The Buried Boy of Obsidian

   

By Zoe Medeios

 The welmish boy had never seen the sun. From the day he was born ten years before he had been kept under the farm, behind locked doors. Every other day his ex lineal Aunt would come down and bring him a large hunk of bread and mug of water. Always hungry, he would devour it.

    Ten years alone the boy spent in the dark room under the farm. Rarely speaking he had no voice to use, but in his head, his mind was obrumpent, overflowing with thought far above where he should have been. The only conversations he ever had were with his Aunt, who did not see him as a human child, just a way to confess her venialia. To her he was on object, a scratchy little voice behind locked doors.

    The boy could almost not see at all. What little light he had he was given by a torch in the hall, that every night would go out, pitching him into blackness so dark he could practically feel it all around him, squeezing him going in his eyes and mouth, suffocating. Then the light would be relight the next morning, and the boy could see his own white clammy skin of his hands once more.

    The first voice he heard was a girls. His Aunt didn't count.

    "Hello?" came a small inquisitive voice from outside the barred door. The boy blinked, rubbed his eyes.

    "Hallo?" he said." his voice so small and hoarse even he could barely hear it. On spindly, stumbling legs, the boy stood and limped over to the door. Standing on tiptoes he peered through the bars, clutching them on either side of his head.

    "Hi!"

    The boy blinked again, eyes adjusting to the meager light in the hall. In the center of the corridor stood a girl. He didn't know this. The only other human he had ever seen was his Aunt.

    The girl had short hair, the color of pale copper braided on either side of her head, bright blue eyes, and teeth too big for her mouth.

    "Who are you" she asked, and came up to the window as well, peering in at him, as he peered out at her.

    The boy shrugged.

    "You don't know your name?" she said incredulously. He shook his head, "well I'm Anna-Alice."

    "That sounds pretty" the boy said hoarsely, "like music."

    "Thank you. What's wrong with your voice?"

    "I don't use it much"

    "Then how come you talk right?"

    "I listen to my Aunt when she talks. She talks a lot. Not to me, but at me."

    "How can someone talk at you?" the boy shrugged again, "Well if I'm going to talk to you, You need a name"

    "Okay."

    "Let's see," Anna-Alice muttered thoughtfully, "here are some I know. Jeremy, Jacob, Austin, Zachary, Kyle,uh..., Devin, Walter, Joshua.... any of those."

    The boy shook his head. None sounded right.

    "Got any more?"

    "Huh... okay, Barric, Blake, Eldric, Edmund, Aldis, and... Ashton."

    "Ashton!" the boy said suddenly making the girls jump, his voice clearer than it had been in many years.

    "You like Ashton?" Anna-Alice asked wrinkling her nose. The boy nodded eagerly, "it's kind of a mouth full."

    "What do mean? Your name is Anna-Alice!"

    "Fine, fine, but I get to just call you Ash. It's shorter"

    "Only if I get to shorten yours. Which is better, Anne or Alice?"

    She thought about it for a few moments."I think.... I like Alice" she said nodding her head curtly. "my mommy always calls me anna-Alice, but you can call me Alice."

    "Would that make us friends?" he asked hopefully. Alice thought for a minute.

    "I think so."

    Ash, for that was now his name, grinned for the first time in ten years.

    "Why are you down here?" Ash asked his new found friend.        

    "We're moving into the barn upstairs.."

    "You are!"

    "Yes,  we're staying with Mrs. Joneson. She's the one that owns the farm, she said we could turn the barn into a house since they don’t have anymore cows."

    "Mrs.Joneson? I that my Aunt's name?"

    "i guess..."Alice stepped back from the small window, "why are you in there?"

    "i don't know" Ash responded, stepping back himself and sitting on the cold floor in the darkness once more.

    "Can I get you out" her voice sounded distant.

    "I don't know" he said again.

    "Who keeps you in there?"

    "My Aunt."

    "What! That's ridiculous. I'm going to talk to her! I'm sure she'd listen to me!"

