Drifting, I marvel at the sight of a thousand sparkling stars splattered all over a blank dark canvass. With no sense of self, it was all I could see wherever I turn, and yet rather than distress, I feel solace. I feel as if I am on the verge of an epiphany yet can't truly grasp it; as if epiphany was water and I was a cracked cup riddled with holes.
Groggily, my eyes flutter awake as I sit up from the bed where I lay. The palm I pressed on it to steady myself easily sinks down, thanks to its fluffiness. I stare at the same smooth cave wall. Feeling as if something is off, I continue to stare at the illumination crystal embedded on it.
Was the lighting always this bright?
My eyes roam around and realize the absence of Obrecht's furnishings and chest. Where did his things go? My eyes then land on the hand that had almost been swallowed by the softness of the mattress. Was the bed always this soft?
A few seconds pass by, until the remnants of sleep completely leave my mind, jolting me with the truth. My neck almost snaps at the speed at which I turn to look at the pool.
Gone… It's gone….
With the pool gone, I study the room more closely and notice that is smaller than Obrecht's cave. I shift to the edge of the bed and find a basin of water, a towel, a few bandages, a sort of what I think is a medical balm, and Father's mask, all on the bedside table.
Just when I was about to touch the surface of the water, I freeze at the sight of my reflection. The markings on my face seem to have successfully completed its appearance. I caress my cheek unknowingly. My markings look different compared to the black runic ones that Father's face used to have.
I glance at the pile of neatly stacked clothes beside the bed's pillow. I check them out and as it turns out, they were clean. Grasping at the clothes I am wearing, I realize that it was still Obrecht's shirt. I pull it up and place it over my nose. A feint scent of citrus and oak hit my nose—
Ah—!
I abruptly take it off and throw it at the bed, heaving and looking at it as if it had offended me. I refuse to look at it any longer and wet a towel to clean myself.
Let's just pretend that didn't happen.
Deciding that I was simply half-asleep then, I proceed to wiping myself off in a fluster. A line of runic markings stretched over from the top of both my arms down to the back of my hands, where they met the ring-like markings that both wrapped the base of my middle fingers. I examine them, and think that I have never seen such markings on other Wraiths before; having markings only on their face.
Burying the thought to the back of my mind, I continue to scrutinize myself. My wounds look like they have been recently cleaned and bandaged neatly, while my bruises had already receded and left only small patches of lightened yellow shades. I wonder briefly whether my sleeping can help my healing and cell regeneration, given that these bruises looked far worse just yesterday.
I don on the clean black clothes I was endowed with. Astonishingly, they fit perfectly. Though the collar is a bit wider than I'm used to, the sleeves were longer and completely covered the scars on my wrists caused by the hand shackles I used to always wear.
I take my mask and stare at it. It feels as if I almost had an epiphany, but now I could not remember half of my dream. I think hard, but all I could remember was the dark canvass of brightly sparkling stars. I close my eyes to try imitate the previous stimulation.
A soft echo of footsteps jolts me from my stupor. A woman older than me comes in and seeing that I was awake, she freezes just as I have. I stare the space between her eyebrows.
"You're awake", she suddenly says. Her voice surprises me so that I take a step back, only to almost knock over the basin of water. Quickly, my hands steady it, spilling a few drops on the bed.
She observes me for a while, before looking as if she has come to terms with something. She says, "You must be starving", and then smiles generously at me. She was kind enough to ignore my clumsiness. My face burns a little, both with shame and with gratitude. Nervously, my eyes follow her.
Now that I'm calmer, I see that she is holding a bowl of fruits similar to what Obrecht gave me to eat. She walks over to the bed, sits down and places the bowl beside her. A gesture from her silently asks me to sit down next to her. Hesitatingly, I conform. If she had wanted me dead or behind bars, she would have done so when I was asleep.
Urging me the bowl, I slowly take a fruit and place it under my nose. I take a whiff of it to see if I could smell any poison, and when I don't, I take a small bite. Although she might have used a scentless poison or an unknown potion on it, I didn't give much care anymore at the urgency of my hunger. I felt famished after the first bite of food.
The fruit was sweet and juicy when fresh unlike the dried ones that Obrecht had offered, and had many small seedlings here and there.
"Ah—", the person beside me suddenly says as her hand reaches for my face.
A memory of one of the Lycan guards grabbing my hair lapses over the sight of her hand, causing me to jerk away from her. Dropping the fruit on the ground, my back presses on the wall next the bedside table. I couldn't even swallow the fruit inside my mouth.
I didn't mean to waste the food she had brought me. Anxiously, I observe the ground near her feet to see if she was mad, but she just sighs.
"There's a seed on your cheek."
Finally, I look up at her and see her smile. After five seconds I look back again at the ground while she instructs me to eat more. My right hand inches up my face, and sure enough, I feel a seed stuck between my fingers when I pull my hand away.
"I'll be outside if you need anything", she says as if she had felt my discomfort and embarrassment.
After she left, I slide down on the wall to sit on the floor. I wasn't this scared around the Nymph-kind. Maybe it was because their trees were so similar to home that I found myself comfortable, while these caves remind me of the cold damp cells in the Lycan's dungeon. Inwardly, I sigh.
With my appetite gone, I stare at the fruit before picking it up and placing the half-eaten thing on the bedside table. I glance at the bandages and then my mask. The fur that Obrecht had given me was attached to the top of the mask so that if I am to wear it, it would cover not only my face, but the entire back of my head to my nape, shoulder blades, and even the back of my knees. I try to feel the softness of it.
I put it on but belatedly realized that a few cracks had appeared on the side of the mask that which allowed light to pass on through. I stroke mask before my eyes linger on the bandages. If I wanted to recreate that same simulation I had in my dream, I reckoned that I'd need to be constantly be submerged in darkness.
It didn't take long for me to wrap the bandages over my eyes before putting my mask on.
The feeling of being robbed of you sight feels foreign. I flail my arms for a while, knocking my knee on the bed's frame.
"Tch", I click my tongue as the pain emanates from my knee. I pause at the sudden illumination of white outlines of a bed. It looked as if an invisible barrier had passed through to survey the surroundings. I straighten up and click my tongue once more but nothing happened.
What am I missing?
It feels as if someone had asked me a question and the answer is at the tip of my tongue yet I can't precisely recall it, and yet it was enough to keep me up all night; that kind of feeling. Taking a deep breath, I visualize the room according to memory. I glance at my hand and visualize it more until slowly, I feel a transparent power rising from my feet to my hand and coating it transparently. It could have been just my imagination but somehow I knew a bit of me was there, making my senses somewhat sharper.
I snap my finger, and this time, my hand had been outlined and coated in a blue color. I look up and see a receding outline of white colors. A small bubbly feeling rose in my chest at having accomplished it; that sense of satisfaction like how I'd finally found the answer that I was desperately looking for.
Is this how Father, Arashella, Ivana, and the other Wraith-kinds see the world?