A Whisper Of Song

Chapter One

There was never a time in her life, at least as long as she can remember, that Genevea had not gotten what she wanted. It's not because she was spoiled- in fact, her parents often ignored her out of their own greedy desires. She simply got whatever she wished for because there was no way she could be rejected. The blood coursing through her veins in a metallic shade of silver was the only proof anyone would ever need of her power and superiority. Without her silver blood, she would be powerless. It was her blood, after all, that granted her ability to sing.

Although Genevea's voice was rather beautiful, the perfect combination between wistful and soothing that was not an octave too high nor too low, her skill did not lie in that particular form of song. No, her singing, the true melody deep within her, came from her eyes, which whenever locked with the eyes of another could quite literally move their souls to do her bidding, as long as her wishes left her lips as she did so.

Some called it mind control, but she despised that term. It sounded like something an evil tyrant would do to suppress their subjects, not a little girl who only wanted to be left alone. She knew it was selfish to use her power, no matter the circumstances, but she also knew of nothing else. Her parents surely never taught her to shy away from her power. They were always drunk on the control that they felt and the fearful eyes that followed their every movement, stiff with grace, as they pulled faces toward them with hungry fingers and ordered them to bow down to their poisonous words. So, a song for the extra piece of chocolate smuggled to her apartments at any hour of the day or a song to skip out on her daily etiquette lessons were only child's play.

  Her aunt and uncle were different though, and their  repulsion of their song gave her respite. If they could hold so much authority without abusing their powers, then there was hope for her too. Not that she didn't enjoy her life of wishing and receiving, which she certainly did, but she would never allow herself to become dependent upon it.

  The one who attains power without lifting a finger is the easiest to catch. Her uncle warned her once in a lesson of history and politics.

  It was this thought that kept her afoot whenever her feelings of loathness kicked in upon entering court with her parents. They might have been in power at the moment, but it was impossible to remain that way with how little they tried to accomplish diplomacy without literally forcing their opponents to agree with them. They would be discovered for their crimes soon enough. So, she followed them to court when they suggested she do so.

  It's not like she had much choice on the matter. If she didn't walk herself, her parents would sing her down the marble hallways with a plastered smile for added decoration. The golden-stained ribbons spun loosely around her blonde locks and silk dresses of fur, lace, and ruffles, she truly was a sight to behold, albeit not a very appealing one. It was all bearable, as long as she retreated to her aunt's apartments the moment the opportunity presented itself. Hiding from court was a particular hobby that she indulged herself in quite frequently without care for etiquette or presentation.

  She didn't care for the rules of court and the forever shifting social hierarchies. They were too irregular and consuming for her liking. If she ever did want to claim the spot of queen bee, however, it was all for her taking. An appetizer that she didn't quite have the taste for yet, but she could count on it to still be there whenever she was in a particularly dire state of hunger.

  Who knew it would only take the sudden death of her aunt and the retreat of her parents to finally be withdrawn from court? Was that all it took, a family tragedy, or to be more blunt, a smear on the Jacos name, to be freed from a high-life of fake smiles and nobles with less than noble interests? She would have never guessed it to be so until it was.

                                            ***

  Now, Genevea sat in the estate home of her uncle, bare except for the towers of books he left sprawled throughout the various parlors and freshly dusted hallways. He always said he was in the middle of rearranging his library, and that is why certain books were left abandoned to their corners, yet never going truly untouched. She did not doubt his constant renovations, but she knew the simple matter was that his library just wasn't big enough to contain his ever-multiplying selection of biographies and history books. Julian Jacos was a historian, in fact. And he was constantly hungry to know more. The spectacles he wore left red marks on the bridge of his nose for the lack of times he went without them pressed against his face. His dull gray eyes were met with deep bags- signs of his wisdom or signs of his insomnia, both of which he contained too much of. She found him a comfort all the same. He was her first teacher and present guardian. Without her reclusive parents, he was the only family she had left.

  For all her gratitude and admiration though, her uncle sure knew how to lead a mundane life. It drew her at first, mesmerized her even, but as the days pressed on, she could say without a doubt that she was bored out of her mind. Her uncle took no visitors and the red servants were few and self-sufficient. She ate every meal with her uncle, she received the highest of quality education from him, and they bonded over the treatises of other countries, which puzzled and intrigued them both, but that was all. Her better days were spent with her maps and fairytales that she bribed the servants to swipe for her. Her worst days were left to her golden sheets, shivering with migraines. It was a petty ailment, yet it plagued her too often for ignorance.

  Still, she would choose this life shrouded in golden sheets and made-up castles over and over again, before she ever chose the life of real castles and golden cutlery in the court of Norta. Her time spent there was brief, and that was how she willed it to remain.

  She could still remember the deadly nobles of the Silver High Houses and their even more dangerous children, just bursting with an excuse to let their powers run wild, all packed in one place. She knew because she was one of them, an unfortunate truth on her part. A bomb waiting to be set off. And sometimes it did actually go off, courtesy of the Lerolan oblivions whose power granted them the ability to explode objects- or even people- with a touch of their finger.

  Today, however, she needed a real adventure, not one in her books of dashing princesses but tangible, one to quell the spinning mechanisms in her mind. And so she set off with her leather pouch, heavy with the weight of her sketchbook and thrown across her shoulder, into the woods at the edge of her estate to graze the scenery. Their forest in Summerton was especially stunning at this time of the year. The earth orbited just perfectly around the sun in this spot. It was cast in golden waves and the air was calm with a quiet breeze that carried the cranberry leaves to the ground gently and aided baby birds in their first flights out of the nest. Julian would be proud to see her when she returned with detailed sketches of these birds native to this eastern part of Norta along with accurate observations of their diets and predicted population numbers.