Your name is Ashley

[It's still too early to see anything, everything is dark, at least for you, your head hurts... you probably have a concussion].

“Ah, look who's deigned to get up. Cesare, look! She's got blue eyes!”

“My head…”

“No, not your head, your eyes - Blue! I won the bet. Cesare!”

“This place... It's huge. I don't remember... anything. Where am I?”

“In the castle!Welcome to the castle! Cesare is... Oh, Cesare. No need for that.”

“Are you pointing a knife at me? It's just a precaution.”

“You heard Cesare, didn't you? It's just a precaution. My name's Carmen.”

“Carmen... Cesare... Am I in danger?”

“No. It's just that Cesare has a habit of pointing sharp objects at people. Cesare, come on!”

“We don't know anything about her.”

“I don't know anything about myself either.”

“How convenient.”

“This doesn't look like a... safe environment. A castle, you mean? The doors seem to... move. By themselves. Where am I? Why can't I see anything?”

“Oh! That's because you're blindfolded right now!”

“Did you... why did you... -Why did you...?”

“Carmen, get out of the way. I'm going to see if she’s infected.”

“I'm not infected…”

[It's too soon to know, or for them to know, but you are.]

He pulls you without any regard and that's what lets you know that the one who had such a firm grip on you all this time is Cesare. You can already look, without the blindfolds, at a stern tanned face with a dark gaze, curly blond hair, two colors, one lighter and one more golden, and a simple, long-sleeved white shirt. His brow is furrowed, and, behind him, there is an exact copy of himself: a tanned boy, blond hair, dark eyes... yet outlandish, discordant and even tasteless clothes, garish and out-of-tune colors. Cesare, who is the more serious of the two, folds his arms, and steps back. He still has the knife with him, but this no longer surprises you. 

You immediately turn to Carmen, you know that only he can be your ally in this situation. “Where are we?”

“Poor thing”, laughs Carmen. “She has amnesia or she's stupid. We are in the castle. I've told you before…”

“I know where, dammit. But I don't know what that means... how much I have to worry.” 

The door behind you emits a faint creak, barely audible. Cesare turns his head in that direction, his body tensing like a spring. 

“He's listening,” Carmen mutters, as if it's the most normal thing in the world. The air feels colder now.

“Who's listening?”

“The Castle... Don't act surprised. It’s been trying to find us for a long time.”

You swallow hard. “You? But who are you?”

Cesare stares at you. Carmen, on the other hand, makes a mocking gesture. 

“Don't exaggerate, brother, it doesn't even bleed.”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Cesare doesn't answer. He just squeezes the knife tighter.

“How do we know it's not infected either? By him?”

“By whom?”, you demand. Cesare makes a strangled noise, some of his blond locks fall under his eyes. 

“By our sovereign! By our god... by the father of the castle. Prince.”

“Who is Prince?”

“He's the heart of the castle,” Carmen answers cheerfully, but there's something strained in his voice. “Or his brain. Or maybe both. He's the one who keeps it alive... one supposes. I'll tell you something: Prince actually…”

“Stop it,” I say, in your voice. Then, you seem to pause for a moment, and you turn pale. You throw up on the cobblestones. I've tried to keep my intervention subtle, but Cesare seems to be growing alarmed. You try to stand up, trembling. “Where am I?”, I say it again, with your vocal cords. “Where in the castle?”

Cesare stays silent. And you start to worry.

[You're infected, Ashley, you're infected by me. This is my voice you hear. I'm inside. I'm with you and you can't tell them. You can't reveal any of this, understand? Or I'll have to kill you too.]

You shudder, you tremble, but you keep quiet. Good girl.

Carmen leans in, his smile too perfect.

“Cesare's a jerk, but he's got a good eye for trouble. And you, darling, seem to be a big one.” Then, very quietly, he adds, “But I'll take care of the big problems, understand? Don't worry. Cesare's wary of everyone… ever since the infection.”

“What… is this infection?” you ask, shuddering again, your voice coming out very soft.

[Be careful, Ashley. You don't want them to suspect.]

Cesare remains silent, knife ready.

“The Castle is not as it was before,” he says, with a measured, cautious voice. “He is chasing us, and… any victim for him is nothing more than a puppet that no longer works. His infections… they serve to put himself in other people's shoes. To have more eyes. To be able to find us,” he stands up then, slowly advancing towards you. “You are in the Castle. We will try to take you to a nearby village.”

“What about the doors?”

Carmen laughs heartily.

“That's what we are trying to find out. Don't worry, really, it has always been like this, the doors… well. Prince controls everything. Including the opening and closing of doors… the location of the rooms… the transformations of the interior of the wings of the castle.”

“Who is Prince? What does he do?”

“Too many questions,” Cesare stops beside you. His knife is raised. He tries to look into your eyes, tries to find me, but I know that, like this, he won't. “Better keep quiet. We'll put the blindfold back on you…”

“Wait a second,” you try to stop him. “There are… there are cities, inside the castle? You told me you were going to take me to a village…”

Carmen's eyes light up:

“Oh, yes! There are cities. Something like that. They appear in strange places: for example, you wander down a corridor and boom! a market square. Or an entire town squeezed into a ballroom. It's crazy.”

“Wait, what? How does that work?”

“Nobody really knows. The castle does its thing, you know? It's like… alive or something. Doors move, walls shift, sometimes you wake up where you hadn't fallen asleep…”

“Towns are temporary,” Cesare then cuts off his brother. “They exist because people create them, but they don't last. The Castle doesn't allow permanence.”

“So... what happens to people when a town disappears?”

Carmen lets out a laugh that gives you goosebumps.

“Oh, uh, they move, I guess? They find another place, start over... Or maybe the castle swallows them whole! Just kidding. Sort of.”

Cesare gives Carmen a tired look. “They adapt. Or they don't.”

“This place is terrifying,” you mutter, and try to run your hand over your face, you're exhausted.

Carmen jumps up with a little jump of childish enthusiasm, even though the brothers look like they're in their mid-twenties.

“Yeah, but it's cool, right? It keeps you on your toes.”

Cesare, on the other hand, looks you in the eyes with complete seriousness:

“I'm going to have to tie you up and cover your eyes. We'll leave you stranded in the first town we find. We can't afford for you to travel with us knowing where we're going, in case you're infected.”

“In that case…” your voice shakes. Cesare looks you in the eyes. And I sigh, and make you stand up. “In that case this body is of no use to me anymore.”

The movement is more immediate than the expression of terror that crosses Cesare's face. Carmen shouts something, but Cesare is too focused on trying to slit my neck. I turn on my heels, spin around, and grab his knife. With one jerk, the knife is already mine, but even though they think I'm going to cut their jugular, I don't do any of that. I know I'm running out of energy; infecting and possessing bodies is tiring. It's not the kind of power I usually have. It's too violent, too forced... too cruel. And my body isn't used to my mind doing cruel things. Just because of that, I know I won't be able to kill them in time. I don't want to either. Not yet.

I bring the knife to my neck. A horizontal cut, too perfect, like all my movements: measured and contained, just the right amount. The fountain of blood explodes over them, a jet that soaks them. Ashley's body falls to the ground.

Your lives in my hands are lasting less and less.

----------------------------------------