    "No!" Ash cried leaping to his feet again, "you can’t, I don't know why I'm in here, but I think she's crazy. You better not talk to her at all about me. She might hurt you."

    "Well if I can't make her get you out, how can I help you?"

    "Food. She only ever brings me food every other day, and I'm always really hungry."

    "Okay! I can bring you food. Are you hungry now? I could bring you some."

    "You better only come down once a day. I don't want my Aunt to hurt you"

    "Okay, well, I better go, my mommy will want me back soon, she doesn't know I went exploring. I'll bring you food tomorrow! Bye Ash!"

   Alice ran off down the way she had come her orange pigtails waving behind her and pink dress flouncing.

    Ash sighed. Alone in the darkness once more. But now it was different. Now he could look forward to something besides his next meal, that would still leave him starving.

    But he had a friend now. Alice would come back the next day. For the first time ever,he could look forward to tomorrow.

    Five years passed. Every day Alice would come down with a basket of food. Ash ceased to starve constantly. He still never saw the sun, but his frail arms became more strong. They were still very thin, but no longer as fragile. He and Alice became very close, and every day they could sit talking on either side of the wooden door for hours. when Ash started growing rapidly, it was Alice that found new clothes for him to wear. Neither of them had to stand on tiptoe to see through the window any more.

   Alice grew to be beautiful. Her long red hair, which she started to wear down, reminded Ash of what the sun must look like. Her blue eyes glimmered in the dim torch light and her teeth were sized more correctly.

    Even after five years, Alice had never seen all of Ash's face. The shadows in his cell were too dark, and what she could see was smudged with dirt and grime. But she could tell he was very tall, he almost had to bend over to see through the window now.

    "Do you know what day it is?" Alice asked one morning when she came down extra early.

    "Huh..." Ash groaned sitting up from his position on the floor where he had been sleeping, not quite awake yet.

    "Oh get up Ash! I asked you if you knew what day it was."

    "Uhh.... I don't even think it's tomorrow yet. Go back to bed Alice."

    "Nonsense,," she said in a pompous fashion, "It's only four in the morning. It is tomorrow, but that's not what I meant."

    Ash got to his feet, nearly tripping in the still solid blackness. The torch had gone out over the night, and no one had come to relight the torch. When he looked out the window, he saw the flickering of a candle and the face it illuminated. His heart skipped a beat when he saw how beautiful she looked, even with her hair unbrushed and wild around her shoulders.

    "It’s the day..." she continued, "when we first met!"

    Ash rubbed his eyes, they still weren't used to the even miniscule light, "Are you sure?"

    "Of course I’m sure."

    "How can you remember that so exactly?"

    "Because, silly, it's my birthday!"

    "Really?" Ash knew her birthday. He thought it should be coming soon, but when you're kept eternally in a dark cell it's impossible to tell time, "I never knew we met on your birthday. You never said that."

    "Didn't I? oh well. here hold this."

    Ash stuck his thin arm through the bars to hold the candle holder. Alice bent down and swung the satchel from over her shoulder. Out of it she pulled a single hunk of bread.

    "Here," I know it's not much, but I'll get you more later."

    Ash ate the bread hungrily while Alice continued to search through her bag.

    "Uck..." she said at last, "Give me that candle, it's way to dark in here, how you deal with it every day I will never know."

    Alice took the candle from Ash and set the torch alight, blowing on it softly to help it catch fire more easily. When the torch was blazing once more, Alice sighed.

    "That’s better" again she knelt by the bag and now found what she as looking for quickly. "Ah ha!" she exclaimed and pulled out of her bag a large iron key.

    "Alice, where did you get that" he said quietly

    "I stole it if you must know, from Mrs.Joneson"

    "I told you no!" he shouted, "My Aunt is insane. I don't want her to hurt you. You should hear what she says every day. What she tells me. I don't think she thinks I can understand or even listen but I do! Remember last year when she tried to poison you mother? That woman is crazy and I don't know what she will do to you if she finds out you've released me."

