ALEXANDRIA'S POV
I watched all the people frantically swarming around me, all in a hurry to get the ceremony started. They were about to graduate, their friends and family all buzzing with happiness. Freya was babbling excitedly to Dante next to me while we looked for everyone else. Vincent and Tori would be graduating with Mikael, Tessa and Jeremy were here somewhere as well. I couldn't help but be amused at the anticipation that was palpable in the air. All these kids so excited for what was to come after high school. Some already had their futures planned out entirely while others transcend into the next parts of their lives without any plans at all. Just wide eyed ambitions and hope, I envied them. When I was their age all the possibilities that exist today simply were not to be found. Women weren't allowed to go to school where I was from, albeit we're going back over five hundred years. But still, the only life I could expect was to be married off to the man who offered my father the most. And what a horrible man that turned out to be, but that's in the past now. For me coming of age was nothing but terrifying, there was no hope, no dreams for what my future would be. I looked down at all the teenagers ready to head into adulthood and cursed the universe for not bringing me into being at a later period in time. If it had my life may have turned out very differently. I started to think back to when my life began to fall apart, when reality had hit me.
FLASHBACK
I was running with my brother Jesse and our friend Marcus who was the black smiths son through the forest. We were playing knights even though father told me not to play with the boys. I had turned fourteen the week before and started to bleed. My father said this meant I was now a woman and had to act accordingly. He said that this meant it was time to find me a husband. I hated the idea, I always had. Unlike the other girls who all seemed to be in such a rush to start their married lives I couldn't stand the thought. I had never been interested in men before. I had no aspirations to bear their children or take care of them. I wanted to do all the things my brother did. I wanted to learn how to fight with a sword and wield a bow and arrow. I wanted to ride horses and train with them, but I would never say that to my father at this stage in life. I remember the first and only time I had ever expressed my wishes to him when I was nine. It had earned me a beating so severe I couldn't leave my bed for two weeks. After that I got used to sneaking around with my brother and our friend Marcus. Jesse had always sided with me, even if our father wouldn't. He had been teaching me how to handle a sword for about a year now and I was good. Not as proficient as I had become with a bow but I was coming along. Me and Marcus were on the same side going against Jesse, he was the best with a sword. And he was swatting us down like flies. He laughed loudly as both me and Marcus fell to the ground because he evaded us both at once. "Come now Lex I expect this clumsiness from Marcus but I thought better of you" He spoke with a cheeky grin on his face. Obviously goading me on for another attack. I pounced at him lunging with my sword. He easily side stepped it pushing me back to the ground with another laugh.
We spent the rest of the day like that, with me and Marcus failing horribly at trying to take down Jesse. When the sun started to set we could here Marcus's father calling for him in the distance and we decided to call it a day. I walked back to our little cottage with my brothers arm around my shoulder. Despite his banter during the fight he had nothing but praise for me on our way home. Talking about all the different improvements he had seen in me today. We were laughing exuberantly as we approached our little hovel but stopped almost immediately. Out front stood our father with a look of pure rage on his face. He briskly walked up to us before slapping me across the face with such force I was sent to the ground. "Where have you been Alexandria? I told you to stay in and do the chores today." He spoke with such fury. All I could do was hold my face and look up at him, to afraid to speak. Jesse stepped in between me and our father and tried to explain but before he could finish a sentence my father had hit him as well. "I've had it with the both of you, neither one of you knows how to listen. Neither one of you can follow any rules. At least I will finally be rid of one of you." As he spoke those words a smile settled on his face. Me and Jesse looked up at our father questioningly as he started to laugh. "Didn't I tell you? I've found you a husband." He said looking down at me. As soon as he finished his sentence our front door opened up and a man stepped out. I heard Jesse's sharp intake of breathe as my mouth dropped open. There stood one of our local law men that I knew very well, and not in a good way. He had spent the last three years following me around. Making lewd comments and grabbing at me in ways that made me uncomfortable. Jesse had complained to our father last year after an incident where he had reached under my dress. All my father had to say about it was I should feel so lucky that anything but a drunken loser would want to touch me. I couldn't believe this was the man my father had chosen. I looked back at my father as I started to beg him to change his mind. "Please Papa, I'll do anything! Not him! Anyone but him!". I pleaded with him while tears streamed down my face but all he did was smile. "What can you do for me that's worth more then the gold he would pay for you? You are nothing but a disgrace, at least this way you'll finally have done something for me for once in your pathetic life." He spoke with such malice in his voice. Jesse just sat next to me, apparently too shocked for words. I started to cry uncontrollably, why did it have to be him. Before I could speak another word the man was next to me, leaning down to my level with a sick grin on his face. "Don't cry now my pretty, you're finally mine. Don't worry, we're going to have loads of fun together." He breathed into my ear before starting to laugh. He roughly pulled me from the ground as my brother finally found his voice again. "No! You can't take her!". He jumped up as he spoke and lunged at the man. But my father was anything but a weak man, before Jesse reached us my father had his arm around his throat. I screamed as I watched my brother struggle to get free until his body finally went limp in my fathers arms. "Don't worry he's not dead. But I will need to reteach him his manners." My father spoke as my screams persisted. "Take her now, before he wakes back up." He said glancing back at me before dragging my brother into the house. The mans grip on me tightened as he started to pull me away. I screamed even though I knew no one was coming to my rescue. Nothing was going to save me from what was to come.
