Chronicles of Flames

Eighteen 🔥

She sat down quietly on the frigid bench at the corner of this confined space that smelt like a mix of everything that could be called disgusting.
It was too bad that her loveliest gown was about to be forever smudged with the stain of dust mixed with moisture which coated the bench an inch thick.
The dark, slimy walls in this claustrophobic place loomed extremely high and the tiny sounds of rats scampering around echoed.

It was already slowly getting dark and as the atmospheric lights dimmed, Ella could slowly feel every glimmer of hope she'd had in the few hours she'd spent alone in this dungeon flicker off.

Nothing she did, no position she crouched or shifted into, could shake off the immense dread that she now felt swimming in her blood.

It was definitely hopeless. Her fate was sealed. Knowing it was her father who ordered it, she knew she was going to pay a full price if she ever expected to come out of here alive.

A bitter sob rose up her throat and she let it out.

It seemed as if the demons in her mind had somehow resurfaced and were now clawing at her and suffocating her.

This is my mess. This was entire my fault.

She knew she deserved the punishment she was receiving. Why did she have to drag the wonderful people that had stepped in her life into this problem?

She could imagine the agitation of her brother, and more so Deborah. Mr and Mrs Layson, who knew most of her life's story would be at a loss of what to do.

She remembered Matthew and another sob, much deeply rooted, rose.
That short bliss she felt was now a shut and locked chapter.
She should focus on thinking of how to escape this place. But her mind was a vagabond, and when she recall how tenderly he had looked at and spoken to her, she couldn't stop the louder wail and bigger tears that wriggled out of her soul. The walls amplified the sound of her wailing and she felt as if her own voice was taunting her.

The monsters of her past were finally catching up with her. There was no more running and hiding.
Just why did it have to be here and now when everything was already becoming perfect again?

Ella didn't wish to cry, knowing it wouldn't solve anything, but she did anyway, having nothing else to do to ease her sorrow.

"Jesus," she cried. "I'm sorry. I am so sorry for messing up. I caused this."

You have been forgiven. A long time ago.

Her ears barely heard the whisper and she almost dismissed the voice as her imagination.
Comfort, like a warm thick quilt, like a steaming cup of coffee in a icy room, washed over her.
This was real. He was here with her. In storm or calm. Ella's eyes pooled as His love washed over her again.

A metal door clanged far above and echoed down the passage.
It startled her, reminding her of the fact that she was a lone soul abandoned here.

Those armed men hadn't taken her to the Ivory Police Station as she had been expecting.
The drive had been long and confusing. At a point, she almost feared that they were either lost or this men were professional crooks who'd perfectly lied just to kidnap her. However, the logo—an engraving of two opposite fluids that swirled in a circular arc— at the peak of the single-storeyed complex they led her into silenced all her doubts.

The place, she had cursorily observed as they shoved her in, was more or less a secret location. No one moved around that area and there was a thick covering of foliage which blended well with the green paint of the building.

The bars they put her behind was situated at the extreme end of the building, down spiral flight of stairs, possibly the basement.

Obviously, she was an hardened prime suspect and as such, she deserved to be kept by herself. The loneliness and cold down here was unbearable but there was nothing she could do about it because the men who brought her in didn't as much as speak a word to her since they apprehended her. All they did was file in reports and updates to an unknown authority on the other side of their sophisticated gadgets.