Severed

Author: Aerdrienya 
Story Index: Index
==First Entry on the Fifth Day==
I don't know how long it's been, the days and nights now seem to be one. The air here is thin and the smell of old dust and burning brimstone saturates it so much that every breath comes with a sting. The taste it leaves is also constant and even more foul. It makes me sick to my stomach on a regular basis.
The dwarves seem to rule here. Dark Irons judging by their deathly gray complexions, but although I see them on a regular basis (whatever "regular" may be) they don't seem to be the ones in charge of this "prison quarter".
The jailer is an orc. His garb is a familiar shade of purple that reminds me of the cultists I've seen both at the Master's Glaive in Darkshore and deep within the former Temple of Elune that is now the ruins of Blackfathom. Which does make sense, since running into that naga pit is the last thing that I can clearly remember.... before waking up here. I hope that Syl is alright. I remember Cynn was headed to her aid as well but I've had no contact with them. I seem to be cut off from our meld. Either that or something disastrous has happened. The world could be ending and I would be oblivious.
When I first came to I was being barked at in the guttural throaty language of the jailer. His eyes seem to be tiny pockets of fire. Ablaze with a hate and fury that I had never seen before. Still quite disoriented I only stared at him briefly and then looked around at my surroundings. It was a nearly perfect cubic room constructed with large smooth blocks of sooty stone. He must have taken my silence and lack of attention as defiance, because the next thing I knew he had shot forward, very quickly for an orc I think, eyes flaring even brighter as the pitch of his garbled words continued to escalate. Instinctively I held my arms up to shield myself while I reached into natures power for the moonfire that might slow his advance.
But nothing happened.
Well something DID happen, just no moonfire.
A sudden pain enveloped my neck like molten metal. I grasped at it. I discovered some sort of collar, (for my hands it was cool to the touch), just as the orc's meaty fist slammed down into my face. I reeled backwards from the force. (Luckily my head connecting with the wall had halted me). My vision flickered and a thousand tiny pinpoints of light swirled through my head like a Tanarian dust devil.
Pushing myself up with one arm I did all that I could, as pathetic as it sounds, I looked in the general direction I thought him to be in and I growled. Yes, growled, like an animal. Something that would be typical of Karnean or Cynnara... but for me it seemed odd... and somewhat disturbing.
Already I could feel the side of my face beginning to swell. A trickle of blood (maybe spit) oozed from the corner of my mouth. As I attempted to wipe it away his hand grabbed my upper arm and pulled me towards him. The heat of his sweat radiated off him in waves that smelt both of roasted boar and a musky incense.
Even though I couldn't see him at all I made one last desperate attempt to claw it his face before I was enveloped in a cloud of something that made my skin tingle. It felt like Elune's embrace.
Then the world went away again.
==Second Entry on the Seventh Day==
I sit here alone in the darkness of my cell. I still haven't been able to feel my sisters and brothers through the meld. All of my efforts to reach out have ending with nothing. I don't think I've ever felt this kind of silence, even before I joined the druidhood.
The events of the previous evening, at least I think it was last night, have provided me with a tiny bit of information as to why I am here. This prison quarter seems to be run by a human woman, a cultist I think, who seems to favor what I can only assume to be the self created title of High Interrogator. She seems to command anyone here donning similar robes but although it looks like many of the dwarven guards fear her somewhat she seems to be receiving orders (maybe suggestions) through them by some higher power.
When I was first brought to her she greeted me with all of the pleasantness of a human noble but also like the nobles her eyes and undertone were laced with superiority, contempt and disgust.
Once her insulting introduction was over she made a simple back-handed waving gesture before turning away towards a table.
