#the Legionarius is another character of mine

[ever-searching]

Airell’s Visions, part 2 - Blood

(Second part of the six-chapter story focusing on Cain's mother and her circumstances, originally written as a MAHI prompt.)

[ Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 ]

Blood

MAHI prompt words used: shy, heard Content notes: ❗ Violence, torture and asphyxiation (moderately graphic)

The dungeon was a damp, cold place. Airell had lost the count of days she had spent there, and with barely any sunlight coming through the small window with reinforced bars, it would have been difficult to say anyway. She assumed she had been held captive for at least a week; maybe even a sennight. It was possible that their temple wouldn't be standing any more when she’d get out.

If she would get out, of course – but she believed she would. She had seen the ocean several times in her dreams, after all.

After the Garleans had stormed their temple, a few sisters from the Eyes of Nymeia had been caught, but Airell had never managed to see a glimpse of anyone else. Perhaps the Garleans were afraid of them and the gift they had been bestowed, even if they denied believing in the Spinner herself. Airell, too, had told the ones who had tried to interrogate her about the things she had seen in their tapestries of fate. The Garleans' and their collaborators' reactions had varied from shock to disdain and outright violence. It wasn’t that surprising – but it was still somewhat frightening.

And, as it turned out, the worst was only to come.

Airell stirred to the sound of measured steps approaching her cell. The dungeons were kept dim and the only source of light was on the wall opposite her cell door, so anyone who came inside almost automatically gained an ominous glow or an aura of foreboding. This time, that applied to a middle-aged Garlean enforcer, whom she had seen before.

"Hello again, darling," the woman tried to sweet-talk to her. She had been fairly forceful the last time they had met, so Airell instinctively shied away from her – as much as she could while her feet were chained, that was. "Now, don’t be like that. I am not here to make you hurt... at least if you are willing to cooperate. You know what we want, and I know what you want. We can make this very simple."

"I won't help you, and even if I wanted to, I couldn't," Airell said quietly. The days spent in the poor conditions had left her feeling weak, but she didn't let her voice quiver and met the eyes of the Garlean woman. "I don’t know where the First Seer is. You have already taken some of my sisters. Where are they?"

"That should be none of your concern." The façade of amiability ended up being very short-lived, and it was replaced by a harsh, blunt tone. "You are bold, girl. You're all alone in this cell, and you still worry about your sisters? How about your own safety?" she asked almost mockingly.

"Nymeia alone will decide my fate," Airell replied.

The woman knelt down in front of her and harshly grabbed her chin, pulling it upwards so that their eyes were locked.

"Damned savages. You and your piss-poor would-be gods wouldn't know sense if it was the only thing separating you from the abyss," she growled. "I ask you one more time. Where is the First Seer, or where are her lackeys?"

"I don't know." Though Airell repeated her earlier words, they weren't fully true. She didn’t know where the First Seer had gone, but she did know where sister Maryn could be found. Just before they had been separated, Maryn had told Airell to come to the secret hideout, which could be accessed via a hidden hatch near the salt lake strand. Airell had been captured, but she had seen Maryn run towards the salt lake with a couple of the novices in tow. They were very young, but the Garleans wouldn't know mercy. The sisters had to remain hidden or terrible things were bound to happen.

Perhaps the Garlean interrogator could somehow hear that lie or the fear in Airell's voice because her expression suddenly shifted. She let Airell go, dropping her onto the floor, and spoke to the guard standing by the doorway with an unnerving tone.

"Summon oen Cestus. Time to see if this broad will be more willing to... talk to her countrymen."

The woman moved onto the doorway when the guard hurriedly went to fetch whoever she had requested, and Airell had a chance to sit up slowly and smooth her ragged dress. Even though she knew that the woman was unlikely to kill her – due to her visions of the ocean, and the vision where the woman chased a giant gloved fist, only for it to turn around, grab her and crush her – the situation still made her feel uneasy. She crossed her arms protectively over her body, causing the heavy chains to rattle, and waited.

Soon, she heard two pairs of heavy boots approach her cell. She saw the guard guide a newcomer in, and she could see and somehow even sense him before she heard him speak. A young man dressed in Garlean conscript attire; despite his fairly broad shoulders and tall stature, he looked hardly Airell's age. It shocked her. As he saluted his superior, his face held a hint of suspicion, which was barely noticeable in the dim lighting.

"Legionarius, it's time to put your skills to the test," the woman said with what could only be called evil pleasure. "This girl is withholding important information from us about the Eyes of Nymeia. Force it out of her."