    "Do you think I care!" Alice shouted back, "you have been locked up in a tiny dark cell for fifteen years Ash. You didn't even have a name until five years ago, and all you ever knew was the hand that fed you every other day. I’m sure it's even better since I moved, but this is still no life. Every day just waiting for me to come down, and then just sitting and listening to all the horrible thingsMrs.Joneson has done! You have never even see the sun, Ash. You don't know what rain feels like, or snow, or what it's like to hear hundreds of voices at once, or anything. The only people you've ever talked to were me and your Aunt. You’ve never got to play with other boys, or pet a dog, you've never fancied someone or... or...." she trailed off, running out of things to say

    Through all this Ash stood in his cell head bowed and began to cry silently, shoulders shaking.

    "I'm letting you out Ash" Alice said, her voice shaking this time, "your Aunt won't be able to hurt me, because we're going to run away. I've been planning it for a while now, I told you about my fights with my mom. Well she went over the line."

    "What did she do" he asked, keeping his voice low so she couldn't hear it shaking from his crying.

    "She engaged me." Alice responded simply, no emotion in her voice. Ash's eyes widened, "To some guy ten years older than me that i've never met. she said it's going to be better for both of us. Her and I, I mean. she wanted me to move over a hundred miles away. I want to run away before he shows up next week."

    Ash said nothing.

    "I want us both to leave. tomorrow."

    "You could run on your own" Ash muttered, "and leave me in here."

    "What! how the hell would I ever be able to do that!. Now, you stop arguing, I'm going to get you out."

    Ash didn't protest this time as Alice worked the large key into the lock. His heart-beat loud in his ears and she turned the key with the grind of metal on metal, for the door had not been opened in fifteen years.

    When she swung the door open, Ash was frozen on the spot.

    For the first time Alice took a single step into the room. Ash had been able to see Alice through the bars, but she had never seen him, even after five years of knowing each other she had no clue what he looked like. Alice took a step forward almost in awe and grabbed his hand.

    "Hi" she said.

    "Hi."

    "You’re free Ash." tears threatened at the corners of her eyes and she smiled, "you can leave the cell forever."

    Ash couldn't respond. All he had ever known had been the inside of this cell. Now seeing the hallway in full, unimpeded through a doorway that had never been opened. What could the outside world be like. Other people. The sky. He could feel the sun. Alice had described it to him a million times but that was substituted for the real thing.

    "I don't know if I can do this Alice" Ash rasped.

    "Of course you can." Alice said, squeezing his hand, "One step at a time. I'll get you new clothes and you can get cleaned up. I'll have to steal some money from my mother and Aunt,and you'll have to get used to walking and the sun, but by tomorrow, we'll be away from here for forever."

    It was difficult for Ash to walk out of the tunnel. He had never walked much and he tired easily and his legs kept halting him out of fear.

    "Come on, one step at a time,Ash," Alice would coax, and Ash would find the courage to move again.

    They came to a full halt when they reached the mouth of the hall.

    Dim sunlight of the early morning flooded in. Ash blinked in wonder, even the tiny amount of light nearly blinding his eyes.

    "This is going to be a huge jump for you, but we can do it."

    "I know" Ash said shakily, "one step at a time right?"

    He smiled at her, and she smiled back.

    "Come on."

    It was still in the early hours of the morning. Not even the animals had began stirring. Alice lead Ash quickly through the short walk in the woods, not wanting to be caught by her own unreasonable mother or Ashes insane Aunt. Ash looked around him constantly, soaking in everything he saw, it was all new for him. The tree's, the low fog that clung to the ground like cotton, the stirring of birds in trees and the grass underneath his feet.

    "This is all so..."

    "Different" Alice supplied.

    "Magical. I've imagined what the real world must be like my entire life, but in my wildest dreams I never pictured anything like this"

    "Just wait till the sun rises. You will be blown away."

