Scars to Remember

| 04 |

E L E N A

Elena pulled her hood she has stolen closer to her body as she walked through the busy street, cold mud squishing between her bare toes. She was staring at her surrounding with astonishment. This was the first time she was seeing people since she ran away from Dykin forest three days ago. Everything seemed surreal to her. She had never seen anything like this in her life. From the houses made of brick and wood to the colorful cars on the roads, she has never seen anything like this before. To say she was mesmerized was an understatement. She was staring at everything with curiosity, even the humans whose behavior she found quite strange.  

Elena stopped and looked at multiple shots with quiet interest. However, she did not buy anything as she had no money with her. People gave her weird looks as she paid no attention to them. She felt her stomach grumble at the sight of food. She watched a man buy some kind of food for his son who was sitting on his shoulder. She then looked at the squealing young girls who were gathered inside a shop and were buying what looked like ornaments. She stopped just as three children past her and joined a crowd of their fellow age.

Elena walked after them and found herself staring at a small box decorated with silk and ribbons. Inside the box were two miniature size figures with strings attached to them. One of the figures belonged to a girl and the other was a knight. Elena looked at them with curiosity as the figures moved and voices pretending to be the small figures came from behind the box. She looked at the words that were written on top of the box.

Puppet show

Intrigued, Elena watched the story about a knight who had given up on his love and decided to protect the people. By the time the story ended, Elena was grinning from ear to ear. She had now started to feel hungry and the number of different types of food that were lined at the corner of the street didn't help either.

She had caught a rabbit in the forest this morning before she came to this town which was enough for her to survive the whole day but that was before she had her awakening. Now, she felt like she was feeding not one but two stomachs which was not wrong to say because she was now feeding Xenia. She was the voice in her head that belonged to her lupin that resided inside her. Though Xenia hadn't gone back to sleep after she had told Elena who she was. Apparently, the awakening took her too much energy, and now she needed all the rest she could get.

Elena had decided to go back to the forest to hunt and return back after she had satisfied her appetite. She has been doing this for days now. She would visit the village to look around and would return back to the forest to eat and rest. She never interacted with anyone though no one approached her anyway, except for a drunk man who tried to corner her in a dark ally but instead he ended up with a couple of broken bones. 

As usual, Elena was walking around the bustling streets when she saw people clearing the way for something to pass. She too stepped aside and stared at what looked like a metal cage on a cart that was dragged by two horses. There were four men on either side of the cage, each holding a sword in their hand. Inside the cage was a woman who was looking at her chained hands. Her dark curly hair was shielding her face from view. An old tattered cloth was wrapped around her body which revealed more than it was hiding. Her skin was marred were deep scars and wounds that were still bleeding.

Elena narrowed her eyes slightly. The girl looked familiar. This was the first time she felt this way since she had left the forest. 

Eliana was not sure what crime she had committed to be held inside the cage or be tortured this badly.

"MONSTER!" the villagers yelled. Some threw rocks at her one of which hit her straight on her head. The woman suddenly snapped her head up and hissed at the crowd revealing her sharp canines and golden eyes.