‘People will hear about this you traitor!’ Griffiths harshly slapped him with the back of his hand which caused the ring on his finger to leave a cut against his cheek.
‘Silence him.’ Griffiths said to the torturer with a shaky voice. The man quickly grabbed Henrick by the face and forced out his tongue and began to slice the flesh. Henrick gave a muffled scream as blood poured into his mouth, Adonia screamed for them to stop but nothing came from her mouth.
‘Enough.’ Kinlan announced, the torturer released the Henrick and he immediately scrambled away clutching his face as blood continued to seep from his mouth. ‘You will do well to forget this day, or it won’t be just your tongue.’ Terrified, Henrick shuddered and looked at Adonia with tears pouring down his face.
‘I-I’m so sorry.’ he managed to whimper with his hands still over his blood-filled mouth.
‘Clean yourself off, and never reveal what happened here.’ Kinlan said as he threw a rag over to Henrick, he nervously took the rag and covered his mouth before shakily scurrying away knowing that his life was in danger.
Adonia franticly thrashed at her shackles and gave silent yells of anger.
‘It appears you have angered her sir.’
‘And to think they could almost have been married if it wasn’t for Greymire.’
‘Or if it wasn’t for that Lylirian whore that managed to buy her way into the Hardgrave name.’ She thrashed again at the pair even with her back to them, her eyes burned with rage and her heart filled with a fire that fuelled every inch of her body and soul.
‘The phoenix has some fire to it.’ Kinlan smiled as he looked into her hate filled eyes. ‘Extinguish it.’ the nobles prepared to leave the torturer to his work but quickly turned around. ‘Oh, I almost forgot.’ Kinlan said as he approached her and tore her wedding sash from her wrist. ‘You won’t be needing this anymore.’ She screamed as he threw the sash into the open fire, he gave a smile as he left her to the mercy of the torturer. As the men left the torturer to his duties of bloodshed, the lashing was just a warmup to test her flesh she how fragile she was to his tools of destruction. He remembered his instructions about the tattoo and took a small yet extremely sharp blade and pressed it against her skin. Slowly he began to slice around the tattoo, Adonia gave a loud yet muffled scream as her skin was cut and pulled away. The small section of skin was tossed to the floor which she stared at in horror and disbelief that this was once a part of her body. The pain lingered yet in some strange way seemed familiar.
The spirit, she thought. She remembered how she touched his icy flesh that she was transported to a scene where every sensation was that of pain and torture, Adonia began to see it now as she felt it, the skin being cut away how it burned at her flesh and the warm release of her blood.
He was flayed alive. Adonia’s mind screamed as her body pleaded for mercy, the torturer continued to cut at her flesh either with a knife or another lash from the whip.
Her body burned as her mind began to fill with a tingling sensation, the rag in her mouth made it harder to breathe, her body began to shake as she lost control, she was forced to lose consciousness. The torturer knew her body had enough, he released her from the shackles and locked her away into a damp, windowless cell. Her ears rang as she slowly rolled back and forth looking up at a black ceiling as her head vibrated. Adonia tried to gain some form of control as she took long, slow breaths trying to calm her shocked body. She managed to look around at the cells and saw the mangled bodies of starved men, some were already dead while others had lost their minds to the eternal torture and darkness. But as her mind slowly began to focus, she looked at their faces, some of these men were from the village, not all of them died, some were taken as prisoner for torture. Adonia forced herself to crawl toward the bars of the cell and look at those imprisoned with her. They barely knew she was even there, their minds lost, Adonia gripped the bars tightly as the fire began to burn again. She would not let the tyrant get away with this, she knew that one day his blood would dance against her sword, no matter how much torture he inflicted, she would never give in.
Days passed with endless torture and starvation, Adonia could feel her body getting weaker but she still strived to fight. She never even knew when it was day or night, the torture never stopped. Her back was tender from the lashes, fresh cuttings scaring over old ones, but today was time for a new torture. She was chained down to a rack and her legs were wedged in between blocks, Adonia gave some struggle but began to learn it was all pointless.
