13 I died there! - Ep 3 - part 4

The girl started crying and pointed to a spot on the ground in front of her.

"I died there!" she sobbed "I DIED THERE !!!"

"I'm so sorry… I'm really sorry, sweetheart," I sobbed too. It was like if I could feel her pain.

Suddenly, I heard a voice behind me.

"They had no mercy."

I turned and found another boy, who had the same wound on his neck.

"They didn't care that we were children."

"Who didn't care?"

The boy came up to me and took my hands in his. When he touched me, I felt sadness, anger, fear. An avalanche of emotions overwhelmed me.

Was I feeling the same as him?

"Now you will see," said the spirit of the child.

And suddenly, I found myself in the daytime, surrounded by the same statues, but they were no longer covered by moss. And around me, I saw hundreds of dark-skins running. They screamed in horror at being pursued by light-skinned men on their horses.

I saw how the light-skins cut the necks of the dark-skins that they managed to capture.

Mothers begged, but their children were still killed in front of their eyes, and then they tasted the steel of their executioners.

«No, no, no, please, stop…» I asked myself.

"This is how we died," said the boy. "They did it."

I saw that a soldier on foot moved by my side, with a long sword in his hands, and with it, he cut the throat of a sobbing mother, who crawled on the ground begging for mercy.

When the blade opened her neck, I felt a stabbing pain in mine.

I put my hands to my neck as if trying to keep my blood from spilling.

"Please stop!" I tried to scream in a strangled voice.

The boy said nothing. He only saw with tears in his eyes how his people were slaughtered. Screams deafened me, blood splattered on the floor and my clothes. Bodies fell everywhere.

"Please ... stop ...," I begged.

So it stopped.

I found myself again in the lonely night. The spirits of both children were no longer with me. I looked around expecting to find them, but I was only met by the company of the imposing statues.

"Boy?"

Unanswered.

"Little girl?"

Unanswered.

"Your Majesty?" I called.

She appeared with her head lowered. I had never seen her like that. She was always shown as a confident woman, looking up, as if everyone was under her.

"Did your Majesty see it too?"

She nodded.

"You knew?"

She nodded.

"Tell me something, Your Majesty, what did you think of the dark-skins before you met me?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did you at least consider us human beings?"

She opened her eyes.

"But what do you say, dark-skin? Of course, I did! I DO!"

"I know that many of you don't even consider us human beings," I said, "Like… we are somewhat subhuman. At the same level as a farm animal destined for slaughter. "

"Dark-skin…"

"And that too!" I interrupted her. "Your Majesty always calls me 'dark-skin. I have a name, you know. My name is Bachué! "

"I am a queen, dark skin, maybe when you become one, maybe when you are fulfilled, you can ask me to call you whatever you want."

I didn't know what to say, but I was outraged. I wanted to yell at her, but I couldn't. I was afraid of her, even though she couldn't do anything to me. She had no power over me and yet I was afraid.

I wanted to remind her that if it weren't for me, she would have no connection to the world of the living. I wanted to make her clear that she, thanks to me, could speak and be heard. That without me she would be nothing. But I did not.

For some reason, I asked for forgiveness.

"Forgive me, Your Majesty. I was disrespectful. "

"You must know your place," she told me.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

It seemed that the subject was going to die there, but my mouth spoke words that I never thought I would say to her.

"I admired you," I confessed. "I thought you were the most wonderful woman I had ever seen. I wanted to be like you, talk like you, walk like you."

She said nothing.

"Now I don't even know what to think, because the Queen that I admired, wanted us to kill a hungry child," I don't know where I got the courage to tell her that.

She said nothing.

Suddenly, Delilah called out my name.

"Bachué! Bachué! Come quickly!"

I ran to where I heard the screams.

I found her on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the rest of a valley. On the horizon, small points of light could be seen moving between the trees.

At first, I thought they were the same crimson butterflies, but then I realized they were torches.

"They found us," Delilah warned. "The Duke's soldiers are coming for us."

There were too many and there was no way to escape.