The Apprentice's Tale

Chapter One
*

Under the sky of purple and blue, beneath of where the sun shines, lays the path to the fallen city. No light nor laughter finds it's way down here; darkness echoes only with screams and cries of those lost or damned to spend their lives here. In the city's streets, no man in the right mind walks alone. Covered in branches filled with thorns, streets are made of ancient rocks, cracked and every here and there stained with what suspiciously reminds of blood, and in the shadows - that's what places where the candle light can't reach are called - await spider webs and creatures thirsty for fear and hungry for reckless souls.

In the end of the main street, when you pass the palaces of nobles, roofs of abandoned houses on which orphans had made their homes and tents of the nomads always looking for a better place both for living and illegal soul trades, you'll reach the Perimeter. You may pass, over the border of non-erasable marks on the ground and through gates guarded only by large and scary-looking plants, but, adventurous traveler, you must keep in mind never to drop your guard and to think twice before every step you make. For now you'll be entering the home of the Master, and who once comes in, they say, is never again allowed to leave.

Yet there you can see people inside the mansion's borders. You can see men and women in the garden of black roses, and you suddenly feel the urge to come in and join them, wondering if it can be that not all the Masters are the same. And the only thing stopping you, apart from the lessons you've learned before you knew to talk, is the silence. There's no voice or sound one so ever coming from the Master's estate, no matter how silent the street gets or how hard you listen.

It is, though, hard to concentrate, since the street around you never really gets silent. Just now, standing hidden in the crowd, you observe as the Queen's men hunt down some girl. She is the one to take the story on, the one we're interested in: barely in her twelfth, thin and darker skinned than most of the people you can see around - though that's not much of an accomplishment - and with eyes gray as mist under raven-black hair. She runs pretty fast, jumping over the things and people laying on the street as if she knows exactly where her next step will get her. Yet she stops in hesitation as she reaches the edge of Perimeter, looking back at the soldiers approaching.

There's a crowd preventing her from running back - she knows there's no way she could push her way through them fast enough - and although no one really likes the Queen men, she's sure no one would rush to save her either. No, she know there's only one solution, and she crosses the Perimeter. Yet those who persuade her don't stop - they're under orders and this young pray obviously is incredibly important - so she has no choice but to keep on running. She passes through the gates, under the plants resembling giant thorny hands, and turns around to face her hunters again. Only one of them follows her through the gates, his evil grin doing bad job at hiding his fear, and stops few steps away from her.

"Now, dear girl, it's the end of the road", he says, catching his breath between the words, "no point in going any further, so you better turn around and come with me fast."
"You have no right to order me around here", she says, somewhat desperately, as the figures recently walking around the garden suddenly come closer. She can feel the coldness and does her best not to shiver.
"I'm under the Queen's orders, little runaway." He smiles, looking at people around her. "You hope to find friends here, kid? You think they'll protect you? Look at them... They're no more than scam, gathered under the wing of a traitor claiming to be an angel."
She opens her mouth, hoping to find an answer, and discovers she can't move a muscle. Not even a moment later, the hunter's skin turns darker. She watches as he becomes more and more reddish, until slowly cracks start appearing all over his body, and his eyes turn in the color of the fire.
"Now", says gently the voice behind her, as if he's a bit bored, "you can say we're strange - I may even get over the 'scam' part... But calling the Master an angel is just insulting."

Queen's hunter suddenly bursts into flames, burning from the inside as if he's swallowed fire. He reaches his hand to the girl, and she takes a quick step back - again able to move - almost falling in the hands of the man standing behind here. She feels his hand, cold as ice and stronger than she'd ever expect, holding her around her neck, and she finds herself struggling for a breath.
"The man was offensive, but told the truth", he whispers, "You'll find nor help nor compassion here, it was stupid to come."
"Sanctuary", she whispers, trying to move his hand, "I claim sanctuary."
He lets her go, although with a somewhat dark expression on his face, and then just turns around and leaves, entering the mansion.
*
That girl never again left the Perimeter's borders. Her name was Evangeline, and she was eleven when her hunters forced her to put her life and soul in the hands of a Master and his Apprentice.
That girl was me.

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(note: It is a project of mine I just recently started, challenged by a friend to write a dark story with a lot of unpleasant events that people will like nevertheless. It's not finished yet, though I have the concepts for all the stories from the series. Oh, and please don't forget that English is not my first language, so there lays the reason why some sentences are constructed in a weir way or such - I'll be more than happy to learn how to change it wherever it's the case, though)
Aria