‘I will ask you again.’ the torturer said as he stood over her with a large hammer. ‘Will you marry his majesty?’ she stared back with burning eyes and barely moved; her answer was clear. ‘So be it.’ she gripped the chains that held her knowing the pain that was to follow, the hammer crashed down on her leg giving a painful crack like a piece of wood being snapped in half. She gave her pain filled muffled screams that were completely silent to all except her. The torture moved over to the other side of the rack. ‘I ask you once more, will you marry his majesty?’ she violently shook her head as tears of pain rolled down the side of her head. The hammer crashed down again, breaking her other leg, Adonia’s breathing was hard and fast even as the rag in her mouth began to suffocate her. ‘What about now?’ he asked as he pushed his hand down against her forehead, but again she shook her head with a violent force. Adonia could hear him sigh as he went to his wall of tools and examined them, she tried to lean up but only saw her bloodied, disfigured legs which made her weep but not give in. Something had to give, there had to be some way to escape this torture. The man turned around with yet another tool in his grasp, but Adonia could feel his perverted gaze on her, and she was powerless to do anything. ‘His majesty doesn’t need to know does he?’ he sniggered as he removed the sack from his head, she didn’t care about his details, all she could do was give muffled yells and shudders as he explored her body. It made her angry. He went to untie the bandage from her mouth but pressed a small knife against her cheek, threatening her if she dared to scream, Adonia tried to move her face away but didn’t have a choice as his tongue was forced into her mouth, she gagged but in this underlying anger she found her advantage, she bit down hard. The man screamed out as he immediately pulled away but Adonia didn’t let up, she bit down harder and harder on this hard muscle until the blood began to spirt out. Eventually his entire tongue was torn out of his mouth, he yelled out in a gargled scream as he fell over Adonia, scrambling at anything to stay upright as the blood continued to pour from his mouth until he eventually fell to the ground dead. She pulled at her shackles until she could feel some wriggle movement, she looked up at her blood-soaked wrists and began to pull and contort her hand, desperately trying to free herself. The blood provided some form of lubrication, it wasn’t much but it was some spark of freedom. It burned as it tore her skin, but she couldn’t stop, she had to fight the pain to fight for her freedom. With one final pull her hands were freed albeit damaged but free, she fell from the rack and gave another scream as her limp legs fell behind her. Even in such a weakened state she knew to be careful, Adonia pushed down a small table that was by the torture table’s side and a number of objects fell to the ground, there she picked up a small knife and held it in her teeth then began her painful crawl to her escape. She could hear the commotion upstairs, the frantic rustle of keys as the door was unlocked, she hid herself in darkness and watched as a soldier quickly came down stairs and examined the death, Adonia knew she could never outrun a soldier in this state, she had to kill him.
The soldier nervously stared at the body of the torturer, Adonia was nowhere to be seen. Silently she crawled toward the man, something inside her made her darker, possessed her. While his back was turned she forced herself up to her knees and like a crazed animal she stabbed down hard on the soldier’s vulnerable area behind his knees, the attack shocked him and took him by surprise but did exactly what Adonia wanted he fell to the floor making himself more vulnerable. She found his expos
ed throat and stabbed franticly. She gave a heavy pant as the blood ran down her body, she tore out the blade from the soldier and gripped the blade in her teeth once more as she crawled along the floor. She looked up at the stairs knowing this was the path to freedom but knew in her state that she would never escape. Adonia remembered what Fenrir had told her as much as she wanted to block him from her mind, that there was a secret exit in the dungeon in one of the cells. She crawled along the floor, occasionally she used the bars of the cell to help move her along, she examined every cell carefully as her eyes adjusted to the darkness until she saw one with a metal grate on the floor. Like Fenrir said the cell door was open, she pulled herself, forcing herself to the grate and with the remainder of her strength pulled at the grate which lifted. Tears welled in her eyes as she could taste the freedom, she reached forward into the black abyss but just as she could feel herself slipping away into the darkness of freedom, she was violently pulled back into the dungeons.
From then on Adonia was shackled in her cell, her arms constantly kept at eye level, her broken ankles kept in heavy chains against the wall and her mouth once again sealed away.
‘How did she even escape?!’ Griffiths yelled at a soldier.
