I woke to a much darkened forest. My arms ached, and as awareness returned, I realised that I was hanging by arms. Vines were looped around my wrists, fastened and pulled taut to branches overhead. Not the most comfortable position.

"It's awake," a lanky man hefting a sturdy club on his shoulder murmured. Bringing it down, he rested his weight on it as he peered intently at me through golden eyes. Gulping, I recognised him as the one I had wounded with my claws earlier.

I raised my head to look at the darkening sky. A whole day lost. The last ray of light winked out, and I vented my agony to the heavens as I was forced back to my natural form. My red cloak hung around me, tattered.

A strike of flint on steel, and a torched blazed. Pounding feet, and a dark haired youth snatched the torch from the man's grasp. Oil soaked strips of cloth flared, and I squinted into the glare of the light.

"Who do ye work for? Answer me!" The youth snarled into my face. I clamped my mouth shut. Idly, I noted that he wore a kilt and a plaid over his shoulder. Feet bare, they were dusted with dirt from the forest floor.

The man with golden hair and eyes gently took back the torch from the youth. Thick brown furs swathed this one, and in the chill, it wasn't a surprise. How the youth could survive in a simple plaid without shivering was beyond my understanding. Even with my cloak firmly wrapped around me and my jaws clenched, my teeth chattered.

Rough hands shook me shoulders, setting me swinging from my bonds. "If ye will no answer, at least tell me this. What manner of bein are ye?"

The man tapped his booted foot. "You'd best answer him, girl. He has much cause to hate you, and his patience grows thin."

I pursed my lips, refusing to give a reply. They could not do anything to me that the Mistress had not already done. On the other hand, the Mistress could still...

The youth raised a hand. Unable to help it, I flinched.

"Siobhan," a calm voice admonished. "Do not do something you might regret."

A rasp of metal against metal. My eyes darted to the side, where the golden haired woman sat on a flat rock, sharpening her weapon on a whetting stone. The youth slowly lowered his hand. Those golden eyes cooly studied us, before she stood up, tucking her whetstone back into a pouch at her side. The weapon went over her shoulder.

Taking the torch from the man, she quirked an eyebrow and said, "Carus, please take Siobhan away. I'll handle it from here."

Carus began to direct Siobhan away with a gentle but firm hand on his shoulder. "You dinnae understand, Elf!" The youth growled at the woman. "This monster hae already destroyed three clans! MacMadahd, MacHaich and MacHann dae not exist anymore because of her!"

A pang of guilt clutched my chest. Yes, I did that.

"Siobhan," The woman warned. "I understand more than you think. And right now, threats, bluster and physical harm will not get us the answers we seek. Go back to the cabin, and calm down."

His nose flared, and he stomped off into the gloom. Carus shrugged, and followed the youth.

A flick of her fingers, and the torch remained floating in the air as she moved towards me. I lowered my eyes from hers. To look into those features -

"I am going to let you down now," She spoke. "Do not try to run or fight. I can easily restrain you again."

I nodded.

Snapping her fingers, the vines slowly lowered me to the ground before slithering off into the gloom. I crouched, rubbing my sore wrists. Tentatively, I raised my eyes to the woman, my blasted curiosity getting the better of myself.

"You're an Elf?" I whispered.

She brushed her hair behind her ear, gracefully assuming a cross-legged position on the ground. "Yes," she answered, exposing her tapered ear. "I am an Elf. A Light Elf, to be exact."

My eyes darted away from her face. If she was an Elf, that meant that the Mistress was an Elf as well. This world had just gotten a lot more complicated.

"My name is Therelia, and on all that I hold dear, I swear I will not harm you. What is your name?" Her voice was gentle, as gentle as a gurgling brook running over its river bed of stones.

"Rosettia," My voice was hoarse. It had been long, too long, since I had a proper conversation with anyone.

"Rosettia, what happened to you? How did you come to be in Aoturoa? As far as I can tell, you are, or was, an Earthling."

