So, would I stand back and watch? That was not me. I was a fighter. I could not observe them rip these innocent girls to pieces, but they would kill me if I stood against them.
I crossed through the pasture, where I had met them when they came through the tree line, and passed the barn, heading toward the rear of the house. I leapt onto my branch to witness the horrific butchery of the family through their tiny windows. The mother let out a scream downstairs, while the father tried to fight the assassins. It was of no use. Abigail and Cassandra heard their mother’s cries from upstairs. They were not harmed . . . yet. Oliver and the rest of the coven were too busy feasting on their innocent prey to remember that the girls were upstairs.
The windows were open and a delicate breeze carried the scent of fresh blood to my nostrils. I inhaled the sweet fragrance, closing my eyes. Control yourself. But I could not. This scent, this addiction, was too sweet this time. Maybe it had been too long since I tasted human blood, or maybe their blood was different. I was not sure which.
When I opened my eyes, Oliver and the coven were trudging up the stairs. Abigail and Cassandra hid under their bed, holding each other and shaking violently. I heard their muffled sobs and something rushed over me. Fear. I licked my lips.
Oliver said something to the others as they entered the room. They laughed. Within a fraction of a second I was through the window and standing beside their bed.
“Ah, Valiant. You decided to watch, after all?” Oliver asked. “I was just telling everyone to take what they wanted. My hunger is satisfied.” He smiled and rubbed his belly.
“I think not,” I said. “They are mine.”
Through Her Eyes
A gentle breeze blew through the iron bars. I won’t be caged anymore, Elizabeth thought. She had been imprisoned a few weeks prior for the murder of two young girls. The murders had caused uproar in the tiny village of Lands. In those few weeks, Elizabeth learned two things: she was sentenced to death by hanging, and she would escape the concrete walls beforehand. It was simple, really. She ardently watched when the prison guards entered, when they left, and when they slacked enough on their job that she could make a run for it.
Her legs itched from the damp, hay-covered floor. She wanted so badly to be out of the irritating sack they had her in. All her clothes and possessions were stripped from her the night of the murders. She was surprised that anyone caught her. If it weren’t for that stupid farm boy, Richard, she cursed. I’ll get him when I get out of here, like I’ll get the others.
She had patiently waited and observed for more than two weeks before deciding she must attempt escape. The bright sun disappeared behind the horizon, and the moon took over the sky. One of the guards stopped by her holding cell.
“How are the amenities?” he asked, smirking.
Elizabeth looked away from the window to glare at him. She ran full force towards the iron bars, but the guard didn’t flinch. I won’t have to worry about them much longer, she thought. He laughed at her silence and pitiful attempt to harm him, moving on to check the other prison cells.
As he walked away, Elizabeth smiled. She had his set of keys.
Once he was out of sight, she jammed the key into the lock and freed herself. The corridor was empty. Torches lit her way. She back-tracked the direction she was brought in. The hallways all looked the same, though. Voices echoed off the mortared walls as she slid between a doorway, hiding, until the guards passed. One false move and her extensive planning would be lost, and she would most likely be confined to an even worse imprisonment.
Elizabeth tiptoed through more passageways before finally seeing the exit. Heavily guarded and with no other way out, she had to think of something quickly. This wasn’t part of her plan. Two guards stood watch over the doorway. Another two routinely paced the floor. A thought struck her: she had to be one of the guards to escape. Slinking back down the corridor from the way she came, Elizabeth waited patiently for another guard to pass by. It wasn’t long before her request was granted.
She broke his neck, swiftly and cleanly. No sound left his mouth.
Quickly, she undressed him and clad herself in the heavy armor, tucking her hair underneath the helmet. This will work, she thought. Nobody could stake her demise now. She quietly practiced dropping her voice an octave in case someone spoke to her. Hopefully there’d be no need for that.
Elizabeth camouflaged with the rest of the guards. Freedom is just beyond those wooden doors. She had done it. She pushed open the doors without as much as a glance from anyone.
“You there!” a man yelled.
Elizabeth prayed he wasn’t talking to her, but turned to survey who he was speaking to.
It was her.
She cleared her throat. “Yes?” she answered in a deep voice.
“Why aren’t you wearing your sheath correctly?”
