"Nottingham, 3-4" by Camilla ´Motone´ Whitney

Section 3

If the World Hate You, Ye Know that it Hated Me Before it Hated You

The window had been riveted shut with heavy wooden shutters.  There was no weapon with which to break the wood, not a single blade or match.  Not even any glass to break, and with the shards, withdraw life.  I hoped I wouldn’t become so desperate. 

The bed was of dark wood, in the ancient fashion of four large bedposts rising from the corners, and empty curtain rods across the top.  It held a single mattress, covered by a dingy gray blanket, and smelled thoroughly of must.  A frail wooden vanity, painted white, rested against one wall, with a small mirror.  Some kind of plastic, I figured, after several unsuccessful attempts to shatter it.  Also resting atop the vanity was a small bowl, wooden again, filled with dried flower petals and leaves.  Along the wall opposite the vanity were clear plastic bins stacked upon each other, some containing clothes.  I sorted through them—nothing I would ever bring myself willingly to wear.  I would remain in my forest-brown cloak, threaded with green, over simple denim shorts and a green t-shirt.  Hanging above them was an ancient-looking clock.  Underneath the bed I discovered a small metal basin of some kind.  Again, ancient; an article I doubted one could find even in an antique store—not that there were many of those to be found.

The Enemy had locked the door behind him.  So, I was to wait here, for him to come to me?  So I could serve him dutifully, faithfully and endlessly?  My old habit of hurling came back to me, although this time a sink wasn’t so ready for me.  I used the basin. 

The thought occurred to me that this man was evidently very powerful and with this power, came the automatic assumption that we would all do what he wanted. 

Not from me, not now that my new life was just beginning to take hold. 

I sat wearily on the bed.  Glancing at the clock, I noticed that it was 12:2:4.  Before I knew it I had laid down.  My cloak was heavy and warm, the smell of smoke and trees.  I pulled it over me, refusing to use the blanket on the accursed bed.  And slept.

I awoke with a start.  I saw the clock and found it was morning.  Stumbling out of bed, I tried the door and discovered it was open.  Cool wood against my bare feet as I walked cautiously down the stairs, alert for any sign of him.  It was still rather early, perhaps no one else was up.  Perhaps I could just slip away, and they would never even realize I was gone.  I walked slowly, silently down the stairs which led to my room.  A woman was storming up, and glared as she saw me descending.  She said nothing, only looked at me jealously.  A vague hope flitted across my mind—perhaps if she didn’t want me here, which her look inferred, she would inadvertently help me escape.  But she continued angrily up the stairs, and I was distracted by something completely different, the cool, confident sound of Chea’s voice.

I peered through the doorway in the corridor at the bottom of the stairs.  It seemed to lead to some kind of a Great Hall.  There stood Chea, talking to him.  His back was to me, fortunately.  She saw me but showed no recognition or reaction.  I was surprised at how fast they found me.  If that was what she was here for.  I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but he started barking angrily.  Chea looked offended and spoke again, but then time he yelled.  Chea glared sullenly and left in a huff, sparing a glance to me.  I spun out of the doorway and hurried down the hall, lest he suspect I was there.

It was a spark of hope amid otherwise dreary days.  They at least knew where I was, and hopefully some sort of plan was in order.  In the meantime, I wouldn’t trust to fate.  I endeavored to study the house and surrounding lands, plotting an escape.

My first attempt came only days later.  Watchmen, the only men on the staff, barred the only doors to the outside.  They were large and burly, and carried dolly sticks as well as guns.  He certainly must be rich, I realized, if he can afford to supply his staff with guns.  It seemed that he was the only person allowed to leave at will.  Deciding that any other means of escape was better than a fight with a Watchman, I formulated a plan based on sneak-and-run.  I had no weapons, and still had not been trained.  My plan was simple.  I would sneak downstairs in the middle of the night, climb through one of the windows on the side of the house that wasn’t bolted shut (yes, it’s true, there actually were some that could open), where hopefully a Watchman wouldn’t see me, then run like a bat from the Prince. 

Even as I was formulating the plan I cringed at myself for still using reference to the Prince, even if only in my thoughts.  The Prince was common colloquialism in society, but it seemed that no one quite knew who or what he was.  Even I still didn’t know, but then, I had never thought to ask.  For all I knew, it could be a vague reference to some fairy-tale entity, like the Hoods.

That night I steeled my courage.  When I felt it was late enough at night, at about two o’clock in the morning, I slowly pushed the door open and made my way through the dark.  I got as far as the stairs when I met a dark, bulbous figure.  It was him.

