joy: book one: the blooming.

record XXI: hijo de la tragedia.

  It was the stench of stale alcohol that welcomed him into the world.
  His life had begun just like a dream. He wasn't sure when it started.
  One day, out of nowhere, he was there.
  No birthday marked his age.

  He just existed.

  The soul was given a title a by a man with the same bright green eyes as he--Monster, Beast, Curse. The man's spiteful names never made sense to the tragic boy, until he looked into the emerald eyes of seething repulsion.

  A woman with the same shade of ginger hair as he called him words he couldn't force himself to repeat. They sounded disgusting, especially when she spat them out of her chapped lips.

  Every day, he worked in the field in his village. It was grueling work, and with no food provided for him, he had to make do with scraps he found.
  His body was haggard and bony, so he struggled to make his way through the tending of the field. However, if he didn't toil in the fields, he would face a consequence that always left a new bruise or scar.

  His most memorable scar went across the right side of his cheek, all the way to the corner of his lips. As he bled on the floor, whimpering, he noticed the woman.

  Her stomach had grown.

  The young boy didn't know what they were, but he knew soon enough, another living person would be in the house.

  Later that night, he sobbed alone in a corner, covered in rusting metal chains. Using a power he was born with, he tended to his wound. His magic seeped into his skin, advancing the skin growth of the scar. The gash would forever remain across his face, but at least the bleeding had ceased.

  He wanted to run away, far into the star-blessed realms of Asteria Majorio. He desired to fly to the floating kingdoms of the peaceful Aesivya.
  To be without a painful life was a dream, and in what he saw as selfishness, he craved for its sweet taste. But then he would recall the person in the woman's stomach.

  He didn't want them to hurt as he did. Though he was weak and was no match for his oppressors, he needed to protect the one who was yet to be born into the world.
  So in the dark desolation of his captivity, he set aside his desires for the one whom he longed to defend.

  The arrival of the new person finally came. The woman shrieked, and the man screamed at the sight of the newborn.
  The infant looked like a tiny, grotesque monster with an orange, furry body and small, cobalt horns and claws. The young boy's heart sank at the sight of him.

  The child who was just born was a Fabelwesen just like him, and he would receive no love from his mother or his father.

  In the dark of the baby's first night, the boy devised a liberation plan. Breaking away the chains that held him captive, the boy tiptoed his way to a corner where the newborn slept.
  He picked up the infant with lovingness, cradling the fragile soul in his arms. It looked normal now, with soft skin and tiny fingers. The boy traced the countable clumps of hair on its head and wept in wonder of the innocent one's beauty.

  "I need to save you..." whispered the young boy, sniffing silently.

  He wrapped the baby in a tattered shirt and exited the house in heedful silence.

  The twinkling stars guided his bare feet through the cold autumn night. A path of crisp leaves decorated the road and crickets composed a delicate song of danger and desperation.
Nightlife chirped and howled in response to the song, making the young boy's barely clothed back shiver.
  As the boy ran, the world became darker. Storm clouds flooded the night, and cold droplets turned the dry dirt to thick mud. Purple veins of electricity stretched across the tempestuous sky.