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[/color] - A Child’s Easel[/b]
Nuria grasped the bars of the gate, her chubby little fingers curled tightly about the metal. Her face was pressed so tightly against it that the bars created indents in her skin, and her button nose and pouted lips stuck out on the other side. Her eyes, of golden brown, grazed over the dusk in awe. She loved the colors the sun had made when it set; purple, orange and pink. She never before had seen them painted in such a way on the easel that was the sky. The only color she was used to was black.
After the sun was completely set, hidden by the horizon of Spain and the clouds that whisped their way over the stars, the familiar voices had called her inside. Hesitantly, she pulled her face away from the outside and turned toward the doorway, open and dark. Her lips laid open, forming a small "o", as if she were surprised. Her time outside was not fulfilled--she wanted more, and that's what they usually gave her.
"Princesa!" the woman called to her once more. This time, Nuria's fingers uncurled from the metal bars that were her prison, and she took a careful step onto the dead ground. The dry, lifeless grass crunched beneath her bare feet as she turned her body toward the lady who was not her nanny or her mother. When she called her again, this time by first name, Nuria picked up her feet and walked with waddling haste to the opening of the house.
Raw. Salty. Warm. Warm blood. It smelled something of rust, something that was no longer foreign to the small child’s senses. Months ago, when she was taken away to this dark place with the cold ones, it had sickened her. The smell, the texture, and its warmth made bile creep up into her throat- now, it was simply something that she was accustomed to, something that she expected every evening after her mid-day sleep. So when the woman, she whom was cold, lifted her into that freezing grasp and put a bowl-shaped dish to her lips, they parted without hesitation. The warm, salty, strong liquid flowed over her tongue, and trickled down her throat.
When Nuria gulped it down, it rushed through that pipe, and was settled within her stomach in seconds. This fluid, this new source of energy, would be what would make her stronger over the years. It would be why she would yearn to fill her stomach with meats, and things like human flesh. She would become a cannibal, by the way she would be raised. It would be normal for her, and eventually it would be her nature.
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[/color] - Old Man’s Death Wish[/b]
She stared into the mirror. Dusty from age, likely very old age. She lifted a sharply filed fingernail to the glass, and slid it against that would-be shiny surface. Debris collected underneath that nail, and she wiped it off at her dress. The dress was spotted and blotched in blood- she’d just killed. It had been her first live kill. Of course, she’d had the help of her “family”. Miriamelle, whom she called “Miria”- she couldn’t pronounce the name as a small child -had held the adolescent boy down. So beautiful he had been. His eyes, of the sky’s blue and the ocean’s waves. She’d never seen the ocean, of course, but she barely grasped onto her memory of the sky. His skin was slightly tanned, bronzed with sun exposure. Clearly, he was an active boy- his muscles were toned. So delicious, so tender, she had thought as she tore into those fibers. He’d screamed. He had begged her for his life. Nuria didn’t have a care for anything but her craving.
Now, while she traced the reflection of her face, the line of her jaw, her cheekbones, she saw her face. Bloodied, stained with dried crimson paint that spurted from the artery when she tore into his neck. Smeared from his tears. There were indentations and scratches, from beneath her eye to her nose, where he had grabbed her, dug his nails in. The boy tried to shove her away, and she had been stronger than him despite her smaller frame. So loud was he when her jaw tore into his Adam’s apple.
She shook her head, and closed her eyes. The small frame trembled with the thought of the kill, it excited her. How strange was she? Thirteen, and she was killing. It was how she lived- off human flesh, their blood, their screams. Their torture.
Cold water washed over her face, and she gasped. It was so freezing, like Laricus’ fingers when they touched her. “You will be my Queen, Princesa,” he told her. Nuria shuddered, and washed more cold water over her face, eyes closed. She must go get more water from the well. Walking was good. Nuria needed a walk.
The fresh, cool water swished and sloshed gently, some spilling out the sides of the full bucket. It was heavy, and so every once in a while she switched to the other hand. Just as she went to do this, a rustle sounded behind her in the dry grass and leaves. She spun around, and the bucket fell to her feet. Its water poured out, flowed over her bare feet, cold. So cold. She took several steps away, and backed into someone. Someone cold.
“Hello, my Princesa.” It was him, Laricus. The leader, the old man. Older, fragile-looking, cold, so cold. His fingers were so bony, so unattractive. Her man of choice would be sturdy, strong than she. He would be warm.
