Beneath, part 7

It wasn’t long before the grand mother emerged from the hovel and took the ratty old clothes she left in their stead a cloth for drying and a dress, mentioning that it was a gift from one of her daughters.  Sasha thanked the old woman and let the warmth of the water boil her a while longer. She could feel the eyes watching her from around the corner, but she didn’t look to see to which boy they might belong. After she had been thoroughly transformed she emerged from the bath, with nothing but her scares to remind her of the life she suffered before. She rolled her fingers, then her toes, her ankles, her shoulders all with a new refreshed life, relieved of pain. She slipped into the dress quickly, taking only a moment to reflect on its appearance. It was long and an earthy red with a belt to fit the waist. She cinched the belt and quickly moved into the home to help old Demy.

Sasha had no idea how she might look until she entered the little kitchen and Demy, who had been working diligently, stopped and eyed her. The old matron’s reaction startled the girl so much that she looked down at herself trying to see what had disturbed the old woman. A brilliant scar showed over the low neckline of the dress, and without thought as to why she pulled her hands over the vibrant mark that spanned over her breast.

She felt terribly embarrassed until the grandmother spoke, “I couldn’t have begun to imagine how beautiful you were in those old rags.”

Sasha looked down at herself again and found the form of her womanly curves. Lines that she could have sworn flat and straight at one time were now round and full. Suddenly she was a woman, and she had not noticed its coming for she had been in the dark. At realizing this she was embarrassed a new. She had been so young when she was locked away it was easy to forget that she had changed in body as much as in mind.

“Come here my darling and help me with the meal.”

Sasha obeyed, but it was quickly apparent that she was useless in the kitchen. The young men came in to find that old Demy was trying to maintain a level of calm as poor Sasha struggled with even the simplest kitchen tasks.

“Didn’t your mother ever learn you to cook sorceress?” said Daniel jokingly.

It took Sasha a moment to realize that the boy was speaking to her as she fought with a bread mixture for their dinner. Her panic made her rather oblivious.

“I haven’t seen my mother in more than 15 years,” she said as she beat at the doughy mass.

“But you made such a lovely porridge the other morning Deary?”

“That’s porridge, it’s easy. Every soldier learned to make it during the war.”

There was a pause, the magnitude of which eluded Sasha. It took a long moment before she realized that all in the room waited for further explanation. She continued to half consciously knead the bread as she tried to recall her life’s story.

“I was about 4 years old when it was found that I had ‘The Gift’. That was when they took me away to the Wizard house. By rights I should have gone to a Witch’s Convent, but our town was too small to have one, so I was taken to the Wizards’ instead. My mother and father left me there and I have not seen them all these years since. In truth I cannot even be sure they are still alive, though it wouldn’t surprise me if they were and had more children to replace me for they were still very young. It was at the Wizard house that I learned to use magics, and how to spar, and many other things. I never learned to cook though. There was always a servant that cooked for us, so it was never necessary for me to know the skill.”

“Was the sparring where you got all those scars?” asked Nathan before he could think to stop himself.

While the question should have offended her greatly, she showed no signs of bother and answered without delay, “Some, but others I got in the war… or after.”

“It’s impossible,” Daniel said, “You would have still been a child during the war.”

“I was about eight years, and already far superior to my masters in the Wizard house. That was why I was conscripted under Lord Byron’s colors, along with all the superior magicians in the region.”

“You fought for the revolution?!” Nathan gawked, leaning forward on his arms.

“Yes. Not that I knew what that meant at the time. I fought for my house, and that was all. Byron had heard of my impressive magic and hired the entire group of us on the spot. My masters were proud of me, and Bryon’s Generals made it clear right away what was expected of me. I was not to be treated as a child. One, General Gunther, gave me this,” she said as she gestured to the long scar across her bosom, “on my first day with the army.”

“How monstrous,” said old Demy, listening closely from the fireplace.

“If you find this cruel you should see the mark I left on him,” Sasha smiled, “He made it clear to me that no one would treat me as any less of a solider than any other man in his army. He made me see that I had to be strong, and so I was. He is what helped make me what I am. He taught me sword play, defense, offense, strategy, just about anything worth learning, really. I became the greatest warrior that had ever been seen because of him. No one stood to defy me, no one would dare.”

“Then why did the Revolution fail?” asked James, finally speaking.

