The Rose Room

Before everything went dark, I was an apprentice to the Great Mage, Belladiana. After her blood soaked win at the Magus Arena, a biannual competition that was set to find and reward the most powerful Mage, I followed her home and begged for an opportunity to learn from her. Though she was taken back by my sudden presence on her property, Belladiana obliged with a smile that showed all of her perfect white teeth.

Up close, I realized that Belladiana’s beauty almost terrified me as her emerald eyes seem to be attached to a face with a soft frown at all times. It also didn’t help that she naturally felt intimidating to me as she was also a dark brown skinned, black woman like myself with long, black hair that went past her shoulders. We looked so much alike with the exception of a wide scar across Belladiana’s face that began above her left eye to under the right side of her chin.

It didn’t strike me as important that I was able to frighten the most feared Mage in the world, nor that I was never asked my name, until much later.

The dark green that was almost black Victorian style mansion became my new home, as one of the requirements of my apprenticeship would be that I would have to live with Belladiana full time. Many wings of the mansion were not to be explored without her permission, much to my dismay. Belladiana was hardly on the grounds to teach me anything and my only duty was to water the rose garden in the back of the house.

Watering the garden took up most of my day as I was instructed to use a simple watering can and her garden was structured with maze-like intricacy. It became no surprise that I was irritable and insulted with this being my only task. Rather than asking for more duties or explaining how insulting this was, I took action. One day I saw Belladiana, as a mere candle illuminated the window in the room where she stood, staring down from a part of the mansion I was not familiar with.

I stood on the stone of the terrace in front of all of the roses with my hands raised to the cool, peaceful light blue sky. Suddenly in the distance, a dark cloud appeared and I clenched my right hand and began pulling towards the cloud as if it were roped. When I released my hand, raindrops sprinkled over the entire garden. After a few moments passed, I dismissed the cloud with a simple wave of my hands and the blue, cloudless sky returned.

“I have more roses for you to feed,” a voice suddenly said in my head. The voice belonged to Belladiana.

I looked up at the room where Belladiana stood, noticing that the candle was levitating in the air before her.

“Come to the Rose Room,” her voice said in my head again as the window where she stood opened and she disappeared into a dark smoky mist. The candle was still levitating in the air, coming towards the back entrance of the house with a bright, captivating flame. I walked towards the candle, almost tripping over the skirt of my dress. As I drew closer to the candle, I noticed that the back door no longer looked the same. There were now two wide doors, covered in thick vines with vicious thorns and made of iron. There seemed to be a pattern across the doors that looked like heads screaming in agony. The doors opened wide without touch and I continued following the candle.

The candle led me through the kitchen despite the fact that I knew the kitchen never looked like this. Along the cupboards, counters, and appliances were thorns and dark mold, but that wasn’t what made me want to stop in my tracks.

Along the right side of the wall where a painting of a woman looking up at an impossibly tall hill would normally rest, a woman’s body was trapped in bloodied thorns that cut into her flesh. Her dark hair covered the entirety of her face and the woman wore a dress that looked so familiar to me though I couldn’t remember why.

Though I was scared, my body wouldn’t stop following the candle no matter how hard I tried to cast a spell or run. I kept walking, bespelled by the flame despite the fact that the woman on the wall smiled at me as I passed her, her mouth stuffed full of roses as blood oozed out of her mouth like drool.

I closed my eyes as a memory threatened to blossom inside of my head at the sight of that horrifying smile, nearly interrupting my journey towards whatever horrors laid in store at the behest of the ever burning candle.

“COME TO THE ROSE ROOM”, Belladiana said loudly in my head. I opened my eyes to find myself still walking, holding a scream on the tip of my tongue at what was before me.

Tears formed in my eyes and my blood ran cold as I was now in the foyer heading towards the left side of the dual staircase. I had never been to the left side of the mansion before and nor had there ever been distorted bodies of bloodied people trapped in thorns along the walls. Unlike the woman in the kitchen whose flowery smile still haunted every step I took, the bodies of these women were bent in positions no one, mage or otherwise, could possibly survive.

