Chapter Text
“Aether!”
“Aether, come on!”
“Quickly!”
A blonde girl ran through stalks of tall grass, the blue flower in her hair fluttering in the sweet scented air. Her laughing was somewhat muffled, almost like a dream, her face not visible through the hazy breeze. She smiled widely, waiting for her brother to follow her.
“Lumine?” As soon as I said it, I knew it wasn’t real, my voice resonated through my mind like a song doused in water. The sun shown in my eyes, forcing me to blink rapidly as I tried to keep my sister in sight.
“Lumine!” I cried, dashing forward as her dress faded into the blinding light of a sunbeam. I yelped as the sun hit my eyes, closing them and throwing my hands up to protect my face. As I shielded myself from that burning sun, I called out one last time for my sister. But she was gone now, and I had no way of following or finding her. As I reached out one hand, desperately trying to catch my lost sister, I found my fingers clenched around something else: something hard, cold, and eerily disturbing. I opened my eyes once again and held back a sob as I realized I was back in that curse cell. Surrounded by bars. Rusted metal bars covered in dried blood and tears of past subjects that had failed their test. The melted voice returned to my ears again, but this voice only brought pain.
“So this is him, huh? He’s a pretty little thing, if he lives I’ll take him as a consort.” The voice was laced with a smile of lust, sending shivers down my spine again. This man made me experience the 7 most miserable years of my life…why did he have to appear again, just when I’d finally been freed?
I threw myself at the bars facing him, slamming into them as my hands reached through, fingers grasping at the man’s throat. I ignored the pain from the collar around my neck as I clawed at empty air, enraged.
The man smiled, causing my hands to freeze in fear. That smile plagued me in years of torture and pain. He stepped up onto the platform I resided on, looking down at me as I dropped to my knees. A crazed laugh filled my ears as I looked at the ground before gazing back up again. He reached his hand down towards me as I trembled, that calloused hand caused so much damage to my very person I couldn’t think of him without throwing up. His hand started to close in on me as everything went dark.