Ah… another one…

Looking down, right in front of my feet, laid a man, bound in iron chains with a brown rag to cover his body. Drops of blood could be seen around his face, along with some bruises and a broken nose. He seems to be unconscious.

At least he is doing better than the women.

Looking around this cell, I could see the women, cowering in the corner, in similar fashion to the bound man, only worse… far worse. The light in their eyes died long ago. You can see miniscule puddles of blood underneath and near them, as small drops fall from their genitals. Most likely ripped from the continuous and rough abuse of the soldiers. The stench emanated by us is foul, I guess that’s what happens from not bathing for years, as well as living in your own filth.

I am not much better, the bruises are healing though, unlike his black hair, mine was dark brown, I had a very slim figure, as expected of a slave. My eyes were dark brown as well, only way I was different was due to a scar starting at the right side of my forehead and ending just above the right eye, and a small, rough, beard.

…the guards are coming back…

The three open the cell, chatting amongst themselves, they were smiling, seems like it is their turn with the slaves. They pick up the nearest woman, she barely resists, but that doesn’t stop the guards from dragging her by the hair. I hope she doesn’t end up pregnant, the child would most likely be killed, as has happened before.

It is time to sleep, the guards blow the torches, darkness falls in this prison. I hear the people around me shuffle to their corners to sleep. We do not talk here, it would be unwise to make bonds of friendship or love, when they may be dead the next day. I prepare myself as well, as I was falling asleep…

Suddenly a loud explosion stirs us all awake.

What’s going on?

I hear the hurried steps of metal greaves against the wooden floor above us, followed by screams. Not screams of pain, but of fear. The screams get louder, then suddenly silence. We were all shaking, fearing what was to come, I am no exception, the fear of death is all too real. From between the cracks of the wooden floor above us, something is dropping, it is too dark to see. Suddenly a drop falls on top of me, it is sticky and hot, blood it seems.

The sight made me quiver, I don’t want to die, not yet. The door to the prison opens, across the stairs a figure appears, the contrast between the darkness of this place and the light from outside made it hard to distinguish much aside from body structure. It was tall, as it walked, the clinging of metal could be heard, it seemed to be armoured. I fell on the floor, I was not the only one, no one wanted to die.

“Please, don’t kill us, we beg you!” screamed a man right beside me, tears rolling down his face.

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He is brave, I can barely breath, much less talk or cry. The fear that this person, who killed the 300 guards around the manor in a single minute, was emanating was soul crushing.

It stopped, right before us. In the blink of an eye, it disappeared. The cell’s door opened, as though it was never locked. We looked amongst ourselves, fear still prevalent in our eyes. I was the first to recover, to my surprise, as I stepped out of the cell. Making my way across the corridor and up the stairs. The others had formed a line behind me.

I was afraid of what awaited me beyond this wooden door, the smell of death, all too familiar to me, was coming from the other side. With shaky hands, I turned the door knob, and slowly opened the door, the fear getting worse by each centimetre. In a final act of courage, I swung the door open, my eyes wide at the scene before me. I turned to the side, not able to contain my food inside.

The expensive wooden floor of the manor was covered in a sea of blood. The floor was littered with bodies of soldiers, or so we thought, the only recognizable thing was their armour, the rest of the body was burned, leaving them in an eternal expression of agony. The bodies of soldiers were hanging from the banner covered walls of the hall, impaled in each pole, with their guts strewn from their stomach. On the stairs to the right of us, an enormous pile of flesh, bones and organs was towering over the hallway. Above that, a body of a man stuck to the wall, skinned, leaving only muscles behind, as small drops of blood fell from his feet. It was the lord of the manor, as shown by the clothes on the floor underneath the man.

In the middle of all this sat a woman, it was the slave the soldiers brought out, she was alive. She sat while rocking her curled up body back and forth. Fear being too weak to describe what she felt. As we approached her, she suddenly looked up.

” AAAAAHHHHHH” she screamed, her voice was hoarse and filled with panic.

“It’s okay, don’t worry…” One of the other women approached her and hugged the panicking girl, whispering that everything is fine.

With uneasy eyes, I looked around and found no sign of the thing that did this. What I did notice was the front door. It was open, I could see the outside, the trees in the distance and the cool night air. Without even thinking I moved towards it. As I stepped outside for the first time in years, a sense of freedom washed over me. Freedom? What was that? My entire life, from the day I was born, was dictated by someone else. I looked up at the starry night sky.

“haha… hahahaha… HAHAHAHAHA!”

I AM FREE!

Without even looking behind me to check on the others, I ran, ran out of the gate, and into the dark forest ahead of me. I am a free man.