Tempus

Prologue (continued)

I examined my surroundings wildly, feeling arising panic weight down my chest like I was drowning in it. Where were my parents? My home? I had always been unusually smart, a fact I chalked up to have geniuses for parents. However now my logical and organized mind was in complete chaos.

   None of this made sense. The house shouldn't just collapse! And my parents,  they should just disappear, unless- no! Although I understood the concept of death, it had always seemed faraway and distant. My parents weren't- they couldn't be...

    I felt pain replace the panic. Tears poured off my face as I sobbed. If I was old maybe I would have muffled my cries, but right now I had no such restrictions. The golden glow that had vanished returned, giving me a bright, ethereal aura, though I didn't notice.

    Suddenly, I blacked out. After falling through endless darkness, I woke up to the sound of arguing voices.

    "I am telling thee, William, the girl is cursed. Verily, get the wretch out of my sight." A woman's shrill voice pierced the mental haze the held me.

   A man's deep baritone answered her calmly. "Wilt thou sentence the child to death? Art thou a murderer, Isabel?

  I opened my eyes a bit, and peeked through slitted eyes at the two above. Both starkly contrasted the other. The man had wavy, honey- blonde hair and warm hazel eyes. He had a sprinkling of freckles across his tan face, only enhancing his eternally youthful look, and a gentle smile.

   The woman, however, was glaring at me as though willing me to disintegrate. She had narrowed icy blue eyes and a disapproving frown on her thin lips. Slightly pointed ears poked out of her dark braided hair. Coupled with her glacial beauty and pale skin, she strongly resembled an elf.

The woman was tiny, the top of her head barely reaching the man's shoulder, but somehow, she managed to look down on him. She drew herself up to her fullest height.

    "William, even if we do take the, the child," she eyed me with a look of deepest revulsion. "How shalt we care for it. I knows nothing of babies, and methinks thee dost not either."

   The man simply scooped me up, and did not look at the dark-haired woman. "I suppose we shalt learn much then, in the next few years yonder.