Imprisoned

In an effort to up my game and get back in the swing of things, I’ve decided to write an occasional micro-story from a roll of the Story Cube dice. This is one such exercise.

Story Cubes: Hand or palm, Tower, Apple, Alien, Lightbulb, the letter L, Fountain, Moon, Flower

Photo by Jaromír Kavan on Unsplash

She sighed and rested her chin in her palm as she gazed out the open window onto the lush fields below.  Flowers swayed in the breeze, glittering like diamonds as the dew on their petals caught the faint light of the crescent moon.  Leaves rippled as the wind played in the orchard, the apple trees lined up at attention, as stiff and reticent as the Imperial Guard.

She sighed again as she pushed herself away from the window and padded across the room, ornate rugs muffling the sound of her bare feet. Her quarters in the Tower were luxurious, if cramped. Exotic textiles from all corners of the Empire were brought to make her imprisonment comfortable, as befitting a woman of her status. But that did not change the fact that she was confined to this gilded cage for the unlikeliest of reasons: love, with a capital L.

Recalling the day they met still brought a flutter to her stomach. She had just returned from a hunt and stopped at the fountain to water her horse as she had, once again, overtaxed the poor beast. A loud bang startled her as she handed the reins to a groom. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so she began to search for the source of the noise. Rounding a corner within the palace, she nearly bowled over a figure crouching to pick up the shattered remains of a lightbulb.

The figure rose, locked eyes with her, and she was lost. She fell into the depths of those eyes, frozen, mesmerized. It was only an instant, but she now belonged heart and soul to the creature before her. Spindly grey fingers wrapped around her own and the alien led her away in silence. They had almost reached the spaceship when the Imperial Guard captured her and dragged away from her Love. She had since been left to rot in the Tower Cell, her Empire forgotten as she pined each day for the alien to return for her.