Chronos

Caged

"We are most artistically caged." 
— Vladimir Nabokov

PROLOGUE

Looking out through the tall slit windows, a charcoal sky lay weighty.

You could hear the branches lashing and crashing against one another.
Casting thin shadows on the already dark forest floor. 

A storm was coming.

"Listen – " a pale looking girl in a emerald dress begged; she was hunched over something.

"Believe me, I don't know how, but when I woke up, she was there," and she raised her hand in-front of her to point.

From a dark corner of the room where the moonlight barely hit a pair of hazel eyes watched as they snaked over to the fine Turkish rug.

The girl was crouching over a body.
Her emerald dress was pooled around her.
The satin soaking up the blood; crawling up the dress, inch by inch.
The blonde hair which looked to be stylishly pulled back was coming undone; sticking to her face, she was sweating.
Her right hand which was raised in front of her was covered in blood, hovering over a women's body.

It was Katia: she looked as any dead person would; pale and hollow and very dead.
Her black locks which were once luscious and perfectly curled now lay flat and matted in blood. The green of her eyes were empty, and her hands were positioned neatly just by her side.

"Please say something...anything"
"You know me," 
"I would never do this!" She appealed wide-eyed,  wiping at her hands trying to clean the blood off, as if that would work.

After a heavy sigh, slow steps approached her from the shadows
"It doesn't matter what I think..." the voice was low and calm.
"And it won't matter to Boris."
"You have limited options Güzel; but I can help you."  it reassured her

".. Boris" she whispered and the taste of bile rose to her mouth, and she swallowed, the acid rising and burning her throat.

"Yes..." "Boris," 
"We have limited time; we can either bury her in the woods out back and scrub this room." 
"Or we can scrub away any traces, and head back to the initiation." 

Transfixed all she heard was her heart hammering in her chest and the pendulum of the clock on the wall making its way back and forth.
The noise annoyed her.

"I think it's best you just leave Güzel, I don't need you to damage the half-brain cell you maybe have left up there." 

Another second passed-

"Just get out – 
I'll take care of this."  a cold hand grabbed her arm and lifted her to her feet.

Breaking her sight from her hands, she looked up and met the hazel eyes, and a chill ran down her back.

"I don't have all night." The hand let go

Reluctantly she took two steps back towards the door.
Stopping and taking in the room.

It was small but spacious, a bed lay in the middle, above the Turkish rug.
Aside from the single desk and chair by the window there was no furniture or personal items. The room was was empty and a bit dusty.
She made notes of everything and then turned and rushed out, closing the oak door behind her. 

Rounding a dark corner she hid behind a pillar as students ran by laughing.
She stood still for minutes catching her breath, before she took the note out from her pocket. 

The writing was messy and covered in blood.
But she could still make out a few words near the bottom of the note, read:

Erasers > Cerberus > Sasha?
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