Set Up
As I fell asleep that night, I had a plan to try to sleep right through my dream. I would try not to open my eyes and find myself back in Mermove Lake. Maybe I could skip all that and just sleep for once. There had to be some way to get past that dream.
I felt myself get claimed by sleep and I felt my senses vanish. It wasn't long before I felt the numbness of paralysis and the inability to breathe. I knew I was in Mermove Lake. I still persisted and didn't open my eyes. I tried to calm my body enough to fall asleep, but I knew my chances were limited. My body relaxed, my mind felt at peace, and my nerves muted.
I felt myself almost float into slumber when I felt a cool touch on my cheek. I coughed, gasping for breath, and opened my eyes.
"Hello Lily!" Carnismiles said innocently. She smiled warmly at me but had mischief lurking in her black eyes.
"Why did you do that?" I snapped at her, angry that she was keeping me from sleep.
"Do what?" she asked, her smile still plastered on her face.
"Why did you have to make me open my eyes? I was trying to just sleep through my dream."
"Impossible," she said, her smile sliding a little.
"What? Why?" I pressed.
"I am pretty sure that it is impossible to dream through a dream. You cannot sleep. Not in Mermove Lake at least..." she said, mumbling the last part.
"Why do I have to give up my sleep for this stupid dream?" I yelled.
"You read the book," Carnismiles reminded.
"Book? What book?" I said quickly. "You mean the one with the long, weird name?"
"I'm sorry, Lily, but I can't say anymore. I've said too much already," Carnismiles said shaking her head and reaching toward my arm.
"But—" I started to argue, but Carnismiles took her blue hand off of my face. My breath departed me leaving me mute and defenseless, floating helplessly in front of Carnismiles.
"Remember," she said, looking into my eyes, "you cannot tell anyone where you are really from, that you have seen me, or anything about your non-dream life. Here, you are Lily Chasey, the peasant girl. Not Rose. Understand?"
Fine, I thought, sending my thoughts to Carnismiles. She smiled at me and took my wrist. Her white nails pierced my skin and I closed my eyes, avoiding the dizziness of the bubbles. Surprisingly, I was getting used to Krystal and this dream world. I still wished that I was never part of it, but at least it was not as much of a shock.
"What about your dad?" I heard my own voice say. My eyes opened and I saw Alicia staring at the ground. "What did they do to him?"
"Nothing. It is not illegal to rape and abuse a man's wife," she said to the ground. "But he always said his punishment was getting stuck with me."
"Alicia, thats horrible!" my own lips said again.
"Horrible, but true," Alicia said standing up. "End of discussion."
Alicia then started to make her way to the dark hall that lead to the gray house. I turned and watched her but did not follow. I did not want to leave this room and all the colors it held just to go back into the lifeless house.
"Come, Lily!" Alicia yelled when she realized that I was not following her. I knew that if I did not listen to Alicia, there would probably be consequences, so I ran to catch up with her.
Alicia was almost at the door when I was finally able to reach her. She stepped into the dark hallway and motioned for me to follow. I stood close to her when the heavy door to the color room was closed so as to not lose her in the darkness. When the last stream of light disappeared with the door, the hall became completely dark.
"Give me your hand," Alicia whispered in the darkness. I held out my hand to the dark and soon felt her palm against mine. "Stay quiet."
We walked carefully in silence, holding out our hands to not run into walls, and just listening to each others breathing. Our feet made no sound on the cold stone floor since we both were barefoot. When I saw light at the end of the passage, I wanted to scream with joy but I held my tongue to obey Alicia's orders. We were almost to where I could see Alicia's silhouette when she stopped.
"What is it?" I whispered. I suddenly felt Alicia pushing on my chest, backing me up to the wall. Her hand pressed firmly across my mouth and I felt my head start to throb from being held against a stone wall.
"Don't make a sound," Alicia hissed in my ear.
I held back my cries of pain when Alicia's hands pushed harder against my body. Her figure was stiff and tense and her breathing became shallow. I was about to bite her hand when I heard what she had heard.
"Alicia..." said a quiet voice at the end of the hallway. "Come out and play with your daddy!"
Alicia's breath quickened and her pressure on me became a little worse.
"He's drunk," she breathed.
"Come out Alicia!" he slurred. "Come out before I make you sleep in the cells."
"No!" she breathed again. "Lily, please! You have to help me. If I go out there, he'll beat me like he did my mother. If I don't, he'll get the other servants to find me and he will put me in the cells. Please! Will you help me?"
