Through The Storm

s i x t e e n

It was dark. And hot. I was so hot. Everything was sticky with sweat- the fresh and the drying. Then there was the ceaseless ringing in my ears. And my eyes... I couldn't open them, no matter what I did. Further efforts revealed I couldn't move anything. As if I wasn't in my body at all. Just some lost soul in the darkness.

But the pressure... the pressure upon my body, as though a thousand horses were stood fixed upon me was not enough to kill me. Just enough to make me welcome such a fate- if only to escape the pain.

And yet, none of that compared to the ruthless throbbing in my head, consuming all my senses. Each throb racked through my head with an intensity that rattled my very thoughts.

"Strange, isn't it," said a low, dangerously cool purr.

Father.

I heard the rustling of clothes and what sounded like footsteps on stone floor coming toward me. Even the throbbing in my head seemed to pause in trepidation.

"Strange, to hear true silence after centuries of voices in your head. And, of course, to finally know the true fear of being senseless in dangerous hands."

I didn't dare breathe. The sound of my breaths would only drown out his footsteps. But the pressure...

"Yes, I'm the reason why you can't hear thoughts anymore."

Light, smooth hands brushed hair away from my forehead. "Things would be so much easier if you would just comply with me, Kaya," he whispered.

The ringing turned into roaring in my ears. I wanted to thrash under his touch- mocking, after all the years he had shown me no affection.

"I ask you once again. Are you keeping something from me... daughter dearest?" I didn't need my vision to detect the sneer on his face.

The pressure eased itself just a fraction as I found I could move my bone-dry lips. "No," I croaked, my throat parched.

The room turned frosty for a fraction of a second, before the deafening silence took over once more.

"Did you know," he began, his voice cool and the picture of mere musing. "Did you know that I never loved any of you?"

I knew he was talking about our family. And, gods damn me, I couldn't help my heart wrenching upon hearing those treacherous words. Even when my family and I had grown up suspecting the same.

Maybe- just maybe, I had been holding out on some home that we were wrong.

"I had never loved any of you... except you."

My heart stopped.

I heard him sigh and his footsteps receded until they came to a stop. "I don't know what it was. I had never planned on loving any of you. Your mother had just been an infatuation- a sort of desire for what was being kept from me. Acquiring her was equivalent to defeating the forces that kept her from me. There was some thrill in that. After that... there was not much."

The pressure was a mild discomfort in comparison to the ache stemming from his vicious words.

"And I know, I know," he said casually, "that you would ask why I stayed with her. She is the most sought after female in history, isn't she? I may be a bit heartless, but I'm not stupid."

"So she's an arm piece." I didn't realise when the pressure had eased and I had regained my ability to talk. I still couldn't see. But I wouldn't have stopped the words that ripped out of me even if I could.

"Call it what you like, Kaya. I like to think of it as..." he paused. Thinking? Was the bastard thinking? "A failing marriage," he declared. "But that doesn't mean you just end things. Especially not when you are the rulers of the most powerful land in the world. Alliances, treaties, properties... they all ride on the shoulders of our blessed union."