“So you tried to trick them into killing themselves?”
He lowered the lid of the trunk. “It sounds like a real shit thing to do when you say it like that. But at the time… Well, that was right about when I started shame-fucking. We’d all kinda lost touch with reality by that point.”
“This place is…”
“It’s a nightmare. Cheers!” He smiled and looked around. “Damn it. I don’t have a drink.”
It was clear that was a common theme around this place. In a way they were living a life of luxury, but the curse hadn’t spared them. Whereas our people were physically suffering, these people were mentally suffering.
Sadness overcame me at the thought of my village, and tears welled up. Best not think about home right now. I’d end up in a darker hole than Hadriel, and it seemed that path led to shame-fucking.
“Goddess spread on a cracker, what is this…” Hadriel had the doors to the wardrobe open and was pulling out dresses like they were covered in chicken poop.
A frilly pink dress was thrown aside, puddled on the ground like frosting. A blue number with ruffles and lace went on top of it.
“Whose dresses were these?” He threw a bright orange frock onto the pile. “Whoever made them should be stabbed.”
“Was this…was this someone’s room before mine?” A dangerous question for my mental wellbeing.
He shrugged. “Maybe before the curse? Not since the curse, though. Or at least not since Butler One was killed gruesomely and Butler Two was thrown from a window. Since I have been in this post, no, there has been no one new in this castle.”
He scrunched up his face and slammed the wardrobe doors.
“Tower!” he shouted at me. “No one new has been in this tower!”
I put up my hands again, trying to digest this cascade of crazy. “Got it.”
He gave me a dirty look before glancing at the overstuffed chair in the corner. Then the table beside it. “Are you a reader?”
I came to attention. “You have a library?”
He rolled his eyes. “Only the best library in the whole magical world. Well, until the curse. We haven’t had anything new since then, obviously, since the rest of the world thinks we just faded away. Fucking demon magic.” He held the candle out, better illuminating me. His eyes widened. “Holy fuck, you’re pretty.” His expression turned grave. “You’re not allowed out after dark anyway, but don’t go out after dark. No one here will force you—the punishment is death if anyone does that—but they’ll be like flies on shit, mark my words. You’re new and you’re pretty and everyone will want to shame-fuck you. Boys who like boys, girls who like girls, boys who like girls, girls who like boys—they’ll all want to shame-fuck the new hot girl. They will want to do things that you will need another decade at least to be comfortable even talking about. So just stick to your room. Read your books, fuck yourself with those vibrators, and pretend life is normal.”
“I don’t know how I can possibly pretend that.”
“Man, I wish I were you.” He shook his head sadly.
“You wish you were a prisoner in a castle, kept away from your family who needs you, all because you went in the Forbidden Wood to keep your father from dying?”
“But did you?”
“What?”
“Did you keep your father from dying?”
I blinked at him. “Short term…yes.”
“Then at least your family is safe. Mine is dead. I came here at, like…” He put his hand out near his thigh, then raised it a little higher. “Little. My parents were nobles in the Red Lupine kingdom”—that was one of the wolf kingdoms still going, last I’d heard—“but they were exiled and then killed as they tried to leave. I was sent here. It was the only kingdom that would take me in. The former queen…” He put his hand to his heart. “She was a good, kind woman. She held this kingdom together. You know, I am a prisoner, too, just as much as you. I can go to the villages, but I’ll get deathly sick if I stay too long. Or that’s what I heard, anyway. I’m too much of a chickenshit to try it.”
“That’s why you’re still alive.”
He jabbed a finger through the air at me. “Exactly! Yes. That is why I am still alive. That and mediocrity. We’re all prisoners in this kingdom, though, in one way or another. At least you get a change of scenery. And don’t worry, the master is a royal cunt, but he won’t let your family starve. He has these, like, principles. He stole you, and you clearly did stuff they needed, so he will make amends for that. He will. I know he will. It’s his duty.”