Seeking Satisfaction

Prologue

The arrow silently ripped through the chilly November air and made home in my mother's heart. As an innocent seven year old girl, I couldn't grasp hold of the situation. Millions of thoughts swarmed my mind as I watched the Angel of Death sweep my mother into his cold, slim hands. My mother can't die! She just can't! Who could have done this and why her? What am I supposed to do now? If she dies, I'll be alone. I'll be an orphan.

I heard my mother's sharp gasps as she held her soft hands gently to her wounded chest. I felt so utterly insignificant and alone, standing beside my fallen mother. A ripple of sickening silence had kidnapped the usual buzz of the marketplace.

I noticed the women were standing, hands grasping tightly onto their children. With wide eyes and gaping mouths, it was like a wizard had blanketed them in ice. The men's eyebrows furrowed down as they attempted to tug their wives and children away from this monstrosity.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw standing at the edge of the square a peculiar figure. When my eyes lay upon him, I felt an unnerving shiver rush up my spine making my heart skip a beat. Although I could not see his eyes, I had this horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that this man was watching me.

He wore a long, thin black robe that looked as if he stole it from the Devil himself. The smooth fabric billowed, the tips slightly dragging on the ground. Attached to the robe was a tall pointy hood, blanketing his face with a shadow of darkness. His presence emitted a sense of deep hatred: hatred for the world, for the people in it... For everything.

All the while, my mother was still clutching at her chest. People made no movement to help her. People were so selfish that all they could think about was getting the heck out of there. My mother needed help, but all people could do was gawk at us, some with pity in their eyes, others with fear. 

Her coughing snapped me out of my thoughts. I went on my hands and knees to hold her. Spasms shook through her body like lightning, while her dying coughs were the thunder. Her blood was the stormy rain, oozing out of the cloud that was her heart.

Abruptly, her coughing came to a halt. Her hand shaking, she held onto me. With what looked to be her final push of strength she croaked out quietly to me so that just I could hear, "I love you, Willow. Always remember me." With that, she took her last sudden gulp of air and went completely still.

I stood up as thick blood began pooling around her fragile body. She lay sprawled across the cold cobblestone ground in the middle of the market. Her dark brown hair was spread out around her smooth pale face, and her warm brown eyes remained open. Glassy and hollow, I knew my mother was somewhere far, far away.

A wet river slowly grew on my face as I began sobbing loudly. Pouring down my face, it was like a hurricane had developed inside my body. My shoulders shuddered and my knees buckled from beneath me. I collapsed onto my knees and felt a warm substance soaking through my dress. I had fallen into the pool of my mother's blood. Tears came in torrents, shaking through my whole body. At one moment, I ended up with my face buried into my mother wishing she could hold me just one more time.

I could feel this feeling swell up in me, one I had never felt before. It was a tidal wave rushing over me and drowning me. It swept aside all other thoughts. Subconsciously, I clenched my fists into tight balls of fire. A burning came from within until my face felt like a furnace.

I would no longer be an innocent seven year old girl. That day, I vowed to myself two things. Firstly, that I would never let myself be attached to one person too closely again. Secondly, that I would send the Angel of Death after the hooded man and watch him suffocate in his own hatred.