I nodded with Alicia's hand still pressed against my mouth. What else could I do? I was not going to just let her get hurt by her father again.
"Go with me," she said, taking her hand off of my mouth. "And, I'm sorry. But I know that whatever he will do to you will be far less horrible than it would be for me."
My heart skipped a beat when I realized what Alicia was planning to do. Was she really going to give me to her drunk father to deal with instead of getting us both out of this? Was she really going to sacrifice me to save her own butt? Anger swelled up in me but I kept it at bay. I was still Alicia's servant whether I liked it or not. My punishment if I did not obey could be a lot worse.
Alicia took a deep breath before beginning her charade. She grabbed my hair and started to pull me down the hallway towards her father.
"You horrible, disrespecting slave! I told you not to wander around. Do you know how long it took me to find you?" she yelled at me hysterically. Tears started to run down my dirty face from the pain coming from my head but I was able to hold back my cries.
"Alicia," her father hiccuped, stopping at the end of the hallway. "What's go-going on?"
"This new slave girl went wandering and I caught her close to the you-know-what room," she said, whispering the last words.
Alicia's father glared at me with his dark, drunk eyes. They pierced more than my class, more than Ms. Jones' beady eyes, and even more than Carnismiles' nails on my skin. They scared me and I felt fear flood my veins. I really hoped that Alicia had a plan.
"So..." he said, drunkly. "Not so good at following orders, are we?"
I looked over to Alicia and her bright green eyes told me to cooperate. I sighed, defeated. With Alicia still firmly holding my hair, I looked back at her father. I shook my head slowly and watched him carefully.
"Well, look at that!" he chuckled. "We have a silenter here. What? That tongue not workin'?"
"Father?" Alicia said strongly. "Can't you just punish her for her disobedience by putting her in the cells instead of taunting her?"
"Fine," he said, looking me up and down, "Gimme her."
Alicia let go of my hair and pushed me into her father. He quickly grabbed a hand full of my hair and pulled it up, bringing me onto my toes. I bit my lip to keep myself from screaming but it was too late to control my tears.
"Look ere' at this girl!" he said, bringing his head down next to mine. His foul liquor breath brushed my face. "What's your name girl?"
"L-Lily," I stuttered. Uncontrollable tears continued to roll down my cheeks.
"Well, well Lily," he breathed in my ear, "let's go have me some fun..."
My eyes flickered to Alicia with desperation. She looked back at me with a sorry helpless glance so I lowered my eyes. She knew this was going to happen. She knew that it was going to be either me or her. I should have realized the minute she showed me that room that she was setting me up.
"Come on Lillly..." he slurred.
He dragged me by my hair, away from Alicia. Through the gray house he would keep me close by his side as though guarding me from invisible predators. I tripped several times over his boots, causing pain to shoot through my scalp. To add on to all of this, he would keep pulling up on my hair every couple of rooms just to show his superiority over me.
It seemed like we made circles through the house before we finally stopped. Through my pooling tears in my eyes, I saw in front of me a dark hall with a giant stone staircase leading down.
"Ere' we are," Alicia's father grumbled to himself.
We started moving again towards the dark, descending staircase. I was dragged down the stairway and slipped many times on the stone. He pulled me quickly down and I soon gave up trying to see what was in front of me. My eyes blurred with tears from pain and my feet slipped on the endless staircase.
When I felt us get to the bottom of the stairs, Alicia's father let go of my hair and I fell to my knees. My legs felt sore and my head ached, causing my vision to go in and out of focus.
I heard metal unlatching and sliding on the stone floor somewhere ahead of me. My thought was that we were in the cells that Alicia had told me about. It was the place where Alicia and her mother were locked for several days and where Alicia's father often put her.
"Well," he grumbled, "I was going to put Alicia in 'ere for awhile but I guess you can just stay in it..."
He stumbled back over to where I was kneeling and grabbed a handful of my hair, pulling me upright. He brought me close, breathing deeply in my ear.
"You will stay in 'ere for a while until I get another bottle of liquor," he breathed. "Then, when I'm all drunk'd up again, we can have some good fun..."
With that, he pushed me hard into the cell. I fell onto my knees and cried out in pain.
"There we go. I thought I'd never hear a squeal out'r you," he laughed. "Les just hope we'll hear those screams of yours when I really teach'r a lesson."
He slammed the heavy iron door and trudged out of the room laughing.