Caspier Redain opened her eyes and almost instantly wished that she hadn't. Being awake meant being away from the dreams of Fellicity when they were young and innocent or the warm, careless dark of deep, dreamless sleep. Death. That would be a dark, dreamless sleep away from the cares of the world. She craved death and avoided it. She was determined not to succomb to it. Not yet. Redain dragged herself to her feet somehow. Every movement was an effort of both body and willpower. It hurt! Everything she did caused so much pain. How weak had she become? She daren't even think. The slaver staggered down to the lake, went down on her hands and knees and dunked her head under the water for a moment, allowing the cold shock to waken her completely and to wash over the strip of bloody cloth which was wrapped around her head tightly. She could stay there. Allow the water to wash over her until the grave claimed her. Allow for defeat to rot her soul at last.
No! She pulled away causing water to casscade around her. Drowning. Two weeks ago Caspier had tried that. Wading out into the lake and allowing the lazy currents to pull her down into oblivion. Fellicity was there. She was crying. Looming over her on the surface of the water. Shaking her head. No! She couldn't do that to the girl she'd fought all her life to save. However much Redain wanted to join the dearest friend she'd ever had in sweet death she knew that she would never ever have any form of vengence on the slavers that had made her life hell. Revenge. Sweet revenge. Pathetic. How much she wanted to take revenge on the slavers, on her family, on Carlotta. She had to survive first. How could she survive? There wasn't anything left of her too survive.
The water stilled and she peered down at her reflection. Staring up at her was a creature that could barely be called human. There was nothing to it. Bones jutted out. Her ragged top was too tight on her and her ribs could be made out, her cheeks were hollow and sunken, the left side of her head was covered in dried blood that she hadn't dared to try and get off yet and her eyes. Those eyes. They stared up at Caspier with feverish pity, hatred, desperation, accusation and loneliness. A tear spilled from them and splashed down on the reflection below, causing ripples to slowly destroy it. Probably a metaphor in there somewhere, Caspier decided not to think on this too closely.
Pulling away from the water she settled on the bank and peered around herself. Food. Yes that would be nice. She grabbed a handful of grass and dunked it into the water before her before shoving it between her lips and chewing frantically, her fingers and chin staining green as she went. When was the last time she'd had real food? A week ago probably. When she had tried stealing. She thought as she had snuck into the brigand camp in the dead of night that it would have been easy for a slaver to steal a little food but apparantly not. She had managed to lay her hands on some scraps which she shoved into her mouth as she went along. Yes! She was well fed at last. Turning to hurry away she had walked slap bang into one of the guards. Sport. She was sport for them. Entertaining themselves they had slammed her head down, drawn a knife and. Blood. Lots of blood. Pain. Lots of pain. They wanted fun and they had got it. They also wanted to feed her.
Caspier hadn't got used to her change of hearing. One ear. She screamed. Nine years of being a slaver had shown her some horrors but nothing was as bad as that had been. She could almost taste the blood even now. No! She had few enough calories in her body as it was, she couldn't afford to vomit up anything. Maybe she'd let the ear...sorry lack of ear...get infected. Slow and painful way to die but she'd die nonethless. But she couldn't. She had to survive. She had to. She couldn't give up. Not now. The problem was that however defiant she was she still didn't have food or care or anything. She was going to die.
She was going to die.
