20 Imprisonment

Lyzbeth Heredis

I open my eyes.

I look up to see nothing but darkness. As I raise my arms to stretch it, I find it restricted and bound. I take a closer look, and damn. They chained my arms. I look down my feet and I feel it chained as well. I feel my mouth, and shoot! They gagged me with a cloth or something I can't untie. Oh, no! They got me! The persecutors got me.

I tried hopping my way for the door. I tried breaking it with a fireball, but it was futile. The door merely absorbed my attack. Fortunately, there is a window on the door. The window is grilled with bars to prevent escape.

I can't escape. I can't cast incantations if I cannot utter a single word. As I look out from my window, I see that the hall is empty. Yes, there are cells across me, but there are no people in the cells or in the halls.

I try my best to remove the gag off my mouth, but it is just impossible. Walking even proves to be difficult, as I have to hop my way. Suddenly, I feel my door open. I stand guard, but there is nothing really I could do. Slowly, the door opens only to reveal an inscrutable being before me.

He wears a typical uniform of a persecutor – beige, the color that I absolutely hate. Even his hat looks awful on him. I want to laugh this off, but I can't even utter a single word. Instead, it is he that laughs.

"Well, what do we have here? Another practitioner, I see."

He circles me as if he is a vulture and I, a dead prey already. "Of course, you can't do anything right now, miss," he continues. "With all of you pretty much bound, you are helpless. Your act of bravery at Scire National High School is commendable, but rules are rules. You violated a law against the use of The Arts in this kingdom."

Suddenly, he goes behind me and pulls something from my hair. My hairpin! Oh, no you didn't! "It's a pretty little thing," he remarks. "But, I know you are smart to figure out to pick the locks."

Out of sudden, he unties the gag on my mouth. "Still, I will allow you to speak," he says smugly. "Cast all the incantations you want. We are prepared for your attacks. That is why I suggest staying put. It would be unconstitutional of me to not give you the liberty to speak. Of course, you have visitation rights, but it is limited."

I say nothing. I can't blame these men. They are only doing their jobs. Still, I want to cut that smug of a face he has and throw it out the window.

As he pockets the hairpin, he goes to the door as if in act of leaving. "The Ministry of Persecution is preparing your case and sentence. Goodbye, mistress enchantress."

And with that, he locked the door. Damn! I could have figured out that I could pick the locks. Then again, I could have used that on Romain if I knew how. What am I going to do? What about my mother? Are they going to suspect her too? They might discover something worse about us. What about our library? There is also our herb garden! My instruments for potionology! This is dangerous. I put my mother at extreme risk for what I have done.

Once again, I tried firing a fireball towards the door, but nothing works. This is bad. I hop for my bed and lie down for a while. What am I going to do? My skills do not work. I can't break free of my mouth gag. The only thing that I can use for picking locks is confiscated. Even if I did escape, where will I end up?

All I can do is just lay down on the bed of this cursed room. What can I say? It seems pretty decent. There's a bed, a table, a mini lavatory, and a little window for breathing. It seems that they are trying to be humane. If they want to be humane, they can just cut out the whole burning thing all together.

As I think, I feel my door opening. I stand up to see who it is. As I expect, just more persecutors. Oddly enough, there are tens of hundreds of them.

"A visitor came to see you," one of them says firmly. "You are to follow our lead and make no trouble. Doing so will result to severe punishment. Do you understand?"

The words go over my head as if I had not heard a thing. A visitor? Is this real?

"My lady, you have a visitor," the persecutor repeats. "Have you not heard me?"

I take a deep breath. "Yes, I heard."