Tales after Dusk 04

The urgent hoot of an owl penetrates the night, pulling Orane from her thoughts. She raises her hand and waves it slightly, as if dismissing the creature.

The man before her eyes her curiously. By the mixed expression on his face, it is obvious that he wants to ask her a thousand questions, he just isn't sure what to say or where to start.

"My men," she says, explaining the owl noise, "they just want to make sure I am safe. If a rope will not get him down, then how do you propose we go about it?"

Shifting awkwardly, he walks over to the spinning wheel. He hesitates, looking back up at her as if he is trying to decide if she is real, if she was telling the truth and if he can trust her or not. When it occurs to him that he doesn't have an abundance of options, he takes a deep breath and leans over the wheel. Removing a panel from the base, he pulls out a wad of rope. Upon bending it into the correct shape, Orane realizes that it is some type of brace.

"I know that a regular rope won't hold him, but I have speculated that one made out of his own fleece will. So for the past seven years I have been shorting the rope by a mere fraction, an undetectable amount, so that I could save up enough material to make this. I finally finished it last week. I can attach it to the rope, but it won't be long enough. I think it will take another day of spinning to get it there."

Orane considers this, nodding slowly. She doesn't like the idea of cutting it so close, only leaving a day in between her and the witch finding out, but if the ram is to come out of the tower there isn't much of a choice. "Fine," she says, rising so that she can ascend the steps of the window sill, "I will come back tomorrow afternoon then."

"Wait—my lady," he says, nervously. With one foot on the plank, he waits until she turns back around before he continues, "Would you—would you stay the night?" Her blank expression causes his face to burn red, his palms to sweat with anxiety, "I mean, please? I have never met anyone other than mistress—I would—it would, well, be nice, to have someone to talk to." He stands there, large hands tightly squeezing the halter while he waits for her reply.

Orane turns away from him, staring off into the darkness as she considers his request. The idea of spending the night in an inescapable tower with a strange man, who may or may not kill her in her sleep, is a ridiculous notion. However, with his first hand experience with the witch he might be able to provide her with some much needed insight into her powers. No doubt he might have questions of his own. She might not have another chance to ask him for she doesn't know what tomorrow will bring.

Lowering her head she squints, trying to make out the ground below. She catches a slight movement in the shadows; cupping her hand over her mouth, she hoots into the night, to let her men know of the change in plans. Orane carefully steps down from the sill. Brushing her cloak back over her shoulders, she leans over a little to release the tension on the crossbow. "I suppose I can," glancing up at him for a moment, she adds some firmness to her voice, "But fair warning, if you try anything—anything—I will not hesitate to kill both you and your sheep. Understood?"

He quickly nods at her.

She stands back up and unclasps her cloak, "My name is Orane."

He genuinely smiles at her. "I am Ezekiel." Trying not to seem too eager, he sets the halter down and walks to the seating area. Motioning to the sofa, he thinks for a moment, "Can I make you some tea?"

"No, thank you," she replies, draping her cloak over the back of it. She sits down at the edge, propping her cross bow against the arm so that it is just within reach. Knowing that she is still wary of him, Ezekiel sits down on the floor, just in front of the fire place, facing her.

"So...Zeke," Orane crosses her legs at the ankle, seemingly comfortable in any situation, "how long have you been stuck in this tower?"

He smiles slightly at her nickname for him. Zeke can't help but wonder if all people are as nonchalant as her, "My whole life. Well, at least most of it actually locked in the tower. I can remember when I was a young, there used to be stairs and other rooms in the bottom."

Orane peels her eyes off of him as she pulls a small notebook and pencil from her vest pocket. Thumbing through a few pages, she begins to scratch down some notes, "Start at the beginning, as far back as you can remember."