"Understood." The young man's voice was quite deep and smooth like a stone by the beach, and it could have been attractive if it hadn’t sounded so... devoid of emotion. Perhaps forcefully so. Only the flicker of hesitation in his eyes betrayed that he was not fully prepared to do whatever he had in store for Airell.

The man stepped closer to her and knelt down, fixing his unblinking gaze onto Airell much like the Garlean woman had done moments before. He repeated the woman's questions, and Airell more or less repeated her own answers – and then he took out a grimoire from his belt and began drawing complex runes and patterns into the air in front of Airell.

All of a sudden, she couldn't breathe.

Airell collapsed onto the floor and gasped for breath, writhing as some kind of miasma felt to seep into her lungs and block her airways. It took a moment before she was able to breathe again.

"I can repeat that as many times as I want until you tell us the answer," the man said as he watched Airell hack and cough. "It's easier if you tell me. It will be much less painful as well."

"If I... won’t be able to breathe... I won't be able to talk, either," Airell replied, managing to stay firm despite the discomfort bordering on pain. "I can't or won't tell you anything."

The young man's brow furrowed, though Airell couldn't quite say why, and he remained silent for a minute. Then he lowered his hands and placed one of them on Airell’s chained ankle.

"Very well."

He drew a rune directly onto her skin, and after a quick brown glow, the skin began to unravel.

The memory of that experience would be forever carved in Airell's memory. The chains had chafed the skin around her ankles, causing the upper layers to start peeling off a little, but the spell deepened the abrasion and tore it open into a wound that started bleeding. Airell cried out in pain, but the man wasn't done yet. He moved his hand upwards, drawing another sigil onto her leg with his fingers, and suddenly it felt as if the floor had turned into a maw of a hungry beast, as several sharp spikes of stone rose from the tiles and clamped themselves around her shin. She screamed and tried to pull herself free, but she was no match to the magical jaws that cut through her flesh and pinned her to the ground, and struggling only made the wounds bleed even worse, staining her robes and the man's boots with deep crimson.

"Where are the others?" he asked, his voice hard and intense like the stone he was using to torture her. "Where are they?!"

The miasma seemed to come back, and now Airell was trying to scream for mercy with lungs that refused to work. She was choking. She could taste metal and her tears.

"Where?"

She couldn't stand it anymore.

"Trapdoor! By the beach!" she sobbed between desperate gasps for air. Tears flowed down her cheeks in rivers. "Please stop. Please…"

"Good work, Legionarius. Your father was not wrong to sing your praises." Airell hadn't heard the Garlean woman speak at all during the spell-bound interrogation session. Despite her praise, she sounded equally impressed and disgusted. "Now make her spit out which beach…"

The woman didn't manage to finish her sentence before Airell blacked out.

Airell wasn't sure how long she remained unconscious: when she woke up, the pain had dulled into unpleasant throbbing and she was able to breathe again, but the Garlean woman and the man she had called 'Legionarius' were still present. The latter was wrapping a bandage around Airell's leg, face eerily still and devoid of emotion.

"You can consider yourself having fulfilled part of the deal now," the Garlean woman said, stepping closer to Airell. "We will come back later, though."

The young man finished bandaging the wounds he had himself caused to Airell, and their eyes met. Airell wasn't sure whether it was due to the glint of emotion she saw or the Spinner's blessing, but something urged her to speak out.

"Before... I fainted, I saw a vision," she said, pushing herself up and looking at the man. Her voice was hoarse, but she didn't let it stop her. "I saw you. You tore down your home, stone by stone, and then tried to build it elsewhere – but although you tried, you couldn't hide how your hands had stained the stones with blood."

For a brief moment, she thought she saw his mask slip and shock overtake his face. Then the Garlean woman interrupted kicked her sharply, causing her to fall back on the floor and almost hit her head.

"Don't listen to her. She is trying to manipulate you," the woman warned the young man. "You're young enough to get fooled by her blather of so-called gods and their visions. Go back to your post, oen Cestus. You've done your job here."

The man rose back to his feet, saluted the woman and then took his leave. His rigid and clumsy movements revealed what his lack of words didn't: agitation, perhaps mixed with denial. The Garlean woman watched him go, let out a sigh and muttered something under her breath before exiting the cell, too, and leaving Airell alone in the darkness.

After the cell door was shut, the courage Airell had mustered faded out, and she broke into tears again. She curled up on the cold floor and sobbed, silently praying for Nymeia to forgive her. She wished that sister Maryn had found a better hideout or already left Gyr Abania – and that she herself would indeed get to see the ocean.

Eventually, she drifted off to a fitful sleep.