Page 2 of Zel
The room was dark, only the window allowing in light, which illuminated a chaise in one area for lounging, a desk in another for study, shelves upon shelves of books all along the walls, and several more filled with bottles and jars, some containing something or another, some empty. There was one shelf covered in trinkets that each looked like the grandest prize the Queen herself might covet and were likely magical.
There was no sign of a sorcerer.
“Hurry. He must be out. Let us not press our luck.” Gregor went for the gleaming metallic and bejeweled items on the trinket shelf.
Instead of following, Sophie was drawn to the desk near the closet door. There was an open book upon it, an empty goblet that might have contained wine recently, and a beautiful silver hand mirror beside a matching silver hair brush. The wine goblet was encrusted with every gemstone imaginable, and yet Sophie reached for the brush.
“Youdare,” a voice boomed, and a hand clamped down on Sophie’s wrist, more vise-like than when Gregor had done the same below and black as the night sky with pointed nails more akin to claws. There was a glow to the veins in that hand as if violet fire flowed beneath the sunken skin.
Sophie whipped her head around just as another hand gripped her by the throat and lifted her off the floor. Where had he come from? He loomed in front of the closet door. Did it lead instead to another set of stairs?
He had her now regardless, and he was awful in his majesty. To look on him was like looking into the abyss, when all that could be seen was night sky with ripples of magnificent color. He was the tallest man Sophie had ever laid eyes on. The skin of his face and the hand around her throat did not match the blackness of the hand that had stopped her from taking the brush. The rest of his skin was ashen, almost with a hue of that violet fire. His long wavy black hair sparkled as if dotted with stars that seemed constantly in motion.
Hewasthe abyss, with tapered ears like an elf. All that was missing were horns, and he could have been a demon from the depths.
“Sophie!”
No, Sophie thought, as Gregor raced over to them. It was her greed, her vanity, her foolishness that had led to this, and if she could have spoken, she would have screamed at her beloved to run.
The sorcerer yanked her closer, and as he opened his mouth, Sophie’s own mouth opened unbidden in response. She felt the same abyss she could see, as her essence was drained from herintothe sorcerer.
“Stop!” Gregor cried. “I beg of you! Take me! Take me instead! Juststop!”
And stop he did.
Sophie fell, dropped from the sorcerer’s grasp, and though she would have collapsed, Gregor was there to catch her. She lived, but if the price was her beloved, she would not pay it.
“I had intended to take you both,” the sorcerer snarled. “Sophie, is it? You taste especially sweet having eaten of my garden, myrapunzel, but your soul is not alone in your body, which may yet save you.”
“What are you saying?” Gregor asked with a tremor in his voice, keeping Sophie upright. She soon regained her balance, much as she panted from almost having become the next husk to be found outside the tower.
“What does it usually mean when one body contains two souls?” the sorcerer queried.
As one, Sophie and Gregor looked at Sophie’s stomach. She was with child? Finally, at last, she was pregnant.
“I do not tolerate thieves,” the sorcerer continued, “especially those daring enough to trespass inside my tower. A boon will be needed in exchange for your lives.”
“You would spare us because we are with child?” Gregor asked.
“I will spare youin exchangefor your child.”
“No,” Sophie said immediately, with rising horror and a hand placed over her belly as if to protect the babe within.
“I do not mean to raise it,” the sorcerer said. “The child, as a child, will remain yours. But all parents part with their children once they reach adulthood, and so too shall you.”
“You want our child when it comes of age?” Gregor questioned. “Why? For what?”
“They will come to me here in the tower and live with me for one month to determine if they are a worthy exchange for your transgression. If it comes to pass that they are, we will unite in marriage, and your debt will be paid.”
Sophie was already shaking her head, but Gregor placed his hand atop hers on her stomach.
“If we refuse?” he asked.
“Then you will die where you stand, and I will have a meal of all three souls.”
Sophie was still shaking her head. The horror of such a fate, to be this monster’s bride, she could not imagine cursing upon her child. But refusal meant it would have no fate at all.
“Take the brush. A gift to seal our promises. Take all you gathered from my garden as well, but heed this.” The sorcerer somehow stood taller, his galaxy hair lifting and flowing as if caught by wind around his dark, fierce face. Eyes near enough to galaxies too, housing the doom of worlds, glowed with some of the violet light running through the veins of his blackened hand. He pointed at Sophie with one of those fingers. “Only you are to eat the lettuce. More will arrive for you to consume each day until the babe is born. Then only the child shall eat it, every day, until the day they are of age and ready to come to me.
