The monastery was on fire. Beatrice could feel the smoke fill her lungs. She felt the heat of the flame against her skin. She staggered outside of her room. She could hear the screams of the other residents. She could hear the sound of blades finding purchase against flesh.
She awoke with a start at a knocking on the door. Beatrice was in her mother's room. There was no fire. Everything was just as it always had been.
Was it a vision? But a vision of what? The past or the future? Or something that was both?
She pressed her hands against her ears. "What are you trying to tell me?" She asked her gods.
For the first time, they were silent.
"Little sister," Beatrice instantly relaxed at the sound of her beloved brother's voice. "May I come in?"
"It is not my room to give or deny permission."
Torin chuckled lightly, opening the door softly.
Beatrice loved her brother and her mother more than she loved anything in the world. But sometimes it hurt to look at them. Her brother looked so alike their mother, it served as a constant reminder that Beatrice was not related to them by blood. She touched her brother's cheek lightly, before tightening to a pinch, pulling at it.
Torin cried out in pain. "What did I do?" He pouted.
Beatrice laughed breathlessly. He was warm to the touch. Real. Yes, this was real, not those flames and blood. It was not a message from the gods. It wasn't something that would come to pass. It was only a nightmare.
Beatrice pulled Torin into a crushing hug. There was nothing to fear. But even so, she wanted to keep him attached to her side.
"Are you also looking for alma?" Beatrice asked him. She still called her mother by the affectionate Vaelic term, even if her relation with her mother was nothing more than love rather than blood. "She hasn't come by here."
"No, Ascanio told me to fetch you. Alma is in the chapel."
Beatrice narrowed her eyes. Ascanio again. She couldn't trust him. Not ever. He was someone assigned by the archbishop. Her guards were not there to protect her. They were there to keep her in. Without her, the archbishop had no power. At first, she was naive, she thought it meant that she would have the advantage. But she quickly learned she could never betray him. He had reached out his hand and pulled her up into the light.
However, Beatrice never realized that the light could hurt as much as the dark.
"Little sister," Torin pulled her from her thoughts. He was holding his hand out to her. She stared back at him blankly. "The chapel," he reminded her.
Beatrice nodded, putting her hand in his own and allowing him to pull her to her feet. There was a time where Beatrice had loved the chapel dearly, but now it only reminded her of her impending marriage. She could spend hours there, staring up at the stained glass that covered the entire ceiling. The world looked so beautiful through the colored glass. The sun seemed warmer through it. Sometimes when the sun would hit the glass just right, it would send thousands of colored crystals throughout the room. Beatrice had never known true beauty until she found that window.
It held the likeness of the sun goddess. The mother of all gods. She was a warrior, the flames of the sun were contained in her hair, forming a halo around her head. Torin had once told Beatrice that she resembled the goddess. She had the same flame red hair. But Beatrice assumed the goddess did not have a hideous mark carved into her skin.
Her mother sat in the middle of the chapel, her head tilted to the ceiling. A smile graced her beautiful features as if she was enjoying the beauty that colored glass contained. But Beatrice knew she could not.
Her mother had lost her sight long ago.
"Beatrice," her mother spoke before Beatrice could even touch her shoulder. "My darling girl."
"Just a minute, alma." Beatrice touched her mother's back lightly as she passed, kneeling before the shrine to the sun goddess and lit a candle in worship. She shut her eyes and prayed for protection. Then she knelt on the floor, putting her head on her mother's lap, clutching for the last shreds of childhood she would soon lose.
"My precious Beatrice," her mother, Echo, stroked her hair. "Whatever is the matter? Today should be a happy day."
"Have you met him?" Beatrice's voice was muffled by the skirts.
"No, the holy father would not allow it."
Beatrice's head shot up. She twisted the skirt in her fists. "Why not?"
"I can only assume he is ashamed."
"Ashamed," Beatrice scoffed.
Karin wanted to hide away her blind mother, but was selling a scarred daughter. What a joke.
"But you'll be at my wedding?"
Echo didn't answer, but her grip on Beatrice's hand tightened.
"You will be at my wedding," now the question became closer to a command.
"My darling," Echo stroked her cheek. "I'm afraid the archbishop has already said-"
"HE CANNOT BAN MY MOTHER FROM MY WEDDING." Her temper had snapped. Her voice echoed through the quiet chapel. She could hear the whispers, gossiping about her outburst, but Beatrice didn't care. Everything outside of her mother's absence on the most important day of her life seemed insignificant.
Beatrice always told herself to never expect the world to be fair. Without hopes there could be no heartbreak. But before she had realized, she had come to expect Echo by her side.
"Bea," Torin chided her quietly. "We can't disobey the archbishop."
"I'll refuse to marry," Beatrice was becoming desperate. "A girl needs her mother on her wedding day. I won't marry him unless you're there."
Echo held Beatrice to her chest, stroking her hair. Before Beatrice realized it, she was crying. Large, fat tears rolling, staining her veil and the breast of Echo's dress. Echo said nothing, letting Beatrice cry until she had no water left in her body.
There were no more words left to say. Beatrice would marry and her mother would not be there. It was the will of the archbishop and, therefore, the will of the gods.
But he did not know the will of the gods, that burden was on Beatrice's shoulders alone. Beatrice feared that Karin's shoulders would break under that sort of weight.
Beatrice turned her face to the sky, the glittering sunlight too harsh for her swollen eyes. She reached her hand towards the warmth of the sun, wishing she could reach out and grab it. When was the last time she felt the sun directly on her skin? When did she last breathe fresh air? When was it that she looked around and was not surrounded by walls?
She dreamt of laying out in the sun on the grass. Of feeling rain against her skin. She even dreamt of snow, occasionally, even though she hated the cold.
'Not yet,' she told herself as she always did. 'But soon.'
Soon… It was a promise she had already broken many times. A promise she would break yet again.
She covered her ears.
The gods were screaming.