Elizabeth glanced over herself head to toe. What was he talking about? She put on the armor exactly how the guard was wearing it.
The man huffed and walked over to situate her cover. “If any of the knights saw you like this . . . Well, let’s just say you’d never wear anything incorrectly again,” he whispered.
Elizabeth nodded, and in a gruff voice replied, “Thank you.”
This time, she wasn’t thwarted during her escape. The night air filled every opening in the armor, instantly cooling her body. She licked her lips eagerly. Flesh and blood—they were calling her name. Nothing close to the pig food they fed her inside those walls. She was a free woman out to feed on those who put her behind heavy iron in the first place. They would pay; that she was positive of.
She neared the village with each fresh footfall. The villagers viewed her as a slaughterer, but it was something else that brought her here, something oppressed within. She never knew her parents. They were killed when she was just a child. Never knowing what love felt like, she grew up with an iced heart. Now that heart consumed every part of her, making her obedient.
Through the clearing of trees was the village. Tonight, while they were comfortably asleep in their beds, she would have her revenge on the villagers.
Elizabeth watched as the residents went about their late-night duties, and waited in the shadows until everyone fell asleep. It would be easier to kill the ones she was after in their beds, while everyone else remained in dreamland. No one would hear their cries.
After losing the bulky armor, she slipped into each separate house. First, the baker, who threatened to burn her hand as a child if she ever took a loaf of bread from him again. Next, the ungrateful barmaid, who took her in when she was orphaned, and never let her forget her past. Lastly, she found Richard, the farm boy who reported her for killing those children, asleep in the loft area of his barn. Cornered, she thought.
Watching his chest rise and fall for several minutes, Elizabeth wondered if she could go through with killing one more person. The fabric she wore as a pitiful excuse for a garment was a reminder to the emotional pain Richard caused her. Anger and torment seethed in the pit of her stomach. She would wake him, so he would remember what pain felt like.
Lightly, she shook his arm. He woke, startled.
“Wha—what are you doing here? How’d you—”
Elizabeth leaned forward and placed a finger over his lips to silence him. “Ssshh. This won’t take long, but I wanted you to remember how you ruined my life, and how I’m going to ruin yours.”
“What?”
Richard didn’t know he spoke his last word. Elizabeth silenced him forever when she bit into his throat, detaching his esophagus from his body with her teeth. His gurgling was the closest he came to crying out for help.
Ready to feast on his flesh, Elizabeth was startled by the cries erupting outside the barn. She peeked through an opening in the slits of wood. Outside, the villagers protested, fully aware of where she was, and that she had escaped the prison. They came after her with weapons and torches, like she was some kind of monster. She ran to the other
side of the lofted area, looking for a way out. The villagers surrounded that side as well.
“Fools! All of you!” she yelled. She watched as they set fire to the structure. Her attempt at escape and revenge was futile. She took a seat, facing the barn door, as the fire blazed around her. Flames lashed out as they neared. The heat tortured her body. Her skin began to melt.
* * *
The next morning, two young men cleaned up the still-smoldering ashes.
“Why was she so crazy?” one of them asked.
“Nobody knows,” the other replied. “Supposedly, she went mad after her husband left.”
“Where’d he go?”
“Nobody knows that, either. He just walked out one day. But can you blame him? She was a lunatic.”
“No, I can’t say I do.” He paused and raked more rubble left from the barn before asking, “And the kids she murdered? Whose were they?”
The young man gathered the blackened soot at his feet as he responded, “They were hers.”
Buried Alive
I try to get out,
to listen,
to hear the world,
but silence sleeps on the other side.
My fingers claw at the wood,
chipping and breaking
with every stroke,
until they begin to bleed.
A few screams for help.
Silence again.
I push with all my strength,
that which is left.
The seal won’t budge.
I’m trapped for eternity.
I will die down here.
Ironic, it seems.
For my own death has been staged.
Unbeknownst to all,
this is a play,
and my curtain has fallen.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rebecca Rogers expressed her creative side at an early age and hasn’t stopped since. She won’t hesitate to tell you that she lives inside her imagination, and it’s better than reality.
To stay up to date with Rebecca’s latest books, check out her website at www.rebeccaarogers.com, sign up for her mailing list, or find her on social sites such as Goodreads, Facebook, and Twitter.
In the Shadows Page 3