Auriferous

chapter 22

Lael ran a hand through her hair but it immediately caught onto a tangle of a few strands. Frustrated, she roughly pulled her fingers through the tight knot, a few of her hair tresses coming down along onto her fingers as she pulled her hand away. "Lael," maura started slowly. She tilted her head up and stared questioningly at her mother. There was dirt on her face and she imagined she had some on her own face too. "I know what i'm doing, mom." Lael said. "No, you don't. Lael you don't have to do this. I know you want to protect me and save me from whatever he has planned to do with me. But i did not even want to take that photo to lure you into here. What makes you think i would want to let you take my place in danger?" Maura spoke of the photo she was made to take in the text sent to lael. "You made sacrifices to raise me. What makes you think i won't make any to save you? It sounds like an unjust exchange even still for you, does it not?" Lael replied. "But if your skin so much as has a scratch, my heart would break." Maura sounded exasperated. Lael looked faraway. "Its not my skin." For the thousandth time, lael wanted to slip out of the skin which was not hers. Maura swallowed. "Oh, yes it is, my dear. Forget that anastasia already, you are much better than her." Lael and maura looked up at the same time to see the open door dangling on its hinges, a gloved hand at the knob, a masked face one arm's length away. "Anastasia was a human being. She had unique points and unique flaws. But you took that away to create something inhuman." Lael glared at the purple ink, the red splotches and the blue patches. "I gave life to you." The reply was stony and curt, as if the face behind the mask was actually hurt. "And you took away life too." Lael shouted back. "Lael," maura warned, her voice a bare hiss. Lael brushed off her mother, if he was that proud of her he would not dare lay a finger on her. She did not care if he did dare any other way. She did not care if she died at his hands, she was not human and was not meant to be in this world. She would be glad to be gotten rid off. Suddenly, the thought of perhaps asking many wrong questions that triggered him would get him to make a move on her? She wanted to test his patience, his boundaries. That did not mean she was going to just jump off any bridge she is on or cross the streets during red lights. If she ever got to see the highway again, that is. "Is there a way for me to die? Do i get killed as easily? How come no doctors could spot the...gears in me?" Lael demanded, losing her language abilities to come up with a word suitable to represent the things making her body function better than normal. Anastasia's body. What would gillian do if she had known? A lump formed in lael's throat. Gillian. Lael had reminded her friend of her dead sister and she finally knew why. The face behind the mask pressed his lips together and gestured for lael to rise and follow. "No, no! Lael you stay here! Don't go with him." Maura pleaded, fear was scrawled across her whole body in big bold letters. "Mom, i'm sorry." Lael whispered. She hated to leave her mother there, she knew that was a great risk itself. But that was the only way she might be able to turn the tables onto him. She was only acting with a sense of sadness in front of him with no other choice. When maura cried out in serious fear for her daughter, scrambling up onto her two feet with great speed, "don't risk your life like this", Lael's answer could have fooled even a panel of actors or the jury in a court. "Its not my life," pain, sadness, fear and anger. Being portrayed in those four words were mixed emotions charged to the extreme. She saw the look on her mother's face. So risking her only form of advantage to piece some comfort into her only relative, she shifted her vest slightly to let her mother have a glance at the sweet black holder sticking out from her waist. She willed her mother to keep her facial expressions under control as she quickly got up to follow him in hopes of perhaps getting answers of any sorts.