‘I-I don’t know sir; two men were dead down here and she was just about to escape from the.-’
‘Silence!’ Griffiths stood by her cell and glared at her, she kept her head down, broken that her chance of freedom was stripped away from her. ‘I want her torture doubled.’
‘But…But sir, Kinlan doesn’t want her too badly damaged, I can’t risk the added torture without going against his majesty’s wishes.’
‘Don’t you have any torture methods that won’t physically damage her, but damage her mind instead?’
‘…There have been methods developed in Lyrine I’ve heard about, but such damage is near impossible to reverse.’
‘If what you say is true then she has managed to kill two men while having both of her legs broken, this woman this a monster, if it wasn’t for Kinlan I’d have her killed just like her family.’ Griffiths leant his head against the bars and stared at her with nothing but pure hatred in his eyes. ‘Mark my words Adonia Hardgrave, I will break you.’
Fenrir was overwhelmed with guilt as he helped with the daily running of the inn now that Arthur was dead. It was also the first time that Barmic actually seemed angry with him, as hard as Fenrir tried to explain himself it was never enough for anyone that knew her.
‘All of her stuff is still ‘ere.’ Barmic said as they entered her room, her sword stood perched up against the wall which Fenrir nervously approached.
‘…She never went anywhere without it.’
‘A still think ye a fuckin moron Fen, fuck if ye loved her that much why dae that tae her?’
‘Because she’d be killed if we were together why can’t you get that?!’
‘Well.’ he sighed as he prepared to clean the room. ‘Nothin’ we can dae aboot it noo, girl’s gone.’ Fenrir slowly walked toward the window and gave a sigh; it was all his fault that she was gone without a trace.
‘It’s better this way anyway…At least she’ll be safe.’
‘Aye n whit aboot ye?’ Barmic almost snapped as he threw the sheets from the bed which was enough to even startle Fenrir. ‘A could tell ye liked ‘er, the way ye looked at ‘er, smiled at ‘er, fuck A even saw ye blush a couple of times when she spoke tae ye. Ye deserve tae be happy too ye fuckin’ eejit.’
‘And what kind of life could I have? Married? Children? I can’t have that Barmic, especially not with Adonia.’
‘Ye won’t ever ken noo, ‘cause ye never even tried!’ Fenrir swallowed nervously, the comment struck a nerve, enough to even make him subtly bite on his bottom lip and look away ashamed. ‘Trust me A ken whit it’s like Fen.’ He sighed as he prepared to put on fresh sheets but couldn’t help but pause as he looked to Fenrir. ‘The pair of ye goin’ through a whirlwind of emotions, A ken ye dinnae go in tae her room fae a quick shag A ken that’s naw like ye. I ken how much ye liked ‘er, A really dae but ye’ve thrown away somethin’ ye only get once in ye life.’
‘Barmic…’ Fenrir sighed as he ran his hand through his hair, he looked as if he could be on the brink of tears.
‘What I did, I did to protect her, I would never, ever use her or anyone like that…Things got heated, out of hand. Divine I’m not going to lie it was amazing, but a normal woman would be killed for being with an elf but Adonia? Adonia fucking Hardgrave, a member of the royal family? Divine only knows what they’d do to her, her name…Everything.’ Barmic gave another laboured sigh, he knew he couldn’t disagree as much as he wanted to, out here yes they could have been safe, back in the outside world its hard to imagine what could have happened to the pair of them. Public execution as a best-case scenario, worse case, public humiliation, mutilation, then execution, but not after either completely shaming her name throughout history or removing her completely.
‘You!’ Jenny yelled as she stormed into the room straight to Fenrir.
‘I’ve met some scum in my life, but men like you are the fucking worst!’
‘Jenny it ain’t.-’
‘Quiet Barmic!’ In her anger her eyes welled up with tears. ‘She was my friend! She loved you, you stupid idiot! That girl would never sleep with a man unless he meant everything to her, and you used her!’ Gossip always spread fast here, most of the girls and staff here had their suspicions about the pair, but that night made it obvious to some and of course there was the gossip that Adonia left as Fenrir had used her which is the gossip Jenny chose to believe.
‘I didn’t want her to get hurt, I wanted her to hate me.’
