Trials: War by Stephanie Jones (the snowy day read aloud txt) 📖

never knew power had a scent, but what I smell right now is nothing other than complete power. Not even my own father had this smell about him. It enrages me that everything about him exudes power; it makes me want to prove to him that he is a not god.

                “I am not an idiot goblin. I know better than to trust my enemy. It would do you well to remember that we are enemies.” I take multiple steps back to clear my nostrils of him.

                He steps towards me again. “It is not my fault that we are enemies, but we do not have to be. Being enemies with each other is doing neither of us any good right now, nor is it doing either of our kingdoms good.”

                “If you want to make a treaty then you need to talk to my father.”

                “Do you think I have not tried that? That my father has not tried it multiple times! It is your father who has turned us away again, and again.” He clinched his fists and raised his voice to such a high volume that it woke all the birds in the nearby trees. I refuse to be intimidated by him.

                “My father has never mentioned any of these meetings before.” I whisper, it sounds weird in contrast of Sdegr’s loud voice.

                “They happened before you were born. If you doubt me so much you can ask your father when you return from visiting my kingdom.”  The second the word kingdom came out of his mouth all of the goblins stood attention with their weapons ready.  I look up at the sky and see that dawn is just barely peaking over the horizon. I run through my options of what all I can do, and I began to see that it will be at least another four hours before my family awakens and another two more before they come looking for me. I also rule out attacking the ‘small’ army, because when my family finds my body they will declare full out war and so many more of my country men will die, and so many more families’ hearts will break.

                It seems I have made my decision.          

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

                My body aches so deeply I wonder if I will ever feel any differently. I am spread eagle across a wall with my hands, ankles, and neck chained to the wall. I try to open my eyes but it is just as dark as it is when my eyes are closed. The wall is roughly made with different sized stones, with some of those stones jutting deep into my back and legs. I try to wiggle around in my chains to see how much I can move, to find out that I cannot move at all. My chains are so securely fasted to the wall as well as to me that even the tiniest movement the chains cut deep into my wrist and ankles. The chains around my neck were tight enough to cause me extreme discomfort if I even so much as twitched my head. Stilling my body allows me to think to of how exactly I came to be in this situation.

***

It seems I have made my decision.

                “You’re honestly not going to give me a choice in the matter are you.” I whisper. The only reason why he even able to hear me was from how close he is to me.

                “What do you think?” His creature was now up and stalking towards us. He put his head under Sdegrs arm and started to bare its teeth and growling at me. It was the deepest most fearsome growl I have ever heard. Fear crept so fast into my body I’m truly paralyzed. The only thing I can do is stare into the wolfs blood red eyes. I rip my eyes away from the creatures to look back at Sdegr.

                “My family will come after me.” My mind was still reeling from the fact that I’m about to go do my death, even if Sdegr said that he would keep me alive. I close my eyes to try and steady myself.

                “I have no intention of allowing you to die while you are in my company. It would not benefit me at all.” His tone is pure ice.

                “You can’t speak for everyone else in your kingdom.” I made my tone just as icy.

                “No one would dare disobey me.” His eyes light up with pure death in them, a sure promise that I will be kept alive while I am with him, but no promise that I will be treated fairly.

                I don’t answer him, I keep my body utterly still, not willing to show any emotion to my soon to be captures. I feel Sdegrs eyes on me, looking at my face my body. He turns his body to fully face me.

                “Canar.” The one word slipped from his lips and his creature lunged toward me.

***

                Remembering the attack made my hands clinch in frustration. My nails went deep into the cuts on my palms from the fight with Sdegrs ‘messenger’ I try to make myself relax. I wonder how much longer I can go without my cuts being infected since I haven’t even had the time to have them cleaned, and I doubt Sdegr or his men cleaned them for me. I wonder how long ive been down here; if its only been a couple hours, a day or multiple days. I am now confident that my family is now aware that I am not anywhere in the elf kingdom, and with the state with my room is in they will already have a clue as to what has happened to me. I have to remember to ask my father if Sdegr was really telling me the truth that he and his father went to mine to talk to him.  If they really did go and speak to my father then why didn’t I know about it? Yes Sdegr said that it was before I was born but I still should have at least heard something about it. I also really want to find out why the goblins started the war in the first place. I’ve always been told they are just war and land hungry, but with how Sdegr is acting I’m not too sure that is correct anymore. I think back to how the goblins fight; they fight with utter strength and brutality, they hold absolutely nothing back. I think back to my first memory of seeing the goblins fight.

                They fought with strategy and tact, making sure they lost as little men as possible, but maximizing the number of deaths on the other side. I understood warfare even when I was a babe; I would often sit in with my father’s war council, listening and learning so I could fight in the war and to help end it. The war is the reason why I was so adamant about my lessons on how to control the fire and how to harness it. Going to those meetings taught me that goblins are more animal than anything else but they are smarter and more cunning then we give them credit for, which means that they have a true and sound reason for starting this war. I was always told that they started the war for land; and it also seems that my people and the dwarfs don’t really care about knowing why the goblins have carried on the war for so long. What shocks me so much is that I just went along with their reasons, and that I did whatever my father told me to do with almost blind faith. I never once thought that the goblins could be fighting for a reason other than land.

                I close my eyes to try to calm myself down from the blinding rage I feel towards myself. The fact that I acted like a mindless drone for my father and for my country sickens me to the point that I feel my stomach starting to clinch and heave. I start to cough rough wretched coughing that shake my whole entire body so hard the chains make a rattling sound so fearful I immediately stop coughing and I feel tears running down my checks. I clinch my hands into tight fists even through the pain of the cuts on my knuckles. I feel my stomach clinching itself even more and I know I would be vomiting on myself if I had any food in my stomach. Thinking of food reminds me that I haven’t even since yesterday morning; well I hope it was yesterday morning and that my sense of time hasn’t been warped by the blinding darkness in this dungeon. If I have been down her for more than a couple hours I pray my family has realized that I am no longer in the kingdom, and if it has been more than a couple hours then I am certain my family is looking for me and has hopefully found out that it is Sdegr who has taken me.

                More coughs rack my body once again, and I have a feeling that if I’m down here for much longer then I will have my answer for what Sdegr is planning to do with me. I also have a feeling that I have been down in this dungeon for more than a couple of hours.

               

 

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Publication Date: 06-24-2013

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