Serenity (Watty finalist 2013)

Hide and Seek

Serenity’s breathing had stopped. Her dark clothing blended her with the pitch black in perfect camouflage. Mr. Thorne couldn’t see her and she couldn’t see him, they might as well have been wearing blindfolds. For once she wasn’t the one bleeding; yet once again she was playing prey for Mr. Thorne.

It seemed like they were destined to play for endlessly until Death finally rode up on his white steed to claim their damned souls and even in death she doubted Mr. Thorne would let her rest. No, a man like him would haunt her for all eternity as hells torture for her. Serenity wouldn’t have been surprised if she had died along with Mr. Stone-her would be employer-on that night that seemed centuries ago and this was hell and Mr. Thorne was Satan.

She was torn between staying completely still or trying to walk around and risk running into him. It felt safer to stay still but at the same time the feeling of being watched and exposed crept over her and fed her the overwhelming feeling that staying in one place was bad. At the same time she knew any sound she made would alert Mr. Thorne and he’d be on her like a hound on a rabbit. She was utterly conflicted and indecisive.

The barely audible crunch of Mr. Thorne’s shoes could scarcely be heard and when it was, it was rare, and seemed to come from different parts of the room. Sometimes she would swear it was close, even when she knew that it was only her mind twisting reality. Once Serenity had heard his breath, ragged from blood loss, as they had been down here for what seemed like days on end, though it could only have been hours.

Serenity had not stabbed him in a particularly vital area but he had been stabbed all the same and was consequently leaking blood. Contrary to Serenity’s first impression, he was only human. The blood loss was weakening him and his own stubbornness to not tear his precious clothing, and give away his position because of the sound, would be his downfall.

Eventually Serenity would either be caught, and have God knew what done to her, or Mr. Thorne would have to give up or risk potentially death. He was tall but slender roughly six feet six inches and weigh in about one hundred and eighty pounds; Serenity estimated he could afford to lose up to five pints of blood before he died. Even if Mr. Thorne did give up on his hunt-which was unlikely-he would simply have to wait her out since Serenity could not stay down in the basement forever. Once again she was in a situation with seemingly no solution.

Again she wrestled with the prospect of moving or staying but couldn’t reach a definite conclusion.

Mr. Thorne advanced closer and closer. He could see or smell anything other than death but he knew she was close. It was almost like a sixth sense; one that alerted him whenever prey was near. He would have found her faster if his entire half wasn’t drenched in blood and wasn’t floating in and out of consciousness. The blood loss was starting to affect him, it was now or never.

Someone knocked on the door.

Mr. Thorne ignored it. Serenity was right in front of him now. His hand reached out to grab Serenity and it grazed against her loose hair.

Someone banged repeatedly on the front door.

They hadn’t knocked once, they hadn’t even knocked, they had rammed the side of their closed fist on his door. Mr. Thorne swallowed his anger and focused on the task at hand but when his fist closed it grasped air instead of a bundle of Serenity’s hair, she had moved.

The impatient knocker that had distracted him and motivated Serenity to move. The knocker attacked Mr. Thorne’s door again. He suppressed a swear word that was dancing along his tongue.

Serenity was trying to find one of the hidden exits. She knew they existed but the opportunity or desire to safely explore the basement had never arisen, now it was vital. The knocker seemed intent on getting an answer and might stick around. If Serenity could get out then she could tell the knocker to get help; since she was going to die anyway she might as well risk her life trying to expose Mr. Thorne, or if she was lucky the knocker would have a suitable pick.

Mr. Thorne heard Serenity moving despite her best efforts to stay covert and he prowled after her. The knocker had stopped but that wasn’t Serenity’s only problem. Now that she had started moving she could not stop or else Mr. Thorne would catch her. She ran blind into the unknown, not knowing what was in front of her, where Mr. Thorne was, or even which direction she was running in. For all she knew was running straight for a wall, there was no way of telling.

She crashed into a slanted bar that slammed across her chest and made her double over and exclaim in surprise. It was the staircase railing. Serenity hadn’t realized the speed she had been running at until the impact hit her and potentially bruised a rib. She struggled to recover from the blow and tried dragged herself back into a run.

A pale hand shot out from the darkness and grabbed a fistfull of her rusty hair. She was roughly yanked back with several clumps of hair being ripped out in the process. A pair of arms encircled her and locked her in human straight jacket.

“Caught you!” Mr. Thorne exclaimed gleefully. His voice sounded weaker than usual with less enthusiasm in it.

Serenity could feel his damp clothing and saw it’s shiny red tint to it. Without his hand to pressure the wound even more blood was seeping out. Serenity seized the opportunity to exploit his weakness and jabbed her fingers into open flesh wound. His grip loosened slightly from surprise and she broke free; his hold was weakened by the blood loss.

Serenity pushed out of his hands with too much force and was propelled onto the floor but Mr. Thorne did not try to attack her again. Mr. Thorne was not moving anymore. He was slumped on the stairs and painting them red. Serenity crawled a safe distance away for the sake of caution. She wasn’t sure if he was faking or being genuine.

The minutes crawled by and Mr. Thorne did not move. Serenity had to strain her eyes to the point of crying to make out his figure but she was certain he had not moved. Frankly it was staggering that Mr. Thorne had stayed conscious this long and reason told Serenity that he had indeed passed out. However, there was the fact that Mr. Thorne never followed reason, it simply did not apply to him. There was also the fact that Serenity needed to get keys.

“He’s unconscious,” Serenity whispered to herself. She got to her feet and took a tentative step forward. “He’s unconscious,” she repeated with her next step. The distance between them shrunk shorter and shorter. “He’s unconscious.” Serenity was less than an arm's length away; he could have reached out to grab her. Instead it was Serenity reaching out to stick her hand inside his pocket. “He’s unconscious,” Serenity assured herself when her hand slipped under his lapel.

The door opened. Serenity’s eyes narrowed from the sudden light source. In the doorway was a scrawny, dirty looking boy.

“Faber?” Serenity asked in disbelief.

“Miss Meadows,” Faber said. Even with Faber all the way at the top of the stairs Serenity could see the fear and tension wracking his body; he was visibly shaking and was as blanched as a sheet like he was going to be sick.

“Hide.”

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Sorry, I know it's short but it seemed like an appropriate place to stop (well maybe not for you guys) and my writting time has been getting cut short as of late so you will all just have to make due with chapters being a little shorter or later. It's out of my hands!