“There was… an attack. By my sixteenth birthday I had been moved up to the highest councils with the most powerful wizards and witches in the empire. By that time it had become our war rather than the lords’. They became little more than pawns supplying funds and men. We thought that we were all invincible, and that left us vulnerable. One night while we rested after a brutal day in the campaign there was a terrible attack. It wasn’t just soldiers, but magicians of terrible power. There was just too many of them and we were overwhelmed. I watched as so many were slaughtered, my friends and family. We had no choice but to surrender. I didn’t know that I had chosen the worse fate. That was when they locked me away from the world in dungeons so deep that the sun cannot find them.

“They shaved my head until it shined,” which stunned her audience since her hair now flowed past her shoulders, “They beat me, tortured me, and when they lost all use of me I was left alone in that dark place in chains garnished with powerful spells so I could not escape.”

“What kind of enchantment could block your magic from aiding you?” asked James.

“It was nefarious really, the spell on the maniacal converted magic into pain,” she said as she felt her wrists, “I suffered a great deal before I accepted my fate. I had even given into the thought of dying when suddenly they came and released me. In all honesty I didn’t think they would set me free. It seemed as though they had every intention of keeping me locked up in the darkness until I died.”

Sasha gingerly pushed around the dough feeling the consolatory glances of all those who surrounded her. She felt old Demy’s hand on her shoulder. She met the old woman’s eye for a moment and saw all the pity in this world in a single woman.

Sasha would have been crushed by their pity if old Demy had not then said, “You’re going to over work that dough deary,” and she shouldered the girl away and began to work the bread with her own hands, “Go grab the pot off the fire and bring it to the table, if you please.”

And with that simple gesture all the pain was forgotten into the past and life continued forward rather than back. They ate their meal with great fervor, and Daniel picked up again with his future bride and her loveliness. It didn’t take long before there were stories flying on every subject. Soon even Sasha found stories of her life with the Wizards being shared evenly with the simple country life of this family.

“One family is more or less like the next really, even one that is found rather than had into,” old Demy said after the boys had gone back to their work preparing the roof.

“I didn’t know what a real family was like,” she said dreamily, “But I never felt I was missing anything. It’s good to know that I didn’t.”

After the dishes were finished the two women went to watch the hard working boys. They all worked to gather the thatching for the new roof. They worked quickly, but never missed opportunity for conversation. They were all so very close, real blood brothers. It warmed her soul that there was a place that families could exist without hate, away from the ravages of war and destruction.

They talked the entire afternoon until dinner, and then into the evening after the meal. She was welcomed into their intimate lives as though she had always belonged. When the time for bed came they begrudgingly parted for the night. The young men set up diligently in the room Sasha had used her first night, and Sasha moved in with Demy.

She slipped off the belt that cinched her dress and fell onto the blanket mattress that was hers. She felt very tired but knew she would not be able to sleep. Instead she remembered the faces of those long gone. Their voices echoed off the endless walls of her mind. It seemed that the images faded the harder she tried to find them. Taya and Alan were the only faces she could recall with any clarity, and they looked always disappointed.

Sasha ran her hands over her face. No matter what she did she could not escape those pained faces. She tried to force the thoughts away, but they only got brighter and more vivid. Taya and Alan went from disappointed to hurt to suffering. She could see Taya’s eyes. They screamed, ‘help me.’ Sasha could hear Taya’s voice echoing through her mind, “Please, we need you.” Sasha’s eyes shot open and she sat up. She could still hear the echoing as she walked out of the little cottage into the night. Old Demy called after her, but she was too distracted to hear or answer, the suffering was still too fresh in her mind.

She could feel the withering pain of torture. She tried to push it away but it was still real in her mind. She sat down on the grass outside the little hovel in the cold night. The wind chilled her, but she did not fight it. She wanted to be made numb once more. She didn’t want any more of the suffering of sensation. Her eyes watered with the effort to keep them open. She feared that if she closed them she would see the faces again. She wanted to believe that it was only a feeling that told her that her lieutenants were in danger, but she knew it was more. She watched out over the field all through the night trying not to blink.

Beneath, part 6

The morning arrived without pity for the late night behind the weary travelers, nor did it shed any sympathy on them for the tasks ahead. The three young men, Nathan, James, and Bryan’s oldest son Daniel, carried the thatching tools as they tread behind the two women, and the sky threatened rain. The young men talked candidly with each other and their grandmother. Daniel was one of the grandchildren due to be married in the fall. All he could seem to talk about was his bride-to-be. She was by all accounts, perfect, and he was not shy about saying so. Sasha listened to him go on about the girl’s beauty, her wisdom, all her various endowments, and could not help but smile at the joy it brought him. His brothers had terrible sport at his expense, but it did not lessen his admiration for the girl. As they walked the sky only grew more and more angry. Sasha paid it no mind, but her companions became ever more agitated. It was merely tolerable before it started pouring rain, and thunder boomed above the wood.

