The Sinking Castle

There is a magnificent building in front of my eyes. It looks like a glass house… a glass castle rather. It has a good number of leeches shooting out from the ground beneath it, trailing against its walls up to the peak.

Now I know why it felt familiar. I have seen it most times in my dreams. It usually comes in the manner of crawling warmth, giving me the illusion that I belong with it. However, there always seems to be a lurking feeling of unease whenever I see it.

I always knew that the castle has its story, a tale of mystery interweaving the cause of its constantly slamming windows or the rapid banging against its door of abyss. It has no clouds and no grounds, just fog and snow―the very snow that swallows it.

I cannot help the chill… the fear. It reels through my veins, mingling with my blood. Then it comes back out in the form of cold breaths and Goosebumps. Even as my vision fades, I still feel the reality of the Castle. I now know part of the cause of its fate, and I am beginning to sense that there were souls cursed together with this cruel fortune.

“What happened to you?” Marretje asks, looking at me.

“I have no idea,” I whisper as shock crawls onto my face. “I saw this… building; golden… white shades—enchanting. It was ethereal until everything dissolved into a dark and crooked place.” I look at the drawing before keeping the paper back on the table.

“Honestly, I do not know what I saw. I have had dreams of this place every time and I have never wondered where that is.” I mumble, my eyes flickering from the drawing to the witch.

She has her lips pursed, red as blood and glossy as glass. One could tell from the slight wrinkles pulling across her forehead that she is older than her guise. The wrinkles make it easy to look beyond the heavy coat of makeup she has.

Her stare is intense and rigid. It makes me feel like she is trying to decipher my thoughts. Then in the next moment, she steps away from the table.

Reaching for Xaulfur, she takes his left wrist and skins the part of his veins with her sharp index claw. “Drink!” she urges me, thrusting the blood dripping wound to my direction.

For a moment, I try to ignore her, but as the clock ticks every second in loud strokes, I realize that the witch makes no requests. Her intentions are clear enough in her demanding expression.

I move my feet to Xaulfur’s side before looking down at the wound. I see that it heals by seconds, which makes me wonder if he is like me or if the demons in him make him heal quickly.

My right palm positions under the wound to hold a few drops of blood. Then I take it to my mouth, licking it dry. Everything feels quite right until something rams my head from behind, pushing me toward the witch.

With my blurring sight, I see her lips move aggressively as she holds her two hands toward me, just before an unseen force drives me to my knees at her control. I squash my head between my palms, the witch’s loud incantations not helping the clangor that will shatter my brain to pieces.

I can hear my own scream as my eyes snap close, painful blows jabbing my head and body from so many directions. I have never felt such an amount of pain before. It is excruciating, makes me go on all fours sooner.

My control over my body rapidly begins to slip away, and I can feel so many inhabitants in me at a time that I soon begin to sense them strip my sanity off me.

My hands grabbing my head does not feel like it is, neither does my scream sound like mine. I feel like a stranger to myself. Yet, at the last moment when it seems like everything is fading completely, the torments stop at once, before I slump to the ground.

I faintly hear hurried footsteps coming to my direction, two strong hands tenderly grabbing my shoulders and placing my head on a soft surface. I open my eyes to see a weak vision of Sir Jack’s eyes staring down at me, concern and anger streaking on his gaze.

How things change! A while ago, I was standing right where he crouches now, but here I am slumped on his thighs, immobilized. What did the witch do to me?

͞

The thing about Castles is their peculiar smell of nature, spice and dignity. Everyone who lives in a castle has morals― so the masses think―just because the so-called scrupulous beings beneath their robes craft themselves an everlasting honor that has to be protected by whatever means.

However, this one castle is different. It exudes loneliness and death, its hallways tainted with blood and its path overflowed by smoke. I cannot imagine what might have happened here.

Somehow, my dream has managed to bring me back to it again. Why it haunts me, I do not know, but there is always a feeling that something tries to leer close to me.

“Allegra, my darling.” I find myself swinging around to the voice that called. Then shock grips me when I see my mother standing just a few walks away from me. Her eyes are swollen and her cheeks gleam with tears.

I feel myself breaking down to nothingness, and even more when the snow beneath her feet begins to drown her gradually. She holds her hands to me, panic stricken on her face, but I could do nothing to help. I am immobile, and I cried.

I shake my head and murmur words that even I cannot decipher. I do not realize to whom I pleaded, but I am begging for my mom’s salvation. I have lost her once and never want to lose her again, not in front of my eyes.

The snow has nearly swallowed her up before I could reach for her, and as I haste forward with a scream, I sit up on the bed, wide awake and sweating profusely.

Everything feels like it has just happened in reality. I even have to blink twice and look around me to be sure that I am still not in an illusion. Yet how can I ignore the pang of pain that keeps hitting against my heart.

There is nothing I can do to stop it either.

Sighing, I climb down the bed, rubbing my scalp as I walk to the window. I open its shuttles and step out to the balcony, giving way to the fresh air that wills its flow.

As I stand against the rail, watching the sky, I can tell that a couple of minutes have been exhausted.

I am also aware that someone has been standing behind me for quite some time now, and while I want to just ignore, my instinct continuously urges me to look back. When I do, I find Xaulfur standing there smiling at me.

Then does my blood run cold!

My first thought is to run, but even that seems impossible, seeing that he is blocking my only escape route. However, he pushes one leg forward, leaving it to hang in the air for quite a long time before it settles on the floor. Then he moves the other, and with a swift turn, he gives way for the entrance.

When he makes a head jerk toward the door, as if quietly telling me to get out, I hesitate to move. I am unsure whether he counts my time; maybe a second or two or three? But I do try to make for the entrance anyway.

