Wyvern's Flight Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Who am I and who are they?

I’m sitting in my room, yes, mine. My room is large and yet small at the same time. The dark black of the walls brings a new level to claustrophobia but at the same time comforts, like I’m in an egg, my room is the soft shell that protects me. Soft, for I am so fragile. My bed is large…everything seems so large and plush here, it is tall, with curtains of silver that hang weightlessly as a canopy. Sheets smoother than silk caress my skin as I sit here, looking. I do that a lot now, look that is, Right now I’m looking at the vanity. The wood is dyed dark purple, and a huge silver backed mirror reflects the image of myself. So tiny, so…fragile in this huge environment, the crumple space around me, my huge egg. I can’t see my face, I’m too far away, but I can see my eyes. Still that purple-grey, still so easy to read. I can see movement as I brush my long tresses, the silver of the vanity brush flashing. I am looking and I am thinking.

Thinking of the room I had awakened in, not very long ago, the sterile hospital-like room, a cage. I am free here, I can go anywhere I please, sure Xavier doesn’t like it when I go out alone, but I can. I’m thinking of my cage and how uncomfortable I was in it. The other house, we are in a new house now, they tell me it is my own. It is beautiful and grand, but I am not at home here. It is mine yes, but I can’t feel it. It is luxurious and pretty but it feels more a sepulcher than a home. So cold, so uninviting, Xavier brought me here to help me remember, but all I remember here is Master’s face. I cannot tell Xavier this; if I just look like I’m remembering Master he has a fit.

 He treats me like a child, and I love it, and I love him, but he’s not what I need. I NEED him, I need to see his face, he left soon after my last incident. He had things to attend to. It tore me to see Amonicus leave. I had just been remembering him. And now it was gone, gone! Why does it hurt so much? Why does it hurt to say goodbye, why do I feel so empty without him? He told me who they were…not in words, I can’t explain how, but I know who he means. I just don’t know them. Am I ready to die for people I don’t know? Call me selfish but I don’t think I can.

As I said I can’t remember much, my mother, my name, my few friends. I can sometimes remember random things, yesterday was my birthday, but I can’t remember how old I am…eighteen? Nineteen? I don’t know. Oh well, I’m alone anyway; I don’t hear Xavier knocking on the door, I don’t hear him come in and I don’t even realize that he’s taken the brush from my hands. Gentle strokes, gentle waves rippling in my hair, a warm hand on my shoulder, a soft voice.

“How are you today? Would you like something to eat?” I keep looking, the mirror still reflecting only me, the brush moving by itself. I know why Xavier shines so bright now, he isn’t human, I don’t know what exactly. Dragian, he tells me, but I know he is not like the others, I can feel it. The swirling silver of his eyes drew me in, like unsuspecting prey, made me forget, made me remember, made me regret things. Things I don’t even know,

“Xavier, when is he coming back?” He flinched; he knew exactly who I was talking about,

“I do not know Mina. But you have to eat something, try to remember, please! You can’t just sit here all day.”

“It hurts, it hurts so much to be away from him and yet it hurts to be near him, too. There is nothing to remember here, this house is not a home, it is a building and I can’t stand it!” My heart seems to break all over again as his face swims before my eyes, but I push it all down, nothing can touch me anymore I am immune to pain. “I am immune….I am immune”, perhaps if I keep telling myself this it will be true. Perhaps the Master’s face will go away if Amonicus were to come back, I feel so very lost without him. 

Xavier’s patience is eaten away by my longing, it doesn’t take long for him to become cross. “Araminta Wyvs! Stop moping around and do something, just because you can’t get over something doesn’t mean he’ll return any faster, or at all knowing that b*****d! Everyone here is desperately worried about you, it pins us to see you this way. Now come down to breakfast, if not for me, for the others.” He rose expectantly, not to be disappointed with his commanding air. I was still thinking, but his tone of voice made it impossible for me to do anything but his bidding, it felt like the voice of Master…it nearly made me scream. Instead, I growled, “You have no control over me, no man can control me, I cannot be controlled.” Uttering the words seemed to give me enough strength to pass him regally out of the room, out of my egg, and into the cold truth. 