Sasha’s fellow travelers stood looking up at the clouds. She looked back to see them all huddled closer together. She looked up into the broad face of the sky trying to see what they saw.

Daniel shouted up to her as she scanned the heavens, “If you were a real witch you would stop this blasted rain!”

The rain never bothered soldiers on the march. If anything it made the work safer, for it hide their marks from the enemy, it threw off unskilled archers that aimed for you, and it broke the spirits of the King’s conscripts. Sasha loved the rain. But seeing the displeasure it wrought upon her companions she waved her hand against the sky without a second thought, and the rain ceased immediately. She looked back at the young men that stared up in disbelief as they towered over their grandmother. Sasha turned away unable to meet their eyes. She was not supposed to be this way anymore. She was supposed to be an ordinary girl. She felt Old Demy’s hand upon her arm as the old matron continued past towards her hovel. Demy looked back at the young men as they returned to their masculine strides. She took up behind them as they passed. James trailed behind next to Sasha.

“That was incredible,” he said. She nodded, but said nothing. “Were you taught such magic, or were you born with it?”

Sasha thought about the question. No one had ever asked such a thing before. It was always assumed that she was born with the gift, which might have been true, but she remembered being taught how to use it.

“I am not sure.”

“You must teach me,” he said emphatically.

Sasha shook her head, “You don’t know what the gift means. You would be forced to give up too much.”

“I think I should be the one to decide that…”

“I will not give you the choice,” her declaration was punctuated by a loud crack of thunder.

She marched up towards Demy as James was left looking up at the sky, bewildered.

Old Demy watched as Sasha strode past almost entirely forgetting her limp and applied peasant demeanor. When she wasn’t trying to hide it she regained much of her regal persona, it had been driven into her for too long that she was above everyone, and it could not be easily given up. It wasn’t until she was significantly ahead that she remembered the reality of her position. The pain, realizing it once more had control, seized her body and took all of her wind. She tried to struggle a few more steps before it completely over took her and she stumbled. She stopped and fought back a cry at the stabbing of pains throughout her body. Nathan ran up to her side. She tried to hide her suffering, thinking it impolite to inconvenience her hosts, but some pain is too evident to try and conceal.

“What’s wrong?” he asked cautiously watching as her eyes fixed onto the distance.

She struggled to find words. It had been so long since she had lost so completely the control of her pain, “Nothing,” she offered up through the fog that clouded her mind.

By that time the others had caught up. They all wanted to know what had happened, but at once Old Demy recognized pain. Demy knew much about pain, having suffered from rheumatism for more than a decade. She shooed the boys along, urging them to hurry if they were going to finish her roof.

“What’s ailing you child?” she asked in her kind warm voice.

Sasha simply shook her head and again said, “Nothing.”

Demy looked the girl over and noticed her hand clutching at her left leg. She could remember the slight limp the young woman sported. “Were you injured deary?”

Since Sasha had so little control of herself she could not help but nod because it was true.

“Is it an old injury or current?”

Sasha couldn’t think to remember. So she just shook her head slightly. Demy took a gentle but firm hold on the girl’s arm and led her down the path.

“We’ll try to heat up a nice bath for you,” she said as they walked.

In the fog that Sasha traveled the remainder of the journey time seemed completely meaningless. It could have been minutes of walking or days, she wasn’t sure. All she could seem to fathom was that eventually the walking stopped. The next conscious realization she had was sitting in old Demy’s little shack. The boys had set to work on preparing to thatch the roof. Demy herself had already begun heating water.

“The tub is out the door around the back,” Demy told her, “So I have to make sure the water is boiling hot before I take it around, otherwise it gets ice cold before I can fill it.”

Sasha just nodded as she sat nearly comfortably in the kitchen. It was taking so long to recover because she had to rebuild a mental tolerance that had taken nearly a decade to develop. She carefully cultivated the layers of protection, protections not only from the severe physical pain, but also the crippling mental devastation. The darkness still haunted her, and she had fallen back into that familiar prison cell, if only for a moment. She pushed her way from that darkness with a strength the likes of which none of her armies had ever seen. It took more force of will to conquer the dark hopeless place than even the most fearsome of enemies. She opened her eyes to see there was light in this place. There was no darkness at all, only the bright, shinning day that looked so new it could not be the same thing she left behind when she was put in the terrible dungeon.

