The RHPK

Chapter 3- Lucy

Chapter 3- Lucy

Little Lucy trudged across the muddy path holding a bucket of water and a loaf of bread. She let out a heavy breath and set down the bucket. "Get back to work!"

She flinched as her overseer, a Medusa Minion, roared in her face. Spit hit her cheek. She shook her head and trudged on to a huge golden throne. She placed the bread and water at the foot of her master and bowed. "I have brought my lord Medusa fresh rye and the freshest of spring water. Long live Medusa," she mumbled.

"Speak up, slave!!" Medusa roared. Lucy flinched. Medusa wasn't ugly. She had fair-toned skin, and though her hair was composed of snakes, she styled it beautifully. She wore thick sunglasses to keep from turning her slaves into stone, though it didn't really matter if one turned into a new statue for her collection.

"Apologizes, ma'am," Lucy said. "I have brought my lord Medusa fresh rye and the freshest of spring water. Long live Medusa!"

"Better. Now, scram, brat!"

Lucy nodded and ran off towards the slave homes. A little boy was stumbling out of one of the caves with mud on the side of his pale cheek. Lucy grabbed his wrist. "Are you okay?" she whispered.

"Y-Yeah..." he murmured. They stayed in silence for a moment before Lucy tucked a golden strand of hair behind her ear.

"I'm Lucy. It's nice to meet you," she said.

"I'm Thomas. Call me Tommy," he replied and shook her hand.

"I best be going. Medusa'll kill me if I stay out to long. Goodbye." Lucy headed to her little shack composed of straw and sticks.

"I'll see you again, right?" Tommy said.

"Yeah." She went inside and curled up on the floor.

Medusa was so beautiful yet so evil and so cruel. She had whole armies of minions wearing green armor and bearing poison-laced spears and blades. It was stupid how she had whole armies, yet she chose peasants to be her slaves and bring her food and water each day. She had a whole collection of statues- once she even told a boy named Landon to pose so that she could make him the prettiest of statues.

He still stands in her collection in a brilliant pose, yet his tears are forever engraved in hard stone.

Lucy rolled over into more straw and sighed. She was a seven-year-old slave who lived in a straw-stick shack among thirty-nine other slaves. She looked at her hands. How had she only lived for seven years, yet it seemed like she lived so much longer? She had eleven more years until she would be freed from the hell she was forced to take part in.

Eleven more years until she could become part of Medusa's prized statue collection. Rarely anyone made it long enough to be eighteen and respectively become a stone statue free of labor. Medusa disliked adults besides those who worked in her armies- she stated that they were more daring and rebellious. Lucy wanted to throw a lance through Medusa's cold heart everyday, but it was simply impossible.

She cried until she fell asleep.

*  *  *

Flames licked at her feet that shone golden in the heat of the fire around her. Medusa's cold glare had fear shining clearly. But how could one little seven-year-old peasant overthrow the Queen of the Snakes?

The little girl with her greasy and ruffled blonde hair stepped up and rose one ivory-colored hand at her master and shot flames into her face. The screams drained away and melted into roars of fury.

*  *  *

Lucy's eyes flew open and her nose immediately stung. Thick black smoke clouded her shack, and she coughed wildly, groping desperately around at the burning sticks. More roars and one furious shriek. Lucy hit the little door and rolled out onto the grass. Tommy was being cornered by a bunch of Minions. His head flew off in one clean strike.