Caged in Darkness (Caged #1)(4)
I inched towards the grandfather house at a snail's pace. My own emotions were bombarding me, smothering me in their intensity. Why would these people help someone they didn’t even know? Why would they risk their lives against two powerful dark witches?
I was almost to the door when I began to inch backwards. I wasn’t looking where I stepped and my ankle caught on something near the path, but hidden within the grass. I heard more than felt the crack, and it evicted a strangled cry of alarm. I tried to use my hand to cover my mouth, but the tears began streaming down my face leaving dirt tracks that carved out forking paths. When the pain tore through my ankle, I fell to the ground. I attempted to stand, but each time I put pressure on my right foot, lightning streaked through my nerves and up to my knee.
As I focused on trying to stand, the porch light came on. The glow shoved away the shadows to reveal a small garden, and the sprinkler that caused my accident. An elderly woman stepped out the door and onto the porch. She hobbled down the stairs and over to where I was cowering. Upon seeing my tear stricken face, and the way I was holding my ankle, she immediately swept into action.
“Ash, get down here!” She shouted through the open doorway. In a matter of minutes, a boy came stumbling through the doorway with a groggy expression on his face and came to a halt.
“Whoa, what happened here?” His brows furrowed in confusion, as he peered around the woman’s broad backside.
“Well, don’t just stand there! The girl is hurt. Help me get her inside.” As the woman said this she pushed upwards from the ground in a pained movement and gently pushed Ash towards me.
When his arms cradled me against his body, I ceased breathing. My vision turned black, and I began to struggle. I couldn’t concentrate on my surroundings or the rumbling from his chest. I could only see the evil that had invaded my body. I could see it sweeping over my hands to grow against his chest; it climbing towards his face to settle in his eyes and frame them with black. I didn’t want to taint him. I didn’t want to allow my parents darkness to touch anyone else. What had I been thinking? I began to whimper. I knew that what I was seeing was a hallucination, because my parents’ evil overcame all of my senses and this was merely a vision. It was a product of my damaged mind.
“Quit squirming. You’re making this harder than it needs to be, just calm down a minute.” I stopped struggling. His voice was smooth and melodic, like a song from his soul; it washed down my panic to blanket my hysteria. I calmed.
He carried me into the house and into a room to place me on a dusty blue couch in the center of a family room. The sofa was hard beneath my small frame, but it was better than the prison I had been kept in for the past nine years. Ash took a small square pillow from a chair nearby and knelt beside the sofa. His hand gently pushed away the fabric of my tattered pants to reveal my swollen ankle. The swelling looked ghastly next to my thin legs. As he did this, Ash’s eyes did not leave mine. He kept my stare; reassuring me that he meant me no harm. He then grasped my foot and slowly lifted it to place the pillow beneath my ankle. I winced in pain at the movement, but began to relax in his company.
The stout woman had disappeared when Ash brought me to set on the couch, which gave me a moment to examine him. He was slightly older than me. His frame was still small; he hadn’t hit his growth spurt yet. He wore a pair of dark green plaid pajama pants with a white undershirt, and a pair of fuzzy gray slippers. His hair was dark brown with hints of auburn, and was tossed in a million directions. I figured that he must have been sleeping when he was called to help me. His face was beautiful. His features were sharp with high cheekbones, sea foam green eyes and an amused smile. He had perfectly even white teeth.
Wait, why was he smiling? I looked up into his eyes and saw laughter shining in them. He had been silently standing there, while I visually inspected him. I was mortified. I didn’t know much about interacting with others, but I knew enough to know that it was considered rude to stare.
“I’m sorry. I’ve never seen a boy before.” My voice was hoarse, which furthered my embarrassment.
His eyebrows crinkled and his mouth altered into a worried frown. “How is it that you have never seen a…?”
“Here we go!” The boy didn’t get to finish his sentence, because the woman had pushed her way back into the room. She was holding assorted items from which I could only recognize a few.
Now that I saw the woman in the light, she wasn’t as old as she had appeared outside. She was hunched over, which must have been what made her seem older, but her face was youthful. She had the same green eyes as the boy, and red hair streaked with gray.
“I’m going to want to know what you were doing stalking around my home in the middle of the night, but that can wait until you’re taken care of.” Her voice was high pitched with a bit of grain to it. She began to feel around my foot and ankle. Her fingers were deft and kind, but they still inflicted minor pains that caused me to flinch.
What’s your name child?” She looked me directly in the eye; daring me to lie to her.
“Savannah. Ummm… what’s yours?” I wasn’t sure if that was the appropriate response, but it was something I wanted to know. If I didn’t get a name soon, she was in danger of being given the unflattering nickname “The Hunchback.”
“Hmmm… My name is Maye Emmons, and this here is my boy Ash.” She lowered her eyes back to my ankle and began to press the swollen area. She made a sound of confirmation, although I didn’t know what she was confirming. She then reached down to grab a bag filled with herbs. When she applied it to my ankle I knew why she had been gone so long; she must have been gathering items and soaking the herbal bag in hot water. The bag was scorching hot, but I didn’t complain. She then proceeded to wrap the ankle with gauze, and followed with a thick padding. She finally finished with a tan cloth bandage to hold it all together.