The perpetually odd smelling jailer along with two dwarven guards then pushed me down into a large blocky wooden chair. Confused at first I quickly realized what events would transpire over the next while as the three of them attempted to bind my hands and feet with thick leather straps. I immediately began to struggle. As one of the ashen skinned dwarves was fumbling with one of the straps at my legs I managed to slip free of his grasp. My heel stabbed up and outwards connecting solidly with his face. The pain that suddenly shot up my leg made me question whether or not I had just kicked at flesh or stone, but it was with enough force to send the dwarf rolling over backwards. A whole string of what I can only guess to be curses followed.
Now that I had one leg free I made an attempt to give the other dwarf the same blessing as his friend, but he was ready for it and easily moved beyond my reach. Then... what had happened before happened once again.
The colors.
Creeping in from the very edge of my vision. Only this time they were not preceded by the familiar darkness... or the pain for that matter. They just drifted in like the lazy tendrils from a smokers pipe until my world was blanketed in their hues.
Still using my free leg to keep them back I began thrashing violently both hoping that this might confuse them just long enough to gain a few more precious seconds and hoping that one of my arm restraints might loosen just enough to slip free.
It worked on the dwarves I think, but the orc just furrowed his craggy brow and let loose upon my already swollen face for the fifth time in as many days. Always in the exact same spot. The impact of the hammered fist sent my head ricocheting off the back of the chair like the shot from a dwarven musket. Thinking about it now, he didn't seem to put his weight behind it at all, as if restraining himself just enough to keep my skull from exploding like a dropped egg.
Ignoring the blow almost completely I slowly turned my head back toward him. My lip curled back in a snarl that I vaguely recognized however I clearly remember a voice escaping through my teeth.
"You.. WILL NOT.. have this.. one.", I heard myself say as my filtered eyes pierced the glowing embers of his own.
He just snarled back, mirroring my own, and readied to strike me again. Then, ever so gently, an arm snaked around his and kept it firm.
"From now on", the silky voice of the woman whispered "if you wish to strike her you will restrain yourself from her head."
I managed a defiant blend of smile upon snarl, daring him, just so I could see what would happen to him if he did. My mind swam with visions of his charred flesh and bones being reduced to dust and blown off into the four winds.
The orc, who towered over her by a head and a half, continued to stare into my eyes. His breathing had gotten heavier, Surely not from any effort though but because he knew that I was silently taunting him, and it seemed to make him even more furious. Finally though, after a long static charged silence, he slowly lowered his arm.
I could feel a grin seep onto her scarlet lips as she withdrew her own hand and patted him lightly on the shoulder as if he were nothing more than a viscious overgrown pet. When I somehow managed to intensify my own twisted smile at this utter domination she seemed to have over him it threw him over the precarious edge of his rage fueled pride.
He lashed out with the same bizarre lightening speed I had seen many times before. Only this time his fist plummeted downwards and sank deep into my abdomen.
With all of the breath immediately forced from my lungs I was quickly overcome with dizziness. I struggled for control but in the end I had lost and my single meager meal of the day was forced back up. The sick and mucus violently deposited itself across my legs and onto the cold stone below.
When the spasms had finally subsided they were quickly replaced with exhaustion. I managed just enough strength to glance up at the orc. His brow was still deeply furrowed but the corners of his mouth were now twisted upwards in an almost unnatural way. It was the first time I had ever seen an orc smile...
...and it seemed to promise me that the night had only just begun.
==Seventh Entry - Twelfth Day?==
Still no contact with the meld.... my friends. All attempts to feel the essence of nature have ended in pain.
I have been working in the quarry less now.
I write these bits upon scraps of parchment that I've torn from the countless books they bring me. They are looking for something but I have no idea what that may be. All of the books have been written in my own language. It is an older form though, the words arranged slightly different, things phrased in ways that are no longer often used. They must be quite old, because I'm finding frequent references to the Highborne.... and the Well. Whether or not it is the ancient Well before the Sundering or the more recent atop Hyjal I can not be sure.
They also have MY book too and "she" seems to be interested in this one far more than all the others. Several "sessions" consisting of demands for me to reveal it's contents to them had proved unsuccessful and I was rewarded with many painful hours of "correction", as they had referred to it.