‘Yeah and now she’s gone you selfish prick, looks like elves are just the same as humans always think with that before anything else.’ She yelled as she angrily pointed at his groin.
‘Jen please, A miss Addie too, but pointing fingers n yellin’ won’t bring her back.’
‘Barmic!’
‘Whit?!’ he yelled to the staff member, a young man ran to the room, he looked nervous yet strangely bewildered about his news.
‘There’s been a huge forest fire out of nowhere, some of the guys found bodies there, looks like elves, I never knew they came this far north.’
‘…No.’ Fenrir exhaled before nervously jogging then turning into a full-on sprint out of the inn and to the stables and took a horse at random before darting off.
He raced through the grasslands but saw a familiar sight, in the distance he saw a large black horse grazing with other animals, Fenrir squinted his eyes at the animal.
‘Midnight?!’ he called out, the horse immediately lifted its head and pricked up his ears before gently trotting toward Fenrir. If he wasn’t panicked before now his heart raced, if her horse was here then where was Adonia? With Midnight in tow Fenrir continued his frantic race into the burnt forest. The ground was covered in ash and the remainder of blackened trees that once thrived in this land. The forest was thinned out making it hard for the fire to rage on, Fenrir slowly and nervously approached a larger clearing where once vibrant caravans laid destroyed by the fires. Several bodies lined the campsite, most completely unrecognisable while some survived the mercy of the fire, but not the butchery of the Tainted. Fenrir looked around the area terrified at the sight before him, mothers clutched at their children, men still had weapons of defence in their hands, but it was one body that stood out to him. A woman laid in a foetal position with the charred body of a child clenched in her arms. Her burnt body resembled that of coal, most of her clothes were completely burnt off apart from a small shred of red fabric, like what Adonia used to wear. Fenrir fell to his knees by the body’s side, the hair that survived the flames was long and black, just like Adonia’s. Her body was a similar height and build but of course Fenrir had no idea that she was still alive, all he knew was that this was the charred remains of the woman he loved and forced away. Words could hardly escape as he reached out to touch the bod
y, but his hands shuddered and recoiled away. It was all his fault, Adonia was dead because of him, he yelled out in pain for his love, he too had lost everything.
Kinlan made another one of his taunting visits, he made sure he saw her condition personally whenever he could, if not just to aggravate her more. He himself was shocked to hear the news of what she had managed to do in such a damaged state. Kinlan sat on a small stool in front of her while she sat on the floor surrounded by chains, she stared angrily while he looked completely contempt, as if they weren’t in a dungeon at all.
‘I have to say Adonia, I’m quite impressed.’ She only responded with a hate filled glare. ‘Two men and while your legs were broken? I see they haven’t cleaned you since.’ He acknowledged her body covered in a mixture of brown dried blood and her own fresh blood smeared across her entire body.
‘I will never give in to you Kinlan.’ Her voice was a deep, angry growl.
‘You weren’t supposed to get hurt you know.’ He sighed. ‘We had it all planned out, I had spies find out which room was yours and we marked it for your safety, made sure it was locked too.’
‘Is this the part where you tell me all of your evil plans?’ she snarled. ‘How is this supposed to make me want to marry you?’
‘Oh, you will in time, you’ll be begging for me soon I promise you, everything you see here was paid for in your family’s blood. That captain that you killed? He bought himself a nice manor with the gold we gave him, laid to waste now but it was a fine manor.’
‘Why…Just tell me why.’ Kinlan leaned forward, she expected some sinister smile or a maniacal laugh, but his expression was stern and serious.
‘You don’t know what it was like living under Reckson, even if you did you were a spoiled brat. Talin was just as soft, he threw away everything his father fought for, whittled our army down to nothing, wasting money on elves, believing the Hardgraves were so mighty that they were equal to the Divine. It was only inevitable that Reckson would take Alexander back with such a weak king on the throne, I had to take charge. But I was going to spare you, once the Hardgrave castle was seized that’s when I was going to arrive and save you, then eventually marry you. Then blame everything on Reckson, the country would all be united, and we would have won, but this was already in motion before any of us even knew about the Tainted.’
Bitter Wars- Ashes Page 20