Maybe The Dead
Warning: Contains talk of abuse, and heavily implied sexual assault/rape
She never did escape the first camp on her own, and now she was stuck in this mess of a guild torturing its own members. She saw Meritt cowering before Onora or Birr; Bogs taking another beating from Ebril; Shade and Arrow hastily polishing Claws’ tools… She saw Pepper’s suspiciously torn face and cautious glances towards Baya – had it really been Nightmare Court? And she saw Tora Zollun, the literal child… And she could do nothing.
Where were the Wardens? Why didn’t she see them? Did they not care? Was it because the Daggers targeted Nightmare Court that they simply declined to intervene? Surely targeting foreigners would make the guild enough of a problem to deal with. Or were they simply incompetent? Was there no one who would do anything about this wretched guild?!
She raged in her hopelessness, taking it out through their raids on Nightmare Court. Sometimes she’d alarm them on purpose, just so she had someone to tear apart.
“Are you okay, Mute? I’m worried about you.” Meritt tried to talk to her, but she wouldn’t respond.
Of course she wasn’t fine. If she wasn’t tearing Nightmare Court apart, she was strategically trying to place herself between Tora Zollun and Baya, hoping to keep her from whisking him away when no one was looking. She couldn’t sleep at night, always keeping her door open just a little in case she could hear anything. She kept careful watch of every weaker member, watching for signs of abuse so she could move in when it happened. It was all she could do and it wasn’t enough.
Tora Zollun kept vanishing anyway, coming back on the brink of death. She felt a personal sense of failure every time she found nothing at her doorstep -no blueberries, no juice- a clear sign Baya had stolen him again.
Then he disappeared for four days, the longest he’d ever gone missing. Baya acted like nothing was wrong, and no one asked where he was. On the fourth day though, in the evening, he finally appeared. The guild members had all been celebrating their most recent successful raid, one that Tora Zollun had missed. There was food and drinks on the one table in the room, but most of the members were occupied with a game of cards going on on the floor beside it. Blueten hung back by the wall, watching as always.
It was Pepper who first saw him, pointing him out with a shocked yelp. Tora Zollun appeared from seemingly nowhere, crawling near the dining table. He was desperately trying to reach the food on the table, grasping at the table’s edges and trying to pull himself up. His wrists were blackened, and it looked like small critters of a sort had
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