    Ash squeezed her hand and smiled.

    When they reached the barn where Alice lived after about a three minute walk through the forest, Alice took her hand out of Ash's and put one finger to her lips in a sign to stay absolutely silent.

    Slowly she eased the door open and stuck her head in. When the coast was clear she motioned for Ash to follow.

    Her mother's room was the first to the right of the door. Together the two tiptoed past it. when they were clear, Alice seemed to relax. She lead Ash up a small set of stairs that lead to another door, which she shut behind them.

    "Whew," Alice let out a sigh, " We should be in the clear now, just try not to talk to loud."

    Ash nodded, his attention ruled by the new surroundings. so many things he had never seen before. Alice opened the door to a small bathroom, holding only a large tube already containing water.

    "You've never taken a bath have you?" Alice asked. Ash shook his head, "well this is going to be awkward. on that chair there is a pile of new clothes for you, put on the underwear, but leave everything else off."

    Alice turned her back while he changed.

    "I’m done," he said after only a few seconds.

    "And you're only in the underwear right? The one that looks like pants but much shorter?"

    "Yes,"

    "Okay, get in the tub." Alice turned as he was lowering himself into the water. He was painfully thin and she could see each individual rib on his chest. Alice strode over to the tub and knelt beside it, pulling a bucket of soap beside her. Taking a cloth out of the soapy bucket, Alice took one of his arms and began to scrub away at the accumulated grime and dirt.

    "Do you see what I'm doing?" she asked.

    "Yeah."

    "Take another cloth and do the same to your legs. Until they look remotely this color," she said pointing to her own arm.

    "Alright," Ash took the second cloth and proceed to clean himself. while he did that Alice moved to wash his hair. First she poured a bucket of water on his head, causing him to jump.

    "What did you do that for?'

    "I’m washing our hair, hush." Ash's hair was very long, having never been cut before. nearly as long as Alice's own hair. As she washed it, and the years in the cell began to run into the water, Alice discovered that his hair was golden blonde.

        As Alice pulled his hair back from his neck, running her fingers through it to work in the soap, she saw it. The water and soap running down his back washed away just enough of the grime to reaveal...something. What it was she wasnt exactly sure. Taking the extra washcloth, she scrubbed at the spot on his right shoulder blade. Slowly the shape came into veiw. It looked like a tatto, but stretched and faded as if applyed when he was very young, before he had grown. It depicted a sheild that must have once been dark blue was now but now faded. Behind the sheild a sword with a dark red ruby on the pummel held by the etching of a claw, was crossed with a detailed king's septor of gold and the same red as the ruby.

     "What is this?" she said,shocked.

     "What is what?" Ash asked, pausing for a moment on the washing of his arm.

     "On your back. It looks like a crest or somthing," alice had the nagging suspision that she knew she had seen this before, but couldn't quiet figure where "I feel like I know this symbol."

     "Where is it?" Ash crained his head around as if trying to see as well.

     "Here," she said putting her hand over the mark, "on your shoulder blade."
     "Strange, could it be a birthmark?"

     "Only if birth marks come in blue, red, and gold," Alice joked.

     "Not a birth mark then"

     "Most likely not."

     "It doesn't reallly supries me at this point. I don't really know much about myself."

     

    Washing was an new experience for Ash. One of the many he had had in the past hour. It was almost fascinating how the once grey skin became a pale pink.

    "You are very pale" Alice said from behind him. Her fingers felt nice in his hair, even if he wasn't entirely sure what she was doing.

    It took a lot of scrubbing for him to become a normal color again, so by the time all the grime.

    "I'm going to cut your hair, if that's okay."

    "I guess.." he responded uncertainly.

    "good, I'll be right back I have to get scissors, keep scrubbing my friend, you are filthy"

    Alice jumped up from her position and darted out of the room.

