A Land Far Away

The first memory she had was of the salt wind.

As the years had gone by a few decades the smell of the wind was still there, but it had grown different. It no longer brought the images of far away lands, castles made of sand or any other things a young girl´s mind imagines.

No, it was just a wind that smelled of salt now.

And it was a different shore.

Granted, it was the shore from where they once left, family then, but to her it seemed like a new shore. Nothing of Selgaunt´s harbor sparked a memory, nothing of it made her feel a thing.

Nothing made her miss Starmantle, either.

*Images flashed through her eyes*

Father, please, no!

Her mother begging... bleeding on her knees...

Herself crawling through streets naked, broken, humiliated...

*she shaked her head*

Nothing of that matters. It doesn´t matter.
I´ve grown stronger by pain that I´ve received and I now bow to a Goddess.

By lash, cold and fire.

*memories continue*

The night they took me in...

I was more inside the realm of the dead than living.

My face...broken.
My body...broken.
Bleeding...
Dying...

I crawled by my fingernails and will only and here, in my new life, I found I had to do it again...

Back then it was for survival.

Tonight it was for acceptance.

I remember well when I was like her.
Unruly, wild, with artistic talent.
Drunk with an elixir of life.

They crushed that in me and now I will crush that in her.
Because it is ordered. Because I need to.

Yet some part of me longs to be back in that innocent age and perhaps that is why I do not lash her so powerfully as my mistress commands.
I get chided for it. I do penance for it.

I endure it.

I remember meeting her the first time as I stepped into the poor hovel that was used as an orphanage in the Copper´s district of Selgaunt. The keeper was a drunk old lady. I didn´t pay much attention to her as we talked, but then... It must have been The Maiden that caused the ruckus upstairs...

Her name is Ramona. Whatever happens to me I will never forget her name.

The girl stood so defiant against her keeper, a queen amongst the young brats. She ruled them, yet she yearned to get away from them.

It was easy to get the old fool leave and get an audience with her. She admired me and I saw it. She told I was pretty, but I knew it. She wanted away and I saw that, too.
Still I stayed silent, watching her. To see if she would lose her composure.

In the end she did, of course, but by the time it took, be it minutes or days, and what I spoke with her afterwards I was convinced that She was the one. The girl convinced me on our way back down the stairs more when she confessed to me that she had slipped sleeping droughts to the whiskey of that derelict of the keeper. We both laughed.

I don´t remember when I last let an honest bellyshaking laughter control me. And I believe it will be a long time til it next happens.

She wanted away and I needed to have her.
We both had our wishes come true and now she is raised to serve the same Goddess as I do by my harsh hand.

Why then I feel the need to hold my hand when it´s her turn to feel the lash?

It all came back tonight in the eyes of those men.

Beasts.

Mere savages.

Yet they made the memories come back. Curse them thricefold!

....................................................................

Father, why am I here?, I asked with trembling voice.

You will meet some nice friends of mine. Do not be afraid.
That is what he said before he left the room and I was alone with those men.

.... I don´t know if it was hours or days after I crawled out of there, sobbing, bleeding. Raising a pleading eye to him, asking only: "Daddy, why?

...I remember his answer clearly. He said "It was needed."

He didn´t say sorry, he didn´t offer comfort...All he said was "it was needed!"

How ironical it is that he came to say the exact same last words on his deathbed. When he looked at me the last time, pouring his last breath after my last stroke of lash had landed on his skin, he raised his eyes and also asked "Why?"

I answered "It was needed."