Anxiety curls in my chest. I don’t want to touch those things. Don’t want to see them. I don’t want to face the reality of what this man has done.
This man, who has put himself at risk to keep me safe. A man who I chose to believe in. A man I gave my body to.
I would have to face the truth of what he really is.
He is still a monster. Perhaps I should regret my actions tonight. Maybe one day, I will.
But what I am certain will not change is that I must escape this place, and if he won’t come with me, I’ll have to leave him behind.
I carefully unwrap my body from his. Though his flesh is strangely cool, my skin still feels instantly colder in the absence of his touch. So I grab a garment, dress quickly in my favorite soft pants and silk top, before sliding to the ground and dragging the first basket in front of my knees.
Carefully and slowly, I remove the items from within. There’s a multicolored knitted scarf. A small blade. A straw hat.
I try, and fail, not to think too deeply about who these items belonged to. Their faces flash through my mind, one by one. I don’t know them, but my heart aches as though I do.
They feel like they are me. I am them. My mother and father. My neighbors. Astella.
My stomach sinks. The reading today had me certain they had Astella. My dream the other day…
I can’t get the thought out of my head.Reconciliation. Someone I care about is here, and I did not know the girl in the dungeon before I came here, so that doesn’t fit my first reading.
Is it intuition that cries out to me that she is here or just paranoia sinking its claws into my mind and soul?
Near the bottom of the basket, there are smaller trinkets. A ring. A coin. An earring. Some pieces of metal I couldn’t even identify.
No keys.
I don’t even feel fear as I consider the reality that I will risk my life, once again, to find the dungeons. I only fear leaving Astella to a terrible fate. I fear inaction. One way or another, I have to know.
To achieve that, I need to find this stupid key.
I move to the next basket. More of the same. Several pieces of clothing and many random items. Finally, I reach a wooden box with a hinged lid. If the key is not in here, I don’t know where to look next.
Was the girl wrong? Maybe he doesn’t have access to the dungeons. Maybe he doesn’t have a way out of here.
My chest is tight as I peel open the lid. The rusted hinge squeals slightly.
My heart throbs as I shift through the objects in this box. Are these the first people he killed? It was on the bottom, way in the back, and appears to be the last.
This box is smaller. Nearly every object would fit in the palm of my hand. Several are wrapped in brown cloth. There is a marble. A white comb. A cup.
There is a small journal with scribbled writing I can’t decipher. I’m unsure if it’s even in my language.
Then, I find something that makes my whole world stop.
My brain flickers. Time reverts, speeding past me at full speed, and I am a young girl, smiling at a boy and handing him a beaded bracelet.
A bracelet I am holding again, now, four years later.
When my heart restarts, it’s racing.
I’m holding the same bracelet I gave to him, Lucca, the year before he died. He wore it every day. Never took it off.
My breath flees from my lungs as I put these inconceivable facts together. In a pile of items saved from people my Dread has killed is Lucca’s bracelet.
I press my forehead to the cold floor, trying to stop the spinning. Trying not to throw up.
My Dread is the one who killed my best friend five years ago.
