Chapter 10 Aaaa!!! Things Really Start Picking Up Now As The Siege Has Put Its Pressure On Ilucia To

Chapter 10 aaaa!!! Things really start picking up now as the siege has put its pressure on Ilucia to the point of nearly breaking it, a strange visitor all but seemingly an omen for turning tides.

Still editing the earlier chapters, so stay tuned for those edits!!! And all feedback welcome, of course please and thank you 😌

tw: blood, death, bodily harm, horror, war, food shortages

Tag list: @skidotto @idonthaveapenname

Ch. 10

“You know,” Maureen was covered from fingertips to forearm in slick blood, the pungent smell of iron and the very beginning of decay permeating throughout the dank room beneath the cabin. “There are those who would have us hanged for what we do.”

Starla etched away at the blade of the old knife, intricate runes taking a long while to carve on such a sharp and old piece of silver. The dust piling on the table was picked up by a gust of wind gently sailing through the open window. “Since when have you cared about those who’d hang us?”

Elisa grunted with disdain as she held the struggling sack of birds underwater, the churning quickly fading away as they met their deaths. “It’s one thing to be heretical,” she mumbled, her breath heavy as a bead of sweat dripped from her brow into the now still sink, “It’s another to do what we find ourselves doing.”

The three of them continued to work mostly in silence. It had become routine, yet none of them found comfort in it. When they closed their eyes at night, they no longer dreamt of each other’s warm embrace and being at one with Vitality. Instead, they bled carcass after carcass dry, praying to whatever gods they thought might listen to make each dying breath the last they would hear unless it be their own.

It was a true waste of what they could do, but they did it nonetheless. Each animal sacrificed; each child butchered… Was there any such thing as the greater good while you pulled the meat from the bones of a babe? Any grief felt when the hundredth dying heart was held in their hands, pink matter turning gray as the bucket at their feet filled?

The three of them sat amongst the riverbed as the child ate. Their feet were drifting in the clear water, the cold not enough to numb them the way they needed. The blood under their fingernails was dark and browning, no amount of river water able to wash it away.

“We’ll die before it happens,” Starla said, looking nowhere in particular as the sun began to set across the horizon. “If we’re bringing this upon the world, I don’t want to see it when it happens.”

Elisa nodded.

Maureen’s gaze didn’t change—it rarely did anymore.

“Let’s decide now.”

The three of them continued to sit in silence for a while. Starla knowing when she’d like it to end, Elisa never wanting it to, and Maureen wishing it would have long ago.

Maureen closed her eyes, breathing in the fresh earth around her as dug her blood-stained fingers into the dirt beneath her. “Everything we stood for was toppled in an instant. All the love we’ve ever felt greedily taken from us. There will come a time where our deaths will have that same impact on him. Then. That’s when we do it. I want him to hurt.”

~

It was dark. Late. Most men who had been well enough to be tended to in the manor’s once-banquet hall had found themselves hobbling on two feet again, well enough to stir a pot or muck the stables if not picking up the sword. The longer the barricade held, the more secure they became in their positions. Less of them were hit by the searching arrows as they learned where the best nooks and crannies were to seek cover, got quicker with the barrels of hot oil, rarely allowing the enemy to cross the threshold.

And yet the standstill was putting them all on edge. This wasn’t a matter of holding their ground; they could do that in their sleep. They needed an offensive play and, from behind a siege wall, it was far easier said than done.

“If you held the meeting and announced your loyalty, it would end. Isn’t that what we want? Isn’t that the goal?” Demetrius followed May at as close a range he could as she hurried through the halls.

She strode with purpose, her boots hitting the floor as thunder roared in the sky above the manor. “My loyalty has been sworn for as long as my bloodline has commanded Ilucia,” a slow pounding rhythm started sounding near the base of her skull as the rage in her blood boiled hotter, thicker, “and I am committed to the oaths I took.”

He sighed, grinding his jaw. “We’d never win against him. You know this.”

She shook her head, her hand gracing the sword in its hilt at her side, “This is not a matter of control to the crown—”

“Then what else!” His whispered shouts were hoarse, his eyes all but emerging from his skull as his face turned red.

May stopped in her tracks, facing him for a moment. Before her lips opened, he knew the answer.

“You don’t feel it? You don’t know?” the pounding in her head grew in strength, as did her conviction.

For just a second, they stood there in silence, the rain hitting the roof so far overhead.

“It ends tonight, Demetrius. When it does, you’ll see that I’m right.”

They made their way through the corridor and down the once-grand set of stairs, the few candle nubs and spent torches barely lighting the rough stone walls. The muffled sounds of the raging storm were both a blessing and a curse: only a fool would procure an attack under such circumstances, while the makeshift village of tents and shacks scattering the courtyard would all but be washed away in the aftermath. She’d have opened the doors to the manor weeks ago for more stable shelter had Demetrius not reminded her that she didn’t know who she could trust.

Oryn and Alec were already standing near the main entrance, shrouded by the shadows playing off the dripping walls and shuffling where they stood.

A shiver ran through Demetrius’s spine as he leaned towards May. “The boy can’t be a part of this.”

No one was summoned to the hall.

In fact, May hadn’t thought she’d be running into Demetrius as she assuredly slunk into her armor, peeking through darkened windows to see if she could spot any wayward fires amongst the storming winds. Of course, there were none.

When she opened the heavy oak door, his silhouette was lurking just beyond its precipice. Something’s about to happen, he’d said.

May took an uneven breath as she looked over Oryn’s figure covered by the heavy robes they wore to sleep. The bit of their body that she could see was taught, straining itself against something unseen.

They feel it, too.

“Alec, go back to your chambers.” May’s voice was firm.

His hair was ruffled at its ends, bits and pieces sticking up from what must have been restless sleep, if any at all. He wasn’t wearing any armor, just his boy’s pajamas. His cheeks flushed a deep, hot red as the pounding in his head slowly started to fade and he found himself for what he was.

He nodded, swallowing the lump in his throat as he turned on his heel. “You’re… you’re all about to go and do something,” he muttered under his breath, not wanting to show how embarrassed he felt as the little boy who could barely hold a sword. “And I won’t be much help. But there has to be something. A reason to… Why’d I come down here?”

The rain continued its relentless beating against the manor. Time seemed to slow.

There was a slow, solid knock on the door behind them.