Room of Fire

It was the third time in the past five days that Aniah had heard screaming. It was so faint she’d at first assumed she was imagining it. But, after considering the fact that she was in the fortress-like castle of a psychotic murderer and kidnapper, she decided it was far more likely that the screams were legitimate. They always came from the same area, and she could only hear them from a single room which she was sent to clean daily. The room was completely empty, but she was still made to sweep it out and check for insects every day. In the last five days, she had been delayed just a few minutes in getting to this room three times. Each of those three times, there had been screaming.

She didn’t let it consume her thoughts overly much. Likely, the King had some sort of prison or torture chamber nearby so that he could be directly involved in the pain of others. Perhaps it was the place where servants who dropped a cup or missed a cobweb were sent for punishment. Whatever the case, she decided it wasn’t her problem. She couldn’t even help herself. How could she be expected to worry about anyone else?

Usually, the screams died out after only a few minutes. Today, they continued incessantly. Actually, it sounded more like one long, endless cry of pain. She wondered if maybe it wasn’t a scream at all, because surely no one could go that long without taking a breath. She found herself pausing, straining to listen in a sort of morbid curiosity. She was so distracted by the sound that it took her a moment to smell the smoke.

Smoke? She frowned, looking towards the door. There was no window to this room, so the scent couldn’t be coming from outside the castle. But the hallway was clear.

A bead of sweat trickled down the back of her neck. Her feet felt suddenly very hot, even in her light slippers provided by Aluri. She looked down.

The floor was steaming. She gasped, stumbling backwards and out of the room. As soon as she was out, her feet landed on a cool surface. The sweat on her body suddenly felt very cool and she shivered. Inside the room, the air warped with heat. She watched, unable to process what she was seeing. Should she call for help? Run away? Continue to stand like a dimwit?

She did the latter. Just as she was beginning to think the room would spontaneously combust, the heat began to subside.

She blinked smoke and heat from her dry eyes. The air in the hallway had grown uncomfortably warm, but it was bearable. When she tried to step into the room again, though, it was like walking directly into a fire. She cringed back, smelling singed hair. Luckily, she hadn’t managed to catch her eyebrows on fire or anything.

After a few minutes she came back to herself. She would be in trouble if she fell too far behind in her tasks for the day.

She took one last look at the room before walking away, broom in hand. She noticed with chagrin that the bristles were slightly blackened. If she tried to use it, she would just smear the floor with black soot. Lovely.

***

Pain. Excruciating, unthinkable, immeasurable pain. Pain beyond the point of reason, logic, or explanation. A mindlessness that overcame the senses and dragged the victim into a black abyss of nothingness. No, not nothingness-a desire for nothingness. That one all-consuming wish for an end to it all. For all was pain.

***

“He can’t survive much more of this.”

“How close are you?”

“The process is much easier on a willing subject. I’m not sure. A few more days at least.”

“Will he last that long?”

A pause. “No.”

***

Joree came to himself as someone forced lukewarm broth down his throat. At first he coughed and spluttered, spitting most of it out. After a bit, though, he was able to force his dry mouth to go through the motions of swallowing. He could barely taste the broth at all, and he almost passed out from the effort of drinking. His whole body throbbed in a constant sensation of agony, occasionally punctuated by a sudden lancing pain in one part of him or another. His ears were ringing, but he could still vaguely make out voices around him.

“His look is bad.” Joree tried to focus. The voice was vaguely familiar, and he thought it was someone he didn’t like very much.

“Torture tends to do that to a person.” A new voice, accent hard to make out in the haze of his mind.

“Yes, Jarshen. I would know.”

A silence.

“Er, yes. I suppose you would.” An uncomfortable sounding chuckle.

“What has been done?” That voice, so calm and cold. Joree would have curled in on himself if he’d had any control over his body.

“He was uncooperative. We have been reduced to forcing him into a basic survival state where his power would engage instinctively. We had to push him to the point where he acted mindlessly. I have it on good authority that he actually died one time.”

“I did not bring him to you to kill him.”

“Sentiment, my friend?”

“Not friend, Jarshen. And I have experiments I need. Do not kill him.”

“I see. Silly me. I should have known better than to attach any human emotion to your actions.”

“He wakes. Do not kill him.”

“He does me no good if he is dead, my-er, Vris.”

“I am not yours.” Vris. That name…Joree’s mind was so strained and addled. He choked as too much broth was poured into his mouth.

“No, and thank Arkadia for that.”

Joree slipped back into unconsciousness.

***

Aniah woke as the female servant-the only one she ever saw-placed a tray of food on the tiny wooden table next to her before moving back to the door without a word. The woman was short and stout, long brown hair braided straight down her back. She never interacted with Aniah, only brought her meals in the morning and evening.

“Wait,” Aniah called out, voice faintly rasping from the night of unused. The woman hesitated, hand on the door. Aniah wasn’t sure what she was doing. What good would interacting with a servant do?

No, Aniah corrected herself. This must be more than a servant. I can’t use Will on her.

“What is your name?” Aniah asked.

The woman shook her head once, then hurried out the door.

Aniah huffed, folding her arms and glaring after the woman. What an insufferable little-bah! She flopped back on the bed. Unfortunately, she had scooted back slightly when sitting up, so she scraped her head against the wall as she fell. There was no headboard, just a mattress sitting on a wooden box.

She sat back up, rubbing her head and growling softly. After a moment, she stalked over to the table to see what kind of disgusting rubbish they had provided for her today.

There was some sort of boiled cereal, no sugar to go with it, of course, and a glass of water that would probably taste like dishwater.

She pulled a face and moved away to get dressed. She wasn’t that hungry anyway. Besides, she wanted to get an early start today. Yesterday, she had been presented with something bizarre and inexplicable. A room that super-heated as if the air itself were fire. Before that, the screams, and the fact that she couldn’t use Will on three specific people.

If she ever wanted to escape, and if she wanted to be of use in the war effort, she would need to unravel these secrets. She had made the decision after several hours of tossing and turning during the night. She was the Heiress of Manicot. It was time she acted like it.