THE GAMES OF POWER

THE GAMES OF POWER: Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7:

It was dark. Dark for I don’t know how long. I couldn’t see anything around me, not even when I lifted up my hands to my face.

Where was I?

Suddenly, a light appeared. Dim, but I could see it. Slowly, I walked towards it. I just wanted to be away from all this darkness…It felt so lonely and cold in the dark. It didn’t feel safe.

I approached the light, cautiously at first, but then I found myself running towards it as fast as I could, fearing that the darkness would suck me under and never let me go. Like a drowning ocean. But this wasn’t the ocean from home, the one I longed to be in. This was a thick, black ocean of tar.

The light grew brighter as I neared it. I was just a few feet from it, and I realized that it wasn’t a light at all. It was a person.

“Hello?” I said, but the person didn’t turn around. They were small, like a child, with long, dark hair. A little girl.

“Hey,” I said, softer this time. “Are you lost? What’s your name? Maybe we can find our way out of this together.”

When the girl didn’t turn, I put my hand on her shoulder. In a flash she whipped around, and screamed in agony.

I looked at the girl’s face and fell to my knees.

It was Embry.

My little sister screamed like she was on fire, and I stood there frozen, unable to do anything. Then I saw it. I could see it creeping at the edges of her clothes. Her skin. Wispy flames spreading fast. Soon she became fully ablaze, blinding me with light.

I cried in agony as my little sister was consumed by fire.

“Ahh!” I yelled, jerking awake from the dream.

God…that…that was Em. That was Em and she was on fire…

“Oy!” said an irritating voice near me. British. I looked around, still dazed, and realized that it was still dark. “Pipe down would ya? We’re almost there. Just a few more hours.”

“‘There’?” I asked, incredulous. I turned my head and felt something brush against my face. Burlap. They must have a bag over my head.

Oh God I’m gonna die…I’m toast… “Who…where are you taking me? Who are you people? What do you want?!” My voice grew higher and more erratic with each word that came out my mouth.

Something crashed into my face, a fist, sending me backward into the chair I was strapped to.

“Shut your trap you bloody moron! You want to wake Niles? Christ, I thought you Hudorians were supposed to be calm folk.”

“Hu-what?” I asked, my cheekbone throbbing where the man hit me. “I don’t understand…why am I here? Can you please take the bag off my head?”

“‘fraid not lad. Can’t have you sneakin’ a peak at anything you’re not s’posed to let your eyes wander over. Bag stays on mate.”

My heart beat fast, and I tried to move, but my hands and feet were tied down tight. I moved my tongue inside my mouth, feeling an odd tang of some sort around my teeth.

“Valerian tablets, mate. Nature’s Valium. Don’t worry, she’s all natural. Keeps you nice and unconscious for the ride. Or at least it’s supposed to. So keep it down would ya?”

They’d drugged me. That’s probably what brought on the dream.

Horrible thoughts ran through my head as I sat there hopeless with nothing but the itchy threads of the burlap to look at. Had Em been kidnapped by people like this? Had they done this to her too? Thoughts I shouldn’t be having coursed through my brain, and it took all my might to keep them at bay.