Question: Have you guys been able to see the photos I've been putting at the beginning of chapters? If not I'll put them at the end of this chapter.
"When you cannot look on the bright side, I will side with you in the dark."
ESARA STARED UP AT THE HIGH CEILING OF THE ROOM. She wondered what the purpose of it was. Surely it wasn't functional to make the roof so high, it had to have been hell to clean.
She'd come to the conclusion that it was either to show off wealth, or to give the unnecessary impression that they were not inside.
She didn't like it, the breathing room. She'd spent so long sleeping in small, cramped spaces where rocks dug into her skin that this place felt so...empty. Usually, she could not even hear her own breath over the strangled respire of the people around her.
Yet now, Esara's own breathing echoed around her as though she was in some hollowed out void.
She could not seem to shut her eyes, only finding the strength to stare up at the high marble ceilings from where she layed on the floor. Unable to calm her erratic heartbeat no matter how much she tried to steady her breathing or force her thoughts elsewhere.
Overwhelmed was an understatement as to how Esara felt, and it didn't help that Celaena seemed so ecstatic by the prospect of freedom. Though the girl's had yet to have a moment to speak alone, Esara could see it in the blonde's eyes. The eagerness, the excitement.
And to an extent, Esara shared the feeling. Rationally, she knew this was good. This was great. It wasn't as though she was unhappy.
But...she supposed she could categorize herself as fearful.
She had been pushed into a world of change without so much as a warning, and the black-haired woman could not seem to wrap her head around it all. Suddenly, she was sleeping in a room, and not beneath thick rock. Suddenly she was scrubbed clean after being roughly bathed by brutish servants. Suddenly the wounds on her back, although throbbing, weren't at risk of infection.
Esara had not felt so clean in years, and it felt like someone had just stripped her of her unbreakable armor. She felt bare. Exposed. Even more so when she hadn't even recognized the room she'd been pushed into.
Esara had taken one look at the lush, silk bed and felt her hands had begun to shake. She hadn't so much as even laid in it. No, no, it had been far too daunting a task to even consider.
She had not slept in a bed so lavish for even longer than she had been in the Mines. Ten years perhaps? More?
That had been around the time she and her brother had been left to their own devices, providing for themselves. Two young kids on their own couldn't afford something so extravagant as the room Esara lay in now.
She missed Celaena. And that fact made her hands shake even more because she felt like some dependent child.
Honestly, she just wanted her friend by her side so she didn't feel so alone.
Her hands were firmly tucked at her side, and Esara didn't dare move them. She had not so much as looked at her wrists since Captain Westfall had taken off her shackles. Hadn't found the courage yet. She didn't want to see the nasty scars on her wrists, and she didn't know how to use the freedom of not having something restricting her every movement.
Gods, she wasn't just scared, she was terrified. And it was all she could do to stop her own tears from falling.
Esara hated that even more than feeling like some child. Because she was not this weak. She just was not. She had been through things that would make grown men soil their pants. She should not be crying over something so trivial as this.
That thought was sobering.
And although she knew she would not be able to get rid of her fear for...a while, she decided right then and there as she lay on the polished floor that she would not fuss. She would not act like some insolent, lonely child and become a burden to her friend's newfound freedom.
So Esara took a breath. Took two. Three. And forced her feelings into the darkest crevice of her mind.
She would not be weak.
⚔️
When Chaol and Celaena came to fetch her the next morning—the blonde looking at the Captain of the guard like she'd prefer to slit his throat—the captain of the guard scrunched up his face.
It was Celaena that noted, "You too?"
Esara was mildly confused as to what the blonde was talking about as she sat up from the floor. She tried not to think about the feeling of her unbound hand, it was far too unfamiliar to handle, let alone relish in.
"The floor." Celaena elaborated as she stepped into the room as though she owned the place.
Esara tried not to let her embarrassment show as she pulled herself from the stiff ground, the familiar, painful ache in her joints a small comfort in a new world.
Although she felt slightly abashed about it, Esara just shrugged, looking straight at the Captain of the guard as she drawled, "I do as I wish."
Esara turned her head to look at Celaena, not bothering to gauge the Captain's reaction to her words as she watched her friend practically sashay across the room and toward the windows Esara had kept firmly shut all night.
Esara didn't bother concealing herself as she walked over to where her fire stood. The yards of fabric they called a nightgown covered her enough.
But she stopped walking for a moment when she noticed what the blonde was looking at. Esara beheld the sunlight as it seeped through the cracks of the drapes. Pure, fresh, warm sunlight.
Such a strange thing it was, that crack of light. It was so little yet so much.
Gingerly, Esara watched Celaena stretch out a hand. The blonde's hand was pale, almost skeletal, much like her own.
Esara watched as she ran to the window and nearly ripped the curtains from their hangings as Celaena opened them to the gray mountains and bleakness of Endovier. The guards positioned beneath the window didn't glance upward, and Esara gaped at the bluish-gray sky, at the clouds slipping on their shoes and shuffling toward the horizon.
She wondered why Celaena had taken such action in Esara's room rather than her own, but quickly remembered that Celaena's room was opposite her own. Facing West rather than East. The morning sun did not shine in Celaena's room as it did in Esara's.
