The pitch darkness met Brenda's soul as it traveled through the portal that Avais made. Upon entering, a vast land of darkness, opposite to the realm of whiteness that both beings were just in, expanded far beyond what Brenda's soul could perceive. With a sigh of confusion, Brenda's soul began propelling its way through the darkness in search of its loved ones.
Time's existence faded from the soul's thoughts as the endless and restless search became more taxing on Brenda's soul. Through each cry outward for its loved ones, the more the soul felt as if it would never find them. After moving all this time, it slowly stopped to float in one spot as a sudden realization had dawned upon the soul.
"There's nothing here." Brenda's soul said in a horrified tone before crying out in a wail. "I've searched for so long, and nothing is here!" It looked around frantically as it began to cry out, "Avais! Avais, please! Help me! I've done so much, but I can't find anyone!"
Only silence met the soul's pleas. The soul slowly floated downward somberly until it touched what might have been the ground of this place. The bright light that Brenda's soul gave off began to dim as well as sorrow began to cloud the mind, and somewhere, Brenda's soul thought it heard a cracking sound from inside.
"Another cracking sound." Brenda's soul said softly, "I've done my best to stay positive, but it's so hard." It sighed heavily as it stared into the darkness yet again, but then a rush of memories filled the soul's mind. While these memories flooded, Brenda's mother's death seemed to be the one that hit the hardest.
Despite it happening so fast, Brenda's mother disappeared before Brenda before could say goodbye, and remembering the face that she made as she disintegrated tore through the mind of Brenda's soul, causing it to scream out in ultimate pain. Cracks began developing around Brenda's soul as it began to experience ultimate despair through the consistent playing back of Brenda's mother's death.
After an unknown time of screaming out loud and being traumatized, harrowing thoughts popped into its mind. Thoughts that made the soul shudder in terror.
"What if I…What if I was meant to suffer here? Was I supposed to find anyone or not?" Brenda's soul said sorrowfully as it looked skyward, "Was I supposed to fade into nothingness? Is this what the goddess wanted from me?" Brenda's soul illuminated slightly red as its tone became fiercer, "Did she lie to me? What did I do to deserve this much sorrow? This much agony? This much—"
Brenda's soul became interrupted as a bright white light shone from above it. It was overwhelming as the light grew brighter and brighter, illuminating the darkness around her to reveal that the soul had been placed in a small space that made it seem like the area endlessly expanded; in truth though, it was a mere cage—a small prison for her. A shattering sound of glass exploded around her as this small prison disappeared, and the last thing that Brenda's Soul heard before the vision fading into the light was:
"I'm sorry. This is the best I could do."
"Wa—!"
"Hel—!"
"Lur—!"
A cacophony of noises and a beaming light from above stirred Brenda as she slowly opened her eyes towards the sky. Her eyes widened largely as she realized that she was looking at a familiar pale blue sky with multiple fluffy clouds, and with her hands, she felt the feeling of freshly wet grass underneath her palms, which she gently brushed to make sure it was real.
Tears of happiness began to stream down her face as the noises of birds chirping and various voices were shouting off in the distance, too distinct to make out their words. She was certainly blessed to hear all this again, and yet, the voices behind her sounded unfamiliar, and the birds chirping was a type of chirping that she had no remembrance of hearing. In her mind, it didn't matter if it was unfamiliar, but to see something besides darkness for a change was pleasant enough.
With a quick inhale, she smelt the scents of fresh hay and charred foods being cooked in the distance. She then breathed in slowly to feel her chest rise and fall, as if this sensation had almost been lost to her completely. The feeling of living was sure with her again, and Brenda was in complete shock.
"This is too real to be a dream. Surely, it isn't—" Brenda thought as she felt a small weight on her chest. She gave out a small groan as she lifted her head slowly to see a small child crying silently on her chest. This child looked to be about the age of six or seven with short silver hair, and his attire was very unsightly as his clothes seemed too big for him and were very tattered.
Suddenly, a pain shot through her neck as she let out another groan, which alerted the small boy. As he turned to her, she saw that despite a layer of dirt and dust on his face, this boy was very pale, which made his green eyes stand out like newly cut jades, and his ears were pointed with a single cut in them. Upon making eye contact, the boy's silent crying turned into a roar of wailing and sobbing as he thrust himself into Brenda's arms, and Brenda, although stunned from the response, gently stroked his head.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm SORRY!" The boy cried out over and over again as his face became a soaked mess. "I didn't mean for you to get hurt, and and and and…" The boy began to become hysterical as his crying somehow got louder.
