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Sang's/Little Pink Pearl's POV
Location: Dontavion's Playhouse, NV
Date: 2 years, 9 months after The Kidnappings
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Suspicion courses through my veins.
Something is wrong...some scent in the air, a tingle of intuition...
I sit in the library, reading about different types of botanical elixirs that will increase healing times.
It's just a bit of light reading, I've already done a good amount of studying on the subjects of poison's, and venom's and potions of all kinds, I just need a distraction...
Something has me on the edge of my seat.
Even as my mind absorbs the information in the book, a prickle of worry has me buzzing.
My mind wanders to the conversation I had with Leninora a few months ago.
~Flashback~
"We need to talk, Pinky." Len tells me, with a lopsided smile. The term Pinky comes out as an endearment, and I smile fondly at her. She smiles back widely, but it's groggy, like she's looking through a fog of sleep.
We walk through my garden together, arms linked, to our favorite sitting spot. The garden is completely boxed in, with the walls of the building on 2 sides. Where the garden meets the end of the 2 sides, it's fenced in with iron.
Not unlike a birdcage, the iron rises up from the earth to connect to the building, creating a dome over my head.
Inside I have my own vegetable garden, some pretty flower beds, and a grouping of cacti Dontavion had surprised me with last year on my "Rebirth Day."
He can be so romantic.
Bushes in shapes of animals and huge rows of flowers obscure the small pond in the middle. Roman had cleared some of the foliage and I'd procured some floofy-ploofy beaded pillows and puffed chaise lounge chairs and a hammock in a very bohemian style to create our sitting area.
We sit in the hammock together, and just enjoy the mild winter-y weather. The summers here are scorching, and Dontavion takes to switching out my vaguely child-like clothes for more sheer and revealing outfits.
Either way, it was a refreshing day when we had that particular conversation.
"You and the others need to start being extra careful." Len breaks our comfortable silence, "We are just about ready to move into the next level of our plan."
She moves around, and places her head on my lap, and I run my fingers through her pale tresses. She's been increasingly distant lately, and less in the moment.
I'd soaked in her affection and calmness that day.
"No matter what I say or do next, you can't trust me." I pause in my stroking and look down at her, "What do you mean?" I ask.
She sighs and shakes her head, "I think Dontavion is growing suspicious. I sent a letter to my Mother on the last mission and one of Don's goonies may have seen my move. Not only that, but Rhonda being so close to you isn't helping anything. We went too fast."
I rub my fingers over her temple, like I'd seen her do when she gets a headache, and she grunts softly.
"No matter what, I have your back." I tell her softly, "We'll give you space and continue working toward the goal. Rhonda's working on weapons so we can protect ourselves, Sonny and Roman are working on separating and diverting loyalties with Dontavions guards. Kay'ari has her kids now, and it's given her hope that you are good on your word. She'll be able to focus harder on her part in this mess."
She smiles up at me, "Take this," She says as she pulls out a small moleskin notebook in a discreet black, "It's got the next few phases. When you've got through that, it's time for Kay'ari to jump into her own. She'll have a good few weeks with her kids before then. When she's done, you need to go to Savannah Chance, both you and Kay, and show her the books. She'll know what to do next. Do exactly as the book says. No deviations, not even if I tell you to."
I nod. Leninora takes a deep breath and lets it out in a raspberry, "One more thing...."
I shove the book into my bra, and she continues, "How attached are you to the name Dontavion gave you?"
"It's not my name." I say quietly, "I might not remember who I am, but I know that what he calls me isn't anything I want to go by." Len nods like she'd guessed as much already.
"Would you consider taking a name I give you? I've spent a lot of time looking for who you are, but I can't find anything on the internet, no records in any of Dontavion's offices, not a damn thing on The Kidnapping site about you. I knew that was why Don wanted you, but I didn't consider what that might mean when we finally get out of here. I have a way to help you, but I want your permission before I go make it happen."
I weigh how I feel about that. No records to speak of. No one looking for me. Who was I? I stare down into Len's grey eyes and get a flash of glasses over darker steel eyes, but the image flies away before I can hold onto it.
I sigh, knowing no amount of meditation or pushing will bring it back.