He gazes up at the ceiling, thinking back as he tries to remember a time that seems like a distant dream, "Well, I can remember that there used to be a small village on the other side of the field out there. I can't remember ever meeting anyone who lived in it, but I could see them from my window. It was always just me and mistress. Things weren't always like this, you know. When I was little she used to let me go outside. This has always been my room, but she used to live in the floor below. There used to be a huge garden out in the meadow, full of anything you could imagine. I would help her tend it, back then. I can remember one day, I was in the garden by myself. Mistress had gone away somewhere. I scared up a rabbit and it went hopping off into the forest—I chased it. It was so beautiful, out there, amongst the trees. I wanted to keep going, but I heard mistress screaming for me. I ran home as fast as I could—she was standing just outside with a tiny golden lamb on a lead. I didn't understand it then, but I do now; she was furious with me. When I told her that I wanted to explore the world—meet new people, see the ocean," Zeke shakes his head, looking up at Orane, "She sent me upstairs with the lamb. The next morning when I pulled open the door to the stairs, they were gone. Everything below was gone. Mistress was outside, bricking up the door. She told me that she was very angry with me, angry that I would want to leave her after she spent so much time trying to keep me safe. As punishment for my behavior I would stay in my room forever and I've been up here ever since."

Orane's eyebrows furrow as she finishes writing something. She looks at him, confused, "How do you get food, water? Have you really never met anyone else, not even when there was a village near by?"

He blushes, "No, besides mistress, you're the only other person I've ever seen up close or talked to. She brings me food with her once a week, in her magic bag—it can hold more things than seems right. My water bucket refills itself instantly. There are a lot of things in here that are enchanted, I think," he looks around the room. Zeke tries to distinguish the items that a normal person would be frightened by, but which seem perfectly average to him.

Not sure why he has paused, Orane cuts off his thoughts, "How is it that you speak so well? I mean, if you have been here by yourself since you were a child, without anyone else to teach you things..." she trails off. Though she is curious, she realizes that she must be careful around him. There is no doubt in her mind that he must be like a newly born creature, oblivious to his limitations. She watches him cautiously, worried that she might have offended him.

Zeke understands her point perfectly clear. He has often wondered about his ineptness, but it has never before been so present in his mind than now. The mere fact that the beautiful woman before him is surprised by his ability to speak is a sharp blow, "Mistress brings me books every week. When I was young, they were lesson books. I was able to teach myself to read, give myself a basic understanding of objects and the world—or at least that is what I think that I know. After she stopped bringing those, she would bring all different kinds of stories about history, magic, princesses in peril—I enjoy reading them. They allow me to escape. But in the past few years I have come to realize that she does it to make me suffer—to give me insight into a world that I can't enter, one that is always just out of my reach. That is when I started shorting the rope." He sighs.

"Hmm," Orane says quietly. She sketches Zeke's likeness in her notebook, finding that his handsome features make him easier to draw than most. "So let me see if I have this right; you have lived here all of your life, never met anyone other than your mistress, and you haven't left the tower since you were young?" She recaps her notes, making sure she got the basics correct.

He nods slowly, looking away at the ground, "Well when you put it like that, it makes me sound rather...feeble."

"You sheer the wool from the ram, spin his hair into rope and by the time it reaches the right length, you let it down for her. She brings you food and books before she takes the rope with her when she leaves. What does she do with it?"

He shakes his head, "I don't know. But these past few years she has gotten increasingly intolerable. She is mean and cruel—you must think me ridiculous."

Yes, Orane thinks to herself, "No, it's just—well why don't you just not drop the rope down to her?"

"Who would bring me food?" He says sharply, offended by her offhanded solution, as if he hadn't thought about it every week for the past decade.

"You could go outside the next day and get your own," she replies, finding herself getting irritated at him, at his seeming helplessness.

"Look, I know what this sounds like. Mistress has other ways of getting into the tower but she doesn't like having to use her powers to do so. I tried not to let her in once—she beat me until I blacked out," his voice starts to rise, skin getting hot as he recalls the memory of being incapacitated by his mistress.

"She beat you," Orane says skeptically. She knows the tone of her voice shows her frustrations but she can't help it. Here is a man who has been with the witch his whole life—he, and he alone, has had the power to stop her, yet hasn't. If he had gotten up the nerve years ago, perhaps her parents would be alive. Perhaps dozens of people would still be alive.