    Ash stopped scrubbing his arm for a moment, to give his shoulder a rest. The water stopped rippling when he stopped moving. A wavy, unclear image of his reflection looked back at him. He could see the outlines of his shoulders and head. This is when he realized, Ash had never seen his own face. He frowned. It was never really something he had thought about, but still. Now it ate at him. He didn't know what color his own hair was, or his eyes. In truth Ash, didn't know his own name. Ashton was a name given to him by Alice when he was ten. Who was he really. Why had his Aunt locked in that cell, where were his parents, and did they have something to do with the mark on his back? So many questions that had seemed unanswerable in the black hole of a cell, now clawed at his mind.

    They could be answered, but those answers could come with time.   

    Before that, Ash wanted to see what his own face looked like. He applied the same method to his face as he had his arms and legs. There was no way for him to see, but he scrubbed anyway.

    When Alice came back with the scissors, Ash was still trying to clean his face.

    "What are you doing, you should do you face last."

    "I don't know what I look like!" he exclaimed, sounding half mad and half excited, "I've never seen my face."

    He dropped the washcloth, "Is my face clean yet?"

    "Not remotely" Alice laughed, setting the scissors down on a table and walking over to help him. She took the cloth from his hand, and started to work away the dirt herself. She tilted his chin back, and started in tiny circles on his jaw line. Slowly, the dirt came away. All of it.

     When his face was clean, Alice sat back and stared.

    She had known Ash since she was ten, for five years , but she had never truly seen his face. Ash was not just handsome. He went beyond that. He was beautiful. Like a fairy or elven king from childhood stories. There was no way this was the boy from the cell she had met everyday for five years but had never seen.

    She blinked.

    Ash was very excited, he grabbed her wrists, "What color are my eyes, Alice? I've never seen my own face, I don't know my eyes or my nose or anything." his face fell when he saw her blank stare, "what's the matter?"

    Alice shook her head.

    "It’s nothing. Your eyes..." she looked into them trying to find the right word to describe their color, "I think they could be considered green, but like a frosty green, and you have a rim of dark blue in the center. You have beautiful eyes Ash."

    He grinned, but not just because of her compliment. He had never known anything about himself. The color of his eyes was a start.

    "Do you have a mirror?"' he asked. Alice nodded still shellshocked. When she passed a small hand mirror to him he frowned.

    "Why are you frowning?"

    "Not really what I expected."

    "Well you had no standards. Have you ever even seen another boy before?"

    "Point taken."

    "I'm going to leave, You get out and dry off. Get dressed. I'll come back in about ten minute."

    When Alice shut the door behind herself her heart beat in her throat. She leaned against the wood staring at the wall across from her blankley.

    Was she really going to do this? Run away? Leave her mother forever. Well the alternative was marrying a man she'd never met. And if she did decide to stay, what would happen to Ash. He'd never been around other people. He would have no idea how to survive or deal with the world. And she couldn't lock him up again. Poor, sweet, beautiful Ash, had never had anything that others did. She was going to help him. Not only because she pitied him, but because he was her best friend, and had been since she was ten and got lost in the tunnels under her new barn. There was no way she would leave him. That settled it. They were running away.

    

    Ash dressed as quickly as he could. The clothes were all brand new. Trousers, a dark grey shirt that billowed in the sleeves before tightening at the wrists, a royal blue and gold vest and a pair of boots. He discarded his old slipper like shoes that he had worn for so many years and donned the sock and boots. Lacing them was more of an issue and took him several minutes to figure it out. He constantly had to blow, his now clean and drying, feathery black hair away from his eyes. Huffing indignantly, he pulled it all back and tied it with a piece of twine. Now less of it fell in his eyes, but one stubborn lock of hair remained.

    He knocked on the door, "Alice?" he whispered "I'm dressed"

     "Good" she said when she opened the door, “We better hurry, my mother might wake up soon."

    "Wait.." Ash uttered, "Before we leave, I want to find out who I am."

    "How would we do that?"

    "My Aunt. She has to know something. Why else would she have kept me?"

