It felt like we had been running for hours. My breaths came in gasps and my legs felt like Jello. Each step sent a sharp pain up my calves but I did my best to keep pace with Henry. At this point I weirdly felt thankful to the Warden for having us do so much running. Without that I feel like my body would have given out much sooner into our pursuit. Without having Linette touch my tender parts in my body made me miss her that much more. Finally Henry came to a stop allowing me a moment to catch my breath. I plopped to the ground feeling the rest of my strength fade from my body.
"I'm frankly surprised you were able to keep up with me on that run." He took off his coat and set it onto a nearby branch. "My crew should be somewhere nearby and can come pick us up. Until then we should have some time to rest." I looked over to where he was removing his garments blushing in turn as his shirt came off revealing a chiseled stomach. Something deep within me realized that this man was a beautiful man, but I tried to shove it deep within me to ignore those feelings. I instead opted to turn around and look off into the distance staring at the direction of the school. "Sorry if you miss it, but we need a strong mage really badly on the Northern Front." He said it off handedly but I shook my head very strongly no.
I wasn't sure if he caught onto it as he didn't say anything in response. "What were you trying to tell me about your necklace earlier?" I could feel his eyes staring at the back of my head. I turned to face him and did my best to gesture to him that I wanted it off. He stared at the necklace and then to my gestures. "Want it off?" I eagerly nodded my head yes. He stepped up to me and attempted to take the necklace off, but that same magic that prevented me stopped him from touching it. "Did they put a cursed necklace on you?" He stared at the necklace for a length of time and then finally sighed.
I could feel an intense heat spread up my cheeks at his intense gaze, but did my best to not let it show on my face. "I think it'll have to be removed by George." He fingered with the magic a little longer before finally turning away. My excitement at the idea of finally being able to feel Linette quickly drained from me. With that excitement leaving my body I could feel that little bit of heat dissipate with it.
"They should be here soon, but honestly we might have to spend the night in the forest. Hopefully you don't mind. I know you might not be used to toughing it out like this." I could feel the apology in his voice. If you only knew the fucking half of it.
I watched him flatten an area out on the ground, removing all of the debris, and finally laid out his cloak, slowly sprawling out. I found a tree that I set my back against, and watched the man snore a few moments after laying down. I lifted my head to look at the sky that had pervaded me for all of those years. Listening to the snores allowed me to feel a decent amount of safety and allowed it to sway me into a lulling sleep.
SNAP… CRACK… SNAP. My eyes shot open at the sounds in the nearby forest. My heart rate sky rocketed looking for Henry, but instead of seeing him sleeping he was simply gone. There was no cloak. I could see the faint wisps of sunlight in the sky, but the forest itself was still essentially pitch black.
SNAP…
My ears pricked up trying to hear whatever assailant was coming for me. I carefully hugged my knees to my chest. Then instead of twigs snapping I could hear footsteps in the vicinity to me. My heart was pumping loudly in my ears, but without Henry I wouldn't even know which was the right way to run. I tried to turn myself invisible hoping that whoever was walking closer wouldn't notice me. Then the footsteps coming closer couldn't be ignored any further. Someone was walking straight up to me.
Could it be the guards? Have they come to bring me back?
I looked up as the steps approached my tree to see Henry's face peek around the side of the tree. His eyes widened in surprise as he saw my face. "Sorry… I didn't mean to scare you… I was trying to let you sleep." I could hear the guilt in his voice. I felt relief wash over me and let out a deep sigh, and watched as Henry walked over holding a bundle of sticks. He gave me little regard as he set them down and proceeded to start a fire. Watching Henry work on the fire was oddly comforting. Him not speaking to me, not wanting anything from me at this moment. I oddly felt like the princesses from the stories I was read to as a child. As Henry stood at the fire occasionally poking at the fire he cleared his throat grabbing my attention.
