What We Do to Survive

“I guess… I should start from the beginning,” she said after a short pause. “I didn’t see all of it myself, but this is what I’ve put together over the years.” She spoke slowly, her voice raw with emotion and unhealed pain clear on her face.

“Mom and I both woke up late that morning. The bakery was closed, so Mom decided to sleep in for once. You and your Da were long gone by the time I finally got out of bed, but your mom was waiting for us with breakfast.” She stopped for a long moment, her face twisting into a sad smile and she half laughed, half sobbed for a moment. “Crag-berry pancakes, your favorite. The platter was all but empty, she had to hide half the batter in our icebox to make sure there would be enough left for the two of us. You were always such a gluttonous little boy.” She poked my stomach, her finger bending as it met hard muscle and she let out another sad laugh.

“We spent a few hours getting everything ready, cooking and cleaning and decorating. By the time your dad came back with the meat, we had almost everything ready, but mom realized she’d lent Mr. Hogwranger our biggest pan and sent me off to go get it. I… I didn’t make it.”

She fell silent and I gently pulled her back against me as she choked back a sob. “That was… that was the last time I saw any of them. I didn’t even get to say goodbye, I was in such a hurry and… and…” she trailed off for a moment and I almost didn’t hear what she whispered next. “The last thing I ever told my mother was that she was getting old and forgetful.”

She took a few gasping breaths and then soldiered on. “The duke’s men grabbed me just down the street from our houses, right outside the general store. They were dressed like town guards and I didn’t even realize what was happening at first. Then… they brought me up to the balcony of his manor, and he made me watch.

“He used some sort of magnifying spell so I could see everything clearly and one of the guards held my head in place. The others… They barred the doors and used magic to block off the windows. Then he lit it up himself. He said… he said that's what peasants deserved for denying their rightful lord.” She stopped again, choking back a sob and pressing her face into my chest.

I groaned my teeth together, the hand behind her back clenching into a white-knuckled fist. Seatamer was a dead man, he just didn’t know it yet. He thought he could get away with killing my family, with hurting my Lea? It wouldn’t be today, maybe not even this year, but someday. Someday I would show him what elf scum like him deserved.

We sat in silence for several minutes as Lea wept silently into my chest, only the slow shaking of her shoulders and the wet spot on my shirt revealing her tears. Something about it struck me harder than anything she’d said so far. As a child, Lea had never been quiet. Whether she was sad, angry, or joyful, she wanted everyone around her to know it.

Eventually she continued without straightening up, and I channeled more mana into my sensory circulations to hear her more clearly. “And then… and then he had me brought to his… ‘private dungeon’, he called it. It's not on any of the public records I don’t think, he bragged about how he’d carved the entire thing out of the rock with his magic. It's cut right into the cliff face under his manor, close enough that you can just hear the crashing waves through the stone if it's stormy enough.

“There were three of us down there. Aniva, do you remember Aniva? She lived just down the street from us, her parents said she was off in the capital working as a maid for one of the Great Names. I wonder… I wonder if they knew. I never learned the names of the other two, they were twins, just a little older than I was, and… he cut out their tongues. Aniva told me one of them bit his cock and tried to escape. They… they didn’t last long after that.

“It was… I think the darkness was the worst part. When he would just disappear for days or weeks and… and I would sometimes wish that he would come back. It was so dark and at least when… when he called for you to service him… it was at least warm and soft and light, even if only for a few minutes.”

Over the next half hour, she slowly poured out the rest of her story, whispering and sobbing into my chest as I held her tightly against me. Outwardly, I did my best to stay calm, to project an image of strength the way I’d learned to for Avalon. My Leana needed me to be strong for her, so I would be the shoulder, well, stomach, for her to cry on.

Inwardly however… bubbling anger slowly cooked into cold rage and icy resolve. The grudge I’d carried with me for half my life rose up, cracking the carefully built walls of indifference and tolerance I’d built up over the years. I hadn’t realized I still had it in me to care so much about anyone or anything. Sure, seeing something in front of me had made me angry, but that was a given. For a story several years out of date though?

