The Art of the Corset (2017)

Chapter Eleven- Those Who Gain From Lies

Doing her very best to resist the pain lingering on her ankle, Evelyn pulled herself to a stand and leveled upon the bars that caged her. With only the freezing floor beneath her feet, the iron that kept her as an animal, a sad excuse for a cot, and a bucket for her more intimate disposals, she found loneliness was her most common feeling. Throwing her head back in frustration, the persistent silence added to her growing madness as she began to feel claustrophobic in her own thoughts and the space around her. Allowing her head to rest on the cold bars, she let out a breath of defeat before hearing whistling coming from a diagonal direction.

"I would not fret, girl..." He spoke with a thick accent she had heard but once with a customer-Irish. "There is not much they can do until our sentence."

"I do not deserve to be here...I have done nothing but try to survive."

"Anyone can use an excuse such as that one. Brother draws dagger into his sibling's heart and claims he was attacking him first, potential king kills those in line before him to obtain the throne for himself-"

"There is no comparison to someone so demonic and myself..."

"I suppose you are here for one reason...the only reason a woman such as you ends up in here with a man like me. A woman of lust?"

"My lifestyle is not one I am proud to admit, but it is what I have had to do since my recent circumstances."

"I am the last soul that is righteous to judge...I can help you leave here..."

"If that is so, why have you not left by now?"

"I have nothing to go to...my entire family was slaughtered by the King. I was only left alive as he fears I have told others of what I know of him."

"Do you not fear death?"

"I fear only what I cannot see."

"What do you mean?"

Suddenly he came into light and she saw how the man had glazed over gray eyes that were similar to that of Marth's "father".

"I have not been able to see anything my entire life. But I fear only what I hear...as it is the most poisonous weapon of all."

"How could you tell I was here?"

"I can hear quite well. I know where someone is moving to and from. I can also smell your dying perfume. Something floral...I would be it was colored...red..."

"It was...You spoke of helping me..."

"Yes. There is a weak point within the bars. Push onto it properly, and it will come open, but you must leave quickly-for it is not a quiet route."

"Why are you helping me?"

"I do not know what it is that you have done to be here. But I can sense within your voice that you do not belong here. And although I have wickedness upon my soul, you should not have to pay the cost of another's ignorance or lack of compassion."

"Thank you." Following the man's instructions, she used all of her strength and pulled the bars until one began to wiggle greater than the others. Focusing upon that one, she rocked it back and forth, then started to twist it until it screeched through the surrounding area. Luckily, the specific piece of bar that was loose had been the one holding the door into place. With this placement, the door fell with a loud crash onto the floor, allowing her the sweet feeling of hope.

"There is something I ask of you. My family, they are marked with a stone near Belaire. If you could place flowers in my honor there, I would be grateful."

"It is the least I can do." She spoke as she thanked the man once more before disappearing from the dungeon beneath the coppers. Keeping to the darker parts of the building, she was able to slip out within a handful of minutes and appear belonging to the crowd. Breathing deep as she pushed through the deep pain of her foot, she eventually found her way outside a market and was able to snatch a few pieces of food before finding an awning to linger under as night began to fall. Closing her eyes for a mere moment, the actions that landed her in prison played through her mind as she recalled discovering the body at Madame Polly's. How Lilly herself told her mother that Evelyn had killed him-when the motive behind the lie was due to the fact Evelyn gained more men than any of the other women in the house. She was then beaten by the girls until she could not move on her own-and left in the cold as if she was a defenseless animal. Discovered by a cop, she was then thrown into jail as a solicitor of sexual favors.

The nightmare felt unreal as reality, but upon opening her eyes, and the pounding pain of her ankle-she discovered it to be true. Feeling dedicated to escaping the horrid town she found darkness to have swallowed whole, she returned to her stride and found herself near the edge of town, crossing a bridge between the wicked town and the woods. Just before stepping onto the bridge a thud was heard underneath her. Freezing in place, she believed to have imagined it due to lack of proper nutrition. But upon hearing it again, she angled her sight around the bridge and saw underneath had been a man dressed in regal clothing-sparkling with specks of gold and silver-even in the darkness, and another man dressed similar to that of a farm hand. The two appeared to quarreling as the smaller man held onto the other man's forearms with great intensity, but upon moving closer, she discovered there had been a romantic moment aside from a cruel one.

Not seeing same sex couples as an everyday occasion, she became flustered and upon climbing back to her route, fell upon a loose rock and landed in the river, to be seen by the love birds. When the man saw her, the couple broke apart from their embrace. They moved towards her as she was fading in and out of consciousness.

"Do you think she saw us?"

"I cannot be certain..."

The voices grew louder as they moved closer. "She is...covered in dust...And wounded from the hands of others...We cannot leave her here..."

"We cannot take her with us. If either one of us are seen away from our families-"

"She is terribly injured and my conscious would not be able to ease without caring for her."

"You choose what you like, I often wonder if you are able to acknowledge the difference between the right thing and the thing for pride."

"I do not have the patience for your philosophical jabs towards me. You either help me lift her, or scurry back to the horses."

The smaller man disappeared into the night as the older one remained near her. Calling out to her by using the word "miss", she only groaned as a response. Finding it that he had no other way, he picked her up in his arms and pulled her from the river and off the streets.