“What are you doing out of bed?” he asked, sour and gruff.  I didn’t answer him, only glared defiantly, only to regret eye contact.  He grabbed my wrist and dragged me back up the stairs.  I was weak compared to his strength, and I hated myself for it.  “I don’t know your name, and you’ve been living here for a week.”  I remained silent, now staring at the wall rather than confront him.  When we got back to my chamber, he opened the door for me.  I don’t know if he was being chivalrous or controlling, but I could easily guess controlling.  Then he said, “I notice you haven’t been wearing the dresses provided for you.”  He shoved me into the room with my silence, slamming and bolting the door behind me. 

Soon I heard vices muttering indistinctly outside my door.  Guards, I realized.  He didn’t even trust me with a locked door.

I must have slept soundly, for when I awoke I noticed slight pain and stiffness.  Then I looked down and realized the cause—I was wearing a tight red dress, made of some kind of slick, shiny material, and absolutely disgusting.  It was low-necked and spaghetti strapped, with small irregular holes running down the sides and slits in the sides going all the way up to the hips. My regular clothes were gone, my cloak tossed hastily on the floor.  The door was wide open.  Angrily, I threw my cloak on over the top of the indecent outrage, and stormed from the room.

At the bottom of the stairs I met a woman—the same one as before—ascending with a vengefully pleased look on her face.  “Lovely dress, isn’t it?” she said nastily.

I tried to lower the heat building up in my head.  “What do you want from me?”  I asked in a steely tone.

“He’s rather fond of the style.”  She said.  “He doesn’t like it when people don’t wear the clothes he’s spent so long picking out.”

“Where have you put my clothes?”  I demanded.

            “It doesn’t matter.”  She smirked.  “He wants you to know that from now on you won’t be let out of your room unless you’re wearing what he wants you to wear.  And that doesn’t include the cloak.”

It was true—every morning someone would be waiting for me, only releasing me when I was “properly” dressed.  They would lock the door to the room, preventing me from returning to change.  I began hiding my cloak inside the greenhouse—the health of the plants convincing me it wasn’t an often visited place.  Every day I would wander throughout the mansion, avoiding everyone I chanced upon.  Partially on a vague hope that I wouldn’t get in trouble, partially on a vague hope that they’d forget I was there at all.

One afternoon I was walking along a dusty corridor, which I had never visited, and found a room.  I couldn’t read the lettering on the door.  The fact that there was lettering on the door intrigued me.  Dust on the handle boasted of little use, but a click and the door swung open silently and smoothly.  A single light bulb—electric, I noticed—was hanging in the center of the room, probably motion-activated.  The walls were lined with pictures, most of which in pairs or single, all illuminated from below with their individual neon lights.  A scan around the room and questions were answered with more questions.  Simple photographic portraits.  Some caught en passé, others were official sit-downs.  Next to each of those pictures were pictures of the same unfortunates, freshly visited by Death’s scythe.  This was a room of crime.

I paused before one of the death pictures.  The scene was too familiar.  Cries and screams, the night death was warmly tinted and carried a knife.  Cruel fiend, I hadn’t noticed him take a picture, too distraught.  I could even see in it the place where I was hiding, in the background. 

The pain growing, I turned around only to be confronted by another.  I recognized the offender, but didn’t know.  He looked to be thirteen or fourteen.  The picture was probably years old.  In dazed silence I noticed a plaque underneath, as all of them had.  Paranoia, knowing I might soon be caught, I desperately tried to read the gilded letters.  It was no use.  I was still as unfamiliar with the written language as the day I left society.  So I studied the face, and found the shape of the lips and the color of eyes familiar, and I finally realized the truth.

Furtively exiting, closing the door carefully behind me, and I never entered again. 

What was a crime, and what wasn’t?  It depended on whom you asked.  Blackmail was hardly a crime, certainly not the worst.  And murder was only commonplace.  I wandered the green room, filled with Venus fly traps and African lilies.

What had Daemon done?  His picture hadn’t been incriminating.  The spot on the wall next to it hung empty; of course, Daemon wasn’t dead yet.

Flies began to swarm around me; to escape them, I left.  On my way up to my room I met the girl.  Trapped, she demanded to know why I deserved the extra attention of the Enemy, the attention that she had worked so hard to gain.  I didn’t know, didn’t want it, but she would take no excuse.  Ice freezing looks, she told me to watch my back.  I already was.