Esara's lips did not peel into a smile as Celaena's did, no, she was too busy gaping at the horizon.
She could not seem to stop gaping even as the servants braided her hair so that it fell along her back and dressed her in a surprisingly fine riding habit that concealed her miserably thin form. Esara took a moment once they dressed her to pinch some of the fabric between her fingertips, feeling the finery with a ghost's hand.
And the fabric was fine. Gods, it felt wrong to be touching such an expensive parcel of clothing—let alone wear it. Still, she did not fuss. She did not voice her fears or her troubles. She said nothing other than her thanks to the kind servant's for their effort.
You are not weak, she reminded herself as the fear threatened to take hold. They cannot break you. Not unless you let them. And although there wasn't necessarily a them to speak of at the moment, the mantra she'd spoken for years brought her a semblance of security.
Esara hadn't dared look in the mirror once she'd been dressed. She was not ready for that yet. The last face she'd seen when she'd looked at her reflection was that of a young girl no older than fourteen.
But she knew when she looked in the mirror next, Esara would not be the girl she remembered.
It hadn't taken much for her to be dragged out of her room—she'd wanted to get out of there anyway. It was far too quiet.
It was not the Captain that led her out of her room but rather a different royal guard—meaning that either Celaena and Chaol were late, or they were very early. Esara placed her bets on the former. The blonde had a tendency to dilly dally.
The halls opened up into a large antechamber Esara remembered from when the Captain has first brought her here. A large door sat at the edge of the room, growing larger and larger as she made her approach. And the gargantuan room opened up into the large, dead courtyard.
Esara had done so well this morning, been so good about concealing her fear and not being a burden.
But all of that faltered as she beheld the mounds of bone-colored rock at the far end of the compound, and the small figures working within the many mouthlike holes cut into the mountains.
Work had already begun for the day, work that would continue without her when she left them all to this miserable fate. Her stomach clenching, Esara couldn't bring herself to avert her eyes from the prisoners.
She just stared. Even when she was sure that the guard accompanying her was calling her name, ordering her to move.
Esara wondered when those slaves would get to see the sun as she was now able to. She wondered if they would ever be given the chance to eat another feast, or draw on something other than the dust coating the ground.
She wondered if they would ever step out of those mines again.
How could she leave them? She could not. She could not just leave them to die. To rot within the jagged stone.
It was not right—
"You seem to be having quite the inner turmoil." A voice spoke, and it was with a degree of familiarity in their voice that Esara drew her golden eyes away from the many mouths of the mountain.
She gave no reaction to the prince standing before her, nor the many guards standing at his back.
She didn't bow, she didn't smile. She just stared at him blankly, not deigning to reply to his question.
At the silence from her, the Prince quirked a brow. "You don't seem very delighted to see me."
Esara finally answered, turning away from the prince and beginning to walk the way her own guard had been herding her toward since she'd stopped walking, "I don't see why I should be."
The Prince took her walking as a sign to follow, coming up to her side as they walked through the courtyard. She tried not to look anywhere else but ahead of her, lest she decide turn and sprint for the mines.
He chuckled, "Typically, when someone frees another from a life of servitude, there is some sort of thanks involved."
She nearly scoffed at the word servitude. What an understatement.
"You did so for your own gain." Esara replied, inclining her head slightly toward him, but not looking at the Prince. "Why should I thank you for helping yourself?" If he really wanted her thanks, he should have freed more of them. And for reasons that weren't for his own purposes.
Esara knew that if she looked over he would have a grin on his face. "It worked in your favor, didn't it?"
She couldn't argue there. Esara grumbled anyway, "I still don't see how that should garner my gratitude." She did. She just didn't feel like thanking the son of the man who had done this to all of them. Although the King hadn't done this to her, she still held a grudge.
A caravan of horses came into her view at the edge of the wall, and it was a struggle for Esara to keep her feet moving.
Yapping filled the air, and three black dogs sprinted from the center of the caravan to greet them. They were each sleek as arrows—undoubtedly from the Crown Prince's kennels. It had been a very long time indeed since Esara had seen a dog, and despite her sour mood a burst of something like joy nagged at her.
She knelt on one knee, her aching joints protesting as she cupped their heads and stroked their smooth hair. They licked her fingers and face, their tails slashing the ground like whips. Essara didn't care that the prince was beside her, why would she? He'd have stopped her if he didn't want her petting his pets.
Dogs were such loving animals. Esara had always wanted one as a child, but the circumstances never gave her leeway to actually own one.
She heard the Prince's boots shuffle beside her, and Esara lifted her gaze to the sapphire eyes of the Crown Prince. He smiled slightly. "How unusual for them to notice you," he said, scratching one of the dogs behind the ears. "You don't have food in your pockets, do you?"
She shook her head. "I'd never be so scandalous as to dirty the pockets of these clothes by stuffing food in them."
He snorted. "Are you fond of dogs?" asked the prince.
She thought for a moment, wondering if she should answer at all. "I don't know."
"You don't know?" He asked amusedly.
