Trapped ( Zarobljena prevedeno na engleski jezik )

8. Reborn

Evangelia opened her eyes. She saw nothing but the gray sky and the pyramidal peak of the gorge. She felt raindrops on her face. Slowly, she sat up. Memories surged within her like a tide. Walking in a line, Matej's death, the assault, her own death, her mother's voice, and darkness. She remembered everything.

I died. There is no doubt about it, but where am I now? She looked around. This place again, where I was killed. Only it's not the same day. Now it's raining, and at the moment of my death, the sun was blazing, she thought feverishly. What did my mother mean when she said it wasn't supposed to be like this? What wasn't supposed to be? she asked herself persistently. What day is this? That one surely isn't, her head was filled with questions. She had no answers to any of them.

She persistently searched for signs of something that resembled paradise. Clouds, flowers, nightingales, or mist, but all around her was just sky and bare stones. She had always been skeptical about what paradise really looked like. Am I now paying the price for my disbelief? She thought bitterly. She even remembered her strange dream. The meadows and streams where her family stood. It resembled paradise, but now nothing around her hinted that she was even close to such a place.

Evangeline quietly prayed. She didn't know what else to do. The dead do not pray for themselves, but there is no one to pray for my soul. She crossed herself, and her palms came into her field of vision. She examined them more closely. Instead of being scratched and stained with blood from being tied up, they were unblemished and without a single scratch. Her hands were not dirty with dust and dirt, but white as snow and impeccably clean.

The girl began to examine herself. Her legs were also free of blisters and scratches, her feet clean, the skin on her soles soft. It was as if she had walked on pillows her entire life, not on sharp stones. The shoes she had taken off were whole and clean. Her dress was also untouched, and she remembered that the beast had torn it before he raped her. Somehow, she felt as if she were reborn. Renewed.

The rain might have washed away the dirt, but it certainly couldn't heal the scratches. There was no blood on her chest. Her fingers moved toward her neck. She had deliberately left it for last. She was afraid to touch it because there was a deadly cut there. Cautiously, she ran her finger over the spot where she had felt the blade's touch. There was nothing there, just soft and cold skin.

Evangelia began to tremble. She tore the dress off herself. She remained naked. She didn't even think that someone might see her like this. She was bewildered. She wanted answers to the countless questions that were piling up in her mind.

She began to trace her fingers over her body. It was free of any scratches or bruises. Just smooth and cold skin, now splattered with rain. She ran her hand over her head. Her long hair was soft and shiny. No longer tangled, rough, and dirty.

She remembered that she needed to check for signs of life. She pressed her fingers against the blood vessel in her neck. There should be a pulse there. She felt nothing. She pressed the pads of her fingers against her wrists. There were also no signs of life there. What is this? How is this possible? She was going crazy with a multitude of unclear things.

She wanted to take a deep breath, but she realized she couldn't. Her lungs couldn't provide an inhalation. My body shows no signs of life, but I can feel touches just like the raindrops, she concluded. Before she started looking for a solution and moving on, she needed to examine herself. She pulled on a dress that looked as if she had just taken it out of a chest.

Evangelia remembered to check one more thing: whether she had a sense of pain. She took a thorn from a nearby bush and jabbed it forcefully into her thumb.

- Ouch! - she cried out. - Damn it! Everything can disappear for me, but the sense of pain cannot! - she lamented to herself.

Then she stared at her thumb where she had jabbed the thorn. Slowly, she pulled it out. Judging by the depth of the puncture, there should have been a little blood. There was nothing; in fact, there wasn't even any redness around it. Just pale and cold skin. The girl stared at her thumb. Her thoughts couldn't connect into a clear and logical whole. How? That question persistently troubled her.