"It's okay—" Brenda smiled as went to say, but she interrupted herself as she suddenly stopped talking, her eyes widening larger than before. "That wasn't my voice? Was it?" She thought inwardly out of pure confusion. The pitch of her voice was a tad lower than before, and it has a sort of inflection on her vowels as if her voice wasn't taught to say certain words the right way.
"No!!" The boy looked up with a small pout on his face, the white of his eyes now strained red from the crying as he continued to say through heavy panting, "You got hurt! I just wanted to play in the tree, and then you climbed up after me, and I didn't wanna come down, and because I didn't wanna come down, you feel, and you didn't move for hours, and—" the boy went back to crying as he suddenly shoved his face back into Brenda's chest. "I am so sorry, Lurai!"
"Lurai? What name is that? Is that my name?" Brenda thought inwardly in immediate shock, and she took a deep breath to prepare herself for the voice that would come out of her mouth before she spoke again. "I'm sorry, young one. Who is Lurai?"
The boy shot up from her chest with his eyes almost bulging from his face with horror. His tears, already streaming down his face, grew fiercer as he let out a pained scream that made Brenda cover her ears. Despite the loud screaming, Brenda reached her hand out to comfort him, but as she touched his head again, he didn't move but continued to cry.
Instinctively, Brenda slowly got up onto her knees and jolted forward to hug the child. The child's crying slowly to a gentle sob after a few moments, but a new sound approached from behind the two of them—the sound of approaching footsteps. The footsteps came to a halt as they got closer as if they were stopped due to a surprise.
Brenda turned around slowly to see an older pale gentleman, looking around the age of 30-40 physically, wearing tattered brown and dirt-stained clothes and holding a large farmer's sickle in his right hand. His face was clear and scarred as if multiple gashes had been taken out on him, while his poorly cut, lavender hair fell cut before his triple-cut pointed ears. In his other hand, he was holding a smaller hand belonging to a small boy that looked identical to the boy, only he had purple hair instead of silver, that Brenda was currently holding, and that boy, too, had tears streaming down his face.
"What is—" the elven man said in a stunned tone as he dropped his sickle onto the ground with a heavy thud. His hand began shaking as he looked towards Brenda with sorrowful eyes and a dropped jaw. After a moment of silence, the man's voice came out very shakily as he spoke, "No—Is it possible?!"
The boy that was holding onto the man's hand instantly let go of the hand and rushed over to Brenda, throwing himself at her chest in an embrace. He, too, began sobbing loudly, which reactivated the sobbing of the other boy as well. Brenda couldn't help, but hug both of them very tightly, as if comforting them was something she had to do.
After even more moments of silence and sobbing, Brenda rubbed the backs of the boys, and they slowly released their embrace around her. She rose to her feet and looked over to the man with a puzzled look on her face. She reached up to rub her neck as it was still paining her, and as she tried to take a step forward, she fell towards the ground with a groan of pain as she smacked against the dirt and grass.
The elven man rushed forward to lift her by the waist, and Brenda realized exactly how tall this man was to her. While she seemed tall from the moment she stood up, this man towered over her, but as he lifted her, he, too, then embraced her in a hug. Brenda froze immediately as she was hugged by this strange man, and after the hug lasted for more than a few seconds, she became very uncomfortable and tried to struggle from the embrace; however, the man didn't loosen his grip.
"We thought we lost you, Lurai." The elven man said with a heavy sigh, "Your neck was snapped, and even the guards couldn't feel your pulse. They even tried magic to heal you, but it didn't work." The man's embrace became even stronger, but at the same time, gentler. "Oh, Lurai. This is a miracle."
Brenda stopped struggling as she heard the elven man's words, and she shot him a very curious gaze. "I'm sorry." Brenda spoke softly as she looked into the elven man's eyes, "I have no idea what is going on? Why are you calling me Lurai?"
The elven man's eyes widened as he looked upon her with a look like that boy's when she asked a similar thing. The man began shaking his head left and right as tears streamed down his face as he began to speak again, "Let's get you home first." The elven man looked towards the two boys and coughed, "Lykas. Cial. Lead her back to the house. I need to go speak with a guard immediately. Do it now." As the boys ran up to them, the elven man lowered his stature to their head height and whispered, "Not a word until you all get back to the housing unit, and tell your mother there is a problem."