Instantly, Zeke rises. He crosses the gap between them before Orane even has a chance to react. He grasps her by the biceps and lifts her up effortlessly, "Yes, me with all of my strength," he snaps, anger and humiliation written on his face. Once he realizes what he has done, he gently sets Orane back down onto the couch. Though the anger dissipates, the humiliation remains, "I'm sorry," he says, meekly, "I know it seems silly, but with the flick of a hand, her powers—they make me as weak as a blade of grass."

Slightly shaken up, Orane picks up her book from the floor, "I see," she says calmly despite herself as she thumbs through the book to find her spot once more. "I'm sorry. It is just hard for me to grasp all of this."

Zeke sits down next to her, wringing his hands in his lap, "I have thought of every possible way to escape. I could climb down the rope and run—but I would have to leave the ram here. Mistress would still have her source of power. She would hunt me down—I just know it. But it isn't just that, I can't leave him here; he has been my only companion all these years. I know he is just a sheep to you, but, well, he is exactly like me. He has spent just as much time locked away as I have; he has forgotten what the sky looks like, the taste of fresh grass, how the wind feels against the skin. That's why I've been working on that harness, so that I could take him with me."

Orane tries to calm her shaking hands by finishing her sketch. She tries to get a few more answers before he has another outburst, "What do you know of her?"

"Nothing. She says that my parents abandoned me when I was a baby and that out of the kindness of her heart she took me in. Her face seems to change. Sometimes she looks older, younger, shorter, taller, wider—but her voice," he shakes his head as if trying to forget it, "her voice is always the same. Other than that, I know nothing. Not even her name—she makes me call her mistress."

Orane looks over at him. She sees a defeated man sitting next to her, one who is desperately clinging on to the idea of escaping; yet she doesn't think that he would ever have the courage to actually go through with it, at least not by himself. She knows that though he wonders and dreams about the world outside of his tower, it is also a frightening place, one that he doesn't know, unlike every inch of his prison. Unsure if she is right to tell him what she knows, she decides that it might be the spark to light the fire underneath him, "Your mistress is a witch. Do you know what that is?"

Zeke looks at her, somewhat confused. He has often wondered about his mistress' abilities. He recalls that once when he was a child, she told him that everyone can do the things she can, but he was born defective and that is why she was so careful to keep him safe, "I know what a witch is, but she couldn't be. They don't exist, like giants and dragons."

The skepticism in his voice tells Orane that he hasn't ruled it out as fiction, "I haven't been able to figure out how old she is, but I know that she is ancient. She has some inborn power, but like all evil witches, she must use a semi natural medium to amplify it. Her medium is always a golden animal of some sort—I have found accounts of that animal being an eagle at some point, now it appears that she has chosen a ram. She keeps part of that animal braided in her hair at all times; the amplifier seems to only last a week before it loses its potency, that is why she must replace it constantly. The remainder of the amplifier she uses with her potions to procure whatever it is that she needs or desires from the unknowing."

Zeke leans over, staring at the sketch of himself in her notebook. The person he sees on the paper resembles what he knows he must look like, yet the man appears to be stronger, tougher than he feels, "How do you know all of this? Do you hunt witches?"

"No, I don't. But your mistress and I have some unfinished business," as a thought dawns on her, she looks up at him, "How old are you?"

"I'm not sure. If I have counted right, I have been in this tower for more than twenty years."

"And your parents—you never knew them?"

He shakes his head.

"There was a flood, do you remember that?"

"Yes, I remember it," he pauses, thinking carefully, "That was twelve years ago? It was horrible. After the water disappeared, the town was gone. So were the people."

