Secret Filled Stars

I couldn’t find fault in you for being engaged.   What sort of person would I be if I did?   I was to blame for the pain I felt and I knew this.   Sometimes, I think, we make our own heartbreak through our expectations, our wants, and that’s what happened.   You moved forward and it was time I did the same.   Following Luukos’ instructions, I changed my profession, starting fresh as an empath.   I didn’t understand at the time why he’d wanted the change but I listened, unquestioningly.   I returned home to my father and was greeted with disgust and hostility but it was expected.   He laughed in my face, his arrogance overwhelming, his hatred warming the blood in my veins but I said nothing, I did nothing. I was permitted to stay there but I had conditions to follow and, although they were cruel, I listened as I always had.   Rarely was I allowed to be noticed and, when I was, I wasn’t allowed to speak unless spoken to.   The chatea...

I spent a short while lost in the darkness.  I was so far not even Luukos could reach me. Minutes stretched into hours, days stretched into the months and months seemed like years.  The darkness was so thick, so suffocating, that it was almost tangible.  Some days, I swear, I could feel it sinking into my skin, mixing with my blood and strengthening my bones.  I started losing memories, my mother's face, the smell of my grandmother and the sound of her voice.  The darkness was taking over and I was letting it.  Here, in the darkness, I didn't feel anything, I was forgetting the pain.  I could stay here forever, I'd reasoned, and be happy with the monsters that prowled in the shadows.  After all, I was one of them, wasn't I? It all changed suddenly. I was making my way through the gloom when my surroundings rippled like water on a pond.  When everything settled, you were there.  It couldn't be real, it wasn't real.  Logically, I knew...

Laying on the bedside table is a large book covered in a dark leather.   Embossed on the cover is a wolf and an owl, gazing at each other.   Elegant scrollwork frames the two, ancient runes mixed in with vines.   Inside are three hundred sheets of vellum, cream hued and filled with elegant words written in black ink.   Scented with vanilla, the author has taken care with the book, ensuring the finished product is in pristine condition. On the first page you read: When I was younger, my grandmother always told me to make a wish on a shooting star.   She believed that if you believed in it, wanted it, enough then it would come true.   I trusted her more than anyone else, so I did.   I wished for silly things at first: a new doll, the newest gown, for Lisandre to sprout warts overnight.   None of them ever came true and yet, as I grew older, I continued closing my eyes and wishing on the falling stars. When I fell ill, I continued wishing. ...