Th_omas

" How about we help each other?" He says and I look up at him, eyes still wet from the tears streaming down my cheeks, heart freshly broken from the public humiliation and betrayal that was Lucas's breakup. I can faintly make out the first droppings of snow floating magically under the light of the street lamps. It's that time of the year, a time for wool coats, a time for relaxing, none of which I'll be doing. "I'm an orphan with a wicked aunt and a boyfriend who left her because she has nothing to her name, how could I possibly help you?" I say another sob escaping my lips. "Marry me" he replies and my eyes widen in anger. Is he mocking me?. I look into the eyes of this stranger and see he's dead serious. "I need a wife, you need a home, marry me and you'll have all you want". I nod.

A Snowy Marriage (A Christmas agreement)

"What are you guys talking about?", I ask Adrian and Arden, and the look that they give me makes me feel offended, even if it does make me feel comically happy.

"Do you guys think I'm an idiot?" I ask, and I can see the retort that is on Arden's lips. She wants to tell me yes, and then we'll laugh It off but she sees I'm dead serious, and swallows her answer.

That actually gets me laughing, and a few moments later we are both clutching our stomachs, and she is trying her best not to fall onto the floor and laugh.

We regain our composure as Adrian stares at us like we were two mythical creatures he could never seem to get the hang of. His face is painfully handsome in that sort of confused fascination, and we regain our composure to sit on the beautiful semicircle couches littered around this hall.

It seems the place is even bigger than I had earlier imagined, as it stretches far off into the distance and I'm sure there is a station where cooking is fervently going on every mile or so. I seem to wonder exactly how large this place is, and if I get lost would I ever be able to find my way back, or would I just keep walking for days on end.

"I have a plan" I say to both of them, and the hesitation in Adrian's eyes makes me groan. It seems he notices the clear answer he already has in his eyes, and even though he tries his best to wipe that answer away, I can still see the clear NO that is spelt out in there.

He doesn't even give me a chance to present what I had in my head, before he bluntly refuses me any chance at participating in what is so evidently going on here.

People are gaining an upper hand in this game, and I'm sure whatever the outcome if it isn't personal would not be in his best interest.

" Will you at least give me a chance to speak?" I say, and the hesitation is still see in his eyes doesn't seem to calm me. It makes me nervous instead, as I realise exactly who I'm talking to. I'm talking to people who have lived here for practically all their life and have witnessed exactly how these games go. They have witnessed the sort of callousness and brutality that seems to encompass the people who live here themselves.

They have seen the betrayals that end up in the deaths of those who thought they had the trust of others, as they slowly crumpled to the floor and die from whatever sort of poison has been slipped into their food. The thought of being poisoned makes me drift off again as I cannot seem to believe exactly what had happened just a few moments earlier. I had almost been poisoned by someone barely my age.

That seems to tell me all I need to know about this place, and it gives me an even hardened resolution to let them know exactly what I'm planning.

Chapter 54