"Give up THE Demon Witch or show this little former Human you turned Profane that its loyalty only goes one way?" he snarls at Anna practically spitting out the word human.
My head spins: does this mean he doesn't think I am human anymore. They keep spitting that word Profane at me and I still don't understand but it kind of sounds like they don't think Anna and I are humans... That is nonsense. I really have been kidnapped by a crazy cult or something.
As my head spins through these thoughts I watch as Anna keeps her eyes locked on me never acknowledging that he has even spoken.
"You see Profane," he snarls turning back to me, "this is what your loyalty is worth to a demon witch." He slowly stalks back towards me
"It will watch you bleed and die Profane because it doesn't care," He is taunting me I realize but I don't understand why, "Last chance to change your choice; you or it?" He offers once more brandishing his knife as though preparing to strike
"Me." My voice is steady and stable. My decision is locked. I haven't even considered changing my mind since I spoke the first time because as soon as I heard my decision spoken, I knew I would die for my Anna.
My eyes are locked with Anna as I speak and again, I think I see a flash of sapphire blue streak through her eyes upon my pronouncement.
"Tch" he scoffs, taking deliberate steps towards me, "Shouldn't have expected anything else from a Profane"
I try to hold Anna's gaze but as I feel him near, I can't help but turn my attention to the man who is about to inflict the same damage upon me that I see on her. He is almost within arm's reach, and his knife looks worse the closer it gets. Just as he raises his blade though
"Stop," rings out clear and true through the room in Anna's voice.
He lowers his blade a fraction turning just enough to look over his shoulder at her,
"Ready to tell me where The Demon Witch hides?" He sneers
I want to call out to her that she shouldn't betray one loyalty for another because either way these men are definitely going to kill us, but a cold laugh fills the room.
"Where is THE Demon Witch? Who is THE Demon Witch?" Anna mocks but it isn't quite the voice I know this one is cold and burns as it echoes around us. Mingled with her voice are the sharp sounds of chains rattling and I tear my eyes from the knife to look at her expecting to see her fighting against her chains.
Instead, I see the last of the chains falling to the floor around her and her blood-soaked dress and hair starting to flow out around her as if wind is flowing out of her.
"You may be free, but I can still kill him if you don't answer me," He roars crouching to place his knife on my neck.
"I am answering you! You blind man!" Furry pours off of the woman I believed to be my wife, "Where is THE DEMON WITCH? Who is THE Demon Witch?" The questions sit quiet and heavy hanging in the air for fust a moment, "Here I am."
As the answer falls from her lips, she takes a single step forward onto the raised path between the two sides of the room and she transforms. Her chocolate brown eyes I love so much now burn with flames of sapphire blue. The hair that just a moment ago was shoulder length and brown is now pure white and swirls around her waist. The dress filled with holes and soaked with blood is now soft layers of pure clean white falling to the floor. She seems to shimmer as if she is radiating heat but the temperature in the room hasn't changed. In sharp contrast to all the white is the red cuts still open across her skin
"Impossible," Roars the man still holding a knife to my throat, "If you were that devil the first man who cut you would be dead. Everyone knows spilling the blood of The Demon Witch is a death sentence."
Again, the cold laugh fills the room, and I realize it is coming from Anna. It is not a sound I would have ever believed Anna could make as it is cold and dark. A menacing sound that only grows darker as she utters a single word that echoes through the room and sends a chill down my spine even if I don't understand it.
"Lëshim" [1]
I swear the air freezes for just a moment, and I feel a tremble pass through the knife pressed to my throat. The blood around Anna begins to swirl as every cut across her body seems to glow. Quickly the swirling blood is solidifying into what appear to be snakes and begin to quietly slip under the door into the rest of the house.
All I can do is stare at the woman I believed to be my wife and wonder if maybe she truly is a demon or witch. Her attention slides to the man behind me.
"It really is a shame you never bothered to apply a cut to me yourself," she says it casually as if it is a perfectly normal sentence, "it would be so much more convenient."
Blood snakes continue to slip out of the room. A muffled sound comes filtering through the floor that sounds faintly like panicked screaming. The cuts glowing on Anna are starting to fade leaving behind unblemished snow-white skin. The man holding me at knife point is definitely trembling now. I don't understand I feel like I am missing something important.
The door bursts open and with the newcomer comes the screams now unmuffled. Only being tempered by distance now instead of a solid door I can clearly hear pain filled shrieks of what sounds like more than twenty men.
"Serge," the newcomer pants, "something is happening."
[1] Lëshim Albanian for Release. (According to online translator)