Esara settled him with a look. "I've been here for five years, remember? It's not as though I've had much time to play with pets."
"Right." the Prince said, and Esara could have sworn he looked a bit regretful as he said the words. Her lack of sleep must've been getting to her head, because surely there was no way she'd seen regret in the Prince's gaze.
Just as the Prince opened his mouth to say something else, the dogs began yapping again, sprinting off toward someone else.
Esara turned, watching as Celaena and the captain approached. Just as Esara had, Celaena bent down to pet the dogs with a jubilant smile. Esara thought her friend looked like it was Yulemas morning and she was just about to open her presents.
The blonde stayed there for a moment, before jaunting over to Esara with a grin. Esara could tell how excited she was simply by the glint in her eye. "How was your first night of freedom?"
Of course, Esara would not bring down her friend's mood by telling her that Esara could not sleep a wink and felt like crying for most of the night. So she simply flashed her friend a mischievous smile, "I could get used to that." Esara lied, adding a dreamy sigh into the mix. "A little peace and quiet did me wonders."
Celaena's grin turned into a smirk, "Sick of my snoring, are you?"
"You've got no idea." Esara snorted. "How was yours?"
"Extravagant." Celaena mused, before her voice took on a thoughtful edge. "It's very strange now." Esara knew what she meant.
"It is." She agreed quietly, wishing the dogs were here so that she might give her hands something to do.
"Let's go." The gruff voice of Chaol Westfall interrupted, and the two women turned their heads. The Captain looked annoyed, and Esara wondered what hell her friend had given him on their way here.
Two piebald mares were led forward, both saddled and ready to ride.
Esara felt another burst of nerves speed her heartbeat. She hadn't ridden in years...well...she hoped it was just muscle memory at this point.
Celaena mounted, swiftly followed by Esara.
The sky came closer, and it stretched forever above her, away and away to distant lands she'd never heard of. Esara gripped the saddle horn as if her life depended on it. Not only because she feared for her life atop the mare, but because everything suddenly became more real.
She was truly leaving Endovier. All those hopeless months, years, the freezing nights, the dark weeks spent in the pits...gone. She breathed in deeply as panic flitted across her skin.
But her panic paused as she felt iron clamp around her arms.
She did not feel the ire she thought she would, nor betrayal or panic.
Esara felt comfort with the shackles around her wrists.
At the least she knew the shackles were predictable. She knew what that felt like to have the shackles rubbing on her skin painfully, and the metal cut into her pale skin.
Esara felt secure with iron clamped around her arms.
It was Chaol that fastened her bandaged wrists into shackles. A long chain led to his horse, where it disappeared beneath the saddlebags. One look at her friend told Esara he'd done the same to her.
He mounted his black stallion, and Esara considered leaping from her horse and using the chain to hang him from the nearest tree despite the sense of security he felt with the chains on. He could have given her some warning, or asked, or done anything other than the brutish way he'd chained her again.
It was a rather large company, twenty all together. Behind two imperial flagbearing guards rode the prince and the man that had pushed her to the ground yesterday—Duke Perrington, his name was, if Esara recalled correctly. Then came a band of six royal guards, dull and bland as porridge. But still trained to protect him. Esara clanked her chains against her saddle.
The sun rose higher. After one last inspection of their supplies, they began riding forward. Toward the edge of the wall. It suddenly loomed, and her blood throbbed in her veins, breathing catching in her throat.
The crack of the whip sounded, followed by a scream. Esara looked over her shoulder, practically snapping ehr head toward the sound, past the guards and the supplies wagon, to the near-empty yard. None of these slaves would ever leave here—even when they died. Each week, they dug new mass graves behind the refining sheds. And each week, those graves filled up.
She balled her hands into fists, eyes suddenly burning with a mix of dread and hope.
Despite her terror, she wanted to be free. But she also wanted to free others.
Esara became all too aware of the ugly scarring of her marred back. It would always remind her. It would make her remember that even if she was free, others were not. And she did not hate that reminder. In fact, she relished in it.
Esara would not forget this place. Her vengeance would not fade, and she would not falter.
She would be back. And she would end this nightmare.
It was that sole thought that allowed her to turn back forward, to look at the wall that came to greet her. Her breath hitched again as she realized they were nearly past it. That it was already beginning to fall behind them.
The world opened up like a blooming flower, trees all around them and footpaths leading into the brush.
Esara felt herself still.
She...she had forgotten just how big the world could be. Just how vast. The sky stretched so far, the trees reached so tall. She was a mere speck compared to the wondrous things around ehr. No more than a grain of sand in a large beach.
Suddenly, Esara felt very, very small.
And she found she didn't mind it.
⚔️
A/N: Hi, friends! I'm trying my hardest to update at least once a week, but it's the end of school term and I'm panicking about getting everything done.
Also, what do you think Esara's last name should be? I have an idea, but I'd like your ideas too
Also, for all those who love criminal minds I'm thinking of updating my Spencer Reid fic, so that's exciting. I have to edit the chapters I already have first though, because my writing style has changed and I want it all to match
I LOVE YOU GUYSSSSS
Here are the photos that i've been putting at the beginning of chapters in case you couldn't see: