The other screams are localised in two spots. The building to my left, and one further down the road, maybe back a road or two, since the screams are so far away.
A constant circle around the captives, the guards are rigid in the chaos. Their eyes gleam with a hunger for war, their gazes sweeping from warrior to warrior—but they don’t abandon their posts.
I wonder why they are charged with this, the babysitting of the humans.
Obviously I know why guards are assigned. If it wasn’t for them surrounding us, many would run, take their chances out there in the dark.
Fair.
I get it.
If it wasn’t for Bee, I would too.
But I wonder if these fae, the guards, are lower rank, somehow, or punished in the denial of that battling and violence they so obviously crave.
Might as well be foaming at the mouths, they watch it all burn with too much intensity.
I sink further into the mushy road.
Still haven’t learned that cringing into a solid object won’t steal me away and into the arms of safety.
Fucking instinct.
Now not only my ass is wet from the slushy snow, but my hip, too, and a chunk of my sleeve.
Even my gloves are starting to ice up so much in the cold mush that the chill is reaching my fingers.
I would bunch myself into a cuddle, wrap my arms around my legs and curve into myself, if I could stand the hum of pain in my back.
I cut my gaze aside to the captives.
Connie has her arms wrapped around her drawn-up legs, her sharp chin resting on her knees, and she watches the face of a building.
I trace her gaze, but all I see are smashed windows and smoke billowing out from them.
I return my wandering gaze to the other captives. Like Connie, some aren’t as haggard as others. Mostly the men are battered through their torn clothes, bloodied and bruised hands, a fatigue weathering their hollowed faces.
And then some others are in better condition. Less tears on their clothes, all of them wearing jackets to battle against the Canadian winter, lips that aren’t so cracked and chapped, fuller cheeks and bellies.
Just a reach away from me, the haggard ones are clustered together—and I wonder if they stick to each other for body heat, since their jackets are finer, flimsier, or it’s that they are afraid.
Some are closer than others, with arms locked, temples resting on shoulders, hands in hands.
And then the rest, the fresher ones, are isolated in their clusters, just sitting close together, like Connie and me.
But I’m not one of them.
Captive, yes, but not in with them.
‘In with kuris,’ the guard said to me.
Sokurismust be what the dark ones call them, the word for the human captives in their language.
I might be one of them, I might not be. But either way, I do feel something for them.
A distant echo of pity.
Mainly because I feel it for myself.
