Marcella
Unknown Hours Later
It was cold.
So utterly cold.
Mari’s eyes fluttered open as she awoke, only dirty stone walls and metal bars there to bid her good morning.
If it even was morning.
It was hard to tell. Some light trickled in through the bars, but it was from the torches that hung outside her cell.
Drip Drip
Pitter-Patter
Mari flung her head around to find the sources of the sounds, but she could find no water droplets leaking from the ceiling nor any animal scrounging around.
Panic seeped into her veins for just a moment before she remembered who and where she was, only that didn’t help her situation.
She was in the cell some soldiers threw her into after she and Tristan were found in the village square beside a pile of ashes, him covered in his golden blood.
They had heard screaming, the villagers said. And they’d peered out of their windows to see a man on fire, which was when many ran out their back doors and grouped up to confront the assailant- only it looked like the assailant was Tristan.
Their pleas did little to convince them.
“Seize them at once!” A woman yelled, pointing to the twins. “They’re changelings, I tell you! Changelings!”
“No, they’re clearly ghosts of the dead who’ve come to haunt us!”
Tristan had placed himself in front of Mari, blocking her from the mob. “We’re not any of those things, we were attacked by a vampire! He was pretending to be a soldier!”
“Liars,” a man snarled. “I reckon you’re the ones who are vampires!“
Tristan scowled at him. “How dare you?! We live here!”
Mari tried to think of something to say, something smart to get them out of there or at least convince the villagers that they were harmless. “It’s true, my brother fought off a vampire! That’s why you see a pile of ashes there. If he was the real vampire, why would he use fire?”
A few people remained silent as they looked to the ashes, but the same man said, “Nobody knows if vampires truly exist, let alone if they are really weakened by fire. To declare both these things is a bold claim, especially with no evidence. Besides, nobody here has vouched for you being citizens of the village. How do we know you aren’t lying about that, too?”
The villagers hummed in agreement. “Look at his clothes!” One of them shouted. “It’s yellow! His blood is yellow!”
The crowd was much larger now as all the ruckus had awoken many residents nearby. Some people in the back moved up to see Tristan, gasping as their eyes indeed landed on the blood covering his body.
“I just gave you evidence, didn’t I? There’s not even a single legend that states vampires have golden blood, nor do any mythological creatures!” Granted, Mari had a very limited supply of books and wasn’t sure if her words were true, but nobody corrected her.
“What’s going on here? Hey! Let me through!”
Amongst the crowd, an old, bearded man wearing an oversized white robe emerged- the symbol of a golden sun etched into the underside of his sleeves.
The priest.
Every village had one, although Mari had never seen theirs in person.
“Can someone tell me what is going on-“
His eyes had fallen on the blood.
“By the grace of Zohar, it can’t be,” he murmured beneath his breath.
“They’re vampires, your holiness!” Someone called out. “We must burn them at once!”
“Not so fast,” a man said, making his way through the mob. With a start, Mari realized he was a soldier- his emblem and uniform identical to that of the vampire’s, although his badge was a tad different. Her gaze wandered downwards and she was relieved to see he had no ring.“Royal law decrees that we hold these two for questioning.”
“And give them a chance to escape?” Another yelled out.
“I assure you that won’t be happening.” Turning to Tristan and Mari, he unsheathed the sword at his side. “Will you two come peacefully?”
Tristan looked as though he were about to curse the soldier out. “Yes,” Mari said quickly. “We will.”
Her brother gave her an incredulous look, but she whispered, “They’ll kill us if we make a run for it. Just go along with them and don’t do anything stupid.”
As two other soldiers grabbed and took them away, Mari wondered if it was too late for that.
After the memories had fully returned, she sat up and tried to calculate how long it’d been since she was detained. She felt like she’d slept for years, but it could only have been a day at most, she guessed. She’d been in and out of sleep and her stomach grumbled with hunger. The soldiers must have dosed her with something. But with what? She tried to recall if any of her books had ever mentioned a drug that could knock someone out for hours. When nothing turned up, she tried to think if she’d ever read of someone having golden blood, thinking of any defense she can give to spare her and Tristan’s life- with no more success.
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Was this it, was she going to die down here?
Had they really defeated a vampire only to be brought down by the ignorance of man?
The memory made Mari cringe as it resurfaced. She’d been useless, able to do nothing but stare up at the vampire in fear as it taunted her. If Tristan hadn’t grabbed and lit that plank on fire, they would’ve been dead.
And it would have been her fault.
If only she tried harder to stop Tristan from sneaking out, if only they didn’t stop to look at that campfire after talking to the vampire. Maybe they would have made it home.
The sound of footsteps and metal jingling brought her out of her thoughts. She looked up to see three soldiers arrive at her cell, the one in the middle being the same man that brought them in.
He pointed his gun at her.
A bead of sweat fell down Mari’s face.
“I’m warning you now: if you don’t behave, I’ll have to do this the hard way.”
She nodded meekly.
He gestured for another soldier to unlock the door, him doing so with a key that dangled from a silver hoop- one among many. “Are you ready to talk, then?”
“How long has it been?” Mari asked, trying to keep her voice soft and docile.
“Twenty-one hours, and we’re the ones asking questions here,” the last solder chimed in, a newer recruit by the look of his badge and youth.
The middle soldier held up his palm and the young one hung his head down in respect. “Do you need anything? Food, water?”
Every sense in Mari’s body screamed yes, but she shook her head. He was only being kind so she’d let down her guard.
“You’re right,” he said, seeing the look in her eye. “I’m here to get information out of you, no matter what manner of methods I deem appropriate to do so.”
