Demon Daughter (Book I)

1.1 | Voices

10 years later...

The child was born from a demon’s seed... the child will be a portal until the world ends...

Ravenna widened her eyes and looked around, but realised she was safe and her shoulders relaxed. Leaning on the rusty railing of the footbridge, she looked down into the rushing river. It was wide, but it had receded sharply, turning into a calm, smooth canal right in the middle. On both sides, the banks were covered with clumps of bushes and trees, which encroached into the winding river.

“It’s so quiet here,” the girl said. “Only the silence is almost soundless.”

Agnese climbed down from the footbridge and kicked a few pebbles into the river. They didn’t even make a plop, just disappeared into the water and that was that. Ravenna waited patiently for her sister to say something. She was in no mood to talk herself.

“All rivers are the same,” Agnese said, drawing a line on the ground with a stick. “They start straight and fast, then curl up like snakes, carry silt and slow down at the bends.”

Ravenna watched with surprise on her face as she pressed the stick harder and drew a straight line on the curves, showing what the river was like at the beginning.

“Is it really like that?” the girl asked lazily.

Agnese threw the stick into the river. It fell very slowly and touched the water without any sound. They watched until the stick went under the bridge and out of sight.

The heat oppressed. Ravenna stood silently, but Agnese was used to it and it didn’t surprise her. The sun had lightened her dark hair, face wasn’t tanned a bit, blue eyes were soft and thoughtful. Ravenna seemed to be in two worlds—no matter where she went, she was always thinking about something else. Agnese wanted so badly to take her sister’s hand and look into the depths of her eyes, to find the real Ravenna and discover what was bothering her, but she knew it wouldn’t help.

The strangest thing was that all the things around Agnese were so real: the old footbridge railing; the river banks, thickly covered with grass, climbing up the high slopes; the birds rising in small, ragged groups from the bushes by the shore; the wind blowing in gusts, brushing her hair out of her face and cooling her heated skin. Agnese felt so clearly the pleasant, lightly quivering warmth of spring, only Ravenna alone seemed like a dream.

“Wanna go for a walk?” she suggested.

Ravenna agreed. At first, they walked down the slope in silence. When the plain at the bottom was near, Agnese jumped down. She landed well on both feet, but something inside her gave a good thump, and her solid body hit the ground hard. Ravenna, too, landed with a skid, barely holding on.

They went to the water. Lots of bugs crawled all around the place, and Ravenna walked carefully, her white linen dress slipping easily through the tall grass.

“It’s so beautiful here,” she said shyly and looked up at where they had been standing before, trying to imagine herself and Agnese on top, but to no avail.

Agnese went along the shore, so Ravenna followed. There was a path by the water where fishermen walked, and as they strolled beside, away from the footbridge, the silence fell over the whole land. But their footsteps seemed to break and disturb that silence.