Fated to the Dark Elf Episode 1

Chapter 1

Delia

The sun beats down relentlessly as I lean over the sparse greenery in our garden, its stinging rays caressing my shoulders around the straps of my linen dress. Eelry is first and foremost known for the Dark Market it houses, but to me, the most notable thing about our latest home is the unforgiving landscape.

A breeze sweeps by, kicking up dusty soil in its wake and shooing away the harshest of the sun’s beams. The somana I’m bent over dances in the breeze, bringing a small smile to my lips.

Even in the strangest of places, seeds of life will find a way to grow.

A sharp snap cracks from my right, nearly sending me sprawling to the ground as I jump away from it. My mother laughs, small and quiet, as she removes her foot from the branch she’d stepped on.

“You’re jumpier than usual today,” She murmurs with a small smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Is something wrong?”

I shake my head in lieu of a response, turning back to the somana and trying to quell the useless panic thrumming through me. In truth, Father caught me in his study today. I’ve never seen him so angry.

I’d just popped in to look at his calendar. He’s been so busy lately, with week-long trips to the market to further business connections – whatever that means – with the dark elves, and I’d wanted to see when he’d be free enough to spend some time together. Humans are becoming more prominent in Protheka, moving into more powerful positions and even marrying into nobility. It leaves little time for family.

Father doesn’t believe these are just outlying incidents and wants to take advantage of the shift to help business. I know he’s only away so often to help maintain the wealth we’ve enjoyed as a family, but I can’t help but miss him.

Had I known being in his study would upset him so much, I never would have done it.

I pour water over the somana, my knees digging into the sandy earth as I lean forward to pat the plant’s base. Father has always been prone to ‘fits of passion,’ as Mother calls them, but I’ve never seen him behave so…erratically.

“I think that’s enough sweating for today,” Mother sighs. “Tea?” 

I nod my agreement absentmindedly, climbing to my feet and dusting myself off. I join her at the table beside the door, murmuring my thanks as she hands me a glass of tea, ice bobbing along its surface. 

Mother settles into the chair across from me, a strange look in her eyes as she appraises me.

“What’s wrong, Delia?”

The question takes me by surprise, and I turn an inquisitive look to her. 

“Nothing,” I lie. 

Talking to her about Father is useless. While I love my mother dearly, she rarely speaks a word against him, even when we both know he’s being unreasonable. Bringing up the incident in his study would only make things tense. 

“Between your skittish behavior and how unusually quiet you’ve been, well… you can’t blame a mother for worrying,” she says. 

I return her smile, reaching across the table to take her hand in mine. “Nothing’s wrong, Mother. I just miss Father,” I tell her, offering a stronger smile. 

Something in her eyes feels different, and if it were any other day, I’d probably press her as to why she’s acting so strangely. It’s not that my mother doesn’t typically worry over me. All good mothers worry over their children, after all; but she rarely seems so concerned when my behavior is mild. 

Typically, she’s only truly concerned when I fall into my more…intense spells. 

“As long as nothing’s wrong,” Mother says, drawing my attention back to our conversation. The look on her face tells me she doesn’t believe me, but I suppose she has plenty of reason not to. I’m many things, but I’m most certainly not quiet.

“I miss him, too,” she adds. “But his absence is for the best. We’re so very lucky, you know, to have the freedoms we do. It’s rare indeed for a human family to exist so unscathed, especially in Eelry.”

“Why did we move to Eelry?” I ask. The Dark Market draws in the most unsavory of all Protheka’s denizens, and with the Market’s largest export being humans, most people avoid the entire continent like the plague. 

Mother turns a sharp look at me. Silence hangs between us for longer than I find comfortable, and I’m about to apologize for upsetting her when she speaks.

“You know why we moved to Eelry,” she says lowly. Something in her voice, her face, makes my heart pick up speed. I shift uncomfortably in my chair as I break her gaze, nodding my agreement.

“For Father’s business. An undeveloped continent means plenty of opportunity,” I say, reciting the reasons they gave me numerous times when we moved here.

I glance up to find Mother still staring at me, her knuckles white as she grips her glass so forcefully I think it might break. In an instant, the intensity of her stare is gone, her grip relaxing on the cup as she settles back into her chair.

“Yes, for his business,” she parrots quietly as she turns her eyes toward the distant sounds of laughter. I follow her gaze to where the neighboring merchant’s children are playing, a ball rolling between them and kicking up loose earth.

I bite back a sigh as I watch them, a wistfulness I thought had long since died settling between my ribs. Between our constant moves for Father’s business and my parents’ rules, I’ve never had any friendships that lasted longer than a few months. 

A part of me wishes that they hadn’t always been so cautious with me. I know they have their reasons, but I always felt like the odd man out, kept at arm’s length from everyone around us for one reason or another.

