Chapter one
Chapter one
It was summer, and the wind was light. The air smelled after sun and grass with a touch of pain.
I was on my way to the castle from King Alus, as I saw her.
For some reasons I took the way along the grass fields. Normally there isn’t anyone, because no village or town is close to the fields. This time however was different.
On the field, in a sea of flowers, was standing a woman, with a long white dress and red long, wavy hair. I could already see from far that she was a beauty.
I do not know why, but for any reason I stopped and watched her for a while from the edge of the field. She only stood in the middle of the field and did not move. It looked like she was frozen.
But then suddenly she moved her upper body in my direction and looked to me. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen and the scariest at the same time.
Her Ocean blue eyes looked at me, like she would look through me, what might be was what she did. Over her cheeks ran tears and her gaze was empty. Her hair blew in the wind and flattered her hips.
I slowly moved my horse closer and stopped a few meters in front of her. I dismounted of my horse and walked the last steps. As I came to stay in front of her she looked up and I realized that my first impression was right she just stared straight before her and her eyes were lifeless. Both together gave her the image of a porcelain doll.
If I’m honest, I saw faces like hers a lot during the wars I had to fight and I knew I would see it a lot more in the coming wars, but it never ever shocked me like this. Not even if I saw it in children eyes, when their mothers died an awful death in front of them.
It was like someone hit me in the face and for the first time ever I did not have my motions under control in front of someone I did not know. I looked at her in horror and disbelief.
It was like I saw an angel crying. An angel, which is normally full of power and energy and happy with life.
“Who are you Sir?”
It hit me. Her voice was so soft and sounded like something I was not able to name at this time. She had a tone of incredible pain, which was deep inside her, in her voice. What made her even more beautiful, in my eyes.
“Who are you and what are you thinking you are doing here?” I asked her with my normal strict ton, instead of answering her question. She looked down to the side, and bit on her lower lip. “I… I am no one. Sir.”, she answered me with her lovely voice. “No one?” I asked and she looked up again, like someone hit her.
The look in her eyes had changed. Now it was full with pain and fear. “What are you doing here?” I repeated the second part of my question. Her eyes changed again to this motionless look. “What they told me to do, Sir.” “What was this? What have they told you and who are they?” I kept asking and was surprised about it, because that wasn’t my normal behavior, but all what I did before since I saw her, either.
“My family and the other villagers, Sir.” was her answer. “They told me to leave the village and come here to the cursed land, where I shall stay until I die. And they are right.” The last sentences she spoke with so much impression that I was surprised.
“Why do they want you out of the village, and why is this land cursed?” That was the first time I heard that this land should be cursed. I never been here ever before but normal the people talk, especially about all supernatural. So I was surprised, that nothing of this gossip was to hear around my area.
“Because I am responsible for the misfortune which struck my whole family and so the whole villages. One man came and asked my father to marry me, but at first my father didn’t want it and so he told him no. But this wasn’t what this man expected and so he left to come back with an army. As my father said no again it got worse. The man ordered his men to destroy everything. At the end they burned all down and killed half of the village. My father… he said that… that I have… have to leave them… so that… so that the village is save.” She could hardly talk and at the end of her story was it difficult to understand what she was saying.
Tears went down on her cheeks.
I did not know what to do. I was not used to be in such a situation. Not that I would not have seen a woman crying before, but mostly I keep riding and ignore them. That is not my business in the big wars I fight.
But now… I felt helpless what never happened before. So I only stood there and did nothing.
Suddenly the wind got stronger and pushed her forward and even before I could realize it I opened my arms and preserved her from falling to the earth and kept her save.
It was suddenly so warm and save.
I closed my eyes and tried to forget all what was happened. The man, who came to ask for my hand, all the men who punished the people in the village and then at least the fire and all the dead bodies of children, women and other guiltless people. And that all what happened was my fault, just because I did not want to marry that one man. If I did, all this would not have happened. But at this moment all seemed so save, like all these horrible things have never happened and I was in temptation to believe it.
But deep inside of me I knew all those things had happened and I could not forget them. I was not allowed to forget them.
Suddenly he tightened the pressure around my body and I got pushed closer to his warm body, and all my senses blend out. The only things I realized were still the warmth, what now changed to a warmth, what was more heat like. The feeling from being save became stronger and a smell, I could not remind of to have smelled ever before burst into my conciseness. The only thing I really knew at this time was that I loved these feelings and would not want to miss them ever again in my live.
But at the same time it was strange, to have this feeling all the sudden. I even could not describe it, because it was so odd. But I hoped it would never end, also I knew that my wish would not become true.
Only for the moment I enjoyed the feeling to be saved and sounded by warmth that I never have known before.
