A Court of Madness and Depth

Chapter 35

AN: Trigger Warning. This chapter contains a mention of physical abuse and domestic violence. Please read with caution for your own mental health <3.

When I awoke I found myself with my head in a comfortable lap. At first my vision was still blurred. I could barely move my body. My fingers would hardly listen to my command to wiggle. However, my senses were overwhelmed with the scent surrounding me and the feeling of someone stroking my hair. The smell was one of the pumpkin bread that my mother used to make when we would visit the Illyrian camp. I curl into the warmth of the body as the familiar scent envelops me.

"I always wanted a daughter," A light female voice breathed down onto me, her breath warm and her voice welcoming. I found myself wondering if perhaps I was dead and she was an angel. I tried to open my eyes, but she was blurred and brilliantly bright. She was gold and red and holy. She was saving me.

"Who are you?," I managed to gasp. The hands slowed, and then stopped. "Someone who has watched you for many years."

"Where am I?"

"You are safe. I am taking you to a place where the Mad Lord will not be able to reach you," The woman's coo was soothing to me. She continued and her voice dropped to a threatened deepness I was not accustomed to, "I could not let them do it again."

"Do what?" I exhaled, trying in vain to move any part of my body.

"Let me tell you a story," The woman said.

"Long ago, there was a lady who wished for nothing but to sing. She loved to spend hours trailing the woods surrounding her home. She would sing and all of the birds surrounding her would sing in return. She had always had a skill with animals.

However, she also had a skill that she was less proud of. This lady also had a skill to control flame. She was able to craft fire in any shape or form that she pleased. There was no keeping it inside. The fire consumed her. It ate away at her, because she knew that being a female with such a power was a dangerous bartering chip for males to play with.

The Lady tried to keep the power to herself. She tried to suppress her powers. She tried to keep anyone from knowing what lurked inside her. However, all of that suppression only resulted in a great burning.

One day she could not control the fire any longer. The day of her bleeding the fire consumed her. It was a cursed flame that burned and scorched anything and everything. Having been suppressed for so long the flame burned for days, finally released from its cage. The Lady could do nothing to stop it.

Her family was pleased with the fire, but they were angry with her for keeping the flames truth from them. They beat her terribly as a punishment. They refused to let her out of their sights. They refused to let her return to the woods near her house.

She never sang again.

The cage they kept her in was one of total control, as if she was a rabid animal who needed to be contained.

However, one day the fools let her out of the cage. They took her with them to a beautiful party. At the party she ate and danced and even desired to sing, though she didn't. She swayed to the music and drank the finest wines.

She was so enamored she caught the attention of an angel . This angel was like the sun and she and her flame was his mirror. The two of them forged a connection. They danced the entire night and once the night was over they began to write letters in secret. They shared a special mental bond, a connection between their two minds.

You have to understand that neither of them were daemati. This was something deeper, something different, something much older. It was as if fate had brought them together to save them.