IMPERMANENCE

chapter forty - the walls

Thea led the group through the lengthy Guntheran dungeons. The others weren't surprised that Thea was able to find her way through the dark halls. Even when Zane had attempted to study as much as he could from Ivan's map, his memory failed him. Ivan couldn't have possibly marked the dungeons, they stretched for many acres underground, and getting out of them would be harder than perhaps saving Alessia.

Truthfully, Thea had no idea where she was going. She dug deep down into her gut and followed the senses of familiarity felt beneath her bones with every step. She would track Alessia and Ivan's scent like a beast scouring the earth for its prey. There were many twists and turns in the dark hall, and the lack of light seemed to help Thea more than she thought. She had navigated her way through whatever prison she had been locked in long ago and managed to do so in complete darkness. She could do it again.

This time Thea wasn't escaping, she wasn't running. She was heading full force into the heart of danger. The walls were narrowing, and it reminded her of her time in captivity. She was unable to track the days, unable to calculate how much of her life had been stolen from her. Meals were sent to her at sporadic intervals of time. There were no sounds, no sensory items to occupy her mind. She very well could have had full access to her vision, but because of the eternal darkness inside of those walls, it wouldn't have mattered. She couldn't remember how she got there.

She could only remember her name. Her name was Thea. She repeated it over and over again. She occupied her mind by reciting old lullabies that she couldn't remember the origins of. She would pace around the room to keep her body from physically giving out. She dreamed of the outdoors, the skies, the mountains, and the grass. She held onto clusters of past memories she knew she had. They contained no people, no faces; only landscapes.

She couldn't have been forgotten about because she was still receiving meals. She couldn't force herself to be upset or frustrated. Her brain was compromised and any negative thoughts would cost her dearly.

violence ahead

While her memories had been obstructed, Thea was no fool. When she saw a crack of light explode into her vision, she gravitated towards it. She tore at the stone walls to expand the gap. She had no concept of her own appearance, so predicting how long she had to pull apart sealed bricks in order to give her enough room to slither through would be difficult.

She was malnourished and thin, with hardly any skin on her bones. She could pinch her sides and tell. Whatever default meals she had been sent hardly helped her physique. Her routine paces around her confinements may have very well been the only reason she had stayed alive and sane. And the only reason why her legs were operative.

She tore at the rough material of the wall, making her nails break, bleed and throb. She tore for what seemed like hours, or days or months. There was really no way to tell.

When she deemed her escape hole sizable enough, she laid her body flat on the ground and crawled through. She remained as low as possible and sucked in a large breath to keep her body from expanding outward. The crawl was brutal, and the compressed walls made her stop multiple times before she could keep going; she had to keep going. The light was sensitive to her eyes, though there was barely any. Everything was brightened. She could feel everything but her own body. She slapped a hand over her eyes to block out the harsh light. Her bare feet had met a texture that tickled the bottoms of her soft toes. It was all too much, she was so sensitive to everything. She had no idea where she was. She could have resided on the edge of a cliff and she would've had no idea. She only ran. Her legs wobbled and her head pounded viciously. Everything inside of her told her to retreat back to safety and comfort, the place she had grown attached to because escape seemed so impossible. Where she was running to, she had no idea. Either way, death would be inevitable, and at least this way she could say she tried.