1 The Little Girl With a Prophecy

I was standing amidst a field of corpses. The innocence I once had gone. Hacked away piece by piece as I was forced to become stronger. Heartless. Blood dripping down from my clothes. My black hair, dyed red. I was covered in it. Even the water I wielded by my side was completely red. I remembered my childhood. I was a happy child. Some would say I was too spoiled for my own good. I came from a family filled with rich and influential people. Some were politicians, others were CEO's while some became famous actors. It was a powerful family, and I was their most prized possession. I loved the attention. I needed it. And I had it.

What would I have become if I had stayed? Would I have been an actress just like my mother? Or would I become an author like my dad? Maybe I would become neither and instead have pursued my own dreams. But I would never know because those were simply dreams. A world far out of my reach with a road I could never cross. No matter how far I stretched my hand to reach it, I would never grasp it. But I wanted to get back. It was my home and I would slaughter every being standing in my way to reach it! I looked at the bloody path before me and smiled.

"I am going home."

It was my birthday. It was the day I became 10 years old. My family had invited all of the rich and famous to celebrate this big day with me. 10 was a turning point. It was the age where I could begin to learn the robes of business. All their hopes and dreams laid with me. I had long asked them why I was so important to them since it made little sense to me. I was only a little girl and it wasn't like our family was declining. In fact, we were rising to the top and ranked to be one of the most influential families in the world. Grandfather was the one who gave me the answer. It was all because of a prophecy. I was never told the details, only that I was a very special girl. A girl who only appeared in the family once every thousand years and that it was the reason for our prosperity. I was a family legacy. So today they celebrated the birthday of an insignificant girl like me with one of the biggest parties ever seen. I was their centre of attention. None of the adults dared to ignore me. One word from me and their lives could end. People admired me. People feared me. People adored me. It was my heaven.

I had lost count of how many families I had ruined. Some were on purpose and others completely unintentional. The smallest little thing happening to me was like a disaster happening to someone else. It was to the point where no nanny or maid wanted to be near me in fear of the consequences. Only one person was capable of hurting me without ever suffering the repercussions. My aunt. The one person whom I hated most of all. Aunt Anne was the one person in our family who despised me. No one knew because she was always very careful and no one ever believed me if I told them. She was the angel of the family. The one whom they had placed their hopes on before I was born.

I had long given up in getting rid of her and instead avoided her like the plague. Because in the eyes of the family, I was a precious brat who couldn't be hurt while aunt Anne was the angel guiding their path. She was a powerful woman whom everyone respected. But underneath it all was a hateful woman filled with ugly schemes. She never laid a hand on me, but the things she said and did had driven me to a shrivelling mess. I had been conditioned to fear her. The very sight of her would leave me running in another direction and that was what I did today.

Aunt Anne was standing at the other end of the room when our eyes met. I stiffened.

"What's wrong Rana?" someone asked.

Aunt Anne made her way towards me with a smile on her face. Everywhere she passed, people became spellbound. To them, her smile was the most beautiful thing in the world and almost no woman could ever get close to her beauty. Only my mother had her beat, being ranked as the number one beauty in the whole world. But I saw what everyone else didn't. An aura of death. Just the mere feel of her presence would have my breath caught. My breathing became faster as she neared. I bolted. In my escape, I bumped into my grandfather but it didn't matter to me. I kept running.

"Rana?" he said before noticing aunt Anne.

"That girl is being unreasonable again. Always running away from Anne. We have spoiled her too much," he said loud enough for me to hear.

The bathroom became my hiding spot. I was sitting on the toilet seat with my arms around my knees and stared at the door. The sound of knocking appeared. I flinched.

"Rana, would you please get out? You can't continue hiding from me every time you see me. You make it look like I'm abusing you," aunt Annes voice sounded from the other side.

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes before once again looking at the door.

"No! This is my birthday! I don't want you here! Go away!"

"Rana, darling. What have I done to make you hate me so much? Can't we please talk about it?"

"No!"

It became quiet.

"Fine. I'll leave," she said.

I couldn't believe my ears. Did I win? Would she really leave? I heard the sound of her heels clicking against the floor getting further away before completely disappearing. She was gone. I stayed put for a while, making sure she wouldn't come back before I finally left the bathroom in a sprint. But suddenly I felt someone grabbing me from behind lifting me up from the floor.

"Where are you running off to Rana?" I heard a high pitched voice say in her sweet as candy tone.

The smell of death invaded my senses. I screamed.

"Let go! Let me go! Mommy! Help! Witch, witch! Let go!" I yelled while kicking and squirming. My screams filled the whole hall attracting the gazes of everyone present. I did everything I could to get free from her claws

"Witch, let me go! Witch!"

People around us were pointing and whispering to each other.

"Stop it! Who are you calling a witch?!"