“It’s illegal to hold me for more than twelve hours without some sort of trial.”
The soldier, a commander she realized now that she had a closer look at his badge, smiled. “You know your rights, good. Then you should know what other kinds of things are illegal.”
The cell turned silent, save for the endless droplets of water and shuffling of feet.
The young soldier suddenly turned on his heel and left. Mari felt her heart drop in her chest as her mind raced with all sorts of possibilities. The commander had to be bluffing, there’s no way an officer would break the law.
He continued, “Who are you? What is your relation to the boy?”
“He’s my brother,” Mari answered, trying to keep her voice from breaking. She wouldn’t cry, wouldn’t let herself drown in tears at a time like this. “We live here in Frostwood, atop a hill near the square.”
“Your brother told us the same thing. We searched the house- it was nearly empty.”
Her eyes widened. “Our mother… she left for Graymire, she should be home by now.”
The young soldier returned with something behind his back.
Drip Drip.
Pitter- Patter.
Dread overtook Mari before he revealed it to be nothing but a worn, dusty chair. He placed it on the ground and Mari released a breath as the commander took a seat, his gun still casually aimed towards her.
“That’s interesting, your brother said the exact same thing- after we told him your mother wasn’t there.”
Let him interrogate her about whatever he wanted, her mom, her brother, their blood…she expected it all.
The commander hummed. “Are you a human?”
Except that.
“What? Of course I’m a human.”
“That’s also the exact same thing your brother said.”
“That’s because it’s true.”
“True, is it? But isn’t truth such a fickle thing?”
Mari stared at him, not sure if she was being tested.
The commander leaned back, “So many things we regard as true. Our officers did find lots of books in that house. I take it they’re yours- how many of them do you think hold the complete truth?”
“Probably very little,” she admitted, wondering if the commander was trying to assess her intelligence.
“Wrong,” he said. “Everything in those books is true because the truth is what the writers deem it to be.”
“I don’t need an agent of the kingdom to tell me that the kingdom lies,” Mari spat, regretting the words as they left her lips .
But the commander’s grin only grew wider. “Of course not. What you need is to decide what story you want to tell me- because here, in this cell, you are not a subject to the law of the land. In this cell, I am the law of the land. You are a girl who nobody will go looking for if she happens to disappear.” He leaned in. “You want to speak of truth? Fear is the absence of truth. As long as I can control fear, I can control the truth. And I am the one who decides how true your story will be, just as I decide how true your rights are.”
“Now,” he continued. “The good news here is that you have a choice, a choice I am giving you out of the kindness of my heart. What will it be- fear or truth?”
She didn’t answer. How could she? She barely even understood the question.
Drip Drip.
Pitter-Patter.
“Let’s try again, shall we? Are you a human?”
Mari thought for a moment and decided it’d be more foolish to lie, even though it seemed like the question was rigged against her. “Yes.”
The commander sighed and stood upright.
The younger soldier vanished once more, only this time taking the remaining officer with him, to return seconds later with something behind his back again. This time, it was no chair.
It was a blade.
He traded it for the commander’s gun, which he held at her now instead. The commander slowly approached her and Mari immediately rose, trapped against the wall of her cell.
“Is that your final answer?”
Her mind raced with any idea for what to do. Should she change her answer? Was this another test?
“Yes,” she breathed with a prayer.
The commander grabbed her arm before she could slink away. She instinctively lifted her other arm to claw at him with her nails, but the soldier still standing at the foot of the cell cocked his gun.
“Another movement and the next time you’ll see your brother will be as a severed head,” he murmured against her forehead, so close that she felt the heat of his breath.
All she could do was nod, fighting back the tears that threatened to spill out. She retracted her arm but had managed to leave a small scrape against his jaw.
Drip Drip.
Pitter-Patter.
With his other hand, the commander raised the blade still in his grip and skimmed the length of her forearm, piercing the surface. It wasn’t extremely painful, but Mari still bit back her lip as the wound began to ache.
He removed his blade from her skin and dangled it in her face.
“Look at this and tell me again that you’re human.”
She stared at the blade- her blood dripping from it’s tip and pooling at her shoes.
Golden blood.
She was silent.
So she did have it too.
The commander released his hold on Mari as her mind again raced for an explanation. She’d never read about anyone having golden blood, and her mother had certainly never mentioned it.
Her mother.
She knew. All this time, she knew and didn’t say a thing, filling their heads with stupid rules- never get sick, never go outside, never let anyone see them.
She wondered if their mother also had golden blood. It had to be genetic, both she and Tristan possessed it.
They’ll confront her when she returns, Mari decided. And she’d have to tell them, she’d have to finally reveal the truth.
“So that’s it, then? Do you intend to kill me now or keep torturing me for information you already know?”
He paused.
Drip Drip
Pitter-Patter
The sounds were going to drive her insane now that her own blood added to them.
It was only when the remaining soldier returned that she remembered he was gone, and he made no effort to hide what he’d brought: a large bucker of water and some cloth.
“You don’t know the meaning of torture.” The commander reached into his pocket and dropped a tiny block of cheese onto the ground. “But you will soon.”
A horde of rodents appeared seemingly out of nowhere and attacked the cheese all at once, clawing at each other’s throats for the singular piece.
“The rats here are just as hungry as you are,” he said as the two soldiers rushed into her cell and placed the bucket of water on the ground, grabbing her and forcing the cloth over her face as she tried to break free of their grasp.
The last thing she saw before it covered her eyes completely was the commander turning to leave. “Let it be fear.”