No One

Chapter Eight

She did not know what to do, where to go apart from home, if she could even call it that anymore. She wanted to see what it was like now, if was even still standing, if her parents, her siblings were there or if someone had done the decent thing and moved them, buried them or burnt their bodies so they could be with their gods, they could be looked after and cared for by the gods who had turned their back on them when they were suffering, when they were being butchered like animals for nothing. She wanted to see it, the home where she grew up, where she lost everything and everyone she loved, more than anything in the world but she was not sure about what to expect, what she would find there, pools of blood, bodies or maybe better or worse, nothing, she could find it clean for all she knew but she doubted that. 

There was nothing she wanted more than to see her family there, alive and well, her mother, father, brothers and her baby sister but there was nothing that could bring them back and she did not believe they would be alive, waiting for her to come home. If they were, they would have gone to get her and there was nothing they would not have done to get her out, they would have paid anything to get her out. Everything pointed to them being dead, it was unlikely they were still alive after all that had happened, all she had seen with her own two blue eyes, but she had hoped it was a lie, a nightmare... anything but it was not going to be, she was not foolish or dim enough to believe it was, not after all that time.

She walked down the cold street, the cold had slapped her in the face, but she was determined to get into her home, to see the mess and the damage. She snuck into her home, climbing through the window. She stood with her back against the door, remembering the time she would not have to hide and sneak around to get into her own home. She was almost surprised by what she found there, no bodies but there was the thick and heavy scent of blood, it made her feel sick inside, like her insides were twisting. She wanted to throw up, but she forced it down, that was the smell of her family's blood, the blood of her parents, her brothers and her sister. That was the sickening and disgusting smell of their deaths, although there was no blood on the ground anymore nor any other trace of them.

Her humanity was gone, she was wild and angry, angry enough to kill the monster who harmed her family. She was not a good person, she was not cute or sweet anymore, she was a monster and she hoped she would live long enough to watch the monsters die with her face being the last thing they saw, the face of the forgotten one. They were so pleased with their grubby little murders, butchering a mother, an older man who had fought for the kingdom, in the name of his king, two brothers training to do the same and a baby, a tiny little thing that could do no harm to anyone. 

She thought she would be stepping in their blood, but someone had cleaned it up, spent hours scrubbing the blood out the wood, getting every last trace out of it. It was strange to see, there was not even a dark patch on the oak, it was all just beautiful, the same way as it was when she left with the intention to hunt squirrels with her brother. 

Her brother was on his way out, she had waited outside the back for him, when she heard the soldiers coming through the front, slashing and destroying everything, she heard her mum cry and beg for them not to hurt her baby, her father started a prayer to the gods that never came for him. Her brothers knew where she was, yet they kept quiet, even as they murdered her baby sister before finally, the guards cut their throats and let their clothes soak up the blood. 

Unfortunately for them, she was not going to be so nice to all of them, slitting their throats would be a quick death, painful for only moments, perhaps. What she had planned was worse, it was going to last longer, give her a little more pleasure in hopes that it would fill the hole they had made in her heart, but she was sure she was going to make a few hearts stop.