Instead, I focus on Len's questioning gaze.
"What would you do?" I ask, needing more information before I jump into it. She smirks and I realize she already knew I'd ask.
"I once had a cousin, her name was Cyan Lavele. (Lu-vell) She was kidnapped a long time ago," Len's voice has a quiver to it, but she coughs gently and continues in a monotone voice that I've learned she uses to detach from information that is painful or personal.
"Your ages don't really match exactly, but that won't matter. The press will love the story I've got planned and if my Mom and Grandmother back it up, we won't have any issues. My Mom will complain, my grandmother will whine about being left out, and it'll be a little uncomfortable at first, but I know you can manage a little pressure." She drops her expressionless face to smile a mischievous smile, "You'll love the rest of the plan. Or I will, at least."
I pause from stroking Len's hair. Leninora is offering to be my family. She's willing to share her own family with me. My heart squeezes in my chest and tears build up in my eyes.
"I'd be happy to be your cousin, Len."
~~~
The door to the library swinging open catches my attention, and breaks me out of my thoughts.
The scent of smoke and ash burns my nose and the scent touches something vaguely familiar, but I can't seem to summon the memory to match the soft sense of fear.
Rodney walks in, and gestures for me to walk over to him. The scent of burnt wood and nature along with a horribly unnatural undertone wafts from him.
The suspicion that's been building all day hits a fever pitch and I struggle to blank my face. For once, he doesn't giggle happily at catching me alone. Rodney looks smug, like he's done something even more horrible than usual. I set down my book and stand up, walking to the door and to Rodney.
When I get near him, he reaches out and he hooks on a chain to the collar around my neck and yanks on it as he starts to make his way out of the room.
The collar was another present from Dontavion, one of the most recent indecent gifts.
They'd gotten completely sexual in nature lately, and it's become a struggle to be allowed my own space and time. He's getting more insistent on keeping me with him everywhere he goes. I fear the collar is going to become more permanent.
The scent of burning things grows and grows the closer we get to my room. By the time we're standing outside the door, the scent was cloying, and Rodney has grabbed my arm in a tight grip to keep us at a brisk pace forward.
He reaches out, swipes his key-card, pushes the door open.
He roughly shoves me in, and I fall to my knee's. I don't even feel the pain as a bright glow catches my eye and horror fills me.
I don't look to see if Rodney follows me in. He is inconsequential in this moment.
~
Leninora sits crumpled in front of the doors that lead to the garden, burning leaves and flower petals fall in around her, burning her flesh and the black gown she wears. I walk toward her, then around her. She whispers something and it makes me pause, but I continue to the open doors.
I focus on forcing a calmness over the consuming fear: Letting the iciness of peace and logic eat at the black, inky ooze of raw terror. I take a deep breath, and the sharp and thick scents that permeate the air threaten to crawl down my throat and drown me. I force it to freeze and crystallize.
I stand in front of Leninora and look out into my gilded cage, and as the scene in front of me processes into reality, I start to laugh.
Soft, hysterical, broken peals of laughter...I laugh so hard it becomes silent. Len once told me that if I needed to cry, to force myself to laugh. No matter the situation, no matter how painful or awful.... it looks better to be crazy then weak.
In that second in time, I feel crazy.
Crazy and uncontrollable, and the laughter that falls from my lips feels good, because I don't know what else to do.
I didn't know how to deal with this....what Rodney or Dontavion or whoever had left for me, in what I'd started to see as my safe place in a very terrifying nightmare.
Another gift...
A body that's already burnt to ash, on a still-burning funeral pyre.
A sacrifice.
Like we haven't given enough.
Like we haven't given our bodies, and our minds, and our memories and pain and sanity.
He's taken from me again.
And despite all he's done to me, the things I've witnessed, I realize in this moment that Dontavion is the very epitome of evil. He is the very definition of the devil.
Because that body, it's a child.
And the only children in the Playhouse are the ones Kay'ari has claimed as her own.
The little family she and I have constructed together in grief and darkness. Our babies.
This I can't forget, and I won't forgive either.
He's going to pay.
I laugh harder because I can't wait to watch him bleed.