The boys, with utmost resolve, nodded and ran up to Brenda, each grabbing a different hand, and both began pulling softly as if trying to guide her. She nodded towards the elven man and then to the elven boys, before having them lead her away. As she watched them pull her along, she realized how pale her hands were.
"I really am pale. Did I really hurt myself, and why can't I remember how?" Brenda thought inwardly. Her vision fell on the boys again with a puzzled look, "Why are they calling me, Lurai? I must have been playing a game with them, but I've never known father to get elves younger than fifteen before. Father must have gotten new elves after the incident. Oh, I hope he is alright, and mothe--."
Brenda stopped suddenly, which caused the boys to stop as well as they were not strong enough to pull her without her help. Tears began to stream down her face and feelings of devastation filled her mind as she remembered the horrible scene of her mother's disintegration. Even though she was alive, she knew her mother would not be.
The boys looked back and forth towards one another in confusion, but the purple-haired one lifted a finger to his mouth as the silver-haired one went to speak. They waited for a few minutes as Brenda continued to cry out in pain, but in a few minutes, she nodded to the boys despite her tears. The boys promptly went back to leading her along, as tears filled their eyes again from her crying.
The boys, silently guiding while trying their best to not let her know they were crying too, lead Brenda past a series of rundown shacks that looked very unfamiliar. They were nothing like the old housing units that were at the Harenhart Manor, as the old shacks were colored with faded purple paint and pretty-well kept. However, these housing units looked very run down, and the paint was almost unrecognizable from the rotting and splitting wood that made up these shacks.
"Just what did those rouges do to our home?" Brenda thought inwardly again as she began to grow more and more worried with each step towards this unfamiliar sight, and she looked around to see a different and larger home off in the distance. It was certainly different from the style of the Harenhart manor, but that is all she could make out from the faraway distance. "Just where did father move to? I'll have to ask him when I get inside."
The boys continued to walk her along the line of rundown shacks until they reached a shack with a tattered curtain as a doorway. This shack, unfortunately, looked the worst out of the shacks in its line, but it was a more massive shack from the outer appearance. The doorframe seemed to be repaired consistently as if the wood surrounding it kept falling away, and the paint on the house was an almost un-seeable shade of a very pale, light blue.
Brenda looked at the boys with a look of confusion as she knelt to their height. Wiping her tears, she smiled towards them with a curious expression as she spoke softly, "I thought you brave boys were leading me to the house?"
The boys nodded in unison as both spoke up proudly, "This is the house!" Before Brenda could respond, one of the boys, the silver-haired one, bolted through the curtain, leaving the purple-haired boy with Brenda.
Brenda raised a hand to her chin with a puzzled look and then smiled as a thought came to her head. "Oh! This is your house! I thought you were taking me to my house." She said in a light tone as she pointed at the larger house in the far distance.
The boy looked back at her with a confusing look as if he thought he did something wrong. "Nuh-uh, Lurai. This is—"
"Lykas, you shouldn't lie to your mother like this. This is no jokin—" The curtain was promptly pushed to the side as a long silver-haired elven woman came through it with bursting speed. To Brenda, she was a beautiful elven woman, like her own height, as her jade-like eyes illuminated her pale face and skin, and despite her tattered and dirty gray clothing, she looked like she had done her best to keep her appearance as beautiful as possible. Instantly, the woman's gaze fell upon Brenda, which caused the woman's jaw to drop and tears to stream down her face rapidly.
"Oh." Brenda said with a smile, "Hello! It seems your boys lead me back to your home. I'm flattered, but I thought they were leading me—"
Brenda was interrupted as the elven woman instantly embraced her, and Brenda could feel the woman physically shaking as she continued to embrace and squeeze her tighter and tighter. "Are they all happy that I am not dead? Brenda thought inwardly as she puzzlingly embraced the elven woman back, "Father must have relaxed back on his rules for the elves now. They were never allowed to hug before, but—"
"I'm so happy you are okay." The elven woman tearfully said without lifting her head, "When I saw you, I couldn't bear the sight, and when the guards said you were gone, I—I," The woman's tears and sobbing began to grow in volume, "I didn't know what I'd do!"
Brenda held the woman in her arms and gently rubbed her back. "It's okay." Brenda said softly with a smile, "But maybe you can tell me something: Why is everyone calling me, Lurai?"
"You don't know?" The elven woman's head rose as she looked upon Brenda with a horrified look, the third she has seen today. The elven woman lifted her hand to feel Brenda's head, which continued to puzzle Brenda, and then the elven woman wiped her tears on her shirt. "I see. That's what he meant by a problem." The elven woman sighed heavily as her expression dropped to an expression of sorrow.
