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Reigen
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An hour before the sun raises, her morning ritual beings.
It starts with a small yell. Nothing huge, just a scream that seemed to come from very far away. The sudden scream used to frighten her at first, thinking that someone was in danger, but now she recognized that it was only her. No one else ever heard the screaming, they only gave her strange looks when she asked about it. It always starts as a scream. A cry for help that suddenly gets cut off, the voice terrified.
“Do you hear that screaming?”
“What screaming? I don’t hear anything.”
“There! Right there. Don’t you hear it?”
“Reigen…maybe you should take a break. There’s no screaming.”
“No, I hear it! I’m going to go look…”
Nothing was ever there, of course. No one else ever heard it, no matter how loud it got, no matter how close it got. She always received strange looks by others when she would crouch down and grab her head, yelling out for the screams to stop. It took her close to a year to understand the screaming…close to a year to shut up about it. Now when she hears the first scream, she knows what must be done. She doesn’t fight it, there’s no point. Fighting just makes it worse.
Reigen stood from her desk, dropping her quill down without much care. Her servants gave her a frightful look, getting out of the way quickly. They knew too. They knew how she acted when she started to hear the screams. The noble paid them no heed as she grabbed her spear and walked out of her room. Her face was blank, void of any sort of emotion as she started her shameful walk. No one stopped her. No one questioned her. They all knew. The guards at the gate gave her a stiff bow, one she did not return.
Another scream joined the first before she could even make it fully out the gate. They would come faster now, the screams of terror, and the cries for mercy. Mercy that would never come, could never come. The faces that were behind the scream flashed in her mind, no scream had the same face or the same voice. They were all different, just another face for her to regret.
By the time she reached the end of the path and into the Ghostlands, a third and forth would join the growing choir of screams. Her steps began to speed up as she tried to run from what she heard. There was no stopping it now, more and more screams began to fill her mind. They hurt her mind, the elf flinching as they grew in volume as well as number.
The pain started to become too much as she stopped to lean against a tree. One of her hands came up, splaying out over the right side of her face. She tried to get a grip on herself, to not let it take control of her like it always threatened to do. She was almost ready to push off and finish the second half of her trip when she heard a voice call out to her.
“Ma’am? Are you alright?”
The small elf turned her head, looking over to the young elf that stood not too far away from her. He looked concerned for her, almost ready to take another step closer to her when she didn’t answer right away. Her eyes stared at him. His whole body seemed to pulse in time with the beat of his heart. In her haze, she swore she could see the blood flowing though his body, begging to be liberated from the confines of flesh.
“HELP US.”
“MERCY, PLEASE, I BEG OF YOU.”
“WE’VE DONE NOTHING TO YOU, LEAVE US BE, MONSTER!”
“HELP"
"HELP"
"SOMEONE SAVE US”
“MONSTER”
“Ma’am, you loo-“
“Go away! Leave me be!”
Her voice was harsher than she had intended, but there was no helping it now. She hardly had control of herself as it was, let alone with the man before her tempting her blade. He didn’t protest the order from the knight, though he looked very off put from her response. When he was safely out of sight, Reigen once again began her trek deeper into the forest of the Ghostlands.
Screaming
Her body sagged as she kept moving, the screams becoming so very painful. The darkness that lingered in the corner of her mind seemed like salvation at the moment. It would be so easy to let go and let herself be taken over again. The thought was tempting, though soon Reigen found herself shaking her head. She had to keep fighting it, she had to keep up her image of control. She had come to far to slip up now.
The sound of a dull drum added to the screams. To Reigen, this was a grace that she needed to hear. Her destination was close, perhaps a couple miles off still. With what bit of control she had of herself, she picked up her pace to hone in on the location of the drum. The closer she got, the louder the drum became. Soon the smoke from the fires graced her sight, trollish buildings began to take shape. She was not going to go right into the village, no, that would be suicidal.
Screaming…
This village always had a lone scout that she could handle on her own. It was a matter of surprising it before it surprised her. Reigen lowered herself to the ground, taking careful steps as she looked around for her target. She had no senses beyond sight and sound to let her know where to go. Sound, thankfully, gave the scout away before she saw him. There, standing behind a thin bush, stood the scout.
…Screaming…
She could take no more of the screaming. The forest troll looked so inviting…standing there on his own and begging to let his blood free. She pounced, driving her spear though it’s knee before it could fully understand what was going on. Before the troll could scream out for aid, its blood welled up in its throat, choking off any sound beyond a few gargles. Fury took it over and it charged at Reigen with two axes swinging without much direction. They hit her, yes, but they could not stop her.
“MONSTER, LIGHT, SAVE ME.”
The troll’s heart was split in half as her spear drove though its unprotected chest. The wood armor did nothing against the metal. The blood seeped into the ground around the body. As the light faded from her targets eyes, she could hear its own scream added to the many already there. The voices all cried out at once, causing Reigen to fall to a knee and clutch her hands over her ears.
The world then fell silent.
Reigen took a few moments to recover from the pain in her head. She couldn’t afford to stick around for long. Just as quickly as she had come to the camp, she departed down a different path. This time, there was no one on the road to see her bloodied clothing, nor her pained expression.
She reached her estate, the return trip feeling faster than the departure. The guards once again bowed to her and this time she returned the motion. She reached her room where her servants were waiting. They swarmed around her, taking away her bloody clothing and cleaning her up so she once more looked presentable. Once they were done, she found her way to her desk, picking up the quill and starting up where she left off.
When her morning work was done, Reigen sat on the balcony, peering down to the movement of those around the estate. They were all wonderful people, her servants and guards alike. She had grown found of many of them, most of all Azaela, who was her favorite and most trusted servant. The small smile she had formed soon faded to a frown as she thought about how close she had come this morning to losing.
There was not much Reigen had to fear in her life, but every day she lived in terror of losing herself to the hunger.