Inked

43

"It suits you very nicely, wouldn't you agree?" 

Farid stared into the mirror. He felt ridiculous in the tight purple pants he had been given, and his black sleeves got in the way of the movement of his arms. But Soleil, and the queen, had insisted, and why that mattered so much to him, he could hardly remember. 

Soleil had been using the fire more and more on him, it seemed, for the littlest things. "Farid, deliver this message. Farid, carry this for me. Farid, get me a snack from the kitchens, will you?"

The more he resisted, the less he remembered afterwards. Now he seemed in a dream-state, constantly distant and gloomy.

Today, when Soleil had shown him his new room -- complete with a carpet that was more comfortable than his tower mat and a bed that seemed unnecessarily big to him, done up in criss-crossing violet hangings and carved bedpoles -- Farid could not bring himself to react with more than a small, "oh!"

It was just too much for her to ask for him to change into the damned jester outfit she brought him. "Here, put this on," she had said, and out of nowhere the feelings she had been repressing over and over in him slipped out.

He spat right in her face and said, "I don't want to. I don't want any of this. I'd rather be in the dungeons than be stuck with your-" But she had already done it again. Silenced him. Grabbed his mind and tucked it away where he couldn't reach it. She was really good, powerful. He felt like he was going mad and he felt like he had never been calmer in his life all at the same time. He wanted to break free of her spell, to yell at her, to hurt her for doing this to him, but a part of him was grateful that he was free from the weight of making decisions, that he could not be blamed for his actions so long as she was the one making him carry them out. 

Now he was standing in front of a mirror, dull eyes squinting back at him, his black hair cropped shorter than he ever would have chosen for himself. It was not him, but he also didn't know how to find the real him once all this was over. If Soleil even let him see a life after this was over. 

"It will do."