The screams start in her dreams, until she realises they are real.

Anne-Marie gasps. She gets up and runs downstairs to where she hears her mother yelling: “Let me go! Let me go!”

“What are you doing?” the young woman asks two guards that refuse to pry their hands off Anne-Marie’s family.

The guards release her relatives who fall to the floor with a dull thump. Anne-Marie’s father rises and tries to drag a guard away from her daughter’s figure. But it’s no use, he quickly gets knocked down a few seconds later.

“The King’s right man would like a word with you,” they declare with pride.

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Before Anne-Marie can reply, the guards have shoved a piece of thick red fabric between her lips. They take one of her arms each, then drag her out of her family’s home. No matter how much the young woman squirms—or how many times she tries to scream—nobody comes for her; nor do the guards slow.

She looks up to the moon.

She thinks of Hector, and wonders how he fares in this hollow nigh—another where she will have not heard any news from him, just like the eight days that preceded.

The castle doors creek as they open. A figure familiar to Anne-Marie turns around and proceeds to greet her. “Hello, dear,” he says.

Anne-Marie’s breaths stop; she feels her heart cease to beat along with them.

The doors to the castle close once more. We are now oblivious to the conversation going on inside.