The Ancients

Chapter 11

It had been almost two weeks since Vipin had been returned to her cell. She was given meals three times a day, at night the lights disappeared and the dungeon was set into total darkness. But she did as she was bid without any protest just like Rheagon had told her to.

For three nights she'd been left alone in total darkness, the lights disappearing was the only thing that she had to tell her what the passing of time was. Perhaps it was a blessing, maybe a curse to know how long she was stranded in this limbo. Her nerves twitched and legs bounced against the floor, being prisoner did not agree with her. She paced back and forth for hours in her small cell, rubbing her gloved hands together for warmth. It was much colder in the dungeon that it was in the rest of the castle.

Her first night an elven woman came before the lights were put out and gave her another pelt to help her keep warm during the night. She later learned that her name was Blyth, she'd been chastised for giving the prisoner an item the king would deem a luxury. But she said it was to keep the southern girl from freezing under Prince Rheagon's orders and that was the end of that. Vipin liked Blyth, she was one of the only guards that didn't look at her like she was shit smeared on their crystal walls. And gifting her an extra blanket didn't hurt either.

On the fourth night her ears twitched against the echoing sounds of footsteps sometime after the lights were dimmed for the night. When she realized they stopped outside of her cell she raised her head and saw her mother's pendant dangling between the bars. Rheagon smiled at her softly, "I think this belongs to you." He had fixed the chain his father had snapped and Vipin placed it securely back around her neck, tucking it underneath her shirt. The cold metal stung her skin but her body heat warmed the pendant quickly.

He had snuck the pendant away from his father and mended the chain. His own little gift in the name of peace between them. Another token of his trust. She felt that he had no more he had to prove, Liam's trust in him was enough for her. But the return of the only token she had of her mother kept her warm even in the coldest of the nights.

She asked about Liam, just like Rheagon knew she would so he didn't come to see her with nothing to share. Liam was taking his seclusion about as well as her, Rheagon had shared his last meal with him twice. It was easier to sneak his way into visiting Liam than it was her, he wasn't condemned by Caspian the same way she was. It was because of this that it took so long for Rheagon to visit her, and the reason that he wasn't able to visit every night. He came only consecutively a few times, at most he came every other night.

He would visit them both, they would ask about the other and he would tell them almost the exact same thing. They ate all three meals that were given to them, they weren't being mistreated, and they seemed healthy, though more than eager to leave their confinement.

Tonight, when her ears twitched against Rheagon's echoing footsteps she did not curse them and wish to return to her former body. Tonight she remained indifferent to the new reflexes.

Sometimes, when he came to see her, he would talk about what it was like to be of elven blood instead of human. Their ears twitched because their hearing was superior to even some animals, with enough time she would be able to control their movement to serve her needs, like a dog or a deer. They aged slowly, as slow as the nobles in Zherune, once they made it to one-hundred five they were considered adults, but still very young. And they lived until they were cut down, Caspian himself was over two millennium old. His sons and daughter were much less than that, Rheagon - the oldest - was two-hundred sixty-seven, Ryland came behind him at one-hundred eighteen, their sister Saphieran was only ten still stuck to her mother's side.

The elves' prolonged aging is why she aged slower than the other half-breeds of the noble courts, and kept pace with Liam. Half-elves, of even mundane humans, lived longer than even those of noble blood, though there weren't very many if any at all other than herself, so Rheagon was unsure of their typical life expectancy. Partially because the blood of elves and humans did not often result in life because the two species were so different. Also in part to the fact that elves did not reproduce often, there had been five births in Tahlven in the last six hundred years, Rheagon and his siblings were three of them.