My skin crawled as someone placed their hand lovingly on my shoulder.  Only one person had the crassness to call me “love,” and when I turned around, I was face-to-face with the Enemy.  I flinched away from his touch and backed away.  He said nothing, but his look said it all as he handed me a slip of paper, a telegram.  “The way is open to you,” he said.  I took it and ran.  I glanced back to see him laughing, noticing the fungus on his teeth, as though they hadn’t been cleaned for years.  For his entire life.

Retiring into the false safety of my room, I opened the letter.  It was a Challenge.  I had never received a Challenge.  I didn’t know what to do with it.  I foolishly assumed that I would be contacted with further information.  I had heard about Challenges before.  They were a popular form of entertainment in the rural areas, and often people in cities would travel out to them as well.  That was the extent of my knowledge.

Fervor of night, as I lay once again, dreading the next day.  The clock’s ticking was amplified in the dark; I focused on it.  If I never slept night would never end and day would never arrive.  A softer scuffling sound was in the background, then a creak and dim light spilling into the chamber.  An accursed shadow crossed my doorway.  His shadow.  Three Watchmen lay on the floor, dead; or unconscious.  He wanted my fear; that he could have.  Anything else, and I would fight.  Three shadows entered, faces painted black.  One of them gripped me, but the fingers were too gentle, too supple to be His.  I looked into the eyes and knew.  He reached into his cloak and pulled out supplies, ridding himself of his false paunch, and shoved them into my arms. 

I quickly changed into the clothes Daemon had given me, and we left the house.

Three shadows and a ghost crossed the asphalt outside the house, never to look back.  They had chosen a foolish course, and as they passed a Station, the ghost was taken from within their midst.  They fought, and were outnumbered.  The ghost found herself the next day in the Preparation Chamber of the nearest Place of Challenge.

Section 4

Ye Have Not Chosen Me, but I Have Chosen You

            A Challenge, I found, was more than a form of mass entertainment.  It was law.  When stating a Challenge, the Challenger provided not only a picture of the Challenged, but also all the records and current data that could be found.  This was, of course, if the Challenger was serious; the information would be used for the good of the Challenge, to insure that at whatever cost, the Challenge took place.  If you didn’t report to the nearest Station directly upon receipt of your Challenge, you were hunted down and forced in no uncertain terms to participate; taken to the Preparation Chamber in the chosen Coliseum.  All terms were stated by the Challenger.  There was no matter of choice in this.  As the Challenged, you could participate in the Challenge, or you could die. 

            I should have chosen “die.”

            Dim, cool smell, like processed air.  Unlike the petrichor I loved.  A new prison.  I examined myself in the mirror, a pallid form with haunted dark eyes.  This wasn’t me, it was a mere shell, a moving and occasionally talking robot.  Like the rarely seen Mechas, who were occasionally built so well you couldn’t tell the difference between them and a real human.  Maybe I was one, and no one had ever known it.  No, impossible, I had grown, I had bled, I had felt pain.  But this, this couldn’t be me.  Just like my name wasn’t me, it was simply a word, strands of letters joined together like boards in a fence, forming a complete wall.  How could some written symbols represent a being?  Sometimes I wondered if I was here, really existing, or just an observer from inside a body, watching the happenings going on around me. 

            My reflection gazed unemotionally back, perfectly still.  I held my own gaze, hypnotized.  What secrets could one read, what dark and disturbed thoughts could be uncovered, hidden in my eyes?  I forced myself away and fell onto the cold couch provided in the room.

            It was time.  The huge mechanical lid of the dome rose and sealed with a thunderous clack.  The strobe light started, flashing, everything seemed faster, slower, bigger, smaller, the senses were dizzied, the crowd was entranced, thrilled.  Their roars filled the dome, echoed and amplified.  My screams of terror were suffused and His laughter resounded.  Silent tears, as all I could do was nothing against the destruction.

            I touched the black lipstick to my lips one last time.  I don’t know what Daemon or anyone else had to go through to get this, but I was extremely thankful, even though I had now succumbed to the realization that nothing would stop my fate.  Nevertheless, I looked horrible.  Exactly the way I wanted to look.  Deathly.  I wanted to die.  I had never felt so desperate.  Even at his house I hadn’t been so trapped, because at least I had the recesses of his estate to escape to, and always the restricting company of others.  But now there was only his naked craze and my exposed fear, with nothing to stop him.  The harsh light of publicity only magnified the actions.  I turned to Daemon, who had snuck into the Preparation Chamber to see me.  Affiliation was not allowed, and the Hoods now wanted Daemon more than ever. 

            “I can’t do this.”  I said.

            “Yes, you can.  You have to.” he replied.  Outside I could hear the crowd growing impatient.