My mouth twitched, but it was more a grimace than a smile. "If your intention is to help me, don't bother." My voice was cynical, hard. "No one can help me."

Therelia did not flinch at my bitter words. "You may find that opinion wrong. I know something about the Dark Elves, and the curses and foul magic they wrought."

For the first time in four years, my heart bloomed with hope. I quickly squashed it. There was no conceivable way to escape the Mistress. It struck me again that this Elf was very much a copy of her, except for the stark difference in colour scheme. "It's hopeless. You'll never break my curse without... her... knowing."

Therelia's gaze sharpened when I mentioned her. "This 'her' that you mentioned," she began, her voice gentle, coaxing. "Tell me more."

I shook my head. Why was this Therelia so persistent about this?

"Please," Her fingers drifted across my knee, but I shied away from the touch. She immediately withdrew her hand. "I want to help you, but without knowing what I am dealing with, I cannot devise a way for you to remain hidden from her sight."

What a way to dangle hope in front of my eyes. But could she deliver? I wanted to break free of the Mistress with every breath, to return to my family and perhaps absolve myself in their eyes. God knows my blood drenched soul did not deserve that, but perhaps he would be merciful enough to grant me that one wish before I was condemned to the fires of hell.

Therelia crossed her arms. "Look. I know that you've been hurt. Perhaps even tortured. But the pain gets easier to bear if you tell it to someone."

"And that someone would be you?" I spat. "You would not even understand a minute of what I went through."

She raised her chin. "As I told Siobhan, I understand more than you think."

Efficiently, the Elf tugged the fur lined leather of her vambraces off her arms. Rolling up her sleeves, she bared the belly of her forearms to my sight.

Thick, jagged scars ran down the pale skin. Some were light and silvery, faded with time. Others bulged out, the ridges creating hills and valleys in her flesh. A single long digit whispered over those on her left arm.

"I did not come by these scars in battle. Someone I trusted, someone I loved, did this. She chained me to a cold slab of stone, and drugged me so I was cut off from the magic of the world. I could not heal myself when she did this to me."

Her eyes caught mine. Ancient soul in ancient gold.

"She opened up my forearms each day, breaking bones and removing the shards for her foul magic. She would heal me just enough for my bones to regenerate before doing the same the next day. It was more than a year before I managed to store up enough magic to escape."

She pulled her sleeve down to cover the hideous wounds. "It was torture. Perhaps of a different sort than what you went through, but torture all the same. There are physical scars like what you saw," she gestured to her arms. "And there are emotional ones." She touched her chest, palm pressing into her sternum. "Those only heal with time, and with understanding. The first step to the second is to talk, Rosettia. A little at a time. It wasn't so easy for me to speak of this. It took me almost forty years."

She leaned forward. "I cannot promise you that opening up would not hurt. But what I can promise you is that I will listen and understand. I will not judge. How can I, when I went through a hell of my own?"

My nose stung, and my throat bobbed. My gaze dropped from her all too astute one again. This virtual stranger had opened up to me, and I at least owed her something. But she will not understand. She will not understand what it was like to kill so many innocents.

"Rosettia," her tone was brisk. "At least tell me why you keep flinching away from me."

That I could do, without revealing too much. She would not know that part of me found a sick pleasure in harming others. She would not know that the dark kernel grew in my shadowed soul with each death and resurrection.

"The Mistress, she looks like you," I admitted. "The same facial features, body structure. Except that her hair is white, eyes are white, and black veins spiderweb her skin."

Therelia's face was grim. "Are you sure she's that alike?"

I gave a curt nod. "Only that she's the night to your day."

The Elf's eyes drift shut. Her face scrunches, as if she was trying to hold back a deep pain within her.

The next words out of her mouth sent a chill through me.

"There's only one female Elf that looks like me. Her name is Zeira, and she is my elder sister."

~

Word count: 1657