Slave to the Tyrant Alpha

Chapter One - The image of you

Blood, chains, and a numbing cold clung to my frail frame.

Depression and an endless madness were the thing’s I’d grown to know during my short-lived life. Hallucinations blurred past my vision as broken memories surfaced before me, a woman, crumbled by the weight of her on coming death hung over me with eyes made of gold and hair that put the sun to shame. I could never focus on her face nor feel her warm embrace as she held me to her. The women were a figment of my imagination, someone I pictured as my mother who held undying love towards me and coddled me at the precious moments in my life.

I began to awake from the dream, my body aching as aged chains clung to my ankles, the rust ate away at my pale flesh as new injuries formed over the old ones. The scent of iron clung to the air with my tongue dry and tasting metallic. The pain that swept through my body was numbing as it grew all too familiar, my bones ached as the cold snuck into old cracks within my bones and reminded me of the times my body was trampled and abused.

When will she return? I wondered, my body weak as I stretched a hand out towards the women, her figure was fading the more I was pulled to reality.

Her expression remained dull and lifeless as she reached forward, never to touch, her golden eyes expressed a deep longing and regret as a blue hue surrounded her, swallowing her, and erasing her from my existence. I sighed, defeated, as I finally released her. The space grew cold and void as my vision cleared and I was once again brought back to the prison I was kept within.

She was never really here, I thought to myself as I bit down on my bruised cheek.

“Alaïa,” a soft voice called out through the long and winding passage.

My head fell to the side as I glanced towards the direction of the sound. The young boy who stole away and visited me in the dead of night crept down the halls he had long since memorized. A dull light illuminated his silhouette, his hair was a vibrant silver with the sweet scent of honeysuckle hanging in the air. My lips were cracked and bloody as I attempted to smile at him. My jaw ached as my tongue traced over my tender gums where my teeth had once been. My fingers fumbled over my discarded canines which had previously been pulled from my mouth with medieval pliers. The aged tools rested on a tray across the room, a reminded of the horrors my torturers put me through. I was made to relive through the endless pain as my teeth continued to regenerate over time.

I am a source of unending torture for them, I thought as I recalled the men who would often visit my forgotten cell.

“Aziza,” I weakly called as I met the boys silver eyes.

His cheek was swollen as a dark bruise encompassed his eye socket; his eyelid was half closed as he smiled fondly to me.

Someone hurt him, again, I thought bitterly as I adjusted my weight to face him.

“I’ve missed you,” he said, ignoring my words.

His voice was like a lullaby, soft, with a hint of a crack as he began to hit puberty. He appeared much like myself, silver hair and crystalline blue eyes that reflected a finely cut gem. He was tall in stature with a lean frame that was adjusting to the sudden growth spurt he found himself in. I smiled fondly as I imagined the life he must lead, he had no parents, like me, and yet he was a prisoner to the corrupt man who depicted the lives we must lead.

“You’ve grown so tall, Aziza,” I murmured as he hovered behind the iron door that help me captive.

My tongue clung to the roof my mouth as I attempted to form more words. My vision was spotty as I craved water, to have the sweet liquid drip down my throat and satiate the unquenchable thirst I was made to endure. I glanced up, a rusted pipe catching my attention as a sliver of a crack allowed a miniature droplet to escape and fall as it landed on my forehead. The stagnant droplet landed on my eye and trickled down my cheek, avoiding my parched mouth and absorbing within the air.

Aziza’s silence filled the air as he glanced at me pitifully, his thought displayed upon his face as he took in my rotting and discarded corpse, I wasn’t yet dead and yet I might as well have been.

"I'm sorry it's been so long, sister, they took me away on a hunting trip" Aziza said as he stumbled guiltily over his words.

"He," Aziza spat before continuing, "wouldn't listen to my protests," his words trailed off.

His eyes wavered from both fear and hatred as he recalled the face of my prisoner, my father. His face haunted my dreams, my head aching as I recalled his hand tangled through my hair and dragging me deep under ground. His figure was ancient and hunched as he carried centuries of time over his shoulders, he was blessed with agelessness and saw himself as immortal. He tore me from my connection to the world, using pain as a curtain, blinding me from reality and turning me into nothing more then a doll.

I pressed my palm into the ground before me and shifted my weight until I met Aziza’s gaze, my limbs twisted behind me, paralyzed with the muscles in my thighs severed so I could not escape. Aziza’s expression was drawn in a frown as he recalled the abuse he lived through on the surface, and yet it was nothing compared to the life I was gifted.

“You’re in worse condition then you were before,” Aziza swallowed nervously as he pulled a waterskin from a satchel hung over his shoulders.

“Aziza,” I whimpered through our shared mental connection.

“I will save you!” Aziza said as he reached through the iron bars.

“I’m already dead,” I stated as he held the waterskin for me to take.

“Not yet you aren’t,” he affirmed, his eyes determined.

He always has a way to convince me, I thought bitterly as I stretched a hand out to take the water from him.

“Agh!” I cried out as my wrist touched the iron bar, my skin smelled of burning meat as the flesh seared from the precious metal.

My fingers fumbled over the leather bag, it slipped from our grasp and fell to the ground before me. I fell forward as desperation coursed through me and pulled the container into my confined space. Aziza watched pitifully as I tore the cork off and guzzled down the sweet tasting water, savoring the coolness as it forced its way down my dry throat and into my awaiting stomach.

"Don't drink it so fast or you'll throw up!" Aziza chastised.

“That is the least of my worries,” I breathed as the water trickled past my lips as the mouth of the waterskin pressed into my lower lip.

“You need to be ready, Alaïa, he will be coming for you soon,” Aziza said with a knowing look.

Who? I wanted to ask as I began to realize the water tasted funny.

“He’s coming,” Aziza affirmed as my head grew light.

The waterskin fell from my hands as my body lulled to the side, my head collapsed into the ground with Aziza’s image fading from view.