"My people dealt with the confusion from earlier. They won't be chasing us any further." He looked into my eyes trying to gleam some information from me. He must have noticed that I looked relieved because he added, "They told us that they could send someone to remove the necklace…" He trailed on. I fingered the choker on my neck wishing that I could communicate with Linette, and stared at his face. I looked around for a stick knowing that there was little point in trying to reach for my failed voice. After finding a decent stick I wrote out to him, Will they try to take me back?
I stared intently into his face trying to gleam any info that I could. He stayed by the fire, but finally stated with a low growl in his voice, "They could fucking try." His eyes turned into a fierce scowl which oddly set me at ease. In case there was any misrepresentation with what I wrote out to him I decided that there should be one further message.
I do not want to go back.
He looked from the message scrawled into the dirt then into my face. He sighed standing from his kneeling position by the fire. He came over to inspect my face. I braced myself for what he might say or do, but instead he softened his expression.
"The North will always welcome someone who can protect our peace."
With that he went back to the fire allowing the conversation to die off. I could feel pangs of hunger assuage my stomach causing it to growl loudly. I quickly grabbed my stomach and attempted to deal with the ensuing chaos within my stomach, but ultimately grabbed the attention of Henry. He let out a quick chuckle. "Don't worry Princess but the food is coming along with my men. Until then we must wait on empty stomachs." He rested his back against a tree closing his eyes attempting at resting his gnawing stomach as well. I tried to do the same, and allowed the crackle of the flame to ease me off into a gentle sleep.
THUD
I rocketed up from my deep slumber to the loud noise that was somewhere around me. I opened my eyes to see Henry reach for his sword but instead of drawing it just left his hand at his pommel. I could see him squint into the woods and let out a low chirp of a whistle. A few short moments later there was a response from the woods. Henry stood up from his position with a smile on his face.
"The food is here Princess." I followed him to a standing position standing off to the side of him. I could see a group of people stride out of the woods to our encampment. I counted seven people plus one person off to the back. I couldn't quite see their face, but based on the clothing, I could tell it was someone from the school. My pulse quickened fearing the worse, but it seemed to be Staples. I felt a weird mixture of emotions on seeing the person who was my teacher for roughly that year long period. I never had any real issues with him, but instead had many positive memories of him teaching me. Henry kept his hand on his pommel and watched as Staples approached me. It was Staples that first broke the silence amongst the group.
"I understand that you purchased her, but you still should've followed protocol. This would have prevented me from having to follow your group out here to remove the sealing choker." He glared at Henry for clearly breaking protocol but approached me stopping just a few feet away from me.
"Why'd you have to seal such a young girl's voice away anyway?" Henry asked with a slight amount of annoyance seeping into his voice.
"Seal her voice?" Staples looked to Henry inquisitively. "You misunderstand Lord Henry. This was to seal her magic away since we had… an unfortunate accident." Staples briefly scowled as he stared into my face. Staples approached me holding his hand out to my neck. I stepped forward lifting my head to allow a better grasp of my neck. I wanted this choker off as soon as humanly possible.
His hand brushed the choker and I could feel it start to slip off. Staples grabbed the choker on both sides of my neck and stared me in the eye. He let out a deep sigh and barely in a whisper said to me, "This is probably going to hurt." He slipped the necklace off of my neck, and I stared at him inquisitively. Why would it hurt…
Pain shot through my spine and shocked straight into the back of my skull. My world went pure white. I could vaguely feel someone shove something into my mouth, but there was no part of me that was focusing on my outside world. Every fiber of my being felt like fire was coursing through my veins. Heat tickled throughout my body as if it was searching for more things to burn. As the fire spread from piece to piece of my body it would cause a brand new spasm. My fingers were curled into my palm allowing beads of blood to pour down my arms. My legs were shaking with a new spasm for each section the fire spread to. I could hear panicked screaming sounding off around me. After what felt like an eternity the darkness of sleep pulled me down.
