Bound To You

Chapter 5

Areven

Areven was back in pain. Beaten to a bloody pulp, but not on death's door. The guards had been enthusiastic in their attempts to get information out of him, and he was without a few fingernails, a swollen eye, broken nose, and not one part of his body unbruised.

He couldn't decide whether he was in worse shape than when he first got to the manor, but he was still breathing. He would go through it all again in a heartbeat. The answers demanded of him were those he would never give.

Those he'd die before answering.

''Where are you from? Are there more of you? What is your race? What do your tattoos mean? Why are your eyes double-lidded? What purpose do you serve? How do you procreate?''

They wanted to know everything about him, more specifically his people. They wanted more of his people, and Areven would kill himself before he gave his Tribe away. So the bastards got nothing out of him but the filthiest cuss words. If his mother ever heard what he said to those guards, she'd make him digest a bar of soap.

He hoped that the creature would be sent in to heal him again and he could perhaps talk to them, but the heap in the cell next to him hadn't moved.

As the hours wore on, he passed the time by studying the other occupants of the cells.

The prisoners were rare races, more so, races that were non-human. So very unlike all of the guards and the Lord that seemed to reside at this place.

All of the prisoners were male, bare chested, and had no shoes, just like him. Though the cold had already seeped into his bones, he was grateful to keep his pants and some sort of dignity after shitting in a bucket.

Some of the races he spotted in the cells were those he'd never seen in real life before, only heard about in stories told around the fire.

Fae, treenant, shifter, merman, gnome, troll, blood-eater, and other races he had no name for occupied the cells. All were covered in a layer of grime. Their eyes defeated and dull, wishing for death instead of life.

After being at the mercy of the guards, and seeing another prisoner get just as harsh of a beat down, Areven could understand how one would wish to leave this world than stay in it and bear this pain.

Especially when the creature heals them, only for them to get beaten again.

After a few days passed, Areven began to notice a pattern.

A prisoner would be chosen, seemingly at random, asked a series of questions they refused to answer, and then get beaten within an inch of their lives.

The creature was dragged out of their cell a few hours after the beating. When the guards went too far and the prisoner was too close to death the creature was taken to them immediately. They'd be healed and left alone for a while, or not if they did something to piss off the guards.

Even stranger, every few days, the creature would be taken from their cell and they'd leave the prison entirely. An hour later, guards would bring them back and take them right to a prisoner who needed to be healed.

For the life of him, Areven couldn't fathom what the fuck they'd be doing with the creature only to bring it back an hour later. This whole prison was a mind-fuck.

Any means of escape eluded him.

None of the prisoners left their cells besides the creature. Even if he could get out of his cell, he was in no shape to handle all of the guards.

With guards that rotated to work in shifts of three, they had a well-oiled system where no guard was ever tired or weary enough to make a mistake. All of the guards were eager too, relishing whenever they got to dole out any pain to the prisoners. Areven counted at least fifteen guards that rotated out of the prison, although he assumed there were many more who guarded the manor itself. Likely a good sized battalion.