I thought I had been mostly over the deaths, the pain, the fear. Lord Seatamer had been too far above me to oppose, so I had set those goals and terror-filled oaths of vengence aside, tried to move forward with my life. Now, Leana’s words brought those emotions back to the surface. It took all my self control not to rush off immediately on some misguided revenge plot. Only the knowledge that it would be futile and I would be throwing my life away gave me pause. Sure I’d gotten the better of two elves, but they were poorly prepared and young. Seatamer was at least eight-hundred years old, and a powerful and wealthy nobleman as well. No, this would have to be done carefully. For now, I focused on Leana’s words, gently stroking her hair and whispering reasurences as she spoke.

I knew I was not a good person. I had literal soul-bound slaves living in my dormitory and planned to acquire more ‘servents’ in the future. Still, I at least had lines I was unlikely to cross without a good reason. This fuck thought? He made me look like a saint in comparison. Hells, I had a feeling Igor would not look particularly favorably upon what the elf was doing. For all his faults, Igor made a point of not directly targeting children particularly often, and he tried to make things quick when he did.

At least I finally had an answer to why an older elf would be living outside their usual territories. For all their faults, the elven kingdoms enforced one of the strictest codes of law in the world within their territory. They would not have overlooked what the centuries-old nobleman could get away with on his own private island.

In short, he was a violently sadistic pedophile with very particular tastes and desires. When his victims grew too old for him, he would either slowly torture them to death or simply tie them up and throw them into a deep chasm below his home as live feed for his kraken familiar. Lea had a lot of experience with the process, as I’d learned between tear-filled gasps and mumbled apologies, he would make his other victims help with the preparations. In the four years Lea had spent living in his dungeon, she’d helped throw several dozen of her fellow victims into the unforgiving tentacles of Igathor Ship-breaker.

When he wasn’t using them, he kept his helpless victims in a system of underground tunnels and cells carved into the cliffside under his manor. The entire thing was unlit bare stone, with only a modicum of care taken to ensure his playthings didn’t freeze to death during the icy winters. Lea described spending almost all her time in a tiny cell, not even big enough to stand up or crawl around in. They were only ever let out of their ‘rooms’ if the elf wanted them for something, some manner of ward or spell ensuring that their bodies did not waste away from lack of food and water.

Despite myself, I couldn’t help but be interested in that part, though I had the tact to stay silent about it. I’d yet to find a spell or enchantment that would let people go entirely without food, water, or exercise for years on end and it sounded like some very useful magic. I would have to look into it further when I had some time, or maybe just steal it from him when it was finally time for vengeance.

“...and then he said that I was,” she shuddered, “I was too old. I… I knew it was coming. I’d been there longer than anyone. None of the others had lasted for more than a year, and my breasts were starting to grow and I could see that he was… getting bored of me. He was leaving me in the dark for longer and longer, months sometimes, I think. It was impossible to know for sure, but it felt longer than ever. Sometimes two or three others would come and go between times he would bring me out. I wish I knew who some of them were, now, so I could remember them as something more than voices. But… but I stopped asking for names after… I don’t know. It hurt less that way, hurt less when he made me push them and cut them and–” she choked up again and finally pulled her face away from my chest. Her eyes were red and bloodshot and tears had left dirty streaks in her light makeup.

“Should I have kept track? Learned their names and families, their loves and hates and dreams and wishes? I’m the only one who remembers their final moments, and I don’t even know enough to mourn them like they deserve. Should I? Should I?”

“I don’t know,” I said simply, brushing a tear off the tip of her nose. “I think you did the best you could. You never should have been in that place, that you survived is testament enough to their lives.”

“Maybe.” She looked around the room, noticing how the light streaming in through the window had dimmed to almost nothing, leaving the solitary mage-light on her desk as the only real illumination in the room. “I’m sorry Orion, I’ve got your shirt all soaked!”

