Living in Darkness (Bloodbreeders) (21 page)

Once again, my question went unanswered. Garvin and
Tanda
looked at each other briefly, then reached down and picked me back up. They
carried me several feet until we came to a large solid door that appeared to be
formed from iron, or some other type of metal that resembled iron. Garvin reached
out with his free hand, and pulled up on the bar that held the door locked, swinging
it open. Inside, I saw nothing, it was completely pitch black, but the smell
that flowed from the open door was more than just revolting. It was
overwhelming horrendous, making everyone
turn
their
heads. The stench emitting from the dark opening made my last encasement smell
like daisies. I gagged several times, turning my head as far as possible away
from the door. I noticed that
Tanda
had her hand
firmly pressed to her nose and mouth, in a futile attempt to mask the odor. Through
her hand,
Tanda
instructed me to hold on tight.

“It’s a long way down, Miss,” she said.

Garvin removed a torch from the wall outside the door, and we began to
slowly make our way down the slime covered stairs. I tried to make out what was
below me, but all I could see were the few slick, black steps that we were
descending. After several minutes, just when I thought I couldn’t hold on any
longer, mentally as well as physically, we finally reached the bottom. They
lowered me down, sitting me carefully on the bottom second step.

“It’s time,” Garvin said. “We must set your feet before we place you in
the hole.”

“You can scream, Miss,”
Tanda
said
sympathetically. “No one will know what we are doing. You can’t hear anything
this far down.”

“Will you please answer me one thing before you start?” I pleaded.

Garvin looked to
Tanda
, then back to me, and
reluctantly gave a sharp nod.

“Why are you helping me?”

Garvin took a deep breath, and let it out slowly.

“Enrique hurt my sister the same way he tried to hurt you. I was
chained to a wall and forced to watch. There was nothing I could do.”

He lowered his head, as if ashamed, and started to turn away.
Tanda
reached out and took his hand. Her eyes were filled
to the brim with tears, when one slowly ran down her cheek. Garvin looked up,
with an apologetic tilt of his head, wiped the tear from her face. It was only
then that I realized it was
Tanda
that he had been
talking about.

“You’re brother and sister?” I asked softly.

“Yes, Miss,”
Tanda
said, squeezing Garvin’s hand gently.

 
That must have been hell for them
, I thought. I couldn’t even start
to imagine what I would have done if that had been my sibling. Garvin pulled
his hand back from
Tanda
, and thrust them into his
pockets.

“Are you ready? If we are gone too long, Annabel will become
suspicious,” he said. I knew he was right, but I think more than that, he
wanted to do anything to clear his mind of those horrible memories.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” I said with a sigh. “Let’s get this over with.”

He pulled his hand from his pocket, revealing a small plank of wood. “Put
this in your mouth and bite down.” I took and placed it between my teeth. I
watched as he positioned himself by my right foot, the less damaged of the two.
He looked up at
Tanda
, and told her to hold me down. “On
three,” he said. “One... two... three,” He pulled and twisted my foot
simultaneously, realigning the broken bones. I threw my body back in agony, and
screamed. The piece of wood that I had been biting down on flew from my mouth,
landing in the muck. I covered my eyes with my hand, panting, before I burst
out crying. Garvin picked up a piece of debris from the floor, and bound it to
my ankle using the cloth from my gag, forming a makeshift splint. He moved next
to the left foot, and asked if I was ready.

“No... Please... I can’t take anymore...” I wheezed.

I was getting ready to tell him to leave it, when he yanked it around,
setting the bones back into place. The wound opened back up, sending fresh
blood down my foot and onto the floor. I screamed and grabbed hold of
Tanda
, collapsing into her arms, sobbing.

“I’m sorry,” Garvin said sincerely. “I had to do it. If you had let
them heal that way, they would have reset them when you came out of the hole,
and it would have been much worse.” He splinted my foot using more debris and
the leather strap he had removed from me earlier.

“It’s true, Miss,”
Tanda
said, gently wiping
the tears from my face. “I’ve seen it done.”

I nodded in recognition, not yet able to speak. They gave me a moment
to compose myself, and then told me we had to proceed. Garvin walked a few feet
ahead of where I sat and pulled open another large metal door. He came back
over, and he and
Tanda
lifted me from the step, trying
their best not to drag my feet.

“I’ll carry you from here,” Garvin said when we reached the open door.
“The hall is too narrow for the three of us to pass at the same time.”

Garvin lifted me up, cradling me in his arms with ease, showing he was
very strong, despite his frail slender frame.
Tanda
walked ahead of us, carrying the torch to light our way. We passed several
short doors made of the same type of iron as we moved down the dark humid hall,
until Garvin eventually stopped in front of one.
Tanda
pulled the heavy door down toward herself, after sliding the latch on top of
it, and then Garvin walked past her, stepping on the door and having to squat
down to carrying me inside. He bent further down, and sat me on the thick
covered floor as gentle as possible.

“They’ll come for you about once every two months,” he said. “I beg
you, please, do not fight them. It will only result in you being left down here
longer.”

“One day I’ll repay you both for being so nice to me.” I let out a
small laugh, and said, “That is, if I’m alive to do it.” Garvin nodded his
head, never returning the smile, but
Tanda
gave me a
pitiful grin, as they turned to leave.

“Has anyone ever escaped and lived to tell about it?”

“Only one, Miss,”
Tanda
said looking up at
Garvin. “Think on things that made you happy once, not on things that can never
be Renee.” Then Garvin reached down and lifted the door back in place, leaving
me only with the sound of the latch sliding into place.

