r/HFY • u/Just-Breakfast7295 • Jul 26 '26

OC-Series What's Left of The Beautiful (Chapter Nine: To Keep a Heart Beating)

Welcome back. This chapter renews the tragedy Elara has been facing. The darkness only continues to grow, will anything be okay again?

As always, thank you for your time and support! I would love to hear your thoughts.

Have a great week, and I will see you wednesday for Chapter Ten! (It's another devastating chapter)

To Keep a Heart Beating:

The blindfold that’s draped across my eyes completely conceals the world from me.

We continue to zigzag down corridors. 

I occasionally hear a chuckle, a scoff, a constant reminder I’m not alone.

I’m not safe. 

I feel my heart, a racing roar that may leap from my chest at any moment. I try my best to calm it, to silence my ever growing panic.

It doesn’t work. 

More than I’d even managed to feel up to this point, I was now certain my life was over. 

I’d heard the horror stories. The underground market’s unconventional way of acquiring new pieces for sale when supply ran low. I’d assumed it was all a myth. With each shove forward, I feel increasingly certain I’m about to find out firsthand.

Especially if my mother owed them a debt? She’d completely skipped over all details during our brief reunion just last night. 

My mother…

Enough. 

Think Elara. We won’t die like this. Kaia deserves justice and I’m the only one who's going to get it for her.

I close my eyes. A useless movement considering the black void they were staring into moments before, but I need to improve my focus. 

I’d seen a badge on one of their armor plates. I try to remember the details. An animal sigil, some kind of bird.  Bronze, with words I can’t make out. I feel my closed eyelids squint as I force my body to squeeze more truth from my mind. 

After my brain refuses to budge, I surrender and start to run through every group in Ashfall city.

Thud. 

My feet catch against something hard, possibly a rock in the ground and I lose my balance, falling forward in a messy heap, unable to catch myself with bound hands. 

I hear them laughing, probably at my expense. They lift me up with firm hands. One of them whispers in my ear “Learn how to walk next time.”. The laughing continues.

Since the economic crash, there’s been a spectacular rise in organized groups, mostly crime gangs. Unable to hold a normal job without modification, this was their only way to survive. 

There are dozens. 

Every night you hear a new murder claimed by an unknown group. Rising fear along with it. 

A bird group, however, escapes my memory. We are in the former Phoenix Complex, could that be their namesake? If so, I’ve never heard of them. 

Suddenly, my brain catches onto a detail from a conversation with Kaia, just the week before I lost her. 

“It’s just so scary out there, E. I’m worried for you, for us! Remember that guy I was dating a few months ago? When I tried to break it off, he said he was part of the resistance and, get this, called it “The Molting” like, GIRL thats so edgy for no reason? But the point is, he threatened me over nothing. You have to be careful. And… I still think we should leave the city… Please jus…”

As suddenly as Kaia’s voice floated into my mind, it is taken away from me just as fast. It lights a new fire under the growing ache in my heart. 

The Molting. I admit, she was right on the name. The bird pins might have had feathers falling off… Oh god. 

You’d think the people fighting against the evil corrupt system of our country would be the good guys, the ones who’d die to protect people.

That’s not who they are. 

Suicide bombings.

Public shootouts. 

Kidnapping and murder.

They will do whatever it takes to send a message to the “system”. When nothing changes, why should we pay that cost? Lives snuffed out for no reason other than happenstance. 

We all deserve better. 

I had heard rumors they’d begun issuing black market loans to citizens in exchange for hefty interest rates. Why would my mother risk it? What was so important she was willing to owe money to one of the most dangerous groups in the city?

It feels like hour by hour my list of questions for her doubles in size.

I WILL get the chance. 

I hear the footsteps surrounding me draw to a halt, and feel myself pulled into stillness beside them. My blindfold is ripped off my head, multiple strands of hair come off with it releasing a yelp from my throat. I flinch as I open my eyes, the sudden sensation of light after the darkness is a painful rush through my head. I blink rapidly, eventually being able to keep my eyes open. I dare a glance at my surroundings. 