The truth is no one ever truly understands until you’ve been there, I stood at the head of the table in front of my friends and really begin to understand what is meant when they speak of “my people”. If the Dragians were all like this, all so warm and good and strong, then I should never have had any worries at all. But I don’t even know what breed of people these Dragians are, bird or beast, flesh or scaled. It does not help that I was not to meet any of my people either. It is one thing to be a monarch; owning people by conquest. It is another to be an icon; owning people by unbreakable right. One word from me and an entire race could go extinct, and I wouldn’t even see it, no one would even resist it.

Food spread before me in endless amounts on a long wooden table, tall backed chairs made it seem to never end. Slowly the others trickled in from different rooms, filling only a small section of seats. Looking around I see Xavier, Mika, Aria; people I have come to know and trust. I want to cry, because as much as I trust and care for these people, I cannot stand to be with them. I know they need me though, I know they need someone, I do not know why I am so important, but they need me. And so, I lower myself into the seat at the head of the table, and I reach for a dish. 

It hurts to eat. It hurts to sit. It hurts because he is not there. I can remember always missing him, but never before have I been like this. Never before, even in my scattered memories, I know, I have never felt like this. Deep down I know, when he returns, he cannot know. He can never know, especially not now. Not now when a war I know nothing about is raging around me.

I return to my room, food sitting heavily in my stomach. I haven’t eaten in days, I feel ill. I empty my stomach of it, I feel better; I’ve lost weight again. I call Xavier to my room. I need to know what is going on...I feel like a zombie. Nothing is right anymore.

“Sit. And tell me of this war.”

Xavier spins me a tale of horror; slaughter and rape are rampant. People live in fear, Dragians versus the Master. The Master, I am thinking about him again...it is like poison to my soul. I can’t stop seeing his face, feeling him on top of me. I feel so sick when I think of it; I am in a cold place. So cold I feel on fire and I want to scream. Xavier is still speaking. He is telling me of the Master, he has no other name, his people have no name. We call them the Blood Thieves.  That Master is the reason my Mother ran away, that he is the reason I suffer. That Master s horrible, that I should never trust him, never believe him, never anything with him. But Xavier doesn’t know how betrayed my body is, how filthy I have become, how I loathe myself and the Master. How I feel guilty with Amonicus and him, how I feel so dirty, so dirty. The feeling never leaves no matter how much I scrub. No matter how much I scream. The Master is there in my head at every moment; I dream of him every night. When I wake up screaming in hysterics Xavier doesn’t know it is the Master I see and feel while he holds me. I am tainted; I am dirty. 

On television they tell rape victims that it will be okay, that they’ll recover over time. What is left unspoken? The nights of screaming and sleeplessness; the tears and illness; the lack of hunger and the weakness. They show a gritty side, but it is not reality. We pretend that nothing is broken, but everything that you are has been torn apart; skin stretches and warps when sewn.

Xavier had left my room, and again I sat staring into the mirror. This time I am realizing what this war means, it is a war for freedom. Once it is over I will again be just a symbol, I can live as I like. That is until the next war; I can see why my mother ran. I know there are other races than the Dragians and Blood Thieves, and therefore I will have to watch my back. However, the Dragians cannot do this alone, I will need to enlist help. 

I will do research, I must know what is out there in this world. I feel so lost without knowledge, perhaps reading will help...

In this house, my house, there is a library. It is humongous. I have no idea where to start looking, and so I will read every book. I never do. With every room I enter I do not feel at home. It feels like a replica of something I once had, something I still treasure. I spent days holed up in the library, I do not think I slept. I know I did not eat. I poured over information, gathering it like a sieve, I learned everything I could about anything there was a book on. I began to feel prepared, I began to feel more worthy. The council brought back a new decision. No ceremonies, I did not need them; we did not have the time.

By Raven Edythe Wilson

Author's Note

This is an UNFINISHED chapter that I have been working on for awhile.

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

A very good chapter. You left a opening for more story. You create a dark and strong story. I like the feel and emotion of the girl. Thank you for sharing this story.
Coyote