I could not take my eyes off him as I slowly walk past him for the door. He too stares at me, still smiling.

I turn to take off, yet a firm grip on my arm knocks away my haste, warm and stinging at the same time. They are his hands. The same hands that now pull me toward the rail and pin me against it.

I am not the type to shiver. My fear is usually embedded within me, and I am most frightful when I am quieter. Nevertheless, as I use my eyes to size this man in front of me, I notice how huge he looks. I imagine he would fit in the brawny class; somehow, this makes me begin to dislike him already.

He leans close, his belly rubbing against mine. I can almost feel his heartbeat as his face draws near. I whimper as I shut my eyes, trying to take my head far before he stops me by placing his free hand under my chin.

The pain of his touch electrifies my whole cells. I imagine death, the ruthless phantom that feeds on lives, especially innocent ones. I would not call mine innocent though, which is why I could not help but think that if I die today, will I be able to see my mother?

“Young flesh,” Xaulfur groans, much to my surprise. His voice has a wolfish growl, pushing its way brutally into my eardrums.

When I open my eyes, I find his face in front of mine. He could be tall, but I am tall enough to reach the point where I now watch his Adam's apple move as he speaks again.

“Look.” I gasp out of the intensity of his voice this time. “Look into my eyes.” I obey. “What do you see?”

As I look directly into his eyes, I see something unusual. It looks like blood spilled on ice, and the ice are his eyes. How can his gray and beautiful eyes suddenly look like he shed blood as tears?

In a flash, he has his hands on my neck, the deadly look in those orbs building up. He looks like he would throw me over the rail, and he would have done so if someone did not knock him out of his position.

It happened so fast that I could hardly see him flying off. But as my legs threaten to give in while I strongly hold onto the rail behind me, I see Xaulfur lying on the edge of the balcony, and the old man wobbling towards me.

Sighs of relief fleet through my lungs before I fall into the old man’s spread arms. He looks worried and his heart beats so fast. It must have taken him all his courage to hit his brother out like that, but he could not have been more scared than I was.

For the first time, I realize that I did not fear Owen at all. This right here is fear.

Shivers course through my body as the old man carefully carries me into the bed. I clung onto him. I do not want to let him go. My eyes stick to the closed window, so many thoughts running in my head.

What if Xaulfur smashes the glass and forces his way in? The old man might not be able to fight him then and I will be attacked again. I only had luck last time because it was something that came out of surprise.

“Do not worry, he won’t touch you again,” The old man reassures. I realize that I have him bent over me on the bed, my legs wrapped around his torso and my hands around his neck. I let him go.

As he sits on the bed beside me, I see how frail and worried his eyes are. Maybe he worries for his brother, or maybe he is concerned for me. Either way, “Why is he like that?” I ask despite myself, and the old man sighs.

“He’s not himself anymore. His mind has been projected.”

“What can be done to save him though? One should not live their entire lives in captivity.”

Silence reigns for a while before the old man spares a glance at my arms. He may have sensed them still shivering.

“There is something that can be done, and that is why we need you.”

“Me?” I blink a number of times. “Why do you need me though?”

There is something in the old man’s expression that gives me a feeling of distress. Or is it just my head messing with me?

I crease my brows as I watch sweat roll down in rivulets from his scalp to his brows. Some settled above his lashes, which some rolled all the way down to his chin.

“I can’t hold it….” he mumbles, his voice breaking.

I narrow my eyes on him. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes waver before he looks down. I sit up properly to lean on the wall, drawing my knee to my chest while observing him. When he looks back at me, his eyes have changed.

His irises are lost in the shadow of his sclera. The latter has taken to two shades―obscene halfway from the top, then bloody below―with blue scanty veins pulling over them.

At first, I thought it was just his supernatural eyes, just like that of Xaulfur. Yet, somehow, I feel that his inhuman state is not a threat to me.

It is not as if I trust the old hag, I just trust the feeling of warmth I usually have when around him. However, it soon hit me.

I can remember it vividly like it was yesterday when Katelyn planted the vivid story of hypnosis in my head. I still recall her description of a hypnotized person’s state, and it is nothing different from what is in front of my eyes.

Now I know that I am in another danger. If the old man has been ordered to hurt me, then not even my blood will be able to save me from him.

Goosebumps reel over my body when he begins to move towards me. I attempt to slip farther from him, but I am too late. He has me spread on the bed, my left shoulder pinned with one of his hands, which makes it hard for me to move.

I try to scream, but his other hands make for my mouth first, his stomach resting on my groin while his strong legs entangle mine. That is when I know how doomed I am, and for the first time, I feel entirely trapped.

With tears filling my eyes, I shake my head, a silent way to convince him not to do whatever he has been told to do. But it all seems pointless because it looks like he really cannot fight his hypnosis.

All my life I have dreaded this more than anything, I have never been subjected to it before. Yet I knew that one day, like a piece of cake, I will have it.

“I’m sorry,” the old man mumbles with restraint. His strong hands flip me over to my stomach, grunts filling the room as his rough hands strongly work on undoing my corset.

I feel sharp pains as his claws meet the flesh of my back, and then do I release a muffled scream into the blanket. I have several emotions swirling in me― anger, fear, disgust, and devastation. Vibration courses through me as I shrug out my emotions with tears.

I bite my fingers and I watch the door, my head pressed against the bed. A sudden movement on me causes me to jerk, just before I feel the weight on me lifting. Then a thud, and several patters on the floor.

The slamming of the door aims to keep me steady, but I have grown too weak. My strength cannot take three circumstances in a day and remain firm. Staying in England could have been better. Yet who am I to decide? I manage to see the person leaving the room through my glassy sight. I am unsure of whom I see, but it is not the old man.