The jailer , although warned already, has struck me upon my face thrice more that I can remember. I think she knows but as of now she seems to care very little as I haven't seen or heard of any actions taken against the orc. She always appears very calm and collected. Only once has she ever raised her tone. And that was when the two of us had been alone.
~
"Soooo," she seemed almost to float towards me, then added with a wry smile, "I trust you are being treated better." More as a statement of fact than a question.
All of the other times that I had been brought here I was placed in that wooden throne. They have been more cautious than they had been during the first encounter and usually added a bit of that strange comforting dust to make me placid.
This time was different though and in no way was it "better". I was stretched out upon an upright pillar. Arms and legs connected to chains that could be tightened at her whim. Right now they were somewhat slack allowing me to just hang. My weight being supported largely by my wrists as my legs were much too weak to hold me upright on there own.
I raised my head slightly when her voice had finally broken the silence. I had been half dreaming I think, as the sounds of her words seemed distant and made about as much sense as those in the books.
"So little elf" she said clearly in mockery of the situation as I was nearly the height of the orc who usually accompanied her, "Do you know WHY you are here yet?"
Staring at her a moment longer I said nothing and looked back towards the floor.
She reached out at took my chin in one hand forcing my head back up. "Do you know what it is we are doing? Do you care anymore? Did you EVER care?"
Squeezing a little tighter now she changed her voice as if talking to a child. "No you don't do you. Because you are the weaker. You simply could not grasp our concepts, because you are smaller in here." she said as she poked at my skull.
Then she lightly ran the same hand down over my inflamed face causing me to flinch involuntarily. Her smile grew so she repeated it again as if stroking a cat. I managed to resist the urge to entertain her this time causing her smile to quickly fade. She glared a moment before slowly extending a finger and pressed at the center of the bruise with a bit of pressure. My good eye closed tightly and I let out a small gasp, the pain radiated throughout the right side of my face like a fissure about to open.
Chuckling softly at this she pushed my head aside and let it drop before turning away towards a nearby bench.
With her back still turned she continued, "You are here because I want it to be so. You will continue to be here until either you die...."
Then she spun around and hit me with something in the very place that she had forbidden the jailer to. Blood and saliva flew from my lips decorating the wall next to me. No darkness this time... no colors. Only pain and stars.
"OR YOU TELL ME WHAT THIS IS!" she screamed then thrust a book into my face. My vision cleared a bit and I could now make out that it was MY book. The familiar cover, now stained with a small spattering of my blood, seemed to greet me. The empty sockets of the humanoid skull only taunted me though as if to say "If you knew you'd be free". I swear that if a skull could smile this one would have a grin akin to one who had lost their mind.
Like many other sessions here my silence was taken again as defiance. This caused her to scream even louder now, "MUST I STRIKE YOU AGAIN?!"
Before she was able to raise the book again I managed to let out a rasp of a reply.
"What?.... what was that?" she said leaning in closer now.
"I said... I... DON'T... KNOW... WHAT... IT SAYS.", mouthing each word as clearly as I could hoping to avoid another blow.
Her smile returned and she reached out for my chin again. Her voice as icy and and as calm as it had been before, as if nothing had happened. "Oh, I think you do... you are either extremely stupid and enjoy punishment... or somehow you have forgotten that you know."
As her face drew nearer mine she looked as if to kiss me. The idea immediately sickened me, but just before her scarlet lips (seemingly the identical shade of blood now) touched mine she turned my head again and placed them softly upon my swollen face. Her tongue snaked out and drew itself upwards toward my eye. It vaguely reminded me of some savage mating ritual and it disgusted me even more than if she'd kissed me on the lips.
Her smile remained an obscene mask and she finally whispered, "I will help you remember."
Drawing back she grinned even wider and then spit in my face.
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Next: VI. Affirmation
Category:Stories