Aunt Anne tightened her grip on me even further as she yelled, making it harder for me to breathe. I had to get away! To escape her grasp, I bit her arm as hard as I could. She screamed and dropped me on the floor. I landed hard and an ugly sound was heard as my head hit the ground. People gasped and ran towards us but I had completely lost all rationality and ran. Everything was a blur after that. My small body escaped through the crowd of people and somehow I escaped outside the compound. Not knowing how I had gotten here I found myself standing in a lake. The water reached all the way up to my waist. My mouth had a foul taste of metal and I had to rinse my mouth with the water. I stood there for a while with my eyes closed. My breathing slowed. The pain began. It was like my head was being split in two. I screamed. My eyes turned to the shore, and I knew I had to reach it. My feet felt heavy. I couldn't move. Something was sucking me down. My vision blurred. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came. Everything darkened.

I opened my eyes and saw the sky. I felt the wind on my skin. My hands were touching grass. A little boy came into my view as he peeked down on me. I tried to speak, but I couldn't. I tried to move but my body felt like lead. The boy ran away. I tried to scream. The sound refused to leave my throat. But I kept trying. I passed out.

When I woke up next all I could hear was people shouting.

"Why did you bring that strange girl here! Have you seen her clothes? She could bring us all in danger!" a woman's voice yelled.

"Calm down Helen. I couldn't just leave her there. Someone must miss her," another voice sounded.

"I don't care about that. If they didn't want to lose her, then they should have kept a better watch on her. I'm telling you this girl is trouble!"

I lost consciousness.

I woke up several times, but everything was a blur and I couldn't remember any details. All I could recall was the yelling and the cooling touch against my burning skin. My whole body felt like it was on fire but there was one constant that kept me sane. When the pain became unbearable a slow flow of coldness entered my body and lowered my temperature. There was a warm, yet cold presence by my side at all times, ready to act when I needed. In-between consciousness I would remember a small figure talking in a low tone. That voice would make me fall asleep and for a moment I would feel content and safe.

One day I woke up, fully alert and the first thing to greet me was a pair of deep blue eyes. They were filled with all the different colours of blue and shone like a beautiful jewel. The eyes belonged to a young boy who looked to be around my age. His mouth broke into a smile when he looked into my eyes for the first time. It was like time had stopped; like we were the only two people in existence. The sound of our heartbeats was in sync, in perfect harmony. What seemed like a whole minute was only but a second. The moment broke.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"I'm Alec, what about you?"

"Rana, my name is Rana. Where am I?"

"You are in our home. I found you in the Sacred Plains. Didn't you know you aren't supposed to go there?"

"What are you talking about? What are the Sacred Plains? And what is this place? Why does it look like we're in the Middle Ages?" I asked as I noticed the surroundings.

The whole house seemed to have been made of wood and there was no technology in sight. The bed I was laying in didn't have a mattress, instead, I was laying in hay. The blanket on top of me was ugly and worn with several holes and the clothes Alec was wearing looked like what was worn in the movies set in the Middle Ages. Did I somehow get rescued by the Amish? But that would be impossible as I had been in the middle of New York City and there was no way, they lived there. I thought of my father. His imagination had always given me hope and dreams. The stories he told me at bedtime were always filled with all kinds of wonders and made me understand the world differently than others. Where people saw a normal tree, I saw its story. I saw stories in everything. The magic. So for a moment, the thought crossed my mind, was I in the Middle Ages?

"I don't know what you are talking about, but you are in a village called Freyo," Alec said.

"Oh, she is awake," said a man as he entered the room with a smile on his face.

He had a nice smile. It was the face of a gentle person whom everyone would trust. But I remembered his voice. It was the voice that had been screaming and yelling along with the sound of another person doing the same thing.

"Do you have a phone or maybe a computer?" I asked the man, itching to find a way home and to discover if they even knew what technology was.

"What is that?" Alec asked.

The man's face twitched for just a second, but he was quick to hide it, although he wasn't fast enough. I had caught it. Alec was looking at me with his head tilted to the side waiting for my answer. Something was wrong. Did I really travel back in time or was I maybe in a different world?

"Do you know about New York?"

Alec shook his head.

"What is that?"

I continued to ask several questions, but every time they didn't know what I was talking about. I never answered their questions and Alec's father got more annoyed with every question.

"You need to explain yourself. We don't understand what you are talking about. It's almost like you are from a different world," he said before I could open my mouth to ask the next question.

I held my breath and observed him. He reminded me of all the bad people I had met in my life. There was one particular person whom I could never forget that was exactly like this man. From a young age, I had been taught the different signs of danger. My mother had been very particular in getting me to understand other people and had taught me everything she knew. As an actress, she knew all the different tells of who a person was. She knew when to push and when to pull. Reading people was her job, and she taught me how. There was a reason why a lot of people liked me. Like my mother I loved attention. I loved being the star of the show and I made sure it stayed like that. So when I looked at the man in front of me I knew almost by instinct that I had to be careful. This place was weird and I had to make up a story.

