Monster

It was raining again.

Neysa pushed back the moth eaten, mustard coloured curtain and groggily looked out into the barren front yard. The grassless area had become a mud field, and through the cracks in the window pane she felt the biting chill of winter. Letting the curtain drop, she pushed off of her resting mat, careful not to disturb her younger sister Eleni before standing.

Her joints popped loudly in the silence, and with one hand against the wall, she moved to the tiny washroom, a luxury in her impoverished village. Her faint memories went back to the time when her father had been the richest azhiur in the area, robust and hale and proud in his position. Too proud. He had gambled his hard earned riches away in a mindless bet against the neighboring azhiur and lost his second wife, Neysa's mother, in the process.

Neysa hadn't spoken to her mother in two years. And with her father for nearly six in spite of sharing a home with the man. It did not matter in any case; he had his youngest, Ahsa as his heir to his worthless throne. She washed her face in the half frozen pan of water and shoved damp ebony hair from her face before staring tiredly into the mirror. That was all she was now; tired. Her murky grey eyes held shadows, her once sun-kissed skin was pinched and pale as the underside of a fish.

Sighing, Neysa exited the small closet and tip-toed from the room, pulling the door closed silently behind her. Even if Eleni woke, the young girl would do nothing to alert the family of the missing member. She was too wise for that.

The heavy front door opened slowly, bringing in the fresh clean scent of precipitation and a blast of icy wind. She brushed one hand against the wall beside the door, feeling for the hook that held their cloaks, and lifted hers by touch, recognising the thick wool and seeing in her mind its flaming red, as bright as the summer sunset. Her mother had given her the cloak the last time they had seen each other, that hazy fall all those moons ago. She remembered how surprised Maman had been to find her only child, now mostly grown, wandering down a row of buildings searching for her.

She had pulled her into the interior of the house, her home now, Neysa had thought, and hidden her in a small room that smelled faintly of wine and old clothing. Her mother had been terrified that Neysa had been seen, that someone knew of her coming here to the village, two hours away from her own home. She had tried to console her, but Maman was full of fears. She had hugged her daughter tight to her for a long minute, letting her remember the wonderful cinnamon and crushed pepper scent that made her her before leaving and coming back with the cloak.

"Your father and the master will not protect you if they find you here. You must go, and not come back again. Please."  She hadn't understood why her mother had been so afraid until a month later, when a messenger from the same village came thundering to the house with a few of the neighboring azhiur's guards, ransacking their home in search of the master's prize. Her mother had disappeared, leaving nothing but a scarf in her wake; that and her daughter, grief stricken and confused. Her father, furious at the intrusion and the loss of what once was his, had grabbed her shoulders harshly, shaking her. She had known there was no love lost between them, but now it was not to be hidden. "Little witch child," he had hissed into her face, she had only been fourteen then. "Have you knowledge of where that wretched creature has fled?" He'd found her teary responses useless, and cast her aside.

Neysa shook off the cruel memories, pulling herself back into the present. Her father had shunned her thereafter, and she him. It seemed it would always be that way.

She tugged the cloak tight around her thin body, pulling the hood low over her face before stepping out into the dreary morning.