A Crown of Bones

~1| CHAPTER~

THERE ARE ONLY two things I fear in my life.

One-

Blood.

I fear seeing the red substance because I know what it means.

I know that my fate is over.

Those red drops ironically create a green light for my future. A future I do not want.

The older I get, the more time slowly creeps upon me and the inevitable waits. I know it will come. I check daily. Hourly. Constantly.

For those small drops of blood.

When I was thirteen, I watched as the girls around me started to see it. They gathered around each other- the fallen warriors, I had named them within my head - and cried about the circumstances of their fate. I never saw those girls again.

My parents watched me like hawks to their prey. Circling around, waiting to finally sink their talons into the prize.

I would not go so easy though.

Those red drops, that had taken away so many before me- I would not let them consume the future I had not yet experienced.

I did all that I could.

I starved. Ate herbs of different leaves. Took whatever pills I could get my hands on.

Months quickly fell into years and my parent's eyes slowly became more and more confused about the wait that they were suffered upon.

The fate that I had not yet been subjected to.

Yet I knew my time was running out.

Running thin.

I couldn't bring myself to make the ultimate sacrifice though.

Couldn't handle the thought of forever ruining my body.

The abuse I had done to it was already torturing enough for me to watch and endure.

And then one morning. One morning that was just like any other.

It happened.

I felt it before I saw it.

The cramps that they had described. The nausea. The mood swings.

And there they were.

The thin, red drops.

Blood.

It led to the second thing I was afraid of.

The second thing that I most feared as I felt the pounding upon my door.

Heard the shouts of my father saying he could smell my blood.

The relieved sobs from my mother as she heard his words.

The splintering crack of the wood as warriors burst, unannounced into my bedroom.

It was the second thing, yet it was probably the predominant fear of them all.

As I fought them off.

Yelling.

Screaming.

Biting and scratching whatever surface of skin I could reach.

On that day, both my fears were shoved at me. Choking me down until I could not breathe. As they dragged me away, knocked out from their blows- because that was the only way they would ever have been able to take me.

My second fear.

The fear of losing my freedom.