    "You've said it yourself a hundred times, Ash, she's insane. Insanity has no purpose."

    "Still, Alice. If she's my Aunt, either my mother or father's sister, then she must have known who I am." Ash took a step closer to Alice and grabbed one of her hands in both of his, "please Alice."

    Alice sigh, sure she was blushing, "okay Ash. fine"

    "Thank you," he said and kissed the back of her hand in excitement before releasing it, "We don't even have to talk to her. She must keep something in her study. I know of it because she mentions it often. She keeps records of everything she does in there."

    "Sounds like a horrible place, " Alice muttered.

    "It does," he agreed, "but it might be the best way to find out exactly who I am."

        

     "Where would we even start" Alice whispered quietly as they stood outside the door to the main house.

    "Like I said the study."

    "Two things. One where is the study and two, how would we find information on you. We don't know how she organizes all her papers or scrolls or books. If it's alphabetical or something we'll never know if we've found you. We don't know your real name."

    "We have to try" he snapped. then closed his eyes and sighed heavily, ,"I just want to know who and what I am, Alice"

    "A filthy little runaway that's what you are."

    They both stiffened and turned around slowly to see Ash's Aunt towering over them.

    She was surprisingly strong. Mrs.Joneson was a very large woman with beefy arm and short stringy brown hair. When she grabbed Ash by his new collar, he had no strength to resist. Alice lashed out at the woman, but stopped short when she looped an arm around Ash's neck.

    "Back off, girlie. Or I will break his scrawny little neck, or you could just stand there and let him choke to death. Ending his life won't mean much, he hasn't has much of one anyway."

    Ash beat feebly at his aunt's strong arm. With her arm pulled tight across his throat he couldn't breathe. He tried hitting at her and pulling away, but to no avail. So he gave up. Alice met his eyes and stepped back. His Aunt released her grip on him and he fell to his knees, coughing for air.

    "Better." the cruel woman smirked., "both of you come with me"

     She pulled Ash by his ponytail and Alice followed. It was her fault he was in this situation. She should never have agreed to entering her house, but he had looked so elated...

   Mrs.Joneson commanded them to sit back to back on a wooden block in the slaughter house. Dead pigs hung upside down from the ceiling and racks upon racks of knives lined the walls. Insanity was an understatement. She tied them together. Around their sternum several times and then tied their wrists together at the sides. When she was finished she stepped back to admire her handy work.

    

    Ash grabbed Alice's hand. He could hear his blood pulsing in his ears, roaring like a flood ready to break free. And that what his blood might become if his Aunt used one of those knives on him. His scalp ached from where she had pulled his hair and his throat throbbed painfully.

    "So" Mrs. Joneson said, leaning extremely close to Ash so her nose was only about an inch away, "you want to know who you are do you" she laughed a maniacal laugh throwing her head back and cackling like a witch.

    "That's probably the funniest thing I’ve heard all day. I raise you like a dog, yet you can talk and walk and you even dressed up all fancy. And you even got yourself a lady friend. Little Anna-Alice I shoulda known you was trouble when I let you and your mother in"

    "Don't hurt her" Ash pleaded, his voice breaking.

    "Don't hurt her? Ha!"

    Alice squeezed Ash's tightly and he could feel her trembling.

    "Have either of you heard of king Leomiere?" Mrs.Joneson asked in a singsong voice. Ash shook his head, but Alice nodded, "what do you know of him my dear."

    "Uh- well. He's been ruler for almost twenty years. He's married to queen Nazara. They have three kids. Or they have two, a boy and a girl. They would have three if the son they had fifteen years- oh my god." Alice's hand went slack with shock.

    "Exactly my little lady!" his Aunt said clapping like an overexcited child, "my little brother was oh so upset set when his darling baby Blackstone went missing."

    "You're-" Alice stuttered, "he's-"

    "Precisely, my, you do learn fast. your little Arch here, or whatever you've taken to calling him, is the missing prince Blackstone."