Daughter of Poseidon

Flashback

(Pov: Kai)

Her head throbs even harsher than ever before.

Hammers drive into her skull, thumping and thumping. Kai's wrists hang heavy on her arms, the metal bonds rubbing them more raw than any blade.

Despite the blindfold that had just fallen off, she still knew exactly where she was once she woke up three endless days ago.

The lavender walls, covered in old posters and paintings that she and her step-father had done years ago, close in like a prison.

For three days, she had nothing to eat.
Nobody showed up.

They had forgotten her.

Nothing happened.

Other than her regularly scheduled visits from her mother. She kept saying she would remove the chains once she learned to listen to her. And then she would leave.

These were no ordinary chains.

These chains, although Kai had not noticed before, restricted her abilities and practically drained all her mental strength as well.

Where her mother had got them, she had no clue.

All she knew was they were destroying her the longer she wore them.

And that she was too tired to care.

Nobody even cared enough to try to find her.

If they did, they would have by now, but they didn't.

So why should she care about what was going to happen to herself if they didn't.

Kai paced her bedroom floor. As soon as she had woken up, she found that her childhood "time out" cuffs had been locked on her wrists.

No chain connected them. They just looked like two cuff bracelets with snaps on them holding them in place.
The more Kai thought about anything, the more confused she became.

A seemingly endless number of memories that didn't make sense returned to mind from being shoved into a thick fog that clouded them, making them hard to focus on.

And sometimes memories were the worst torture.

Only bits and pieces returned as if they had been hidden or covered after the fact.

She hated getting flashbacks from things she didn't want to remember.

To be able to remember them, but not be able to do anything about it drove her crazy.

Kai stood on a thin line between giving up and seeing how much more she could take.

Clutching her teddy bear, that had somehow been delivered to her room that morning, she smiled sadly at him.

Chocolate the Bear had always been there to listen to her woes, to mop up her tears, and cuddle abundantly. She had always felt secure with him.

Now, cradling him in her weary arms, Kai's mind flashed back to one summer before she had moved to Lake Isabella.

It was summer time seven years ago, when Kai was nine. It was the year before her step-father had showed up.
She had been swimming in a lake near her old house with her childhood friend Callie and her younger brother Max.

She had just dove under the crystal clear water, when a sudden chill sent goosebumps up her arms.
The water around her speckled with snow and frost.
Kai came up for air, breaking a thin layer of ice to do so. Her face became chapped as soon as she had resurfaced.

White snow fell from the sky sticking to Kai's eyelashes.

"Momma!" She cried out, her limbs numbing over.