Hey there. Here's Chapter One.
Cale stirred. He opened his eyes slowly, his head still spinning from the Elder’s attack. A strong, putrid smell hit him. Cale tried to move but his hands had been tied behind his back. The other parts of his body had been left alone, but Cale had a feeling that they wouldn’t be that way for long if he was stuck wherever he was. His heart started beating fast as he realized he had been thrown into a room he’d never seen or heard of before. The walls were made of rotting wood and termites were crawling around. Being in this room definitely wasn’t a good thing, he thought. He spotted a rotting body a few feet away from him. Cale recoiled in horror. “Be still, my heart,” he whispered to himself. The stench made him sick, and he was starting to panic. He felt the thick linen rope as he leaned against the wall. The sounds of the feast bounced off the walls. It was taking place nearby. Cale listened closely.
The sounds of clanging forks and spoons filled his ears. The other elves in the village were eating, but something wasn’t right. It was quiet apart from that. The Elder’s birthday should be something celebrated. “Well, if you minus out the part where I got attacked,” Cale sighed. His heart was still racing and he felt uneasy, but he ignored it. He wondered how Tendra would react when he went home later on. He would be sent home eventually, right? For some reason, he had a very bad feeling about what was going to happen. His black jacket was dirtied with the dirt from the room’s floor. Cale licked his lips and tasted something sickeningly sweet. It was probably blood from when he hit the ground earlier on, he thought, remembering the Elder slamming him to the ground. He felt blood rush to his face. He felt anger, confusion and embarrassment all at one go.
He wanted to know why the Elder attacked him. He went into the humans’ realm by accident. He hadn’t meant to disobey the Elder. The man was a respected figure in the village, and he would never dream of defying him. The Elder was normally a calm man, so why had he reacted the way he did? His eyes had been wild, like he was possessed. “It’s just...” he muttered under his breath, “so—“
“Weird?”
Cale recognized that gruff voice. He shivered. He didn’t dare look up. “Look at me, Cale,” that voice commanded. Slowly, Cale lifted his face to see the Elder looking intensely at him. The old man looked terrifyingly strong, and Cale could vouch for his strength. He had experienced it first-hand. The Elder smirked, “You’re not going home, ever, in case you’re wondering.” Cale’s breath hitched in his throat. Those words made him feel sick. The Elder surveyed his face with satisfaction, “But you’re not going to die either, unlike this poor man right here.” He pushed the rotting body with his left foot, giving it a look of disgust.
Cale gulped. His breaths were shallow. His stomach was knotted. “What’re you going to do to Tendra?” he almost whispered. The Elder snorted, “Nothing. She doesn’t even know what you did.”
“What do you mean? I walked into the humans’ realm by accident, I swear.” A drip of sweat fell on Cale’s pants.
“You didn’t have any contact with humans?” The Elder rubbed his chin.
“No, I didn’t, sir.” Cale felt a little more at ease saying that. Hopefully, the Elder would believe him and let him out of this room. He could go back to Tendra, receive a scolding, and that’ll be all. His life would return to normal. Not this mess he was experiencing.
“I know you didn’t.”
“Then why am I here, sir? Please let me out of here. I swear to stay away from the marsh if you will it.”
The corners of the Elder’s lips turned upwards, “Of course I’ll let you out from this room. I just need to attend the feast first.”
With that, the Elder turned and walked out, closing the wooden door behind him.
Cale let out a sigh of relief. He wasn’t out of this mess yet, but he was going to be let out from this place. That was a start. He spent the next few minutes thinking about what he would tell Tendra when he got home. He would emphasize the fact that it was all just an accident and misunderstanding. That would calm her down. Cale had seen and heard Tendra going hysterical when the Elder attacked him. Thoughts filled his head and soon, he fell asleep. The day’s events had exhausted him.
The door swung open and the sudden gush of wind woke Cale up with a start. The Elder stood there, with a knife. Cale forced a smile, “Thank you, these ropes are starting to hurt, sir.”
“Who said anything about cutting those ropes? We’ll come to that later.”
Cale looked at the Elder with disbelief, “Pardon me, sir, but you said you were going to let me go. Why can’t you release me from these ropes now?”
Right after he said that, the feeling of cold metal against his neck sent chills down his spine. “Listen to me,” the Elder said, “and I’ll let you go. Walk.” The Elder pulled Cale up from the ground.
Cale couldn’t say anything. He was at a loss for words. What was happening? He walked out of the room, his eyes darting from side to side. This place wasn’t the Elder’s home. He had been in it before. The corridor was lit with candles on the ground. In the Elder’s home, there were no corridors. There were two rooms, one of which was a main room where Tendra, Lyn and him ate together every night. The Elder would join them sometimes. Cale wondered where Tendra was as he walked towards a door at the end of the corridor.
“Walk.”
The Elder’s voice brought him back to the realization that something bad was happening at the present moment. The door had been opened by the Elder. Cale took a few steps forward into the cold, dark night. How much time had gone by while he was stuck in that room? It had been about noon when he had gone to the feast.
Cale looked around the village. Nobody was out. Not a single house was lit, and the whole village was deafeningly silent. It was strange. Normally, there would be the noise of laughter and mothers nagging at their children for playing too late into the night. The Elder’s voice gave him a fright, “I told them to not come out of their houses. Unlike you, they listen to me.” Cale opened his mouth to say something but closed it shut after remembering the knife against his neck.
They were headed towards the marsh, Cale realized. Was it so that the Elder could kill him without anyone seeing? No, it wasn’t. The Elder could’ve killed him in the room earlier on if he wanted to. There was only one other reason. Cale’s spine tingled. The knife was taken away from Cale’s neck.
Cale tried to run but in an instant, he was knocked to the ground by the Elder. Cale struggled to breathe. He tried to fight off the Elder however, Cale’s tall and lean physique was still no match for the Elder. The Elder picked him up and threw him on the ground like a ragdoll. Cale writhed in pain. His mind was growing hazy, just like the mist surrounding him. Cale spotted a lady in the distance. Her blonde curls and thin physique were unmistakably Tendra’s, the woman he had fallen in love with the moment he laid eyes on her. He could hear her sobbing in the distance. It was heart-wrenching. Cale struggled to keep his eyes open. He wanted to call out to her, to tell her that everything would be alright. That all this was a just a bad dream.
“Oh, how I wish it was,” Cale’s last thought drifted across his mind as the sight of Tendra in the distance faded to black.
