"Do you remember, mother? How these shadows had once housed us? I remember. This was the home I loved most. This was where I belonged, in the end. But you and Raeden...you were always looking for sunlight. Needed to be close to the sun so you could shine in competition of it. You both always wanted to be seen. But here...here, I could disappear. Fade away. I didn't have to worry about you missing me. I don't think you ever did anyway. I could just...fade. Unimportant. Invisible. It wasn't so lonely here, I think. Maybe I should have known, back then, that this would embody who I would become.

I have ruined a good soul, mother. Wasn't this what you wanted of us? To break the hearts of men? How could you possibly enjoy this, enjoy watching someone crumble to your feet and claim your perfection? It is...disgusting. Overwhelming."

Her throat is clogged and wet, and tears stream down her face in silence, falling like rain to the dry earth below. They land in tiny, crisp sounds that are barely audible. She stares down into the red waters of the Deep, and leaves her tears upon the bank, and she speaks to a reflection she can't stand.

"He loves a mirage. He loves what is no longer beautiful, what never was. I am sick inside, I am a plague, and I kill all who I come across. I never wanted to be like you, Mother. I never wanted to hurt someone who loved me.

Are you proud?

Have I done your name well? Have I finally become a good daughter, by doing that which I despise?

Twins are supposed to be close...instead, mine ripped my heart and left it in pieces as you laughed. Are you happy, Raeden? Baby sister has finally grown up. I bet you'd still laugh, for me having such an awful 'prince'."

And she sobs, a horrible sound that shakes her tiny frame like a storm, and she wails and cries her heart out to those blood stones as her world crashes down around her. When it calms, she is still crying, but her voice is desperate and broken. She briefly thinks that she's too young for this. Where had her childhood gone?

"Life...is not what I thought it would be. Loneliness is sooner to kill me than anything. My mind alone will be second. What happened to loyalty? Love? Honesty?

What happened...to me?

Where did I go wrong? When did I turn into this monster? Why am I so broken that I cannot let someone be at my side without fearing I will ruin them? That I would be forced to break the heart of...of someone so pure, because I'm incapable of loving them back? Because I'm afraid to?

Who am I now, mommy?"

She crumbles to her knees as if in prayer, her last few words ringing out clear across the water, and wonders when she had been broken so much that she wanted her mother at her side for the first time in her life.

But her mother wasn't going to come. Not anymore.

You were never what she wanted.

i am the designer of my own catastrophy;
an unbelievably orchestrated...
and beautifully choreographed...
illusion

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