Tʜᴇ Pᴀᴛʜ Tᴏ Hɪɢʜɢᴀᴛᴇs

Tʜᴇ Cɪᴛʏ Bᴇɴᴇᴀᴛʜ Yᴏᴜ

Cʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 33

12 marks the hour, 10 stands the day,
In depths of solitude, in midst of autumn,
A single tune, strumming astray,
A voice from behind the wall, ill sputum,
Spewing from a throat-torn, red suede,
In a world not written, no kingdom,
The hour depleted, 9 stands the day.

"(𝚈/𝙽)? Wake up."

Your eyes blinked open. Your nose scrunched as the morning light dilated your pupils.

You sat up, your hands automatically dragging through your stiff hair. Your lethargy slowly seeping through your pores, exiting your body like a mist.

"Get drezed (𝚈/𝙽). Ve have zings to do." A voice declared from the other side of the bed. Their tone assured- vivacious.

You turned to see that it was Reich. His body standing awkwardly at the other side of the bed, his eyes watching you intently. He didn't seem to understand that it was incredibly strange for him to be standing over you while you were sleeping. He seemed to be too preoccupied with his own excitement, as he bounced on the spot eagerly.

You raised a brow. "My God Reich, give me a minute to get up why don't you?" Muttered you, your hands grasping the covers as you spoke, before pushing them away. You then clutched the net that surrounded the bed and pulled it back so you could throw your legs over it.

Reich stood back, revealing the black body of Salem sitting by his feet.

You sat on the end of the bed, waiting for him to leave so you could begin to get dressed. However, the German stood there still. His eyes wide before his eyelids dropped by an inch, his brows furrowing. You looked at him weirdly. "Is zat mein Vaters schirt?" He asked inquisitively.

Your eyes fell down to the clothes you were wearing. You had completely forgotten that your makeshift pyjamas were just the Empire's spare shirt. You had forgotten how strange that was, sleeping in his clothes every night. Reich clearly found that strange, however, you thought nought about it.

Meeting Reich's eyes again, you deadpanned. "Get out so I can change." Reich huffed. Then turned to leave, a sauntering Salem following at his heels.

You sighed once the door slammed shut. You didn't sleep well last night, you didn't sleep at all really. Your brain was too wrecked with anxiety, your blood searing through your veins. Paranoia screaming in your head, telling you the Empire had seen the key in your palm. That he was aware of your theft.

It kept you up all night.

The domineering worriment that he would push his arm under your pillow, and realise that you had something you weren't supposed to.

It burned in your brain all night. Like a wick that hadn't quite fizzled all the way through yet. A candle melting slowly, its waxy body dripping through your mind. Alive and alight, steering your head through an exodus of fear.

Even as you began to get changed. You couldn't shake off the feeling that he somehow knew. That he had seen it concealed within your palm. He knew it was there; latent within his mind. Yet unseeable to his eyes, a vestigial thought that remained dormant until it flowered. Efflorescence within a squirming mass of chemical reactions between the gyrus of his brain.

And that was terrifying.

But it was baseless.

It was asinine.

He couldn't have known, for if he had, why wouldn't he have asked you about it? Why just ask to return to bed before slipping away himself? It was absurd to think he saw.