Akira... strange child...

 

My name is Akira. The phrase "my name" fits my situation perfectly. I gave myself this name. I don't have a particularly clear past, which is to be expected of someone raised on the streets of various cities. I'm sixteen now. Or so I think.

My early childhood is just a blurry nightmare that recurs in visions when I drink too much or take too many drugs. Then I see a flowery meadow, blurred, as if seen from beneath the surface of a frozen lake. The blurred colors of the flowers and the softness of the grass beneath my feet. I'm still small, so small that I can barely see the figure calling me from above the greenery. I don't know what the woman in white is shouting, but I'm sure she's calling to me. "Mom! Mom, I'm running!" I feel the warm wind on my face. Her gentle arms lift me up. I think she's going to hug me... Gods, how I want her to hug me! But... Her eyes turn a furious red. They spew hatred from the dark orifices of their formless faces. They terrify, wound, destroy! "Leave me alone!" The woman in white is gone. I'm trapped in the strong embrace of the armored knight. His rotting breath, he's not human. Everything around me dies as quickly as it appeared. He throws me away like useless trash into the mud. There's only darkness. "Mom?" Silence, a silence so terrible that its noise pierces my head. A scream rips through it, a terrified child seeks refuge in tears and the sounds of despair. I see only shadows, distant enough, shapeless enough, macabre enough. Someone is hurting a child. Hurting... What am I talking about?! Hands are being torn from a small body, shoving something in its place! I hear whispered mantras; they must be spells! Damn it! What are they doing? "Stop it!!!" But I'm not screaming at all. I'm a child. A little girl paralyzed with fear. I sit crouched amid the stench of death and filth, forced to gaze upon all the horrors whose shadowy reflections surround me. A metallic, cold grip tightens around me again. Now it's my turn...?

Here the dream ends with the tinkle of breaking glass and a morning headache. Things

seemed to get better later. I think... I don't remember much either. From what my older companions told me, a soldier once brought me to the master, begging to be cared for. Apparently, I survived the fires of Kislev, when the armies of the empire attacked the army of chaos. Complete abstraction.

My new life. I was the "sixth" and the youngest of them all. However, that didn't entitle me to anything. I had to work like everyone else, to have a place to sleep and something to eat. Work, it was hard to call it work itself. I had to steal. On commission or simply, anything of value that could be sold. The master took care of us, perhaps not perfectly, but he tried. There were beds, warmth in winter, food, clothes, sometimes even chic ones, but on the other hand – constant conflict with the law and escapes. We never stayed in the city for more than two or three weeks; we were afraid to take risks. I grew up among people who had numbers and skills instead of names. None of us were human, only tools. An exceptionally profitable tool.

I was about eight years old when we arrived in Middenheim. The center of the world that encompassed my mind, the heart of my life, a paradise. Here, one could easily become an anonymous shadow and stretch out my arms. After just a few hours, my pockets would fill with a delicious burden, something that in the western regions had to be fought for, sometimes for days. My happiness didn't last long. Already at the new moon, paradise became the gates of hell. Looking back on it now, my life seems like a series of unfortunate accidents and misfortunes. As if I were constantly appearing in the wrong places at the wrong time.

This time, it was the monastic knights. They scoured the city, searching for "abandoned child souls who could still be led back to the right path." Age wasn't important, but probably quantity. They took children, small, large, poor, rich, clean, and dirty, all who were unattended even for a moment; sometimes they even managed to snatch them from their mothers' arms. They cared nothing; no amount of wailing could stop this roundup. Again, bad luck would have it that I was caught by one of the guards stealing someone else's property. There wouldn't be anything wrong with that; we'd all spent the night in jail many times before, only to sneak out at dawn. I believed I could too. I was halfway through a moralizing lecture from the uniformed officers, one of whom led me, tied up, in front. How many times had I heard similar words, whether in comrades mocking the incompetence of the authorities or in the stories of the elders? He was simply boring. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a man on horseback appeared before me and, after uttering a few strange words, lifted me from the ground and sat me in the saddle before him. As I began to struggle, the last thing I remembered was a searing pain in the area around my neck.

I woke up lying in a wagon among others. Unfamiliar faces, tearful, swollen, and so terrified. After a moment of such a sight, I probably would have burst into tears myself, but the fact that they had ruined my new yellow dress sparked more anger than fear. I directed my complaints at every passing person, as if that would change anything. Only reaching the cold walls of the monastery roused me from my foolish thoughts. If I had called the previous events hell and nightmare, I don't know the words to describe those four years. Toil until I was exhausted, floggings, hunger, and constant pain. Back as cheap labor. Previously, I had been a slim, smiling girl with long red hair, but what I had become then didn't even remotely resemble a starving person. I could barely lift the blanket and pillow stuffed with my own hair that served as my bed, and the monks forced me to dig through fallow land in the midday sun.

I'm surprised I survived it. I've probably tasted everything. Yes, even in moments like these, you encounter a feeling that, in its madness, only grants a few moments together and love on the cold floor of a church. When they took him away from me, transporting him to an even worse place, it was as if a sudden surge of courage had taken hold of me. I escaped.

Wandering alone through various places wasn't safe, but I didn't believe it would be. I grasped at any job, simply to survive. My own cause became the most important and foremost thing for me. Survival at all costs. It hurt. I had to convince myself that selling my body could also earn me something. In those humiliating moments, I met Ravel, who offered me a helping hand. He had once lived on the street, so he understood my purpose, though I had long since stopped caring for him. He gave me shelter and teachings, not for free, of course. During the day, he taught me how to use a sword, and at night, I faked orgasms so he could feel fulfilled. I didn't know what that meant, but I was learning to connect the dots – the louder I screamed, writhing in bed, the better his mood in the mornings. Interesting account...

Almost all the knowledge I possess stems from his dusty attic apartment. He was only six years older than me, yet he seemed practically an old man to me. Perhaps because, without a childhood, I was still a child.

The time came when he could no longer offer me anything. I had to become independent. I started in a strange way. I poisoned my savior and, watching him die in agony, drank from a bottle of wine. Gathering the necessary things for the journey, I carefully avoided his slowly cooling body. I left in the morning with a backpack full of all sorts of treasures. I kissed his closed eyes, loving him in some foolish way, but I couldn't leave any trace behind. He repeated it himself.

I ate my last meal at the inn in the market square, stole a horse from the stables, and for the first time in my life, I was truly free. I had the whole world before me, wearing an old leather cloak and a sword in my hand. I set off north without wondering why. Truly, the trail is full of adventure. I wandered with various people, hooking up for days because there was always free food and drink.

I stand here, over another body in my path. A young woman, her eyes wide open. Dressed richly, ornately, even luxuriously. I will drag her body to the ditch and cover it with leaves. The jewels, robes, and horse are already mine. The saddlebags will give me her past. Where was she going...

Now: "I am Kashmir della Roya. The third and probably last wife of a knight who fought in the defense of Nuln many years ago. I am going to honor his memory during the celebrations."

What nonsense...