Twenty years. Thats how long i have been in this shit hole. Twenty motherfucking years. It is my fifty sixth birthday. I only look like a teenager in human years though. The slaves in this camp call me mothers child. Like the original mother. I smile at them when they say that. My story gives them hope. That they will survive. They will go home. If a human can do it why cant Fae? Little do they know i am not human. Im surprised no one realised i am demi fae. Since i have a animal form i can shift in and out of it and will be able to until i die in hundreds of years. They haven't even noticed i don't age. Its probably because i look like all the other slaves. Bloodied. Bruised. And covered in mud. You can't even see my face.
They stopped whipping me at every opportunity about seven years ago. Now they just have a schedule. Punch me in the face five times to wake me up. Mining for six hours. If i fall or stop then twenty lashes. Then after i get strung up for one hundred lashings. I then get a slice of bread and a glass of destroyed water.
The worst part is that they wont let me die. Ten years ago i lay down and let them whip me until i almost died. I wanted to die. But they stopped just before i died and rubbed some salve on my cuts. They chuckled and spat in my face before telling me that they weren't done with me yet. They will never let me die. If i stop eating they force feed me. I tried to kill myself. But that time the guards didn't see and they didn't interfere. The only thing that stopped me was the invisible hand holding my pickaxe away from my face. I resisted it but a voice in my head pleaded for me to live. So i did. And i never tried to kill myself again.
I lay against the rock. Waiting for sleep to take me away when i hear some human girls whispering next to me.
"Did you know that lord tamlin has completed the first part of the curse?!" says one excitedly.
"Realy?" asks another cautiously.
Once you are in here for more than a year you stop hoping. Stop longing. Stop feeling. The life rates are a lot higher now. Most people survive for one to five years.
"Yeah. I heard one of the guards say it. Apparently a human girl killed his friend in his wolf form with an ash arrow. Lord tamlin has taken her to his manor" she says excitedly
"He hasn't told her about the curse has he?" asks another anxiously.
"No why?" asks the fist girl confusedly.
The new girl explains"because then there would be no way to know if the love is real and therefore the curse would be null"
"Ohhhhhh" says the other two.
"What do you think Aelin?" asks one of the girls.
"I think. I think that we have ten more years before our fate is sealed for good. If this human falls for him earlier than we can thank the mother above. If she doesn't love him in time, or at all. Then we are destined to live the rest of our miserable lives here" i say simply.
They look at me shocked.
"What?" i ask kindly.
"That is the most you have ever said to anyone" says the smallest girl.
"Well" i say, looking at the roof of the cave. "i thought i would do something for my birthday"
I fall asleep listening to the light breathing of the people around me. I let one tear fall. Just one.
YOU ARE READING
Child of Night and Fire
Fantasywhen ten year old Aelin escaped after her parents were killed she falls into the rivver. only to be saved by elena. but to save the young fire-bringer she has to send her to another realm. there she meets the inncercirlce. her memories of her family...