Hesitantly, Nuria lifted her head, her lips set in a straight line, pressed together thinly. She didn’t speak- she hadn’t spoken since the day she reached this place. This hole. She only looked at him, nodding once. A gust of wind blew from the south, and her hair blew behind her, flowing. Long, to her lower back. Laricus closed his eyes, and his nostrils flared as he smelled her scent- he had always thought that she smelled sweet. Nuria wasn’t sure why.
“Mmn.” He only moaned, a satisfied sound. Not sexual, but hungry. He was hungry for -her-, but he refrained. Laricus always had held back from her. He had plans, intentions, for this young girl. Before reopening his eyes, the man simply turned his back to her and began walking toward the home. His pace was slow, and he was calm, but Nuria sensed he tension rolling from him.
This was it. She wasn’t sure how she sounded- she only spoke in her dreams. In her dreams, she sounded sweet and her voice was that of an angel. Sadly, Nuria knew that she was so far from an angel. Parting her lips slowly, cautiously, she tried to make sound. “Lar… Laricus?” She had stuttered, but barely. It was nothing the way she pictured it- her voice wasn’t angelic, but it was soft. Soft like her favorite satin dress, like the fur of a kitten. It was warm.
Laricus halted, his body rigid. Laricus. His name. She had spoken his name, and she hadn’t spoken a word since the day they took her from her family. “Yes, Nuria?” he asked her, acknowledging her as if this was simply an everyday thing. It wasn’t. It was an obvious façade.
Simply, she rose her voice to be assertive, to show that she wanted to know. Needed, not only wanted. Needed to know about herself. “What am I?” Simple. Confusingly simple.
“You are human, Nuria. You’ve known that.” They had always made it perfectly clear to her what they were, and what she was. They never tried to pull the wool over her eyes, not in that. This girl deserved better than that.
Frowning, the teenager tilted her head. Her hair fell in an awkward way, against her face, shielding one brown eye. “I eat them. I.. I want blood. I want their skin in my mouth. To rip them apart.” She paused, and took a deep, quivering breath. Then, she said it again. “What am I?”
Laricus growled then, lowly, violently. It rumbled through his chest, vibrated his vocal chords in a way that made him sound like an animal. He turned to her, angry, frustrated that she questioned him again. “Your family gave you up. They gave you up for their own lives, Nuria. You are a human, a human child with no family. Soon, you will be part of our family. And you will be mine,” he said. The last word that came out of his mouth, “mine”, came like his life depended on that thought. Like his unlife depended on the concept of her being his.
He was gone so fast that his body was a blur, before it was gone. The force of his speed swept her hair to whip across her face. And then, once that air about her settled, when all matter was still but her, she said it.
“And you will die.”
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[/color] - Tic Toc Heart[/b]
The transformation was nothing like she had thought or pictured. Nuria had braced herself for this pain, but it wasn’t nearly close to being ready for such torture. When Miria had bit her, the convulsions started. Eyes rolled back- white. Skin, crimson. Blood. The veins and arteries in her body bulged from her skin, pumping with each heart beat. Tic toc, it was saying. Your time is up.
Her own pain was so loud that she couldn’t hear her own damned screams. In that time, she hadn’t felt anything but a burning. This burning was one you would get from ice, so cold. Was she scorching? If someone just gave her fire she would be all better. Just give me fire, she thought. I don’t like the cold, I don’t want to be here. I’m human, I’m human! Finally, she could think just enough through all the noise that was her mind when her vision refocused. Little by little, fuzziness started to come in. There was Miria over her, her chin bloodied and stained. Her face was scratched up, clawed- Did I do that? Laricus was nowhere to be seen, not anywhere. The scent of her must have driven him off, somewhere. I don’t want to be here. I want to be nowhere. Somewhere other than here. Get me out.
Nuria tried, so hard, to reach out to her friend. Miria’s face was sad, upset- the girl wanted to make it better. Anything to get her mind off of this. When her hand came into her own view, it was twisted in agony. Crippled, it looked. When she was inches from Miria’s face, only to caress, to feel her cold skin, Nuria felt something. A crack? A break. Her back had arched so far off of the floor, so high. Broken vertebrae? Spine.
So light-headed. Heavy. Make me numb. Anything was better than this.
Damn was the last thing that screamed bloody-murder in her head before she couldn’t remember anymore. [/size][/ul][/td][/tr][/table]
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