With the door closed, I could see absolutely nothing. It was black as
coal, and even when I held my hand in front of my face, I couldn’t make out so
much as its outline. I began feeling around with my hands on what little floor
there was to explore. The ground was wet, but not like in my usual cell. It wasn’t
like water at all. It was a thicker substance, almost the consistency of
pudding. I kept sliding my hands through the blackness until I touched
something hard. Instinctively, I jerked my hand away from the object, but after
the initial shock was gone, reached out to feel for whatever it was. The object
was round and firm; I rolled it around with my hand, and noticed there was
something soft attached. Curious, I picked it up in both of my hands to further
investigate. I quickly realized what I was holding; it was a skull, a human
head with bits and pieces of the rotting flesh refusing to give up their
rightful place. With a guttural moan of disgust, I chunked the skull away from
me as hard as I possibly could. It was only then that I understood that the putrid
substance, in which I was lying, was the decaying remains of the slaves that
never made it out of here.

The thought was too much to handle. I rolled to my side and leaned
against my closed fist, and dry-heaved. When my body calmed, I scooted myself
back against the wall, mentally and physically exhausted, and the same thought
that had entered my mind many times since my capture crossed it once more.
How could this madness go on and it not be
known? And how could those that know, not do anything to try
and
stop it?

Chapter 17

I lay there in the dark with no way of knowing how much time had
passed, for what seemed to be an eternity. All that I had to keep me sane was
my memories of home, and my
ever present
wish that
someone would save me from this unimaginable hell. It didn’t matter what
memories I started with, my mind seemed to always travel back to thoughts of
little Johnny and my family. What had happened after they found his lifeless
body? How was Mother handling it all? How would she handle it if she knew that
it was I, her darling Renee that was responsible for her youngest child’s
death? The guilt of Johnny’s demise still weighed heavily on my mind. If I had
only listened to Martin, none of this would have ever
come to
pass
.

One night, while I lay in the festering matter, I heard the door
unlock. Slowly it opened, revealing Garvin standing on the other side. The
light from the torch he held was blinding. I held my arm up to shield my eyes
from its brilliance.

“How are you, Miss?” Garvin asked. I gave him a look that said
'How do you think
?'
which made him drop his gaze momentarily. “I have come to
take you to feed.”

“I won’t. Please, just leave me alone,” I said, turning my head away
from him.

“I’m sorry, but you must. I have been ordered to bring you to Annabel.”
He entered the small room on bent legs, squatting beside me. “They seemed to
know you would refuse a regular feeding. You are to be force fed.”

When I didn’t make any attempt to move, Garvin scooted around behind
me, and slowly began to lift me up. There was a sickening sound as my body
pulled away from the thick grime on the floor. He picked me up under my arms, dragging
me from the room backwards.

“Can you stand? How are your feet?”

“I can move them, but I have no idea if I can stand,” I replied.

“Of course, I wasn’t thinking. I'm going to stand you up. Hold on to
me.”

He lifted me off the floor like a child then lowered my feet to the
floor slowly. The pain was sharp, and I was very wobbly, but I could stand.

“Try to take a few steps,” he said.

I did as he asked, and I was amazed that I was still able to use my
feet after the damage they had acquired. “That is very good. They seemed to
have healed correctly. We must remove the splints before we go any further. It
would be very bad if Annabel, or anyone else, were to find out we gave you
aid.” I could tell from his tone that he was worried about what I might say
once upstairs. He knelt down, and began to remove the makeshift splints.

“How long have I been down here?” I asked tentatively.

“It has been more than six weeks,” he replied.

“And I guess once they force feed me, I’ll be brought back down, won’t
I?”

“Yes, Miss,” he looked down, avoiding my gaze.
 
“They could keep this up for years if the
Mistress wished it...” he then paused. “Or until your life has expired.”

“Then why don’t they just kill me and get it over with?” I asked,
becoming frustrated. “Why prolong it, what are they waiting for?”

“Because if the Mistress really wanted you dead, she wouldn’t have
ordered that you be fed.”

We continued down the hallway, and soon reached the steps that led
upstairs. The ascent went slowly. Each step I took shot daggers up my leg,
making me weigh heavily on Garvin for support.

“Can I carry you, Miss?” he asked. “Your body is weak, and it is the
only way I can think to help.” It took me a few minutes to answer him. I knew
of one way he could help me, but I knew getting him to talk would be a hundred
times harder than climbing these stairs.

“Thank you, but after lying on my back all this time, I think I need to
walk,” I finally concluded, then stopped him as we approached the top of the staircase.
“I need to ask you something. Do you know how that person escaped?”

It was obvious he was taken aback. He began to shake his head in
denial, but I could tell from the look in his eyes that he knew more than he
let on.

“Please? I have to get out of here. Someone has to do something.” He
turned as if to move farther up the stairs, so I grabbed him by the shoulders
and shook. “Don't you see this has to stop? What about
Tanda
?”

He looked at me in shock, but I may as well have sprouted a new head,
because I clearly wasn’t getting through to him. “Please, you're the only one
that can help me. I'm begging you Garvin, help me.”

“This will never stop,” he said desperately. “It has gone on for
hundreds of years. It is you who must see that this is what it is, and you must
do your best to survive.”

Survive?
Is that what
he’s calling this form of life
?

“Don’t you think there is a better way to survive than to live in this
horrid place? You have to want more than this, if not for you, then for your
sister.”

I must have struck a nerve, because his eyes shot up to mine angrily.