Breath taker

Part 13- Freak

Meanwhile

As soon as Melinoe walked down the stairs towards Hades, under her mother's gaze, she headed immediately for the library. As she skipped along, a raven flew down from above toward her, landing on her arm.

"Hiya Atlas! Wanna come help me look for books?" she asked him. The raven cawed in response, as he tilted his head to the side, almost as if he was asking her What are we looking for today?

Understanding, Melinoe responded. "I'm gonna try to find books on how to grow taller. Momma says that I can go up to the surface when I'm taller than her."

Melinoe was always a very bright child. She'd learned to read when she was 600 or so years old, which sounds like a lot until you remember that she'd only aged about 7 years in the past 1000 or so years that she'd existed. She'd mainly taught herself as well, with help from her mother in the beginning, and could now read fluently at the speed of most adults.

She skipped down the hallways, when she reached the large doors to the library, which she opened before closing it shut behind her. It was then that she let her appearance change back to its original form.

She felt the allusion melting off her, with the feeling that she always associated with the water cascading off of her face. She looked up at the mirror, but she didn't need to see it to know what she looked like. Half of her looked the same, but the other half of her was a skeleton with burned flesh over top some parts.

She was the only one of her sisters to have this difference and she didn't know why. She figured that it was because of her mother, her skeleton side was similar to her mother's disguise, but it was different, it wasn't just bone, but burned flesh as well. She often wondered if this came from her father, but she wouldn't dare ask her mother. He was never spoken of.

Melinoe had always hated her monstrous form. Her sisters were used to her face, they'd seen it from the moment that they could see so they'd never cared about her face. Her mother had always told her to be proud of her differences, and that her sisters might one day be jealous of her because it made her her own person instead of being just 'one of the triplets'. But Melinoe hated it.

She hated being different from her sisters. She hated how people had reacted to seeing her, in fear. She hated how it separated her from Nyx and Hecate. She hated being the odd one out. She hated being alone.

She wanted to be just 'one of the triplets'. She wanted to feel like that barrier separating her from her sisters was in existent. She wanted to be seen as a child, not a monster. She wanted to be normal.

One of her first memories was of running out with her sisters to play with the other kids, only for them to run in fear of her. They'd never played with her, ever. Eventually, her mother had shown her how to make her mask with magic. Now she wore it almost everywhere in public. But the kids still never really invited her to play.

Not a lot of people went to the library. Only the bookworms, but most of them only grabbed books before taking them to their rooms. They'd all gotten used to seeing her, the little half monster after centuries, so they didn't care anymore. Today the library was empty.

Happy to be alone, Melinoe began to wander around the library, looking for a book that might be of help.

"Let's see.... where would a book about growing be? Physical well being maybe?" she wandered through the aisles. She climbed up a ladder to continue her search up higher.

"The dangers of growing? That might be of use, but why would it be in the torture section?" she pulled the book from the shelf, pulling an angry spirit out as well.

"Children should not be reading about these things. Find another subject. This book contains things too gruesome for you." the spirit cried, pulling the book out of Melinoe's hands.

"I am over one thousand years old." she replied, her face blank. Melinoe had learned long ago how to get the spirits to have to give up the book. Most detect things from people telling the truth. So if you told the truth and were old enough to be able to handle it, they had to give up the book. Props of being one thousand years old.

"That I know, Melinoe Estelle Azrael. I also know that you are physically, spiritually and mentally a seven year old. You may be able to trick some spirits, but not me! Find another book!" the spirit yelled at her, hitting the ladder so that it knocked her onto the floor, before disappearing into the bookcase.

"Ow! Hm, I won't be able to trick you will I? Oh Atlas!" she called to the raven, who had perched in the beams above. He flew down, onto her arm, where she whispered "The dangers of growing. Fetch!". Obeying the command, the raven flew up, plucked the book from the shelf and brought it down to her.

"Great job! Alright, let's see what's in this..."

Fifteen minutes later, and a fair few gruesome pictures later, Melinoe climbed back up the ladder to put the book back. "So it was about the rack, I should have guessed. That option's on the bottom of my list, in case I'm desperate to get out of here."

"Hey ladder, can you find me a book about how to grow taller?" she asked. The ladder, answered immediatly, moving across the room and sending her upwards, to the middle of the physical body department "I knew it." she said as it came to a stop, the book she wanted beside her right hand.

"Ways to grow up healthy? I'm not sure if that's the right book, but if that's what you say." she reached for the book, when the boom of the library door made her jump.

The sound of children coming into the library could be heard. "Hey, there's one of them! Hey! Do you want to play foursquare with us?" a boy asked her.

"Me? Great!" Melinoe said, sliding down the ladder, putting her illusion on and turning around to face them. They were new kids to the underworld, they hadn't seen her face yet. "Let's go!" she said happily.

"Hey, sorry but which one are you? Are you Nyx or Hecate?" one of the girls asked her.

"Oh, uh. I'm Melinoe." she said, a little nervous. Oh great. Here we go again she thought.

"M-Melinoe? Like Melinoe Azrael?" one of the boys asked her, shaking slightly. Yup. They'd heard of her.

"Yeah? What? Do you know another Melinoe who looks like me?" she confirmed, getting more concerned by the minute. A few of the kids huddled together, but she caught the words they said

"She's the freak one."

"She looks normal. Maybe the others are just lying?"

"I heard that she could hide her appearance. Her face right now is just a mask."

"I heard that if you see her real face, it scares you mentally for life. And that she removes her mask in front of you because she wants to do it."

"Well then, we can't invite her. Let's get out of here."

"Yeah, I don't want to stay another minute with that monster freak."

They broke up their huddle. Melinoe was close to tears, but was keeping it in, like she'd seen her mother do. Don't let them see you cry. Don't let them think you're weak she repeated in her head.

"Sorry, we thought you were-" the original boy started.

"One of my sisters. Yeah, I get that a lot." Melinoe interrupted.

"So uh, we're just gonna go." The kids hurriedly turned around and ran out the door, slamming it shut behind them. As soon as they were gone, Melinoe collapsed on the floor and began to cry.

The fluttering of wings and the plop of a book on her lap made her wipe her tears to see what happened.

Atlas sat on her knees, Ways to grow up healthy in front of him, his head tilted to the side. This was one of the reasons why she liked animals more than she liked people. Animals don't care what you look like, they're willing to love you and love you unconditionally if you love them.

"Thanks Atlas. You're right, who needs stupid kids anyways? I have you. I'm gonna get us out of here, the above world's got to be better than this." she said, opening the book and beginning to read.