            “He’s going to choose me!”  I said.  “Please just kill me now!”

            “You’re going to make it!” he said, holding me by the shoulders.  “Everything will work out.  You will survive this!”  His voice was so smooth and reassuring, but I couldn’t bring myself to believe him.  I had to pull away.

            “It can’t work out!  He is going to choose me, no question!  I would rather die than be with him!  Die!”  I was desperate, insane.  He touched his fingers to my lips, hushing me.  The Enemy was outside.

            “Dread not, neither be afraid of them.  No one will benefit from your death.  Even if he does get the chance to choose you, there is still hope.  You’ll still be alive.  Trust me.  Everything will be fine.”  I opened my mouth to protest, but he lifted my face with both his hands and looked deeply into my eyes.  I held his gaze for a moment but shifted away.  It was too intense.  “Just trust me.” 

            “Why do they hate me?”

            “Because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”  Daemon said.

With that, he left.  My eyes rested on his quiver as he paused cautiously at the door, and with a swash of his cloak, was gone.  Something seemed wrong with the picture, that’s all I knew.  Something was definitely wrong.  He was leaving me, leaving me to my doom.

            And then he was gone.  At that moment, I felt more alone than ever before.  All the loneliness I had ever felt before, combined together, was no match for the hopelessness now.  I was being abandoned to my doom, without even a weapon to fight it off.  I couldn’t allow myself to cry.

            “Come on out, beautiful.”  I flinched when I heard His voice.  My muscles tensed and my stomach began to churn.  I turned stiffly to the open doorway.  Harsh sunlight spilled into the dim chamber.  I had nothing left to do but go out.  Suicide was no longer an option; the only obtainable weapons had left with Daemon.  They made sure the Preparation Chambers were very safe—I wasn’t the only of the Challenged unwilling to accept fate.  Each step was forced.  My brain whirled wildly for any reckless hope of escape.  My only option was to trust Daemon.  The crowd outside was getting restless.

            The smell of scorched dust.  I was out.  The crowd quieted.  I squinted against the glaring sun.  There were too many people.  Too many spectators there to witness my downfall in order to satisfy their twisted idea of sport.  Why did it have to be so?  I still did not know exactly what was to happen, waiting for an uncertain doom.

            The heat.  My skin was already damp.  My fingers were heavy with rings threatening to slip off.  Large rings I was unaccustomed to wearing, adorned with skulls, spiders and eyeballs.  My ears held multiple rings of the same type, I had just had them peirced, and my neck was loaded with similar necklaces.  My fingernails were black, my hair dyed the same color.  Hair dye was almost impossible to find.  Any sort of cosmetics was.  Who Daemon had to kill was certainly beyond me.  In an attempt to scare him, I had obtained the freakiest clothes possible after the Challenge had come three days ago.  I also got no sleep after that first horrifying nightmare, nor had I eaten.  I was easily hooked up with the standard black heavy cloak and spiderweb hose of the cult—the nameless sect in which most of society secretly practiced.  No one would admit it to their neighbor though, if they ever talked to their neighbor.  Even if they saw their neighbor at a cult meeting, they never mentioned it.  It was society’s best kept secret.  The rest of my outfit wasn’t so easy to obtain, or so I had heard.  But I now had the look I needed.  Hopefully it made me look as wan as I felt.  Of course my white skin always helped in making me look unhealthy.

            I had gone sixteen years of my life without eating, and now, after only a few days of being deprived of food, I felt as though I was going to die.  I had gained weight since joining Daemon from the meat we consumed.  I was beginning to enjoy eating.  Now I found myself wondering when my last real meal had been.  Not during my occupation in the house of the Enemy, this I knew.  While the Enemy occasionally indulged in eating, all others in the household were Photosynthesists, even the cooks.  I would filch whatever I could whenever I could from the kitchen.  My last meal had been so long ago, in the forest, the morning when we left to travel to the city.  Rolls with bits of fruit baked in, clear, cold water. 

            Summer on a winter breeze.  I looked up at my Opponent, the Challenger.  Fresh and trim, with bouncing blonde hair and an effervescent smile; she was the obvious choice.  The woman who hated me, I now knew why.  Dressed in a flattering pink that was probably very expensive, I could almost see her glow.  How could he possibly choose me, a sickly heathen, over someone so fresh and energetic as her?  And yet I knew he would.

