Coven

Chapter Eleven (The Present)

Backseat Passenger

"Kiara!" You hear someone shout from within the fog, genuine in their excitement. Their voice is unlike anything you've ever heard before. It's deep, almost grating, commanding the attention of the entire forest around you. Beneath your feet, you can feel the ground shake when the person speaks again, their voice adding more to the atmosphere as they question your friend with an air of familiarity and worry, "Where've you been? It's been months since you've visited our neck of the realm."

Kia untangles herself from your hand like an impatient, excited child, quickly standing to attention with a slanted smile. She tries to keep her cool as she calls out, "Just got caught up with other things."

She walks forward and within a few steps she's gone, disappearing into the thick cloud of grey that surrounds your form. It's haunting how easily she slips away. If you hadn't watched which direction she went, you would have been lost and completely vulnerable to whatever lay just behind the mist. Knowing that scares you and causes your mind to run. The thought of corpses and fangs waiting out of sight makes you anxious, even if it's not that realistic. However, the notion that someone could be lurking behind you, just waiting for you to fall back into their arms, sits more prominently on your brain. Apparently so much so that your body moves on its own, forcing you to follow Kia's ghostly trail and run from what may follow.

For the first few steps all you can see is smoke. It's thick and blinding, only increasing in darkness as you stride forward. If it wasn't for the chatter in the background, you might have thought you'd ventured into a void of nothingness. Thankfully you can hear snippets of close-by conversations. They're clear enough to be able to distinguish emotions, but too fuzzy for you to recognize any coherent sentences. It's frightening not knowing what's happening. Who is talking to who, and what they're discussing. The paranoia you feel paired with the neverending black brings you back to your time at the manor.

Most days were boring. You didn't do much as you were often dragged around to accompany one of the many men attached to your hip. Usually things went as smoothly as they could possibly go in such a situation. You followed instructions, kept them happy, and played the game as well as you could. However, occasionally issues occurred. Whether it be you or them, someone could end up causing a problem, and you would always be the one to pay for it.

Your punishments typically weren't too extreme. Grant, Charles, and Michael often just gave you the equivalent of a slap on the wrist. In addition to them, Fai rarely ever did anything unless you were absolutely in the wrong. He'd be a bit stricter, treating you like some child in need of discipline, but any bruise suffered at his hands could be easily healed within an hour. Yet, Adam and Francis are a completely different story.

Francis used to shove you into a closet when you failed to live up to expectations. He'd leave you there for days with no substance, coming in every few hours to use you as his own personal punching back, while only allowing Adam to interact with your weakened body when you were on the verge of death. Everytime the eldest would bring you back, heal some of your wounds and internal damage, before leaving you in the mercy of the Englishman. He had the ability to stop the pain, to take you out of there, and it always hurt how insistent he was that you served out any punishment given.

In the dark you can recall hearing the voices of people you'd lost long ago. Of course, they were merely hallucinations; vivid auditory tricks your mind made up to take away from the horror. It didn't mean they didn't scare you; that they didn't seem real in that moment. They'd cry out to you, begging you for things you could not offer. They wanted freedom, they wanted life, and most of all, they wanted forgiveness. You would cry for them to stop, to be quiet, to leave you alone. To let you suffer in silence. They never listened. Eventually you got used to their screams in a way. You hated them. Hated what they stood for, but they became a comfort. You can only assume this is because outside of the tiny closet you suffered much worse than screams. Perhaps, in a sense, you suffered more than they did too.