Yet their heads shook violently from side to side with laughter as I ascended the staircase.

“Go to the rose room!”, “Feed the roses!”, “The roses are hungry!”, they said as I continued following the candle. Tears fell silently as the voices sounded so familiar though recognition was far out of reach. I was close, the candle seemed to insinuate by its slower movements as it led past the foyer and into a long hallway.

The house suddenly went dark.

I wanted to stop here as tears continued to fall from my burning eyes, making me realize I had not blinked in quite some time. The candle...no...Belladiana did not want me to miss anything else.

With only the flame of the candle to guide me through the deep darkness, my body continued walking. The flame was no longer as bright, a signal that I was close to the end of my journey. A hot, harsh breath blew in my face, sending my hair to cover my eyes leaving only my breath to push the hairs out of my eyes since my hands no longer were under my control. The more I blew, I noticed that my breath was sweet; a suffocating sweet scent that also smelled a bit wrong. Quite like the smell of…

I knew what would happen next with clarity that shook me to my core. My body wouldn’t stop like I wanted. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t use my hands to cast a spell.

I stood in front of a door that opened with such force, it almost put out the dying flame. I walked into the room, noticing the sound of my heels was different against whatever this flooring was made out of. Behind me, the door slammed close and the flame went out, the candle falling hard to the floor of the dark room. As the overpowering scent of roses greeted me in the darkness, I knew I was here.

I was in the rose room.

I was in control of my body again and tried running directly behind me. What should have been there was a door, instead my hands ran against a smooth wall; The door had vanished.

Suddenly the room illuminated by the flames of hundreds of candles spread around the room. I turned around, ready to cast a spell to get out of the room. My eyes met Belladiana as she sent thorny vines in separate directions to bind my hands.

Quickly I learned that Belladiana and I were not the only people in the room as I saw three women sitting in chairs covered in vines.

One woman was missing the lower half of her face and what was in place instead were.. .

Another woman had no eyes in their sockets and what was in their place were. . .

The third woman’s body had a large cut open from her neck to her navel. Instead of various bones and organs that should have been exposed, in their place were. . .

Roses.

It all became clear to me as tears spilled from my eyes. I finally knew what the woman in the kitchen reminded me of. I finally knew why the dresses of the women trapped in the foyer look so familiar.

As Belladiana drew closer, this time with a hammer instead of pliers to pull out my teeth; instead of a wide spoon to take out my eyes; instead of a machete to cut open my body, I knew this was the end.

She struck my head and the world went black.

When I awakened, I knew I only had a matter of time before the roses took over. I was long dead before Belladiana took a fifth blow to my head and cast her spell, but my ghost form could confirm the truth while I…(or was I an it now?)...could.

I stood in front of the window, the room was facing the front of the house now; the witch Diana could make the rose room materialize wherever she wanted…(Diana? That’s not her name or is it?).

Bella or was it Diana? didn’t win the magic game the first time. I did. She invited me here the first time to congratulate me on my win because I was her toughest opponent. I even mended the scar that the spell I cast which made an irreversible cut on her beautiful face. She even agreed to my offer to cook up a dinner because we fought pretty hard together.

I was attracted to her and I thought she was attracted to me too. I apologized once again for my spell going too far, competition be damned and I would reverse it as soon as I got my hands on my grimoire. She asked me where I lived and I cast a spell to open a portal to my home so I could grab it while the food was cooking.

She struck me from behind which rendered me unconscious. She bound me to a chair and began to torture me, pulling out my teeth and laughing as she fed me the food I cooked. She stole my grimoire while I was unconscious and made me watch as my house was on the other side of the portal engulfed in flames.

Every win that she achieved at the Magic Games, (wait...that’s not what it’s called, is it? I don’t remember), came with a ghost that haunted her. A ghost that she thought could do magic but Belladiana was too drunk on magic to even recognize her powers were growing beyond her own control.

A ghost that would tend to the very roses that once took her last breath as they grew in her throat.

I see her approaching Belladiana as she secured another victory and before my eyes and nose fall off for the roses to bloom, I wonder if she will one day wake up in time to survive.