3. Prisoner

Alicia is trying harder and harder to match the pace with the guard. The guard is holding her right hand and is walking at a normal speed only but it is her that is not able to meet the threshold.

Her headache has now turned into a migraine. The splash of water that had been spilled over her moments ago has awakened her conscience but the pain is not gone.

Every time her footstep lags to match with the guard. She feels a rough scratch in her hand getting engraved. She also keeps getting a little push in her back by another guard walking behind her. She sees the steps going down to the dungeon at a bit of distance.

The guard lets her hand free and marches down the steps. She moves her freed hand to her eye level and looks at the rashes. Freshly engraved red lines are very vivid, contrasting her milky white skin. She blows a bit of air on rashes but doesn't seem to help much. She lets her hand slide to the sides.

The white shoe covering her toes has a silvery symbol of an eagle with its wings open wide. As her feet move forwards the silvery symbol in front turns golden under yellowish light. The small sole of it falls on the first step of the stairway, she jerks forward. Her hands get on the wall in front in time, thus her nose only brushes the surface of the wall.

She turns left on stairways and puts her feet carefully with wide eyes focused on every coming step. A sigh of relief comes out of her mouth on finishing the steps that are only a dozen.

A number of empty metal cells are on each side of the long passageway in front. The guards walk forward looking straight. Alicia's eyes trail from metal bars on the left side to the bars of the giant cell in front. Bars appear fatter in their shadows on the giant cell's floor. Supposedly thin lines of dim light appear in between the lines of bars.

"Something's in there," she prompts, seeing the shadows of one bar getting submerged into the next one rapidly.

"SHUT UP!" barks the guard walking in front of her.

She gets her eyes off the cell and turns to the right following him. The guard walking behind her takes a long gaze at the cell with wide eyes. Finding nothing suspicious he lets off the gaze and walks slowly.

Few footsteps straight they reach an empty cell in the right passageway. The guard in front of her opens it and stands beside it. She gets pushed into the cell by the one behind her, she stumbles.

"Can I get a little water? please," she pleads, turning to them.

"You won't be getting anything," says the guard beside the gate and rams the gate with full force. The metal bars sake like a leaf, reverberating boom sound.

She sits on the floor desperately. "Don't worry, you'll be sentenced to death soon," says the other guard smirking. Cackles of both guard echoes, cutting the dead silence of the dungeon.

She lays her back on the wall. Tears drop out of her eyes, "I didn't do it, please", she says sobbing. But no one is there to listen to her.

Her eyes trail from the pitch-black ceiling to the same colored wall and get shut merging the darkness outside and her eyelids. A very dim light coming from a distant flambeau reveals her sitting. Her head rests on arms clasped over crimped knees.

A few moments later, the sound of metals clacking hit her ears. She lifts her head and turns to the left. Gate swings open. A guard's head covered in a helmet bends to the level of a three feet gate. A reddish-brown object in his right hand glitters under the light of a short flambeau in his left hand.

The guard walks in and stands in front of her. He bends a little, and the object moves forward in his hand towards Alicia's knees in front of her face.

"What is it?" she asks, wide-eyed.

"Water," says the guard in a sympathetic tone. He lowers the flambeau to let her grasp the cylindrical shape of the reddish-brown glass.

She plucks the glass from his hand and lands it on her lips. Chilled water travels across her throat, a soothing sensation goes across her head, and rashes in hand.

The guard opens his only eye-revealing helmet. "James," she says with a lit-up face.

"Shh," James shushes her and puts on the helmet. "Follow me" he hisses and walks towards the cell exit with light steps. Alicia puts the glass on the floor slowly and follows him.

They walk with light steps to reach the giant cell. One guard is lying on the floor with his feet barring the passage. They walk over him, making sure they don't wake him up from the sleep James put in minutes ago. Another one is lying near the steps going upwards. 

James walks around with light steps. Alicia follows him on steps to reach the long hallway in front. "Why are there no guards?" she asks, astonished, noticing the anomaly.

The hallway has a series of rooms on the left side while the right side has only pillars. The first room on the left side is the throne room she was dragged into. It has a wide gate of over five feet. The next gates belong to the king and other royals. The last one in the series is Yuri's room.

Being the place of men for the highest ranks, each gate stays guarded with two guards at all times. Seeing the whole hallway clear amazes Alicia. "They are in Yuri's room to put off the fire I broke out," hisses James to quench her curiosity.

"All of them?" she scrunches her nose.

"Yeah, Everyone here fears Yuri," he signals her to stop as they reach the start of the throne room's gate. She hides along the wall. James walks in his natural guard way from one end to the other. Turning around he signals her.

She walks hurriedly up to the middle. She takes a look in the throne room. Prince Reza is sitting over his throne. His one hand is over cut in the other hand's shoulder. His eyes are clung to the ceiling lost in thoughts.

James opens the door of the prince's room just beside the throne room. They both get inside. "Now wait here until Prince comes out of the throne room...secret passage out is from there," he says, turning back towards the exit.   

"What if someone comes here?" she asks.

"This is Prince's room...No one comes here except the prince and girls"

"Girls?" she purses her lips out.

"What? he's a Prince," he says, lowering his head to the sides. She nods, scratching her head. James walks out and shuts the gate.

"GIRLS COME HERE," she yells in her mind, jerking both hands. She walks towards the bed with maroon-colored bed sheets. Four bloated white square pillows are on the head end. The brown headboard slat has a beautiful engraving of two swans.

She sits around the headboard and her hands trail the one swan's head to another one just beside it. A familiar scent reaches her nose, she recognizes it in an instant. It's the perfume she gave to Reza a few days ago. 

She takes one of Reza's pillows in her hands and inhales the mesmerizing scent of the Jasmine flower. A soothing sensation goes from her nose to chest and she feels the warmth around her chest. 

Tat-tat!! A light knock comes on the door. The pillow brushes her cheeks, as she puts it down hurriedly. She stands up and walks to the gate. 

She opens the gate slowly and comes out. She sees Reza with his back to her, going towards the dungeon His one hand is gripping the sword hilt. 

"Days ago, you had me in our arms. Now I'm your biggest enemy. I wish things didn't have been his way," she thinks watching him going away from her maybe for forever.   

"Alicia" hisses James for the second time seeing her stand stunned.

She waves her thoughts and follows James into the throne room. James walks to the end of the room then moves to its left corner. He taps on the big half-round pillar attached to the wall reaching up to the ceiling. The sound of taps changes as his fingers tapping move to the right.

He takes his sword out and puts it in between the wall and pillar. The pillar rotates like a gate revealing a dark passageway ahead. Alicia takes one flambeau attached to the wall and they walk in. James closes the pillar from inside.

The walls of the passageway are scratchy with sharp edges of splintered bricks. "Be careful with those," says James lighting with his flambeau.

When echoes of his voice settle down, she can hear the thud of his footsteps clearly distinct from her deafened ones. Few steps later, the sound of birds chirping comes their way, hinting them of the end.

A wind blows in, the flambeau flickers James guards it by getting in its front. "Afraid?" asks James.

"Never," she says with conviction. Living alone as a kid had made her cope with the darkness. Time with James's parents only made her stronger. "That's my girl," he says in an assured tone. 

A beam of dim light comes over her face as James opens the exit door of the passageway. She sees the trees leading them into the woods.