Raven's DarkNess | ✔

Chapter Five

The way Nessa held my hair scared the life out of me. She angled my hair in a way that made me feel like she was going to cut it all off.  She held it to its full length, pulling at my scalp in the process and I used my hands to clean my eyes, feeling really sleeping.

I should have slept.

"You have so much hair," She remarked, staring at it in awe as she kept pulling at it from every angle. "How do you manage to even brush this much hair?"

I shrug. I don't brush it often because despite that, I'm just blessed I guess. It's bone straight. Silky bone straight and so it never knots. Well, it does sometimes when it gets this long (it's currently below my ass and almost at my knees) but usually, when it's just above my hips or at my waist then it just never knots. I guess that's the good thing about having silky straight hair, except it can be a pain when you want to put it in any type of braid or bun.

"How short do you want it to be, Raven?" Nessa asks and I stare down at my hair not understanding why I'll miss it. I have hair that grows at an extremely fast rate.

On average, hair grows about 6 inches a year. Mine grows about four times that speed meaning I grow about twenty-four inches of hair a year and two inches a month.

I remember my mother getting frustrated every six weeks when she had to get me a haircut because my private school had strict regulations on hair length and after a certain length, my hair just got in the way of everything. Yet, whenever my hair is either cut or trimmed, I still feel a small loss.

"The assassins' always preferred it to be at waist to hip length. They said that between that length, it was long enough to be attractive yet still short enough to not get in the way. I disagreed but it wasn't exactly my decision to make,"

Nessa smiled devilishly taking the hair above my shoulders between her fingertips.

"This length should be just fine then," Nessa proffered with a smile and I squeaked.

"You want to cut off all of my hair?" I almost screamed at her, my words stretched out due to how drowsy I was feeling.

"Not all. Just to shoulder length,"

I pull my hair out of her wanting hands. "No," I tell her.

"Listen," she starts, once again taking strands of my hair into her hands despite me. "There is a picture of you on the front page of all your pack's newspapers with your dazzling blue eyes and hip-length black hair. The newspaper has most likely circulated. So if we are going to do this then there's no way in hell that you can look like the infamous Raven,"

"But I am Raven!" I argue, groaning tiredly. "This long, full hair is part of the sultry image that mesmerises males, Nessa. If you take that away then how's Enzo gonna fall for me?"

Nessa sighs, sitting down next to me. "For the best Assassin, you sometimes say really stupid things. Men fall in love with personalities and fall in lust with beauty. You know that,"

She was right but most times, I preferred to capitalise on lust instead of love. It's just way easier that way. Love takes a really long time. For that, you have to mould yourself into someone else's dreams.

"Your hair is gorgeous but if you go into that pack looking exactly like the newspaper print then at some point, someone is bound to recognise you, Raven and once your cover is blown then that's it," I think on it for a while, staring at locks of my hair that were gathered like a rug on my thighs. "Besides, hair grows back and yours grows fast,"

I nod in agreement still not liking this and Nessa only smiles. She reaches for my hair once more as well as the scissors and hairbrush.

I watched as locks upon locks of hair gathered at my feet, the vastness of it all surprising even me. When she finished, she refused to let me see myself in the mirror, so instead, I fingered the strands that gathered above my shoulders as she cut me bangs. More hair fell and I pretended not to notice.