I suppose it’s safer that way.

The children halt suddenly in their game, freezing as three figures approach. The eldest of them scoops up the ball and hurries his siblings away, all of them darting back to the safety of their home.

My brows knit together in confusion as I squint at the oncoming trio, trying to make sense of the figures’ faces through the bright light. 

“Father!” I cry as the foremost figure’s face becomes clear, leaping to my feet to rush to him.

I’d thought when he’d left this morning he’d be gone for another week, and I wouldn’t have an opportunity to explain or apologize for being in his study.

I take a step towards him, my arms outstretched to embrace him, before stopping short. Two dark elves leer from over my father’s shoulders, their eyes lingering on me far longer than I’d like. My arms drop limply to my sides.

He never brings business associates home.

“Father…?” I repeat as he stops a few yards from me, his face hard.

He extends a hand, and at first I think he’s beckoning for me to come to him. My mother’s skirts swish as she moves past me, placing her hand in my father’s as she joins him.

“Mother?” I ask, confusion turning to panic. What’s happening? Why has he brought dark elves to our home? He’d always said it wasn’t safe to have them here…

Tears shine in my mother’s eyes, but her lips are pressed into a firm line. My eyes dart between the two of them, my mouth opening and closing, my voice vacating me as I try to put words to the raucous thoughts in my head.

Faster than my eyes can track, the dark elves are upon me, two impossibly strong sets of hands gripping my arms as they drag me away. I thrash in their grip, a familiar, uncontrollable sensation rising in my chest in response to the danger.

“Mama!” I scream like a child as tears run down my face, the sensation in my chest tightening to a nearly painful point. I’m about to lose control when an invisible force shoves itself down my throat, suffocating the roiling power brewing in my chest.

“Daddy! Help!” I cry, kicking and writhing beneath the dark elves’ grip. What’s happening? Why aren’t they helping me? Why aren’t they doing anything?

The dark elves don’t budge as they continue with me up the street. I throw everything I can at them, willing that silent sensation to come back, to help me when I need it, but nothing comes. My throat constricts, panic taking over completely, and I bite one of the arms holding me. 

The dark elf barks in pain, letting out a string of curses as he releases my arm. I throw myself to the side, hoping to avoid his grip, when he strikes me across the face so hard that I nearly topple to the ground. 

I sob, stars dancing in my vision as he takes hold of my arm again.

“Mama,” I cry out, my voice breaking. I catch sight of my parents over the dark elves’  shoulders as they shove me into a waiting carriage. My mother turns away from me, burying her face in my father’s shoulder as he watches impassively.

The door slams shut with a finality that adds yet another crack to my breaking heart. I wrack my brain as the carriage starts, trying to make sense of the past few minutes and orient myself.

In almost no time, I realize four things.

One, my parents had no intention of intervening while the dark elves took me.

Two, based on the path and direction we’re traveling, I’m headed to the Dark Market, where any manner of unknown horrors await me.

Three, I will only have one chance to escape--and that’s if I live long enough to see it.

I take a shuddering breath, trying to stifle my tears. They won’t help me where I’m going. I bide my time, counting the turns of the carriage, every movement forward only confirming our destination. 

The carriage lurches to a halt, my breath catching in my throat as the two dark elves disembark from the front. The door is flung open – the moment I’ve been waiting for.

I lunge, breaking through the two dark elves before they realize what’s happening. I move faster than I ever have before, but only get a few paces away before those sickeningly familiar hands grip my upper arms.

“Spirited one, isn’t she,” grumbles the dark elf to his companion. I snarl at him, kicking and flailing as hard as I can, aiming for any bit of elven body within reach. The dark elves evade me easily, but I refuse to give up despite the futility of my efforts, scratching and clawing as they drag me up the path. 

I catch glimpses of the goings-on in the market: a human man, tied to a post, his back a mess of oozing red flesh as an elf hands a mean-looking whip off to another. Human women, nude and bound in chains, being paraded by a vendor and groped by the patrons of a particularly busy stall. Elves I can only assume are mercenaries lurking in shadows, some with dirty, gaunt humans leashed to their belts.

Then, suddenly, we’re in a building, the fetid stench of human excrement, blood, and tears crawling up my nose. I’m thrown into an overcrowded cage before I can react, and I fling myself at the bars of the cage door as it shuts in my face.

I beg, shriek, and demand to go home until my voice is hoarse, rage taking the place of my tears. Hours into my tirade, a guard turns to me, an ugly sneer twisting his features as he finally speaks. “This is your home now, girl.” 

My heart stops beating, and the world slows around me as the gravity of his words sets in.

And number four? My parents sold me to the Dark Market.