The Potion and the Poison

The day after yesterday in a dimly lit room there was a little girl on her hard bed. She was crying, her long chocolate hair spilling over the pillows and her round babyish face. Her small body racked with sobs, she misses home. The rooms, her prison scares her. It's cold, dark and full of unknown shadows. It wouldn't have been so bad but the thick, black veils covering the doors and windows seem to suck out all the light and happiness.

The door opens, the eerie cloak pushed aside allowing magnificent light into the room, but only to the shape of the door as the light would go no farther. The girl rolls to her side to face her Keeper, who holds her in this dark cell. She's startled to find that the man in the doorway was not her Keeper, but her father. In one hand he holds a gleaming sword, in the other a bright torch, whose flames lick at the veil that kept out the light for so long. The small lass launches off the bed and runs to her father. "Daddy!" The tall man sheaths his sword. Bracing himself he catches her one armed.

He smiles sadly, "hi princess." Setting her down gently on the floor he hands her the torch. Sliding his callused hand into a pouch he withdraws two identical vials. These vials hold a light purple liquid, with a cork as a stopper. They are as tall as the little girl's middle finger, with long necks and a round fat bottom. They have dark silver vine like carvings that run across the glass. The edges softly clink together as the man moves his hand. He tells her to take one, delicately she wraps her fingers around the one on the right.

As soon as he takes the torch back from her, she unknowingly clutches it to her chest, wrapping herself around it. He takes a deep breath, "now princess, only one of us can get out of here. Your Keeper gave these to me, one is a potion that will transport you home and one is a poison. Even the Keeper doesn't know which is which. " He taps her lightly under the chin, "drink up, your mother is waiting for you." Tears run silently down her cheeks. She opens the bottle along with her father. Her father wipes a tear from under her eye. She grips his hand. At the same time, they drink.

Then the man disappears and the little girl collapses…