The orderly released my neck and walked over to the far side of the room, picking up a wood contraption and carrying it over.
He placed it in the bolts in the ground, locking it in just in front of me before grabbing the hair on my head and forcing me down.
My chin hit the smooth wood, my teeth grinding as he grabbed the other piece that was attached by hinges and swung it over, locking my head in place.
“I understand what you do here now,” I said through my teeth as they untethered the leather they had placed over the hole in the back of my straightjacket. It had been modified in such a way that kept my hands pinned tightly to my ribs but opened up the entire back when they needed it at will.
“Oh?” she asked, standing directly behind me.
I felt the cool air touch the still raw skin on my back. “You don’tfixpeople. You force them to see the world through your eyes. Live with your ideology, your beliefs.”
She laughed this cruel, deep laugh. “And I suppose your views are better.”
“My views have substance.”
“Hmm,” she hummed, “so do mine.”
I snarled but didn’t move. I wasn’t going to fight. Fighting against the torture was something we learned not to do. You wait, you watch, you endure, you study. Fighting only worsened the torture and got you no information in return. “Your god does not havesubstance.”
“My god? You say that as if he’s nottheGod.”
I stared at that jagged wall, forcing my body not to tense preemptively. “I’ve heard the speeches before, Elise. I’ve read the books, all of them. You cannot pick and choose which parts of which religion you want to follow. The way you puzzle together your own religion and tell me to believe is telling me that you should be the one in this position.”
“You don’t believe in anything, Azrael, that’s what got you here. Thou shalt not murder.”
So we were choosing the Christian god today. “‘He said unto them, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast astone at her.’’’ If you want to punish me for my sins, shouldn’t we first punish you.”
“Oh,” she laughed, “preachers don’t get punished, sweetie. We are of godly descent. Now, are you ready to obey?”
Here we go. “Never.”
“Very well,” she hummed.
I heard her right foot slide back. I heard the air shift when she lifted her right hand, and that’s when I braced my back for the whip as it came down, slicing my skin cleanly and with each strike, she yelled louder and louder. “Obey!Obey!OBEY!”
Present Day
I felt that familiar dark rage burn in my soul. I closed my eyes and shook my head before opening them again, letting the rage simmer as it had for just over a decade now.
Perhaps next week I would teach her how to brush her own hair.
I sat in my chair and leaned back, studying the way her dark lashes touched her cheekbones. Porcelain skin. She was kept inside her entire life. The sun had barely gotten the chance to see her in that house laced in black-out curtains and padlocks.
A queen that had been locked away by the evil of a world labeled Wonderland, filled with promises of fairytales and hope. I wondered how far she would have to be pushed in order to realize howfalsethe ‘Good Book’ truly was. I wondered how much I would have to teach her in order to make her seemyworld.
I angled my chin. A game wasn’t a game if we didn’t shift the story from time to time. “The pirates of the Jolly Roger have locked you away,” I ho-hummed, watching her still at the sound of a new tale. New to her. “If it’s a game you wish to play, then we must play it right. Wendy doesn’t just fight, does she? No, she bides her time and so must we all. The world is madness, littlesinner, and we must find the ticking clock lost deep within the crocodile before the Jabberwock with a hook for a hand comes to steal you away.” It was easy. I had lived within the madness of my own mind my entire life. Seeing thingstheynever could. Hearing things they were tooperfectto hear. I wasn’t sure how long this girl would last in my world, but perhaps, just for a breath, I wouldn’t be so alone within it.
She tapped a finger, her excitement clear in the way she did it.
Yes, she was strong. She had a darkness deep within her just waiting to bloom, but all this time the spades had been painting the roses white when they should have been painted red.
I had no problem fixing what they had shattered. No problem revealing to this world the bloodlust hidden within the silence they tried to drown her in.
I crossed one leg over the other. “We’ll need to get you your very own staff,” I told her. “A crown too. One made of silver and rubies.”
Her thighs shifted, drawing my attention down. She quickly adjusted herself and smoothed out her dress before dropping her chin to her chest and waiting.
A rule engrained into her soul. Don’t move unless told to move.
