My ferocious and hostile attitude switched as I gazed at the man’s hand… he was holding a little piece of paper wrapped in a thin layer of plastic… there wasn’t anything written on it, but an image that was worth a thousand words.
It was… mother and father… they looked old… their faces were wrinkled and their expressions tired… they weren’t the people I once knew.
After months I had spent in silence, I spoke once again just to ask the man:
"What is this?"
His faint smile remained stamped on his face as he opened his mouth once again:
"Look at them, this photo was taken three days ago"
I once again turned my head toward the photo…
My father and my mother were holding each other’s hand, they looked tired but satisfied as they ca out of a little garden…
Behind them was a house with white walls and a little lawn… it looked familiar, almost giving her a sense of Deja Vu.
"You’re telling they’re alive?!... After all this ti?"
I was desperate… I felt a sense of emptiness… I had spent so much ti trying to forget them, only to find out they were still alive…. It would’ve been a terrible joke, wouldn’t it?
"What have you co here for?!"
I raised my voice to signal the fact that I didn’t want to play his stupid mind gas, and it worked because he told what he had co all the way over there for.
"Let’s work together… I will give you a status no one can contest, and information on your parent’s location, but in exchange, you will have to help us out with your strength"
"Are you trying to ta ?"
I asked annoyed.
"It’s called cooperation"
He replied, mirroring my expression.
"I don’t trust you… if what you say is true then… why haven’t they contacted all these years? Why did they decide to run away?! Why did they abandon us?!"
I was starting to get heated up… I felt like ripping his body apart… why did I feel like that? Was it because I found it difficult to accept the truth after all that ti? Was I denying once again sothing that my body had already confird to be true?
That mysterious man paused, he looked at the ground as he sighed…
"Oh… how should I say this…
They didn’t abandon the two of you…
Just… you"
I was left speechless… I could hear my own heartbeat speeding up, a timid voice that didn’t belong to the beast I had been for the past months ca out of my mouth as I whispered:
"What?"
"Oh… look at the ti"
He exclaid, completely ignoring , he didn’t even have a watch on his wrist.
I ca here to do what I had to do… the rest isn’t in my hands… maybe you should think deeply about it… you know, that’ll probably help you when you find out about your sister’s…
Oh well… whatever."
"What are you talking about?! What do you an?!"
"Well... I would like to answer but I really don’t feel like it, have fun in this cave for the rest of your life if you feel like it, or maybe… well, you figure that out on your own.
If you make your decision…
Make your way up north, you’ll find one of your future colleagues… maybe bring a few pelts… his residence’s pretty cold in the winter."
"Wait! Where do you think you’re going?!"
He had already gotten up from the ground, and he was hastily making his way towards the cave’s exit.
I was already facing his back before I could even notice…
"Hey!!!"
I continued to call him and try to get an answer, but the only thing he did was walk away and avoid when I tried to catch him, mumbling and telling a lot of useless information I didn’t even bother listening to.
As we got to the exit, he smiled as he turned his head around to look at .
He held the photo between his fingers as he said:
"I’ll leave this here, it’ll help you figure things out… don’t worry about it"
"What the heck are you talking about?!"
I was mad because he didn’t listen to what I was saying, he went on and on as if I wasn’t there.
"Well then… see you again if fate allows"
As he said those words, I tried to grab his collar and give him a good beating, but my hands passed right through his body…
Was it really just a ghost? An illusion?…
Maybe… I had officially gone mad, and he was the representation of the disturbing and haunting thoughts I had tried to forget…
As I fell forward, my surprised face reflected my thoughts… I simply couldn’t figure out what was going on….
The man had disappeared…
My first thought was…
’So it really was just a ghost…’
But as I tried to go back inside the cave, I felt sothing slippery under my foot…
It wasn’t as rough as stone… it was… plastic.
I was now filled with chaotic thoughts…
If that man was a ghost then… why could I see and feel the photo right beneath my foot?
I tried to pick up the photo, and as soon as I tightened my fingers to hold it… I could tell it was real… everything was real.
What illusion? What madness? That man… was simply extraordinary.
I ca to know about his identity much later when I had already beco the crimson lady.
He is one of the three most trusted aides of the Tyrant…
Together with the crimson shield and the crimson blade… he is the only one who holds a power similar if not superior to those of the seven thrones…
The Crimson shadow.
And he has a peculiar… attitude… because of that, no one has seen him more than once… he is the one and only person on this planet who cos close to being as subtle and unnoticeable as a shadow…
I held the photo with both hands, as I watched my father’s face.
I was worried… he looked so old… so tired… so…so real.
Was it really true? Was he really alive? If so then… why?
At that mont, the words the man had spoken rang in my head…
"They didn’t abandon the two of you…
Just… you"
And it was right then… the mont I rembered and the mont I realized… I realized that they really had abandoned … they decided to get rid of even if they had to fake their deaths to do it…
But what hurt just as much was that… the feeling of Deja Vu wasn’t senseless… I felt like I had seen that picture sowhere… that house… that lawn.
It was on my sister’s bedside… it had been there for years… it just appeared one day and I never questioned it…
I was sure of it, they had planned the whole thing together…
How dare she… how could she find the courage to hold my hands when I woke up after I received the news that they died…
How dare she pat on my shoulder when I cried… how dare she tell to cheer up, when she knew how much they ant to …
My teeth turned sharp as my anger exploded, like a beast, I tore through hundreds of trees as I attempted to calm myself down…
"How dare they?!"
"Why?!"
"Bastards!…"
One after the other, the sturdy trees of the forest fell down, until eventually, my anger cald, and I remained there… exhausted.
The sadness that had been soothed by the exploding anger returned to my body as tears started sliding down my cheeks…
I cried until my eyes were swollen that day, and right there, on the branches of the fallen trees… I swore I would make them pay for the pain they had caused .
The following morning I departed, heading north, trying to be as accurate as possible to avoid getting lost in the woods.
I had explored a great part of the territory, but I hadn’t found any base, so that ant it had to be a long way before I reached it.
Every single step I took, every single breath I drew… everything was done with a single objective in mind… I would tear them apart… My mother first, my sister right after… and when I was done with them… I would ask Father… I would ask him why… why did he betray ?
I continued walking, even if uncomfortable because I had to wear the clothes I used when I still lived in human society, and not so rags made from the pelt of various beats.
I walked day and night for hundreds of hours until finally… in the distance, a bright light blinded …
I barely managed to gaze at it as I covered most of my sight with my hands…
It was an enormous structure made out of ice… almost like… an ice castle.
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