A Court of Pain and Sorrow

The broken thief

The girl wrapped her sister's hands in her own before nodding her head.

The both entered the mansion through a window, as silent as a shadow, her bodies moving as one and finding shelter in the shadows that the night offered them.

They had chosen the mansion weeks ago and they had been watching it ever since.

It belonged to a wealthy man who had inherited his fortune from a distant relative.

The mansion was enormous. The walls were thick and made of stone. There were some windows covering the walls as well as a couple of balconies.

The man lived with his wife and his two sons and their live was marked by a horrible routine which they never broke.

Both sisters had memorized it. They would he asleep by now  and they would still be asleep when they left.

The plan was simple, enter the house, go to the vault they had in the basement and grab as many jewels as they could.

It would be simple. Just as his master, Dante, had said.

"You know the drill, sis, don't be too loud and be quick." The girl said.

Both sisters walked silently, finding shelter in the shadows around them.

It wasn't their first job to Dante. But it was their first time stealing jewels. However, the purge had started.

It was a bloody tradition that everyone in Dante's guild of criminals hated and feared.

Once a year every single one of the rookie criminals under Dante's wing had to go through the purge. A mission, normally outside their comfort zone, sometimes the only job they would do for the whole year.

Some of them died.

Dante didn't care about that.

He very often said that he only wanted the strongest working for him and that the purges helped him erase the weak ones from his lines.

So there they were. About to finish their third purge.

Before they realised, they reached the staircase and, without a second thought, they descended without looking back.

Once they reached the vault and they walked in, they didn't loose anytime and started grabbing every jewel they came across with.

It was going great and the girl was starting to question why Dante' s thieves went through so much training.

They finished stealing, grabbed their bags and left.

As they ascended the staircase, they heard voices above them.

They were muffled and the girls couldn't understand what they were saying.

"Don't make a move, Leta." The girl whispered to her younger sister.

The voices were coming closer and the girl realised they would probably have to fight their way out of this. So she slowly and silently left the bag on the floor and grabbed two daggers, getting ready.

"I swear I heard something." One of the voices- a male one- said.

"It's impossible. We would have noticed if someone went down." The other voice said.

"You and your friends spend the nights drinking. You wouldn't notice in a thousand years."

"What do we do, Kalta? Her sister whispered in the lowest voice she could. However, it reached the men's ears.

"See, I told you there are people down there."

Kalta didn't hesitate.

She grabbed her sisters hand and climbed the stairs. Once she reached the two men, she cut the legs of the first one and stabbed the second one.

They would both live. But that would slow them down enough for them to get away.

Or so she thought.

Both men screamed loudl, loud enough to last the rest of the guards.

That didn't stop Kalta.

She kept running, squeezing tightly her sister's hand as sge struggled to keep up.

She didn't stop until they reached the window.

"Come on, Leta." Kalta said, ushering her sister out of the window. "When you hit the ground run. Do not wait for me. But don't worry, I'll be tight behind you."

Leta quickly hugged her sister and kissed her on the cheek before doing as she was told.

She climbed down the window, the bag on her shoulder and when she reached the ground...

When she reached the ground an arrow went though her chest.

Kalta almost screamed at the sight of her younger sister dropping dead on the floor, blood pooling around her and jewels scattered across the ground.

The sound of the guards coming to kill her as well got her out of the trance. Her adrenaline kicked in, blocking the pain of the events she had just witnessed as she run though the mansion and found a place to hide inside an old wardrobe.

She held her breath as the guards stopped right in front of her hiding spot.

She could see them though a little opening on the door of the wardrobe and she could clearly hear them as they spoke.

"Dereck was right. There was someone inside. Just a kid. She's dead now so return to your positions and keep your eyes open from now on, this accident must not repeat itself."

Kalta watched as they left and she waited a couple of minutes before exiting the wardrobe and exiting the mansion through another window.

Once she was out of danger, she walked though the forest.

The adrenaline rush was wearing off and she was starting to be conscious of what had just happened.

She dropped to her knees and let the tears fall down her cheeks freely.

She didn't know what Dante had planned, but it better had worked. Her sister had just died for it.

'No.' She thought. 'My sister just died because of me. I killed her.'

A sob broke the silence of the forest. And then another. And another.

The screams followed soon after.

The pressure she was feeling in her chest, the anger towards herself, the sorrow... They were too much to bear.

She looked up at the sky as she cried and the sky looked back.

The light of the moon and the stars illuminated her features. The stars seemed to be crying with Her, specially her three favourites.

She had always thought that those three stars, forming a triangle, were the most beautiful ones. Leta disagreed, of course. Her sister claimed that they weren't even a constellation, that they had nothing that made them different.

That didn't make Kalta like them any less.

They always seemed to comfort her.

Not tonight, though.

She looked at the grass beneath her. A grass that her sister would never touch again.

She cried again. She punched the floor, trying to make the pain inside of her go away. She screamed and cursed at the Mother for being so evil, for taking her sister, a kind and young soul, away from her.

She didn't look at the night sky again.

If she had, she would have seen those three stars shining even brighter than before.

One in an emerald color.
One in a silver color.
And the third one, the higher of the three, in a gold color.