Arrival (Pennywise x OC)

Chapter 17

'Ana's clan used a grove of gargantuan trees as their penitentiary, having hollowed out the massive trunks to use as individual cells for the captives, the doors keeping them inside made of latticed gold. To the uninformed onlooker, the cluster of enclosures probably looked like a gorgeous, well-kept orchard rather than a prison, with the towering trees lush and green, the surrounding plants well looked after and sprouting every color imaginable.

Ana didn't struggle for her freedom as her weapons were taken from her and she was taken to her delegated trunk, knowing she was sorely outmatched with the dozen guards that the Temple Master thought he needed to keep her in line. Instead, she tried to reason with her father, who was pretending to ignore her pleas for him to listen to reason. He stood with his arms folded neatly in front of him as he watched Ana being forced into her cell, and then gazed at her silently as the door was pushed shut and locked securely. Once she was confined, the guards dispersed, only two remaining as one stood on either side of Master Seaghda.

"Father, please," Ana was saying, wrapping her hands around the aurelian spindles that were physically denying her freedom, "you can't do this!"

"I must," he replied calmly, speaking for the first time since announcing that she was under arrest. "It is for your own good, and for the good of those that love you."

"It's not for the benefit of anyone," she disputed, looking past him briefly for Newlyn, wondering if she was in a cell near her right then. "Whatever Valdis told you, he's deceiving you - "

"Valdis didn't have to tell me anything!" Seaghda cut her off with his commanding voice, his demeanor shifting in an instant as she continued to defy him by arguing with him. "My seer saw everything that Newlyn saw when she was in your mind. Everything! You have fornicated with the Incubus! You have shown it loyalty, affection, friendship! And you have killed innocents in its name!"

Ana stared at him brazenly, her instinct to deny every claim, but knowing there was no purpose to it now. He knew, and his veteran oracles had never been wrong before. After a few silent moments, she decided on her reply. "Not one of them was an innocent, Father."

"So you deny nothing?" he asked, tone voice silky and incriminating as he took a few steps towards her cage.

"Why bother?" Ana said, shaking her head. "Even if I did, would you believe me? And when your seer enters my mind to confirm everything, you'd further accuse me of lying?"

"How far you have fallen, my Raanana," Seaghda replied, shaking his silver-haired head sadly. "My very soul is grieving to see what has become of you."

"And it means nothing that I didn't have my memories when all of this took place?" she asked. "That I had no idea who I was, where I came from, what I had been taught since I was a child?"

"Those are disgraceful excuses for your crimes, and nothing more."

"Crimes?" Ana cried, the idea ludicrous to her. "So that's it, then! I do some things you find offensive in another dimension, where I was forcibly taken to and completely isolated, and that's your verdict! Where is the discussion with the council, my trial, my chance to tell my side?"

Seaghda looked as somber as ever then, his head now hanging towards his feet as was visibly trying to come up with the words he was going to speak next. "There will be no trial, Lady Raanana. The only discussion Valdis and I will be having with the council is whether or not you will be executed outright, or if you will be kept here for the remainder of your life."

Ana almost physically felt her heart break at his statement, his betrayal an assault on her more than the idea of her being put to death. An array of emotions went through her, and the sudden bombardment kept her frozen in place for a few moments before something manifested a reaction. Rather than cry or scream in anger, or fall to the ground and burst into into tears, Ana started to laugh.