"I'm sorry. It's just that I have never been away from home. I live in a place called New York, which is a place isolated from the rest of the world. My mother took me to see the world, but I seem to have lost her," I explained.

"I've never heard of such a place?" he said.

"We keep ourselves very isolated from the outside world. I was just confused when I woke up and my head still feels a bit heavy, so I thought I was at home for a moment. I don't know much about the outside," I said as tears flowed down my cheeks.

"I'm scared."

It wasn't difficult for me to cry because it was the truth. I didn't know where I was and something strange had happened to me. I hoped it was a dream but no matter what I did, I just didn't seem to wake up from it. I was clever. The tears were real and so was the fear. My family taught me well, and I knew how to turn everything to my advantage. It worked. The dads face softened as he saw my tears and he went down on his knees, putting his head at my eye level and smiled gently at me.

"It's all right. I'm John and this is my son Alec. This village worships the God of Water, Zelorzthas. You can stay with us while we figure out a way to find your mother," he said.

"Can I really?" I sniffed.

"Of course!" Alec said enthusiastically with a big grin plastered on his face.

For about two months I lived and breathed the same air as the villagers of Freyo. Alec's family comprised his father; John, his mother; Helen and his little sister Tabitha. Helen was the person who held the most authority in the village. I learned from the other kids that she was a Messenger. They were the people who were sensitive to the Gods will and conveyed it to the people. I also learned that almost every village had them. Their roles were not important to the countries and their status was only slightly better than a village chief.

Priests and Priestesses were another matter entirely. They held the highest authority, even higher than the emperors and kings. These were the people whom the Gods had chosen as their own. They were granted powers similar to the God they served and lived lives of luxury and comfort. Almost every kid I talked to spoke highly of them and wished to be one of them. It wasn't hard getting them to talk. While I feared the adults, kids were another story. I had won almost every kid in the village over by using my wit and charm. I introduced them to a life of fun and showed them a glimpse of my world. They ate it up and in return, I gained information. I learned that the name of this world was Saighra and that this world relied heavily on their belief in Gods. I gave up on learning their names as all of them were unpronounceable. This was definitely not the world I grew up in.

Alec was the one person whom I truly liked. He was sweet and protected me from the adults. I always stuck with him. His mother was especially harsh towards me. I didn't know why she didn't like me, but she treated me like a nuisance and made sure I knew I was a freeloader. She was almost as bad as Aunt Anne. I stayed clear of her. I had long had enough of people like her. If I had been at home she would never even have been worthy of my presence. But I was far from home. I had no idea how I had stayed so clear-headed in this place. I had pondered for so long why this had happened. Was it punishment? Fate? Was it the prophesy grandfather had mentioned? It didn't matter. What mattered was that I had to stay alive. This place gave me the creeps. The people were nice and no one was especially mean to me, except for Helen and a few others. But my instincts told me to be careful. Mother had warned me to be wary of other people and to trust my instincts. So I did.

But apparently, I wasn't careful enough. I was woken up in the middle of the night. Helen dressed me in a white dress. I asked her what we were doing but only silence greeted me. I gave up on speaking to her. Instead, I tried to run. She would have none of that. I was hit hard on the head, making me dizzy and slow to react. My vision had only blackened for but a moment and yet I found myself standing in front of a crowd.

"Our God has been angered!" Helen yelled and looked down upon the people. They all gasped and whispered amongst themselves. "Rain has been sparse and we can all barely survive as it is. The stones have spoken. Only a Bride can appease his anger. The girl has been chosen," she said in a grave voice and pointed at me.

"Our God's wrath has to be appeased or we will never see rain on our land again. So I ask of you, what is our answer?" Helen yelled these last words at the crowd and only a second passed before they all answered in unison.

"We shall offer him a Bride!"

"Let the offering begin!"

I found myself bound tightly with ropes and unable to move. A group of people began to carry me and the journey to my apparent death began. I struggled but there was nothing I could do with my small body. I couldn't scream because they had stuffed a piece of cloth in my mouth that tasted sour. Every time I swallowed I felt myself getting weaker and my breathing became shallow. It felt like we were walking for hours and yet only minutes had passed as we reached the destination. It was a lake. Helen chanted in a foreign language I had never heard before and yelled at the sky.

"Our God Zelorzthas, we as your subjects have found your Bride. Please accept our offerings and let rain once again fall on our lands!"

Everyone got down on their knees and prayed, but one person did not. Alec was running towards me, only to be stopped by his father.

"Let me go! I have to save her! Please don't do this!" he yelled.

Through the grogginess, I looked up with difficulty and our eyes met. Time stopped. We were in a world of our own. No words were needed to convey our feelings. Without words, we knew what we were saying.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I never thought mother hated you this much. I tried to warn you, but they stopped me."

"It isn't your fault Alec. You are the first real friend I have had."

I smiled.

"Please, please don't die!"

I was thrown into the water.