heavy, winter-weight velvet. Breathing became almost impossible. Not only did the chamber reek of death and decay, but that velvet compressed her lungs, rendering her incapable of doing much more than quick, shallow breaths that did nothing but make her lightheaded and the fear even colder.

Although she'd heard the tales of when Smaug sacked Erebor, not a one of them ever mentioned dwarves trapped deep within the kingdom. She'd always assumed they'd all gotten out.

How wrong she was.

She sat there a little longer, then pushed herself to her feet. Heather was safe. She was also safe. Safe, perhaps, but utterly spent. Exhausted. Worn out.

With a heavy sigh, Sophie padded into the bathing chamber. One of the best things about Erebor was that, unlike her flat in Dale, or even the rickety house in Esgaroth, was the heated running water. All she need do was turn one of the taps over the black stone bathing tub and within minutes, water hot enough to steam poured from the spigot.

She let hot and cold run together and as the tub filled, she peeled her ruined dress from her back. It held the stench of the chamber, the heavy muskiness of sweat caused by utter, abject terror, and she didn't care if she ever laid eyes upon it again. So, while the tub filled, she stripped off her equally ruined chemise and hose and made her way out to the great room, to toss all offending garments in the fire.