Work Text:
William Favric. Chapter one, the golden clock / a duty you cant ever fulfill.
The sky was dull and the streets were crawling with white fog. The churches golden clock hit Four o clock and a child was born.
Its parents abandoned it and left it wrapped in cloth in a basket after seeing the monstrosity. A hybrid, between a human and an endier. A perfect half and half hybrid had never occured before. Either a heavily disabled human child or nothing at all, the mother and father tested their luck in hopes of the latter.. but.. it was not what theyd had expected.
They left the child in an unfortunate persons house, the child wailed until its voice was left hoarse. A woman, the owner of the house, noticed the child, in a mess of its own, black, tears. The woman cooed as she picked the unwanted monstrosity up. Tracing her fingers over the edges of its face, she peeled the thin cloth the child was wrapped around in. It was a girl.
She brought the child home, unsure of what to feed it. As the man approached the house and barged inside, seeing the woman and the child, the man was furious and beat the woman, she'd had begged to keep the child. The man, with a click of his tongue and a wave of his hand. Had left the woman and the baby.
The woman crawled over to the wailing baby that was wiggling its fingers for the womans warmth. The woman shushed it and cradled it on her arms.
The child had grown into the ripe age of Five. taller than some, frail and weaker than most. When the woman died of an illness a few months earlier, the man had sold the child as a slave. The child, with a name she cannot remember or pronounce, had wasted half its life away at the mines, covered in soot and grime and shackled by the feet.
The child had not seen the sunlight in month's, their owners never gave them breaks, either. That was until, a kind man, preaching the words of lady crow, her god.
She prayed often, in unteligeble murmurs and garbles, she thought to herself and herself only. Maybe lady crow finally heard her prayers.
The man took one look at her, and smiled, grasping her hands and took her away from the mines, not caring when his robe had gotten dirty.
The man had taken her to a church, gray marble paired with black and gold made a beautiful pair, everytime the sun pooled over the windows and onto the floor and surroundings, it looked like an image straight from heaven, if such thing exists.
She had learned that no, heaven did not exist, most expecially not on earth. Despite the man from that day, his smiles and his promises of a much better place, they were not even a tiny bit true. The place, he took them to, was far, far worse than anything she could have imagined.
She was met with lips curled downward and a man pretending fool.
The nuns and priest forced them to pray, to offer their soul and mind to lady crow. Once, she had to be the leader of the prayer. she, not knowing how to speak or read, had stared at the book in front of her,
Murmuring unteligeble words and garbling. The nuns and priest screamed at her, dragging her away to a room, and carving a lone feather on her back. She screamed, wailing, black tears pour down her chin and onto the marble floor, staining it.
The day after, the nuns and priest ignored the child, much like any other day. As the sun set ovet the horizon, yellow light pooling over the floor and walls, painting it gold. The child looked over to the window, seeing a man in a dark robe. She could not see the man's face, for the robe shadowed over.
The child had walked over to the man, he shushed her and held her hands. He had dark clawed hands and it dug on her own tiny scarred fingers as he gave her something shiny, she looked down and saw a golden feather necklace, recognizing it as one of the offerings on the churches altar.
The man said four words to her, murmuring in her language. "Keep it, hide it" the child looked back up at the man letting out a surprised garble but saw him gone. Leaving only particles of gold and ember in his wake.
The child had gone to bed that day grasping the necklace like a lifeline, with a duty she cannot ever fulfill.
The child woke up to a woman screaming and yelling something she cant understand
She garbled a confused noise, the priest tried to grab the necklace from her and she swiped a hand to the mans hands, leaving four, bleeding red marks. She'd had wondered when her hands turned dark and clawed like the man from yesterday.. but she had no time to wonder as she saw the priest's face and held the necklace closer to her, with a jolt, she stood up and ran away. A mess of limbs stumbling outside until her unprotected feet felt the grass.
The child ran and ran, avoiding the yelling crowd behind her. She ran until she could barely see her feet and legs. As her breathing quickened and her legs felt searing hot, she saw a well and looked inside. It looked dark, but a few specks of white twinkled below. As she looked at the bottom of the well in amazement, she heard a man yell, she looked behind her and saw the priest and nuns with the church patrons. Holding pitchforks and torches.
In the heat of the moment, she took one more look at the well, and the bright light of the torches
And jumped.
The darkness swallowed her whole, it felt both chillingly cold but also warm. Like a dying mother's hug.
She could no longer feel herself breathing, in fact, she could not feel anything at all, not the murky water from the well enveloping her, or the feeling of her heart dropping into her stomach as she saw the people.
And she stayed there; floating in the darkness, she could not feel it, but the golden necklace laid in her hand, shining like the stars she saw in the well that day.