Orane thumbs through her book, "I came across a very old, blind man in my travels, who told me a story of a small forest town—ah yes, here it is. He said that there were several people who lived there, but one woman in particular everyone avoided, because they suspected her of, well, not being human. She had a home with a tall wooden fence in the backyard, around her lush garden. He wasn't very coherent, but from what I could gather, the old man said there was a tower that housed a happily married couple. The wife was pregnant. One night while looking out onto the village, she peered down into the woman's garden, catching a glimpse of some sort of vegetable plant. The wife had ravenous cravings for it and her loving husband decided to sneak into the garden and steal some for her—he was caught. The old man wasn't sure what happened, but after the wife gave birth, the two were found dead—strangled—leaving the baby to fend for itself. The woman took charge of the baby and the tower. After that, several people left the village; those that stayed avoided the tower and its occupants. They believed that if they left the woman and the child alone, she would leave them alone in turn. When the boy disappeared, the woman seemed to disappear as well, yet no one dared to go near the place, for fear of her returning. The situation in the village seemed to improve, until a horrible storm came. It happened so suddenly that no one had a chance to escape; it killed everyone in the town, save the old man who clung onto a door and managed to float to safety," she flips the page, "He recalled the year that the couple died, as it was the year his son moved away. That happened just about—twenty-four years ago. Twenty-four years in two weeks, in fact."

As is something else dawns on her, she thumbs through the pages in her book, stopping to read a few sentences before flipping pages again; worry crosses her face, "Oh, no. Why didn't I see this before?" She says quietly to herself, rubbing her face in frustration.

"What is it?" Zeke asks softly.

"It seems that every six years, on the summer solstice, there has been a story, a rumor, hushed whispers, of a happy, loving couple being strangled. I have down here at least a dozen. At least, that is what I am speculating. I haven't been able to find one within the past twelve years."

He thinks about the story she told him. His parents, killed by the mistress—he always suspected she had something to do with it, but he never knew exactly what. "Who was it twelve years ago?"

"Mine," she says, softly; Orane pushes her memories out of her head, "The summer solstice is in two weeks. If I am right, she will kill again."

...

The smell of eggs cooking wakes her up. When she opens her eyes, at first she expects to see the soft canvas folds of her tent above the gauze insect netting that surrounds her bed, but instead she finds herself looking up at a dozen wooden beams radiating out from a center point at the peak of the tower. As she lays there letting her body adjust from sleep, she wonders what it would have been like to open her eyes and see the exact same thing, every single day; to know that when she gets up, she will be doing the exact same thing as she did yesterday, the same thing that she will do tomorrow. She imagines a life without any human contact, except for the pain inflicted by a hurtful witch. When her eyes begin to burn as tears form in them, she knows that she must do all that she can for Zeke as no one should ever have to live like that.

It was a very late night. Her muscles groan in objection as she sits up and swings her legs over the edge of the bed. He had hundreds of questions, some about the witch, but most about life in general, about what was real and what wasn't real from the mounds of books he read. She patiently answered each one, watching him eagerly soak up the information as he tried to catch up on twenty four years of life. Though she found herself getting irritated at first, as it was a tedious task, she was soon touched by his sincere curiosity. He has a gentle kindness about him despite his large size and despite the horrific tragedy that is his life he is remarkably well adjusted.

When neither of their eyes could remain open for much longer, Zeke kindly offered his bed for her. He assured her that there was no reason for her to worry about her safety or privacy, as he would sleep on the couch. Orane was surprised to find herself peering over the edge of the bed to watch him sleep. When she realized that she truly does find him handsome, her cheeks burned so hot she thought they would catch on fire.

After pulling on her boots and vest, she walks down the stairs to discover how different everything looks in the natural sunlight. At the bottom, the ram slowly chews on a bucket of oats, watching her curiously, while to the right Zeke stands beside the table, waiting for her. She is pleased to discover a plush breakfast of omelets, bacon, biscuits, coffee. After she takes a seat, Zeke sits opposite of her, pouring her a cup of steaming brew. Upon her first forkful, Orane finds herself amazed at his cooking.

"Mmm. So, Zeke...what will be the first thing you'll want to do today?"

He looks at her curiously, "I'm not sure what you mean."

She sips from her mug, "Well, if all goes according to plan we will leave the tower by mid afternoon. It is too risky to travel to town in the dark, so we will return to my camp and leave at first light. That will give us the late afternoon, evening and night. For the first time you will truly be away from your tower. What would you like to do, to see?"