Marry or Kill

32

S O L

The carriage tosses me around like a ragdoll, my back and wrists screaming in protest. The shackles, spiked and unforgiving, dig into my wrists, keeping the wounds alive and burying. I shrug to the side, avoiding the blood dripping onto my face. The chains, crafted with precision for torture, confine me to a space barely large enough to move.

The blood dribbling from my wrists sometimes wakes me up in the night in cold sweat with waves of agony. So, I learn to sleep uncomfortably, sitting up, with my back slightly arched.

I look up at the iron-barred window, and the icy wind caresses my cheek like an invisible motherly gesture. Usually, the cold is the only relief gifted to me, numbing my bare arms up to my fingers sometimes.

Once again, the carriage bounces, and the spikes cut into my wrists again. It would be in Atticus's nature to choose the rockiest route, each jolt intensifying the pain. A breeze passes, and I cling to the chill, half-hoping it could freeze me whole.

I don't give him the gift of a painful noise slipping out of my lips. Instead, I lift my head up to the chains, sweaty hair falling to my back, watching the chains bleed my hands dry.

Suddenly, the carriage jolts to a sudden halt, sending me stumbling to the farthest corner as the chains clank against the wooden interior. An icy chill permeates the air as the doors swing open, revealing a wintry landscape that takes my breath away.

A guard, his face masked by the biting cold, casts a cursory glance at me before assessing the chains that bind me. There's a key in his hand, twirling in his right hand, almost mocking me. But I realise it isn't mocking when he finally grimly looks at my face.

His hair is white as the snow, complemented with eyes that appear grey in the cold lighting.

"Come here," his voice cuts through the frigid air, and I hesitate for a moment before complying. "Move," he commands, his impatience evident.

With a sharp tug on the chains, the cruel spikes embedded in my flesh, I move forward hastily. The guard deftly unhooks the shackles from the carriage's wall, catching me in his arms as I stumble out into the pristine blanket of snow that stretches before me.

"Ah, thank you for catching me," I remark, a playful grin curving my lips as I survey the guard who had, quite literally, swept me off my feet. "You're quite the handsome saviour, aren't you?"

His lips twist into a disgusted line as he pulls me along, and I nearly roll my eyes at the silence that swallows us again.

The West looks unexpected – a garden adorned with a delicate layer of snow, and a path toward the building with neatly trimmed plants lining it.

The guard pushes me forward, and the crunch of snow under my foot echoes in the hollow silence. His grip remains firm on the end of my chains, and I can't help but notice the scars etched into the faces of the other guards who watch me intently.

As we approach what seems to be the entrance to a court, my shoulders tense.

The guards, with their weathered appearances, stand silent, their eyes betraying nothing. I almost have the urge to touch them to check if they're garden gnomes instead, or whether they're frozen by the weather.

I take smaller, slower steps, and I can see irritation drip from his face as I rove my eyes around all the guards once more.

"Tell me, is this little game of 'statute impersonation' part of your grand strategy for intimidation, or did you pick it up from spending far too much time freezing your senses in the cold?"