In the search of her goddess mother who abandoned her on birth, Jevelene leaves behind a cold Italy to the magical kingdom of Alkinshime in the icebergs of North Sweden. But what she ends up finding was completely beyond her fantasies. A demon and a...
"Are you okay?" Yasnel asks me as the class disperses for its daily duties. My brothers surround me, tending me to their love and compassion. Dulen cleans the blood from my forehead and Keikel puts some cotton to stop the blood while Jaslet wraps a towel around my head and secures it with pins from his hair. My share of work is done by my brother, Meisha, who washes the cows and feeds them.
I sit in my room and Sherlem reads me a story about Stars and Gods. And the curse of Music and Beauty. Sherlem is the eldest of us all, I do not know how old he is, but he doesn't have a single crevice on his face unlike Mrs Fitzgerald. He is tender and knowledgeable about all the sciences and arts. He is also very handsome, has black hair, white skin and eyes just like mine. We all have black hair, white skin and blue eyes. All three thousand of us.
Sherlem puts me to bed and kisses my forehead. His lips are warm and his hands are soft and loving, "I will see you at supper," I smile at him as I squirm into my bed, "Would you sing for me?" He smiles most gently and venerable bows before my miniature frame, "With the utmost pleasure, my lord," I giggle, "Yes, you may take your leave now,"
And he does. But the moment he does, I feel alone. I wish he would come back. I wish we could all play together, and mom was a bit kinder to let us. I want to be with them at all times. I want to be kind, I want to be unwaveringly and relentlessly kind. I want my genuine adoration for everything to roll off of me into waves and embrace itself in the souls of everyone around me. I want to fall in love with my existence.
I had dug a huge ditch in the middle of the fields and Remitte held a cart full of kitchen waste right beside it, "This deep should do, must I help you?" He had a gravely voice, even though he was only a few years to me. Mom thought of him as an excellent singer, he could also dance very well and had all the manners of a gentlemen. But he wasn't very handsome, so she didn't keep him as a footman but rather as someone who disposes off the waste of the castle while my job is to dig ditches across the barren land around our fields and make manure.
"Could you? I'm tired and I think the light is beginning to consume me," I say. He laughs as he pulls his sleeves up and asks me move aside. He jumps in and holds the shovel which turns to ice. One hit into the ground and the entire soil begins freezing, turning white and then he smashes it with his hand. The ditch grows deeper and he looks at me, "And that is how a man does it,"
"You are so strong, brother!" I clap my hands from above. He grins and jumps back up. He upturns the cart and all the waste falls into the pit, "Now then, I'll get going, cover the ditch and come for supper," He leaves and I cover the ditch with soil and snow. I walk back home as the light shines on my dirty face. My feet, they are sore and my throat is dry. When I get back, the food is finished and everyone has gone to bed. I look at clean dishes kept on the huge dining table, with not one crumb left to eat.
And, It is dark...
It was the first time I had seen darkness. The first time I had experienced what it felt like to look up and see nothing. Absolutely nothing. Enchanted, I run ahead and slip on the icy floor towards the swirling white curtains with red embroidery over them. I get up on my knees, my hands feel sticky and as the moonlight fall on me from a hollow, I see that gory red on my hands. I get up and look around, it's all blood. All of it.
I shriek as I try to run, but I slip again. The thunder clacks through the window, that's not red embroidery that is blood, and before that, stands my mother in her white, night gown, "Mother?" I whisper. She looks down at me coldly, it's the same icy glare, "Who digs the ditches, Nataniel," "M-Me, mother," I stutter, terrified, I wanted to run away. "Why did you let Remitte do it? That was your job, Nataniel," She said and she brought her hand forward, holding Remitte's decapitated head by his hair, the lightining falls again, lighting his face up, his blue eyes were still open wide.
"My word is law, and no one breaks it. Not even my own son"
It was the first time I had witness darkness and death.
I screamed as I ran out of there, I was still covered in my brother's blood. I was crying as I ran. I was horrified. Monster. My mother was a monster! I had to run away from her, "MOM KILLED REMMITTE!" I yelled it as I ran through the halls, I wanted the entire world to know how cruel my mother was.
I ran inside my room and locked my door. I smeared blood everywhere I touched, and it was sickening. I took some towels and wiped off all the blood off of me but it just wouldn't go! I wished that lightening fell upon me and burned every speck on my existence. I wanted these lakes to swallow me whole and hide me from the world. Its mortifying! It's excruciating to behold the blood of a dead brother, to hold his joys slither upon my veins, it feels inhuman and insane. I couldn't stop screaming even as I sank into my bed with all that gore upon my body and the smell of death lingered upon my skin like the marks of a lover's kiss as the blood flowed down my throat from my lips.
My heart went numb and I couldn't think, all I could do is feel, feel miserably weak. I wanted to tear my body apart to let go of something that was constantly beating inside me. My brother, he is inside of me.
And never before had these thoughts occurred to me before. I was still young, I was still alive. But I never wanted to die as bad as I did then.
-To be continued
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