Wishes

He was not a big man, but he was still bigger than her. His arms were thin and wiry. His little moustache bristled like a ferret. There was a sheen of sweat on his forehead and his hands where he gripped her were hot and clammy. She strained against him, but the cords on her wrists and legs were thin and they cut into her skin.

"I want my wishes, girl," he hissed. "It's not too much to ask for, a few wishes, is it? Young girl like you's got wishes to spare."

He kept glancing from side to side. He looked nervous. She expected an arrow any second, but none came.

The pantry door was ajar. There was blood splattered up the steps. He shoved it open and threw her inside. She smacked onto the polished flagstones and slid, under the table where she had eaten breakfast, where Gwynn had made bacon and listened to her secrets, where Seskie had huffed and pretended to be severe. The man grabbed her by the back of her dress and hoisted her onto the table.

"It's not my fault," he was saying. "I didn't want to do it. What choice do I have? What choice, when they all look at me like that? What choice?"

Under the sweat and bristly moustache, he looked confused, almost sad. She wriggled away from him across the table.

He grabbed her. His hand was hot on her leg. "I'll be gentle," he stammered. "It won't hurt you. Just don't fight, and it won't hurt at all. I never meant to hurt any of them."

"We have gold," she said. "I can show you where it is."

"Gold," he looked almost relieved. "How much gold?"

"Lots of gold, upstairs, in the tower. Untie me. I'll show you lots of gold. You can take it all."

"Gold.” His eyes were unfocused. His breathing was funny, as though he wasn’t really in the room with her, as though his mind were in another place.

“Gold would be alright instead," he said. He took a knife from his belt and cut the knot around her ankles, though he left her wrists bound, then he retied the rope around her wrist, making a leash.

"Show me where," he said.

Her mind raced. Mother had her jewellery, but would that satisfy him? There was the bracelet father had brought her. It was just a thin ribbon. Then there was the cut grey metal band that Mother kept on her dresser. Mother had said it was the most precious thing she owned, but it didn't look precious.

She just had to stall him, that was all. Lead him on a route through the house. Convince him to keep following her until Llan could get here. Maybe she could get away across the lawn, back into the woods. Maybe she could send a signal. It was a puzzle. She could solve it if she could only think hard enough.

The servant's stairs were behind the kitchen, narrow, steep and twisting. "This way," she said. He kept jerking her with the cord, but she didn't stumble. He was strong, but she was clever.

"I never meant to hurt them," he stammered. He was really sweating now. "I only wanted to touch them, but they never let me, they always looked at me that way, like I was dirty. It wasn't my fault. What's a man supposed to do?"

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He wasn't even looking at her now. His face was twitching like a hunk of fresh meat rubbed in salt, like the eyes in his mind were looking at something else.

This was the man who had killed Seskie. Tossed a knife into her back like it was sport. She wanted to bite him, but she led him onward. She passed her room, with the bottles and jars, her silk squares folded in her drawer. Something told her to hurry by quickly. It was not safe to be in that room with him with all her personal things around her.

There was Llan's room with the big windows and the grand outlook, and there was Mother's room, small and unassuming. The door was slightly ajar. She pulled it open.

"In there."

"Where?"

"In the dresser."

"You go first."

"I can't. I'm not allowed to go in first. It's... it’s an Aden thing."

He looked at her suspiciously, then he shrugged and went inside. She watched him open the dresser, lift out mother's necklace and earrings.

"Is this it?"

"No, there's more. It's hidden."

"Where?"

"There's a loose board, next to the door."

He knelt. There was a board there, but it was not loose.

"How do I open it?"

"There's a catch, in the door hinge."

She waited, waited, he slipped his fingers into the hinge, began prodding and probing. She put all her force against the door and slammed it in his face.

The scream was inhuman, rising up through the octaves, higher and higher, then wrapping right around into a series of deep guttural bellows. She yanked on the cord and it came free. He wasn't holding anything with those fingers, not for a while at least. She dragged a chair over and propped it under the handle.

"I'll kill you," came the cry from inside the room. "I'll fucking kill you you bitch. I woulda been gentle, maybe let you go afterwards. Now I'll show you. I’ll show you!"

The door began rattling, and the chair began to shake. Where to go? Hide or escape? There were more men outside, but Llan was there too. If she went outside, someone might grab her. If she could get up high, she could send a signal. She could bar the door, call to Llan, and wait. He would come get her once the men were all dead.

She pattered up the next flight of stairs, fast feet, up and up, around the spiral, into the tower room, Mother's tower, where she liked to watch the shifting hills. Mother’s book rested face down next to her chair. The door was stout and there was a latch on the inside. She slammed it shut and clicked the latch down. For good measure, she dragged a dresser in front of it. The little bottles and jars on the dresser clinked together.

She heard heavy footsteps on the stairs, and a banging that made the floorboards shake. "Open this fucking door," he screamed at her. "Open this door, I'm going to fucking cut you."

Why would promising to cut her make her open the door? It didn't make any sense. Still, she was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to get in without help. She swung the window wide and leaned out. The air was chill.

Way down there, she could see a group of Grandfather's men skulking through the woods, making their way towards the exit.

She could see Llan and Taliette standing together on top of the tower. She was leaning up against him, whispering in his ear. He was stooping with a dopey look on his face. There was a big dead guy slumped in the corner.

The cold air rushed around her legs, and it was like the cold air on a distant hilltop in the woods.

And then she was trembling. Her head was pounding and her heart was fluttering in her chest. The man was still banging at the door. She gripped the windowsill, all the clarity washed out of her brain, and she was no longer clever, she was small and alone and locked in a tower, and a man was trying to kill her.

"Llan!" she tried to say, but her voice was so tiny, and each bang at the door knocked all the words out of her skull. The chill wind swirled around her ankles. She could almost smell bacon.

She was no longer clever. She was just a foolish little princess who thought she was clever, and she was locked in a tower, and the Prince didn’t even know she was there.

"Llan, I'm up here. Please come get me Llan.”

But he was still talking with Taliette on top of the tower, and she was making the big eyes at him, and he was holding her hand, and the blonde guy was still bleeding, and nobody ever even looked up, and why was her voice so tiny.

The door was rattling.

“Llan, you promised.”

And she almost thought he would look up, would see her waving to him, her big brother, and he would come running with his sword and kill the man and carry her down, out of the tower and sit her on the bench and smooth her hair.

But then the world exploded.

And a monster came into the garden.