            Cow’s dung thrown on the thrashing wind.  I looked up and there he stood.  The Enemy.  I looked back down, not allowing myself even to cringe from his effluvium.  No more than half a second had been spent, yet it was still too long.  Eye contact can still be made in half a second.  I didn’t need to look anyway.  I could picture Him perfectly in my mind.  A greasy, curly beard, hair too short, eyes too small, gut too big, and always emitting a new smell, each one more repulsive than the preceding.  His tone, a raw pink, what could be seen under layers and patches of dead skin.  I still had to shudder at the thought, even though I now lived on meat.  This reintroduction to society reminded how repulsive meat-eating was in the eyes of the Purists, and even the non-Purist Greenies. 

Why she had called the Challenge, I didn’t know.  I hoped I never would.  I hoped I would get heat exhaustion and dehydration all at once, fall into a coma and die.  “Trust me.”  Daemon had said.  “Everything will be fine.”  I didn’t know what he was planning, but he was my only hope.  Aside from spontaneous combustion.

            “I love the way you always manage to look so cute.” he said.  I didn’t try to hide my disgust.  He laughed at my reaction.  I wanted to strangle him with my heaviest necklace.  The big chain one with the large iron skull, it must have weighed at least two pounds. 

            The crowd was chanting.  “Choose!  Choose!  Choose!  Choose!”  I peered into them.  The black makeup under my eyes hardly helped the glare.  The shouts of the thousands were resonating off the walls of the Coliseum, off the other crowd members, off the sky, the dusty ground, the other shouts, and finally vibrating incessantly in my eardrums. 

            Then I saw her.  Chea.  So she, too, found this to good to miss.  She had always been sly, manipulative and deceptive.  But treasonous?  It hadn’t been known to be so, but it was highly possible.  She was looking at me.  We made eye contact.  She was not scoffing.  I couldn’t tell what she was.  Doubtful, maybe.  Perfectly stoic.  She had such an expert way of hiding her emotions.  She glanced to a high corner of the stadium.  My eyes followed.  There stood a figure wearing a dark, hooded cloak, hiding something under it.  He looked to be a cult member, maybe.  The place was usually swarming with them, or so I had observed in the past few days.  The figure cautiously lifted his hand and pulled off his hood, only for a second, but that was all it took.  I recognized him.  His hair, his movements, his tall lean figure, his confident stance and even at the horrible distance, his dark eyes which looked so intently into mine.  They were looking at me now. 

            They weren’t the only eyes looking at me.  I could feel His gaze.  I glanced away from Daemon, pretending to be scanning the entire arena, pausing now and then to make it more believable.  I couldn’t risk drawing attention to either of them.  They were brewing something.  I had promised myself not to smile in order to make myself even less appealing.  Not that I ever smiled anyway.  Until now, it hadn’t been very difficult.  My eyes involuntarily glanced up to where Chea was.  She was no longer there.  Their plan had started to take effect.

            The Enemy was making a speech.  I hadn’t been paying attention to him.  Why would I want to?  It was probably something I would need to know.  I deliberately let my attention wander.  Just to spite him, if not anything else.  He turned to face my Opponent and I.

            A swish, followed by an animal scream.  The Enemy was slumped over, a crude homemade arrow digging into His spine.  Daemon never missed his mark.  My Opponent ran over to Him, cradling His head in her arms, gently speaking soft words into His ears.  The Watchmen ran out the doors, immediately locking them.  It would take a few minutes for them to access the seating area and search the panicking crowd, and by then the bow, quiver and cloak would be gone and Daemon would be panicking with the worst of them. 

            The focus was sufficiently away from me.  I could run.  Instead, I was grabbed and held from behind by two pairs of black-clad arms.  One belonged to Chea, the other to Ellison.  So far, all four of us were wearing the same cult outfit.  Smart.

            They dragged me into the Preparation Chamber, where I was supplied with different clothes.  They were pulling off the black shrouds, which they threw into the fire, revealing the familiar brown and green ones underneath.  I hurriedly wiped off my black makeup as well as I could and started to change.

            “We’re catching a subway to Canada before the news of this spreads.”  Chea whispered.  “From there we can get safely to Europe.  We might have to pull a few strings, but none of us will be safe here.”  Daemon soon joined us, already changed.

            “The Hoods have more Watchmen than we planned on.” he said.  “I could barely get out.  We’ll have to use the underground passages.”

            “Anyone that saw us would think you were being kidnapped to be sacrificed by the cult.”  Ellison continued explaining to me as we moved stealthily along the cool, dark passages.  The smell of wet clay was calming and the presence of Daemon and my other friends by my side was even more so.

            It was then that I realized something.  Daemon only brought what he thought might need in everything he did.  When Daemon had left the Preparation Chamber, he had two arrows in his quiver.