Page 29 of Plaything of the Dark Elf

Their heads poke out of doorways and from behind walls, eyes wide at the sight. For the longest time, Meru acted as my head butler. With him in charge, things get done around here.

I want to turn around and drive my foot into his stomach until his insides come out of both ends. What a fool.

“Sir!” Meru exclaims. “M-My leg! It’s–”

“Did I tell you to speak to me?” I reply, not even turning around to check on his physical state. It doesn’t matter. Red taints my vision. “Tell me where Dalia is before I cut your head off at this instant.”

“No, no!” Meru wants to scramble to his feet, but my hand on his scalp makes it difficult for him to do anything more but flail wildly. “I-I know where she is! She must be doing laundry by the river! T-That’s what I instructed her to do this morning!”

I click my tongue. “You were instructing her? Who gave you the right?”

“Y-You’ve allowed me to direct the actions of the other servants–”

I whip around, driving his head into the wall three times. An indent is left behind.

“She isn’t another servant!”

Meru chokes back his sobs. Grabbing his scalp once more, I drag him through the hallways of my mansion, past the threshold, and outside. The rocks underneath my feet feel jagged, but I don’t mind dragging him over each one of them. I hope they’re cutting into his skin and drawing blood. It pleases me to hear his agonizing cries for help and mercy.

“General Etheron, please!” Meru begs. “I-I can’t take the pain!”

“You’re going to take it for as long as I tell you.”

I’m losing myself. I can’t think straight. I want blood. His blood. I have every right to kill him for defying my orders. Every person who stands in the way between her and I deserves their tongues cut out and their eyes fed to their families.

I’m drowning out the pitiful noises that Meru makes underneath my hold. If he continues to annoy me, I’ll have no choice but to stomp my feet into his skull until his insides ooze across the ground.

By the river, he says. If she’s not there, the butler dies.

I purposely lug his body over sharp rocks as we make our descent to the river. Blood trails down his arms and legs, but it doesn’t matter to me. He’s losing consciousness because of the pain. He stops crying out for help, knowing that no one in their right mind is going to come to his rescue. Not while I’m around.

I hear the river flowing closeby, so I pick up my pace. On the small crest I stand upon, my eyes land on Dalia and my grip on the butler loosens.

She sits with a large hat on her face, dipping clothes into the water and wringing them out over the river. My heart races. The moment I see her, everything else in the world fades away. She makes me forget about the darkness that lingers within my heart.

All the desire I have to maim and kill the butler underneath me is gone in seconds. He’s not responding to my small kicks at his legs. He might already be dead. It doesn’t matter. Servants like him are as replaceable as the food I eat.

Dalia. She looks ethereal from afar. I don’t even want to interrupt her as she works. She seems focused. Her tongue slightly juts out of her mouth while she cleans the clothing. My eyes trail down from her face to her arms to her legs. Admiration fills me. She’s stunning.

But then, I start noticing something strange. There are dark blue and purple splotches across her upper arms and on her lower legs. They’re grotesque, ugly marks that ruin her complexion. What’s this? This isn’t right. Those are bruises.

Bruises. Someone did that to her.

Not only that, but there’s a gauntness to her face that wasn’t there before. She’s lost weight and I can see it in her cheekbones. I notice the way her wrist bones jut out, as well as the back of her spine.

Rage fills me in seconds. I leave this mansion for a short amount of time, wanting to clear my head, and everything goes to shit. Meru is to blame for this, but I don’t think he acted alone.

No, I recognize how other dark elves feel about human women. They detest them, but that doesn’t give them the right to mess with Dalia. She’s different from the rest.

Why? She’s mine.

“Dalia!”

My voice booms across the clearing, startling the small animals that are nearby. That includes Dalia, who jolts with the sound of her name. She hangs onto her hat as she turns around, staring at me with wide eyes.

I can’t decipher the emotions going through her. Are they as intense as mine? I crave her body, but something needs to be done about the marks and bruisings that litter her skin. Some of them look fresh.

The emotions swirling through my heart are indescribable. They’re mixed in a pool of black rage. I don’t want to say what I’m capable of doing to the dark elves responsible for her suffering. At that moment, I clear my mind of those wastes of air.

Instead, I focus on her. Only her.

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