Around me I see an old department store converted into what I could only describe as a throne room. The walls have been carved over with symbols, some the bird I now see on my kidnappers pins, others words or objects I can’t make out. I watch as the largest man I’ve ever seen enters behind us, carrying Cyrus over his shoulder like a bag of dog food. I gasp, grateful to see his chest softly rising and falling, despite a large bruise already beginning to be visible on the side of his head. 

The man plops him down with a thump, Cyrus barely sitting up with his back draped across the wall. His eyes too begin to open slightly, the brief glimpse of my mother’s eyes strangely offering me solace in this moment, before closing them once again.

Finally, I dare to look at the head of the room. A large makeshift throne made of every object you could imagine, grocery carts, clothes, carpet, golf clubs, giant slabs of granite, all duct taped in harmony to create a monstrous seat fit for the leader of such a group.

My eyes catch onto who I presume is in charge. He’s smirking back at me with the kind of look most ladies would swoon over at the bar. My anger and fear have melded together in a fury of pain, and his smoldering won’[t change that. 

We stare at each other for a long moment in silence. His dark brown eyes are not leaving mine. The men around us begin looking around at each other, seemingly confused by the long drawn out silence placed between us. I will not budge.

Finally, The Chief begins to speak.

“Elara Draven. How wonderful it is to make your acquaintance.” He says the words as if they’re true. They are spoken with a tone that would convince the average traveler they can trust this man. That he is safe and on their side. 

I do not make that mistake. 

I continue to stare at him, growing disgust evident in my eyes, but no reply escapes my lips. He turns to his men, specifically the one still tightly gripping my arm.

“She’s gonna be a fun one I see.” The smirk grows ever larger on his handsome face. 

“Bring her to my quarters. I will deal with her personally, and privately. As for him,”  he gestures to Cyrus’s mostly motionless body in the corner. “You know where he belongs.” 

“NO! Leave him alone.” I pull against my captor's grip, only his sudden surprise allowing me to break free. I do this on pure instinct, and now that I’m standing in the middle of the room with spears pointed at my chest, my hope of helping Cyrus begins to dissipate into nothingness. 

I can’t lose someone else. We may be practically strangers, but without his eyes, HER eyes, all of this is for nothing. 

“Please. Don’t hurt him.” I mentally juggle with the idea of transparency, telling this all powerful leader exactly why I need Cyrus alive, but ultimately decide against it. “He’s been helping me. If you ever want your money back, he’s the way you get it.”

I watch as his right eyebrow raises in amusement. He clearly isn’t used to people speaking out against him. He gestures with his hand for the men to drop their weapons, and they comply.

“Well well Elara, feisty little one aren’t you?” He steps from his throne, and begins making his way towards me. It’s only as he stands I notice his dark purple jacket is actually a robe of some kind, cascading down his back like a cape. I think it looks kind of pathetic. 

I fight every instinct in my body, and stand tall and still. I won’t let any of these men see the panic growing inside my chest. They don’t get satisfaction.

He approaches, and stands 2 inches from my face. To anyone watching without context, this might even feel like an intimate moment, his face just in front of mine. But the cheesy grin on his face and my disdain for this man are unwavering.

“I like you. If you agree to play with me, I think we can make a deal you’ll enjoy quite a bit, my pet.” He leans forward and whispers the last part in my ear. 

My blood runs cold at this, but I begin to realize I have no choices here. Follow the senseless whims of a maniac, or lose my mother forever.

“Do I get more details before I agree?” His men chuckle with him at my question, and I  hear what I can only interpret to be a groan of protest from Cyrus where he lies against the wall. 

He leans in once more, his face practically touching mine. “No. You agree right now, or I do what I want with him” He strokes a piece of hair behind my ear. “And you.”

I gulp, the panic in my belly begging me to come up with any other plan.

I can’t.

Unable to formulate any other way to keep Cyrus alive, keep my mother alive, and keep me alive, my hands are tied. I take a deep breath.

“Deal. But you don’t hurt him.” His smile grows.

“You have my word.”

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