A gentle sway is what I was awoken to. I could feel a light breeze brush against my skin. Something cool was pressed to my head blocking my vision, but the cold sensation alleviated my ear splitting headache. Every inch of my body felt tender and sore. Whatever that intense fire was earlier had caused severe damage throughout my body. I gingerly attempted to flex my fingers but felt a pang of pain from such a simple gesture. Someone must have noticed that I was stirring awake because I could hear the shuffling of feet.
"Henry, she's stirring awake!" A female voice sounded out. The voice in nature sounded gruffer than the typical female voice, but didn't sound threatening which set my mind at ease. Oddly enough and much to my surprise hearing Henry's name also set a stir through my mind. I felt calmer knowing that he was still in my vicinity. I could hear hurried steps coming over to where I was at.
"Hey there Princess!" Henry's voice sounded off somewhere near me. I could vaguely tell that he was kneeling down next to me. I attempted at opening my mouth to respond, but even the attempt at opening my mouth sent pangs of pain down my neck. I let a groan slip out between my lips.
"That was pretty scary earlier to be honest. That magic professor told us that the magic re-entering your system would cause some mild pain… It didn't seem very mild to me." I could hear a faint bit of concern in his voice. A hand reached out and removed the cloth from my eyes. I could see that I was in a tent of some sorts. I couldn't see below me, but I knew that there was some sort of fur blanket covering my body. I attempted sitting up causing intense waves of pain shooting through my body, and thought better of it. I didn't even bother looking at Henry because I could tell that the only look on his face would be that of panic. I didn't feel very comfortable looking so weak in front of the man who spent money on me. There was a part of me that wanted him to feel like he got his money's worth. We're already some dumb mute creature. Hopefully he doesn't abandon us on the side of the road.
Then after thinking that thought I could feel a faint flick of something familiar. Linette! Are you there?!
Another light flick inside. It felt weak by nature, but honestly judging by that intense flash of pain I imagine she also needed to recover. Henry stood up next to me, and a part of me didn't want to look at him. I fought the urge and settled my eyes on his.
"Well Princess… we're camping for the night. Not sure if you're up for eating, but Namen cooked up some mean grub." He flashed me a cheeky smile and leaned forward.
"Well… as good as one could expect for a humorless bastard." He winked at me and in the process of standing back up there was an object that ripped through the door of the tent. It pinged off of Henry's head causing it to go careening into a different corner of the room.
"IF YOU DON'T LIKE MY COOKING THEN WHY DON'T YOU FUCKING COOK IT!" I could hear someone screaming from outside of the tent. Henry, rubbing his head, went over to pick up whatever the object was and rushed to the door. I could vaguely hear him and another fighting outside of the tent. The scene itself caused a chuckle which caused another intense flash of pain to course through me.
Let's not make fun of whoever's cooking that was. I don't think I'd survive a headwound like that…
Henry came back into the tent after a while holding a steaming hot bowl of something brownish in nature. The steam, and smell of something sweet in nature assaulted my nose.
"Other than being weirdly sweet it's pretty good. Able to sit up?" Henry knelt back down next to me. I knew without even trying that I would strongly regret the idea of standing and tenderly shook my head no. The frown on my face caused my stomach to do flips. Every thought of being abandoned went through my mind. God why now!? Why do I have to be more of a problem?
Linette didn't even stir within. She must have been too exhausted to be my internal support. I understood her. It was exhausting being with me too. Without much spoken word Henry was scooping food into my mouth. The taste was heavenly for my empty stomach. The sweet taste of the meat in the stew felt like it was soaking into my sore and broken body. I could barely resist the urge to moan in pleasure at the taste. I could hear Henry chuckle next to me, but didn't even really care that I must have seemed pitiful. Here I was purchased, getting fed by my new owner. After finishing off every last scrap of food I licked off the excess that clung to my lips.
"Was it good?" Henry stood above me looking down at me holding the now empty bowl. I nodded enthusiastically. "I'll let Namen know you liked the food." He smiled down at me and turned to leave the tent. After watching his back I could feel a warmth seep through my body. The warmth was accompanied by a pleasant breeze that drifted me off into a deep sleep. Thankfully nightmares didn't chase me that night.