Haunted by the Past

Don't show pain, don't show fear

Soon after I woke up there was another guard change. The new guard was the same guard who had helped me yesterday. My cousin, I thought. The thought was still quite foreign to me, but I knew it to be true. She kneeled down next to me outside of the cage, "He's decided to leave you alone today. He think's you'll... feel the torture of yesterday for a little while and... well he doesn't want to risk accidentally... killing you by torturing you too much in too short a time span." "Hmm." "How are you feeling?" "I have been better." "That sounds like quite an understatement." "It is." "You look like you've seen a ghost." "Do I?" "Yes, but maybe that's just the aftermath of the torture." "Maybe. Maybe not." "Are your answers always this... curt?" "What?" "You don't really speak much, do you?" "Not really, no. I... don't really feel comfortable speaking to people I don't know." "You're not sure if you can trust me." It wasn't a question, it was a statement. "No. Of that I am sure, actually. I just... don't make a lot of conversation because I don't have a lot of people to talk to." "Oh... I see. That must be lonely." I shrugged, "I do enjoy solitude sometimes. Quite often actually. But... well I had one friend... for a really long time." "What was he like?" "He was a raven that I had turned into a man." " That sounds... fascinating." "He was..." "Was?" "He's... he's the raven that Henry..." I couldn't bring myself to say it. "The raven he shot? Diaval, his old prisoner?" "You met him?" "Of course I did." She chuckled humourlessly. "And it seems that now I also met the woman he regrets pushing away from him." "He... he said that?" "He did, yes. Quite often actually."

I let that sink in. Diaval had talked about me. "Did he say anything else?" "He said he was drunk... you both were. And... he got angry because of that. Couldn't control himself properly. Couldn't think properly." "I... didn't know that. He seemed sober enough." "Well, he wasn't. And... well he said he wanted to protect you from doing something you'd regret. And... in his drunken state he thought you wanted to use him to forget about your ex..." "I didn't." "Yeah, he seemed to realize that later. But at the time he felt used and it made him angry. He told me he regretted it... a lot." I sighed, "I wish I hadn't left him." "So did he." "It's my fault Henry captured him." "He thought you'd say that." I smiled slightly, "He knew me too well..."

"Hey, what's that in your hair?" She stared at the feather that I had braided into my hair, near the base of my right horn. "it's a feather." "I can see that, yes. But where that you get it? I mean, it can't be one of your own feathers, this feather is... silver and your wings are black." "I found it in my cage this morning after a quite... fascinating dream." "A dream." She looked at me, trying to decide whether she should ask me the question that seemed to be on the tip of her tongue or not. "What kind of dream, if I may ask?" "My mother... she visited me. In my dream." I probably sound like a lunatic, I thought. "My father has done that too... a few times." She said softly. Or maybe I don't sound like a lunatic. "She... told me something about my family. She told me she had a younger brother. And that he had a daughter." The guard looked at me, she remained silent for a long time, thinking. "So you know then," she eventually said. I nodded, "Yes. My mother left this feather here as proof that it wasn't just a dream." "What else did she tell you about me?" "She said you're also the half sister of Henry... like Aurora." "Ah... that. I'm not proud of that." "I can imagine. But now I know why you're wearing that helmet all the time. You don't want them to see that you're a woman." "And that I have horns... like my father did. And I obviously don't want Henry to recognize me." I nodded, "That makes sense."

"So, can you tell me something about yourself?" I asked after another long silence. "I mean, I don't even know your name." "My name is Dareah," she said. I uh... I'm thirty years old, though people often tell me that I look younger than that." "I thought you were a young man the first time I saw you," I admitted. "Well... I am not very tall and wearing male armour. And I have a relatively low voice, so I don't blame you." I chuckled, then I hissed in pain. Moving too much hurt. "Can't you heal yourself?" Dareah asked me. I showed her my wrists. The iron shackles they had put on my yesterday were still around them. "Not with these on, no. And even without them the torture might have left me too weak to heal myself. It would simply cost too much energy." "Energy you don't have." "Yes. Energy I don't have."