Paronix rubbed the carved handle of her dagger with her thumb, making sure to keep her grip tight. Her other hand was on a door, keeping it open a crack. Keeping one of her ears close to the door and holding her breath, she listened to the movement and voices on the other side.
Two voices, a low whisper and a scratchier one conversed.
The low voice commanded, "Quickly, make sure the gag is tight."
"Yes, yes, it is." The other one snapped.
That was when a third voice, muffled through what Paronix gathered to be a gag, murmured something. The tonality, pitch, and emotion in the voice remained intact. A girl's voice, higher than normal. It was Princess Illithya of Petrichor, and she was afraid.
"Shut up!" The scratchy voice growled quietly.
Paronix took this as her sign to enter. She opened the door as slowly as she could, running her dagger-less hand along the carved indentations as if inspecting the door. Keeping as flat to it as she could and holding her dagger out, she watched the reflective blade carefully until it was oriented in such a way she could see where each person in the room was.
Illithya was next to the window, her arms tied behind her and the scratchy voiced man looming over her. The other man leaned against the wall near the closet, his arms crossed as he glared at Illithya. He muttered something about the higher-ups, but Paronix was too focused on planning her movements to pay attention. The men were wearing wooden demon masks, so there was hope of remaining out of their peripheral vision. Her shoulder held the door in place as she reached to grab another dagger. She gave herself a countdown and adjusted her grip on the first dagger.a
Three, two, one.
She flung the dagger towards the man near Illithya, who screamed out in pain as the knife hit his lower leg. Paronix slid around the door in a rush, but the other man was similarly quick. He grabbed her attacking arm as she came closer, knocking the knife away. He was inches away from grabbing it before Paronix kicked it under the bed.
"Beraud, flee with Illithya!" The man yelled as he still gripped Paronix's wrist tightly. He pushed her back, but she managed to kick his shin hard enough to make him collapse. He let go, giving Paronix an opening to tear his mask off and hold him by the throat. Choking him backfired when she saw the familiar face of a Captain she had known in the Petrichoran military.
Captain Faingard had been a Sergeant of a different troop, so Paronix had heard about the man but never worked under him. She had recently heard he had moved up a few ranks and taken charge of a few Castle Guard troops. Now, she was seeing him in an attempt to capture Princess Illithya and was caught off her guard.
Before Faingard could slit her throat or Beraud could flee with the Princess, the door was pushed open with a bang, and a Palace Patrol soldier stood at the ready.
They saw Paronix wrestling with their trusted Captain, holding a demon mask that matched with the man holding Princess Illithya tightly. It was only fair that the soldier's perspective of the situation was skewed.
"Wait-" Paronix gave up on her phrase when the soldier bolted. She could either attempt the traitors from kidnapping Illithya, or she could risk chasing the soldier and explaining the situation. Her options were made even slimmer when she turned to Faingard and he jammed his own dagger into her abdomen. He shoved her out of the way as Beraud rushed towards the door dragging Illithya along, and he followed quickly behind.
Paronix felt hot blood beginning to soak her shirt, and slight dizziness set in. Even for someone trained to withstand adrenaline, she felt her heart rate increase. Despite the setback she pushed herself up and was faced with more choices.
She could run after the guard and run the risk of passing out and being arrested, or the guards not believing her. Or she could flee, convince the castle guard she is guilty, but make it out alive. She was sure she could at least make it outside the palace before the bells began to ring, but convincing a squadron of soldier that their captain is a traitor? At least if she fled, she could go after Illithya.
She buried her face in her hands for a moment and gave a frustrated growl. Then she looked both ways across the hall and began to run towards the stairs. It was easier at that point to flee than to bother trying to explain everything.
As she made it out of the castle through a side door, she stumbled over a couple of the steps. Despite being disoriented, she knew there was about three minutes until the bells began to ring and she wouldn't be able to make it off the castle grounds.
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At the gate she saluted the soldiers, who waved her by without worry as usual. When she reached roughly the ten-foot mark, the alarm bells tolled overhead.
"Ilo, wait a moment!" The guard called out.
Paronix stopped in her tracks, then turned slowly, putting her hand over her wound. She stared at the guard who called for her, and when he glanced down at her hand she did as well. Each finger was drenched in blood. She looked back up at the guard, who appeared fearful.
"Listen, Ilo- whatever happened can be-"
Paronix shook her head and backed away, slowly turning, and running. "It wasn't me, but they'll never believe that!" With any luck, the guard would believe her. Although, with any luck, she wouldn't be here in the first place.