"Problem?" Brenda raised an eyebrow towards the woman, who nodded her head once.
"Dinner will be ready soon, so it's best to wash up first." The elven gave off a sorrowful smile towards Brenda as she reached for the curtain to draw it for her, "A bath might be good for your memory."
"I feel like I could use a bath." Brenda said with a sigh of relief, "but I can wait until I get back to the house."
The elven woman bit her lip softly as she turned away from Brenda, "Please. I insist that you do it here. My table—" the elven woman sighed again, "was already set for five."
"I shouldn't insult her. I'll just take another bath when I get back to the manor." Brenda thought inwardly as she moved towards the curtain and entered the rundown home.
As Brenda entered the home, a very basic sight met her vision. The home was decently sized on the inside with only a few windows spread around, but the floor and the walls all had rotting wood with minor stabilizing repairs shoddily done to the home. As Brenda took a closer look around the room, she noticed that the beds were against the far wall, four in count with one much larger than the others, and the sheets of these beds looked ragged and torn while there also seemed to be no pillows in sight.
Near the beds, a large stone fire pit was set up around a mound of sand that was lowered slightly below the flooring, and resting atop of the fire pit were three large metal bars that allowed a cauldron to hang from it. As the cauldron was heating slowly above the already lit fire, a welcoming aroma of herbs and meat made its way to Brenda's nose as a gentle layer of smoke filled the air of the home.
In the center of the main room, there was a large dining table with five wooden chairs that seemed to be made from old pieces of wood as well, but the table and chairs appeared to be more sturdy than many of the walls in this home. Five plates that had various cracks and chips out of them had been set up already as well, and tiny scraps of fabric were placed next to the plates as a substitute for a personal eating cloth. In Brenda's mind, it seemed to her that they had already set up for a fifth person.
"If the man was their father, that makes four members of this family. So, who is the fifth? Do they have an uncle of some sort?" Brenda thought inwardly as she looked to the other side of the room.
In the direction she was now looking, she saw another room closed off by another tattered curtain, and she pointed to this curtain as she looked back at the elven woman. The elven woman closed her eyes as she nodded and went off to the cauldron above the fire. Brenda slowly walked towards the curtain and pushed it to the side, and as she entered the only other room in this home, she could swear that she heard the elven woman begin crying again.
After pushing aside the curtain, Brenda stumbled into a very small outer room with newer, but still rotting wooden walls and flooring. In the center of the room rested a large basin of water and a small lit fire pit to the side with a smaller cauldron of boiling water resting above it like the one in the main room of the home. On the far wall on the opposite side of the tub were a wooden bucket and a small-paned mirror with a large crack in it, which made Brenda frown deeply.
"I assume this is the best that father could have given them." Brenda said with a sigh, "At least they have a fire for the water," Brenda walked over to the water and felt that the water was ice cold. "Fire for the water."
She looked again at her arms which were somehow still pale, and she gave a heavy sigh. "Is this a side effect of dying? No, I must be freezing, but I'm still in shock?" Brenda raised an eyebrow and shook her head from side to side, " No no. That can't be it. Let's just--"
Brenda froze as she reached down to take off her shirt, instantly realizing that she was wearing a gray cloth dress instead that was torn in multiple places and dirt stains were splattered around it. Brenda's hands began to shake as she clutched the dress tighter and tighter, and in a rush, she dropped the dress to the ground and hastily walked over to the mirror, only to freeze again as she looked into it.
What Brenda thought she'd see was her long flowing strawberry blonde hair with her cerulean blue eyes staring back at her, but what met her instead was an unfamiliar face. This incredibly pale young girl in the mirror had sheening silver hair that fell just below her bangs with small grass blades mixed within, and a new pair of jade-like green eyes looked back at her. Her face was now slim with sunken cheeks and thin lips, and there was a small but thick scar that rested underneath her left eye. However, the most noticeable thing that stood out to Brenda was a pair of pointed single-cut ears that extruded from the sides of her head.
Brenda stood in silence for a few minutes in front of this cracked mirror as tears began to flow down her face. At first, she couldn't believe what she was seeing as she blinked multiple times to see if the vision in front of her would disappear. Numerous thoughts then filled her head, but only one came out of her mouth in a cracked and pained voice.
"I--I am Lurai, and I am h--home." Lurai said aloud as she touched her face before her vision faded. She felt the blood rush away from her face as she fell to the ground with a solid thud against the wooden floor.