Old Demy smiled at the poor girl as she made her way once more to the large bath. Sasha limped after not feeling the same crushing blackness that had nearly consumed her moments before. The bath stood barely half full and already grew cool. Sasha looked at it and thought of the last bath she had taken. It was after they had exhumed her from the earth and again brought her back to the land of the living. That experience as pitiful as it had been had not made her feel any cleaner.

Sasha put her hand to the water and its level began to rise. Demy watched in astonishment as the tub reached the point of nearly over flowing in a matter of seconds and the water let off a satisfying steam from heat. Sasha looked at the water as it rippled and reflected the shining light of midday. She ran her fingers slowly through its pristine depths.

“You’ll have to fill one for me when you’re done Deary,” old Demy told her as she walked back into the house to fetch a drying cloth.

Sasha smiled as she watched the old matron disappear through the door. She quickly stripped away the now ratty thin shirt and trousers that had been her only clothes. It left her bare to the nearly imperceptible cold that clung to the air. It also left her scared body visible for all to see. She had been raised as a warrior, so scars were common to her, but there was something fantastic to the criss-cross of elaborate and brutal marks that covered her body. She had scars from blade and arrow point, whip and cudgel, but also burns from magical bursts and bolts. Some were old from simple sparring, others from actual battle and imprisonment. There was the brand of her order upon her left arm and the prison brand upon her right. She slipped her battered body into the warm water and let the relaxation fill her veins. It had been so long since she had felt fully warm. The cold could not bite because there was no warmth to bite at, but now there was warmth in every pore and crevice. It was as thought she had been clad in ice for years and only now had begun to truly thaw.

Beneath, part five

The young girl looked out across the darkness as a primal terror roused within her. It was too dark here. She slid from under the covers and crawled along the floor to the small bedroom’s door. Ma Demy had already fallen asleep so it was no bother for Sasha to slip out towards the hearth. She carefully made her way to the diminished fire, and quickly called it back to life.  She curled into a ball in front of the dim light it cast. She let the warmth wash over her in a wave of soothing calm. Her panic flowed from her like water in a stream as the fire warmed her body.

She could hear the footsteps coming across the floor but was unwilling to turn away from the comforting light of the flame. Bryan’s son James sat down next to her on the floor. He crossed his legs in front of him as he too looked into the fire.

“You don’t like the dark do you,” he stated more than asked.

Sasha looked on into the fire. The flames wrapped themselves around the logs in a thick blanket of lapping light. It was beautiful, and terrifying all at the same time. The soldiers had written a ballad comparing her to a flame when she led them into battle, but she felt it had always been a lie for she was not nearly as beautiful as the golden light of the fire. She was terrifying to be sure, but never beautiful.

“I knew you were special from the first moment I saw you,” he continued, “You probably left the north because people always demanded to see you perform like they did today, didn’t you.”

She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. “Do you really want to know?” she whispered from behind her knees. He nodded vigorously. She turned her gaze back to the flames as they continued to lick away the logs. “I left because I couldn’t give them what they wanted. I left because I was broken, and couldn’t go back to being what I had been during the war. I wasn’t strong enough anymore to be the person they needed, so I left to find a place where I could be the person I have become.”

She glanced back out of the corner of her eye to see his reaction. He was looking at her. He didn’t seem so young in the light of the fire. She could see a beauty there that deep inside she pined for but could never have. No man would want her, no matter how foolish they might be. Not if they knew the truth.

“It was unfair of them to expect too much from you,” he told her, “It was unfair of them to put such heavy expectations on your shoulders. You’re just one woman.”

Sasha turned her gaze once more to the fire. It was unfair to force a child to grow up as fast as she had been made to, but she did not feel cheated, not anymore. She felt sad to have missed out on so many experiences that were supposedly her right. She felt grief that she couldn’t help those that had counted on her. But more than anything she felt tired. She felt wrung like an old dish rag, and wanted only to be left to her own devices. Her years of service had at least earned her that much, hadn’t they?

Sasha rested her head against her knees. She didn’t feel pushed here with James beside her, and a house full of sleeping family around her. She felt calm, calmer then she had felt in a very long time.