You took me up by what it seemed your diaphanous hands. I didn't want to break you, but you already hoisted me on my feet. It was only you and I now.
"Take off your disguise.
I'll kill the devil that runs in your eyes," your voice ever so slightly spoke.
And slowly I pulled off my Moretta mask that kept me silenced from words.
I could see your facial expressions changing so horridly once my mask was off.
Turning to a mirror, I wondered, "Do you like how they battered me? They all had their special whips they hit me with."
Lines of cinnabar veil the color of my skin that used to be tan.
Theodora appears closer to me through the reflection.
"We live in a world where life hurts, I can't promise to protect you, but I can promise to never, ever let you die feeling mute."
You put on my mask and took my hand.
"Now, let us go, Zia. The carnival awaits, let us walk gracefully hand in hand. The night is our gondola and the world is our lagoon."
But how could you not see the city was abandoned? Theodora, why are we walking into a bright light? Theodora?