“It’s fine. I’ll dry it off later, what else is magic good for if not taking care of laundry?”

She giggled, her voice hoarse and weak but I still counted it as a win. “I guess that's true. You’ve got to tell me how that happened though. I never thought you would ever become a mage. How did that happen, actually? Where have you been all these years?”

“It just worked out that way, I think. After… you know, I never wanted to feel powerless again. Still, you first. How did you ever manage to escape?

“Oh, right. Yes, I guess there isn’t much else left to tell. It was almost five years ago now, but I still remember it like yesterday. He barely even seemed to pay attention, just told some of the others what to do. One of them bound my arms and legs, just like I’d done to so many that came before me. Then… he just lay me down and rolled me over the edge.”

I could see it clearly in my mind, Lea’s body tumbling end over end into the icy ocean, a monstrous kraken waiting in the waters below. “So, how did–”

“I got lucky. So. Very. Lucky. The pool under his manor, it's like this deep trench that connects to the ocean outside through a hidden cave entrance. He liked to brag about it sometimes, about how perfect his home was, how powerful his familiar was, that sort of thing. Well, something else, a large sea-serpent of some sort, decided to swim into the hidden cave and the kraken didn’t like that at all. They started fighting right as I was falling, spraying up mountains of water and thrashing about. A sharp rock cut one of the ropes and I managed to ride it out, treading water in the calmest spot I could find. And then, when the serpent began to run away, I followed it. I clung to its tail as it swam out of the trench and back into the open ocean.”

Holy shit. That was… Lea had… “Damn Lea.”

She smiled ruefully. “Thanks. I don’t think I’ve ever been more terrified in my life than in that moment. I should have died in so many places, drowned, shattered against the rocks, eaten by something… But instead, a passing ship pulled me out of the water. I don’t know how they spotted me, Erwin still will never tell me and I was unconscious, but the next thing I knew? I woke up in a tiny wooden cabin with Erwin dozing beside me. The rest?” She gestured around the room, “Well, the rest is what you see here. They took me in, fed me and healed my injuries. A few years later, I impressed one of the headmaster’s students with my drawings, and he got me a spot at Lightcastle to learn how to imbue magic into my work.”

I nodded my head slowly, still reeling slightly from the last part of her story. She told it so… nonchalantly, but it sounded utterly ridiculous. If it wasn’t my Lea, if I couldn’t sense the sincerity in her magic and read it in her eyes… I wasn’t sure if I would have believed her.

“Who else knows?” I asked quietly. “Do you think Seatamer suspects you survived?”

“I… don’t know. I didn’t think to change my name at the time. There are hundreds of Sweetglasses and he rarely leaves his island. I… I hope not. Originally, there would have been no reason for him to ever notice one random merchant girl, but… well, it's a long story.” I nodded, I suspected it had to do with that other girl, but I wouldn’t pry. Not yet. “If he does… I’ll kill myself first. I’m never going back there. Never. I’ve only ever told Erwin the whole story, and he hasn’t even told his brother. Hopefully…”

“If he ever tries to touch you, I’ll kill him.” I said sharply. “In fact, I’ll kill him anyway, but if he tries to touch you again–”

“Orion…”

I let out a long breath and squared my shoulders. She’d been so open with me, so vulnerable and honest about everything. I didn’t think I could do the same, not fully, but she deserved to know some part of it. “I think it's my turn.”

I paused, opening and closing my mouth as I tried to figure out where to begin. “I guess I should start where you did. On that day. Like you said, I–”

“Leana, Orion, dinner is ready!”

I froze and our eyes met as Leana looked up at me. Her stomach growled loudly and she blushed bright red. “We can eat first.”

Leana doubled over in laughter, almost falling onto the floor. It was annoying to stop right as I’d mustered the willpower to tell my own story, but this, hearing her laugh so freely? It was worth any price.