Scales And Feathers [HIATUS]

CHAPTER 13: RYU PART VII

Here's a sketch of Lucio. I have absolutely no idea why, but when I first put up this picture, it came out blue when the paper was white. It's fixed now. It didn't really affect the view of the drawing but... It just really bugged me.

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I was going to kill him.

above everything else while I was down in the dungeon, my anger was only second to the soul searing pain that seemed to be writhing about just beneath the surface of my skin. Unbearable didn't even begin to describe it.

I didn't know how long I was down there, but I'd given up hoping that the next wave of pain wouldn't come. Every time I blacked out I could only hope that I wouldn't open my eyes again, but even that seemed in vain. Every time I woke to the sight of the bare ceiling above me I would begin to hope that it was over. These hopes were dashed immediately when the next wave of pain crashed into my senses.

It felt as if someone had poured boiling hot water directly into my veins, and I just wanted to claw madly at my skin to let it out, but the thick metal bands securing my arms and legs close to the floor kept me from doing just that, exactly like he said they would.

As I floated in and out of consciousness for god-knows-how long, I could only feel despair for my situation and anger for those who caused it. What did he mean he 'poisoned my food'?! He said it like it was the most common thing to do to others! I couldn't imagined what I could have done to anyone to deserve the pain I suffered alone in that dark, cold, windowless room.

My throat hurt something horrible because I'd been doing nothing but screaming and thrashing madly in fits of pure agony. The shackles bit into my skin, and The back of my head throbbed from being slammed repeatedly into the cold, stone floor beneath my back. It got to the point were my consciousness seemed to split from my body and I barely registered my own actions; only the stinging pain in my throat let me know that I was screaming madly. My mouth tasted like blood. I must have bitten my tongue bloody, and by the feel of my aching gums, ground my fangs until they bled. Amazingly, I still had enough presence of mind to know that it wasn't normal to be so familiar with the taste of ones own blood. I couldn't help it though.

Ever since I started training, I'd somehow gotten used to being beaten and battered by the redhead, only to be told to pick up my sword and get to my feet. I didn't mind though. I liked sword fighting. It just felt right, even if I was tattered and exhausted afterwards. Maybe the exhaustion was the reason why I never realized it sooner.

The slight tingle on the tongue left by the broth, the way heat seemed to linger in the stomach, the way most of the others never seemed too enthusiastic when it came up to meal time, it was all there, but I was too naive to even consider something like that. Why would I? I trusted him. Look where it got me. Strapped to the floor of a dark, damp room suffering endless, unimaginable pain. I understood now why the other boys seemed to give the older seven a wide berth. It seemed they respected yet feared them deeply. I didn't understand how two groups of individuals could live in such close proximity, interacting every day but seem like complete strangers. They avoided the older boys like the plague when they could, especially the three look-alikes. Hell, they avoided me because I was always around the older ones. If I wasn't being brutalized by the redhead, I was having my head crammed full of information by the curly hair or mercilessly tortured and taunted by the straight hair.

I was far too new to this awful place to understand the older boys, yet I was avoided by the younger ones because they feared the older boys who hung over me like a dark shadow. I was set adrift all on my own in freezing waters with the older ones whom I've put my trust in keeping me afloat while I struggled to learn to swim. Of course I was angry when I was suddenly left to sink. So very angry. This is why in my few blessed moments of coherent thought I could only process rage.