Catina never had a reason to hate her strange appearance. Her golden hair and deep brown eyes- eyes that could be mistaken for red- had never caused her any misfortune. Until one night, the great conqueror arrived- a man who wanted the world for him...
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There is peace.
I stare up at the night sky looking at the stars. The texture of the ground, the array of beauty that is before me- all of it is too surreal. It is not of this world.
I do not rise. Instead, I continue to lay there, trapped in a void that I cannot describe. The heaviness of my chest is lifted. There is a peace.
"Well done."
I turn my head at the sound of the voice. There is no shock left in me when I see the figure that is by my side.
The female body is beautiful. Covered in scarlet, dressed in robes that are exactly like mine. There is a difference between us though. Mine are faded. They are torn, with dirt and blood staining and ruining the fabric that had once been something glorious.
The head turns, red eyes staring back at me. The lioness smiles, revealing her teeth, the golden fur reflecting off the light of the moon to cause a glow that takes my breath away.
"Is this it?" I whisper. Was this hell? Was this the peace that I would never be able to receive in the living. Something only granted in death.
Violence flashes before my eyes. The last emotion I had felt had been anger, and it rips through me now.
The woman's grin only grows.
"Mikabellum," I said. Because that was who she was. She was here to punish me. To trap me in torture and agony. I had stolen her name and claimed what was not mine. I had called myself her when I should have known better.
She nods slowly, red eyes gleaming in the night. Gently she reaches out to me. Her fingers show sharp edges at the tips, claws that are extended now to grab me. Her violence scratches its way to my eyes, tracing the blood stain that was still there. His blood. His blood that he had covered my sight in, cloaking me with red to let me be the only one to know and feel his claim upon me.
I see the anger there in the goddess' eyes. Maybe it was because of this mark. How dare he? How dare he try to claim what should have never been his.
"Stand."
We both rise, our images mirrors of each other. She takes me in as I evaluate her.
She points to the distance, "look at them."
I see the flames there. The camp that stretched for miles and miles. The Onism tribe that she was the divinity of. Her lips curl back in disgust at her own people and something in my soul withers at the sound of her unrepressed anger.
"Look at them," she says again, "with their plans and traps. Years and years in the making. And you." She faces me. We stand before each other.
The head of the lioness is tossed back, a throaty laughter escaping from the monsters' mouth, "you who were created from nothing, rising from the ashes to be something. You were more than they expected you to be. More than they could handle."