She made it into the woods, making sure to keep her eyes peeled for anything that could risk her safety. However, as she went further, she felt each root getting harder to step over, and her feet beginning to ache more. Her whole body hurt. She could barely stand much less run, mostly because things were spinning around her. Her toe caught the edge of a pine tree's root and she fell, barely catching herself with her hands. A little bit of momentum kept her from tripping completely, and she ran a few more feet before losing stability again. She fell onto her hands and knees in agony. Lack of oxygen made breathing difficult. When she tried to catch her breath, she could only inhale between coughs, and the urge to vomit tagged along after each exhale. Consciousness was fleeting, and each throbbing pain in her head brought fading vision.
As she was beginning to let her arms and legs give way, a crackle of branches in the woods warned her of danger. There was nothing she could do. A glimpse of an armored figure on horseback was the last, blurry sight she saw before she could not keep her eyes open any longer.
~
Although waking up in a strange house paired with blood loss makes for a disorienting morning, the fact that Paronix was waking at all came as news to her. As she became aware of the heavy quilt over her, she also remembered the excruciating pain in her side. Fortunately, it was not nearly as bad as it had been before. What worried her more was the cheery sunlight illuminating the room and casting in rays onto the bits of dust that floated in the air. She sat up, pressing her hand to the wound. Another surprise was that her torso had been wrapped and tended to, which explained why the injury didn't hurt as much.
The room she was in seemed old, and as she pressed her feet to the ground the hardwood floors creaked alarmingly under the aged rug. Furniture, decorations, and boxes cluttered the room in an organized chaos. Each item in the room from the Cuckoo clock on the wall to the gaudy armchair in the corner was dusty and aged, but quaint nonetheless. Paronix was reminded of a woman in her town long ago with whom she had taken reading lessons with. The informality of a time of learning over tea and biscuits was a piece of pleasure despite the times, and being in a similar room brought Paronix peace for a moment.
That was until she was reminded that the quaint room she was in did not happen to belong to her or anyone else she knew. Even after inspecting it and its intricacies, Paronix did not trust anything at the moment until she knew who was behind it. She glanced at the window wondering if she could open it quietly to flee to somewhere that guaranteed safety.
As she pondered the escape route, the muted sounds of a conversation started up in another room. Paronix pressed her ear up to the door for a moment and caught the tail end of a sentence.
"--should go see how she is resting." An elderly woman's voice said cheerily.
Paronix backed away from the door, her hands reaching instinctively for her sword and being rewarded with a grasp of nothing. Her clothes had been changed too, she realized. In the act of searching for a weapon, she knocked a basket of yarn off a tea table, but managed to grab a knitting needle as it fell.
The door creaked open, and rather than being faced by a terrifying enemy, an old woman wearing a floral apron stood at the door, smiling. Her wrinkled hands shakily held a bowl of soup, the steam filling the room with a pleasing aroma.
Paronix held the poor replacement for a sword defensively, her eyes wide as she glanced the old woman up and down.
"Oh dear, you're awake!" The woman said calmly. "Poor thing, you do seem terrified. Here, I'll set your soup down here for you."
Surprised by how unbothered the woman was, Paronix set the needle down slowly, with her eyes still locked on the woman.
"My name is Gwyneth, my friend Abaddon found you in the forest with a nasty wound and he brought you here. He's so kind, that fella." Part of her sentences were little mutterings that tailed onto when she spoke to Paronix. "What is your name, now that I've given you soup?"
Paronix did not answer, but continued staring.
"Goodness, you're like a pup'. I don't know what happened to you but if I'm going to use my soup and other talents on you I at least want to know your name." She giggled to herself.
"I'm Paronix Ilo." Her throat was dry which made her voice break.
Gwyneth came over to Paronix and grabbed her by the shoulders, sitting her down at the bed and forcing the soup into her hands. "What a delight, Paronix. Now eat up."
Paronix Gratefully yet hesitantly took the soup and began to eat. It seemed like years ago that she had eaten. Although the room and presumably the rest of the house was dusty and deteriorating, the soup was far from. With absolutely no clue what was in it, she still devoured it. Never had she eaten a soup that delicious before, even having eaten her mother's soup. She hardly realized that Gwyneth had disappeared from the room.
She finished her soup and wandered to the other room, expecting to see Gwyneth doing a friendly little old woman activity. Instead, her heart and soul gave out from under her at the sight of the Petrichoran insignia engraved onto the armor of a large, brooding man.