Fraya Willow sat in her dingy bedroom. She was only 15 and yet she had seen many terrible things, not that everyone else hadn't either. Her and all the others her age began to think over the same things: Ever since the deal had been made in 2021, 300 years previously the demons had ransacked and pillaged the people who lived here. She dreaded her next birthday. Because when a boy or girl turned 16 they were assigned to a demon. And since demons and humans couldn't have kids it was mostly for slave and familiar work. Except in special cases. When the gene type of a human is exactly right, it results in a half demon half child hybrid. But none of those things have survived. The demon genome eats away at the human counter part causing death right after birth. There is no cure for it.
The human race was permitted to endure by the demon king Scarr. Scarr is the same demon king that the survivors knew. And so he allowed humans to marry and "fall in love." Although no one believed in love anymore. It was a myth that the people who lived before the wars had relied upon to live happy prosperous lives. And to justify the bad things they had done. Such feelings were a product of a time of luxury and prosperity something we don't have and never will.
Fraya sighed and stood up deciding not to dwell on it. She still had a good five days of school left and five days with her family. Five days of her mother's cooking. Five days of her father's smile. Five days left of freedom. But what she wouldn't miss was the sneers of the class. Which only occurred because of one thing, her parents incessant belief in love.
"Fraya dinner!" yelled her father cutting through her thoughts.
"Coming Dad!" Fraya bellowed in reply.
Tying her raven hair into a knot at the back of her head she headed down the long hallway. As she arrived in what passed for a kitchen she nearly vomited. The smell of what her father had called dinner was atrocious. As if a demon had urinated on everything in the room. It smelt of ash and toxins. Her father was pulling an extremely burnt pan off the stove. As well as a blackened hunk of some meat out of the oven.
"What. Is that?" she asked making a face.
"Chicken and Brussels sprouts, or it was supposed to be," he trailed.
"I take it Mom is with Demitrious?" Fraya said softly looking at her father. He nodded his eyes hardening. And Fraya knew the subject, as always, was closed. And instead of probing as she normally would, she let it go. She didn't want to ruin her last days with her family. And it could be worse. Demitrious and Calypsa were really nice compared to the other demons out there. And our family was more family like than most. I guess in times such as these we lived lives of luxury. And that is exactly what it is, luxury, something I probably won't have. She thought bitterly.
"Fraya would you be a dear and please make some edible dinner please?" he asked making big puppy dog eyes.
"Fine, but only because what you made smells and looks awful," she replied. And because this might very well be the last time that I can make you dinner. She added mentally not wanting to upset her father.
She grabbed a clean pot and set about putting water in it so she could boil water when she heard her father gasp in realization. So, she thought, he forgot the water again. Finally after what seemed like forever her macaroni was done and it came out pretty much perfect. And in that respect she was like her mother. Cooking came second nature. In most other respects though she was like her father. Including looks, her father and Freya were mirror images. It seemed that nature had decided to make a gender bended version of her dad. But the one point that she was different from both her parents was the belief in true love. She believed in a natural caring between a mother and child and a father and child. Only such thing could exist or there would be many more children on the streets. And she believed her parents cared deeply for each other, but love that in her eyes was a lie. Made up to give a false hope to small gullible children. And she prided herself on being neither small or gullible. Although she wished constantly to be a child again to postpone the inevitable.
