Lions and Lambs

Chapter 10

Sabine

Sometimes she woke up for the morning meal, other times she forgot, and still occasionally she found a stale piece of biscuit by her bed. Otherwise, she did not see Cassian. Her room probably began to stink after six days of keeping it shut tight with only her body to occupy the bed, and it certainly became ripe after a week and a half. Sabine's senses adapted though, and she noticed nothing.

Often she slept, but occasionally she stared at the bottom of Cassian's bed with wide open eyes until they stung and watered and she was forced to close them. Either way, it kept her thoughts quiet and dissuaded the whispers from attacking her when she was most unprepared.

The one time a day that she ventured out to eat dinner was like preparing for a battle.

Strap on the armor, lower her face mask, yet still the smells and sights and sounds bombarded her and blew her armor to shreds.

Guilty. Murderer. Fool. Naïve. Witch.

Often it tormented with simple words that bounced around in her head, caught between her ears like a game of Slaps between two competitive children.

No one is left, there is no one. You abandoned them, they abandoned you.

Occasionally it spoke in sentences that scourged deep inside her bones, carving out chips of marrow. Those days she could do nothing but shiver in bed; those days there was always a hard biscuit by her pillow.

Without the iron ring, Sabine might have started to believe that Cassian had only been a figment of insane hallucinations, and sometimes even the ring seemed like an illusion. On one of those such nights, at least a week and a half since she had first entered this room, he made himself appear, just enough to keep her from diving over the rail of the ship.

Sabine could tell from the shadows of the moon that it was almost midnight when the door to her quarters popped open with a sore groan. A familiar shape drifted into the room, only recognizable because of its indistinct outline. He looked taller for some reason, and the scraps of moonlight that did manage to enter their room seemed to be swallowed up by his presence.

Sabine sat up in bed ever so slightly to watch him pull a match from his pocket and light the untouched candle by their beds. It burst into existence with a gasp and the faint smell of sulfur.  It struggled to light the sharp planes of his face which Sabine now realized had darkened considerably since his time in the prison. He was just as beautiful as she remembered, only now the curves of him frightened her with some promise of violence.

She inched away, shielding her eyes from his terrible light. Suddenly, she became painfully aware of her sallow cheek bones and long tangled hair. She had never been very padded to begin with, but after barely eating these past days she was skeletal.

"What?" She hissed, her voice cracking from disuse. He arched an elegant eyebrow but drew away from her.

"So you are alive." His accented voice was cool with disinterest that stung her like nothing else could down here.

"Of course I am," but the words lacked any conviction.

Even his shrug was fluid, and it transformed into the next motion with the grace of a dancer. He placed the candle on the chest by their bed then climbed into the top bunk.

Sabine's heart froze mid-beat as she strained to hear every shift that he made. Silence fell on them like dust mites, and Sabine tried to keep her breathing as quiet as possible, afraid to disturb the air around them.

"Where have you been?" Her voice sounded sinful breaking this silence.

"On the ship."

Sabine didn't care enough to argue with his vague answer. She accepted it and closed her eyes, knowing with some deep instinct that this was the end of their conversation.

Murderer. Guilty. Hideous. Witch.

Whispers overwhelmed her, terrified her, but she couldn't get away- by the gods they were always there, and-

"Go to sleep." His melodic voice cut through the noise like a hot knife, and Sabine drifted off to the exulting sound of silence.