Chapter 2
Another moment.
My eyes opened abruptly at the sudden brightness, I felt as if I was drowning my lungs. It has been weeks since I awoke from sleep. All I felt was pain, nothing but pain, as my body felt heavier with every breath. Huffing harshly as cold moist air filled them, I waited once more for the gates of heaven to open, finally I was a step away. Putting my arms out to caress the soft white cloth around me, it felt different to the hard rough gravel of the cage I was kept in. The soft sheets, the beige curtains, again I felt like I was home.
"Miss, it's time for us to get you out of bed. Come on now, the bath has been prepared!"
A familiar voice tickled my hearing as I turned to my side to see Amy, my personal maid for when I was still living in my parent's place. I smiled softly at her, I see now, I am still in a dream. I whispered, almost shocked, at the maid who was only 5 years older than myself. My throat felt dry, as she handed me the usual morning glass of water. She looked at me in disbelief, and I could almost imagine her thoughts. Taking a sip, I chuckled remembering the freshness of the water made from magic
"Oh if only this was all real, how real this feels is amazing…"
"Miss, what nonsense are you muttering? Why would you say something so foreboding?" Amy asked, almost afraid.
"Not really...?Remember the year of 1823, accidentally stomped by a horse in the East of Downtown." I answered her back.
"Katrina, the little Miss, is saying something so auspicious. Inform the Duke and Duchess, I think there's something wrong with our Miss!" she yelled at the maid accompanying her.
"Miss, lay down! How are you feeling? Are you okay?" Amy touched my forehead, and I couldn't help but flinch at her cold fingers.
"You're burning! Duchess, our little miss!"
Duchess, Duke...as in my parents? A minute in, I could hear a couple of loud footsteps and they came barging in, there they were my parents. My mother seemed more youthful than when I last saw her. Her hair was still fiery red, vibrant as if fire itself was embedded, the colour I myself inherited. She came over by my side and immediately talked to Amy, and soon a man in a coat rushed in.
The Imperial Doctor? It couldn't have been, my father the Duke, would never use his power for such a useless moment- oh no he would.
What a weird dream, we would never have a doctor this quick unless the teleportation circle had been activated. I couldn't help but wonder my eyes to the tall man beside my mother, eyes silver like mine but hair blonde, almost like strings of gold thinly pulled and sculpted.
"Father? Mother? How could this be?"
I could clearly remember everything as if it was yesterday itself. My father lay down as his tied limbs were torn off one-by-one by horses. All that was left of him was nothing but his head and torso.
Death by disruption. Dismemberment.
I got out of bed almost tripping, before he grabbed me. Warmth.
My father froze in confusion, and I held his shirt tighter, afraid that I would lose him almost immediately if I let the cloth go. The heavens had granted me a beautiful dream, and yet it felt like a curse. Once this dream ends, I would wake up to nothing but loneliness and sorrow.
Father's worried tone lingered in my ear, asking me if I was alright. His deep baritone voice mixed with my mother's, was what I needed. Even in my early years, he had always been worried about my welfare, whereas mother would encourage him to let me be. I would hear stories about how he cried when I took my first steps from Mother, let alone when I got my first sprain.
I remembered his last breath, as he led the family's knights down the hallways of the royal palace, in search of me. Despite his ageing stature he found me trapped in my room, with my young sweet child found cold dead in my arms. He saw how much pain I felt as nothing, but emptiness filled my eyes and dried tear stains on my cheek.
My son was poisoned, and the emperor was too busy with his mistress to even fix the door lock of my drawing room. My father who was there to visit me found that everyone in the castle were acting as if they were conspiring while they ignored my cries of help and my fists banging on the large wooden doors. He was baited and became known as the man who poisoned his majesty's son, and I, his accomplice.
"Father, I love you so much. Mother as well."
My mother died of sickness, but I knew in the future she was deliberately poisoned. It was to have the Duke's family weakened from the inside with the lack of a Lady Master, that was when the other houses of nobles started to attack the Manor. Politics at its best. I pulled Mother in for a hug, her floral scent, lingering and calming me down. How bittersweet, if all of this is to vanish from me once again.
If only I knew better. If only.