Ravenna soon floated down to the crater of rock beneath her and collapsed on her side—completely drained. Like the lucky person she was, she cut her cheek on a jagged stone and felt the blood leak into her open mouth, but she had to admit, there was a lot of blood on her.

Her white shift had been torn open and blood stained the jagged holes. The cool night air brushed against her bare legs as her eyes drooped closed and she passed out atop a pile of rocks.

. . .

"Oh, shi—" Ravenna cursed as she twisted onto her side and ripped open a healing wound. She opened her bleary eyes and found the sun high above her. How the hell did that not wake me up?

Ravenna propped her elbow against the ground to push herself up, and she felt the faint throb of aching muscles, but her arm seemed relatively fine.

She dragged herself fully up as she squinted at the house next to her, the owners so blissfully unaware of a murderer in their midst. She scanned the horizon and tried to find the way back to her farm, but because the sun was solidly above her, she had no way to tell north from south.

Um, hello? If you—yes, you, the creepy voice—if you're still in my head . . . could you, um, help me get home?

She waited a few minutes for any sign of anything, but the only response was the little voice in her head telling her she was being stupid.

"Fine," she huffed as she crossed her arms and watched the sky. She saw a distant flock of birds flying away from her. "Wait, birds migrate south, so I'm facing south right now—oh, poop. Wait, it's summer, so they migrate north? No, that's spring. But then—ok, why the hell am I arguing with myself?"

She dropped her arms and was extremely close to using "Eeny-Meeny-Miney-Moe" to choose a direction to walk.

Suddenly, that strange presence in her head glowed—internally, of course, she wasn't glow-in-the-dark—and warmth bloomed in her head.

A dark wind wrapped itself around her and spun around her playfully. The thin draft suddenly doubled and rushed around her three times faster. Her hair whipped around her face and she gaped as her feet starting lifting from the ground.

I will help you this once.

Holy gods.

Indeed. 

Oh, shi—

Listen Heir. You are being transported by my winds. You will have to find your way the next time, but hear me closely. You are capable of anything within your mental mindset. Your magic is capable. You can teleport, zap, and fry anyone. 

Ravenna realized the world started becoming hazy and like the double-vision filter was switched on in her eyeballs, she saw a bustling city layering over the mansion.

Realizing she was going to leave, she finger-gunned the mansion and let the winds transport her. Whatever that goddess-lady was talking about was imprinted into her memory. It wasn't everyday air talked to her. And she didn't need any more pep talks about her "mindset." Her mind was fully set to being against hippie mottos—no offense of course O Great Goddess Person Lady.

When the mansion fully disappeared beneath the vision of the city, Ravenna stopped talking to herself and took in the crowd of people rushing around her.

Good luck, the divine force said. And with those last words, the subtle comforting presence left her and her full range of emotions hit her.

Grief, anger, sadness, frustration, hatred, pain, rage, infuriat—

The sea of people around her blurred as the full onslaught of memories hit her—as if they were being repressed before—nice, evil primordial force.

She ran around the corner of the nearest tall building and sank onto her knees as hot tears started rolling down her face, clearing a path through the grime on her face.

She took in a shuddering breath as she clasped a hand on her neck. She jumped when she felt a pendant tied with black cords against the hollow of her throat where bare skin once was. She ran her fingers over the amethyst gem.

Where did this come fro—Ravenna paused as she remembered this very same pendant around Daeva's neck when she was young. The first time she asked about it, Daeva avoided the question and she never saw the amethyst ever again.

She fingered the black cords tying the gem around her throat and rubbed the stone.

"What are you doing?"

Ravenna immediately dropped her hand and tilted her head back to find a tall girl around her age staring down at her. The girl's warm brown eyes caught the tears in her eyes and dropped her gaze.

She started fidgeting with her braided black hair and awkwardly rocked back on her heels.

"Are you ok?" she asked.

"I—I'm good," Ravenna said, trying to keep her voice from wobbling. The girl stared at Ravenna leaning against the wall and she dropped to her knees as well and became eye-level with her.

"Are you hungry?" Ravenna shook her head. It was true, her stomach was torn and she was incapable of stuffing herself.

"Are you hurt?" The girl eyed the gash down her cheek and her torn white dress dripping blood. "You could come with me. I live with some other kids in an apartment building not far from here. We could get you bandages."

Ravenna thought over the girl's offer. It would be nice to get cleaned up, but what about getting to the farm? 

She shuddered as she thought about what would happen if she returned to the farm. A rotting, decrepit farmhouse vision came into view. The once luscious crops were nothing more than bad fertilizer in the ground and all the farm animals she had once loved were all dying, providing meat for her—no, she wouldn't survive even if she got to the farm.

Ravenna responded to the girl's question by forcing herself upright and nodding at her. She offered Ravenna a shy smile.

"What's your name?" she asked her. "I'm Emlyn."

"My name's Ravenna," she responded and Emlyn gave her a slight nod of greeting.

"Follow me," Emlyn said excitedly as she started at a brisk pace, mimicking the businessmen ambling about on the streets. Ravenna followed her stumbling over her feet trying to copy Emlyn's footing. He legs started burning immediately after hanging five feet off the ground for almost a week.

They shoved past several pissed-looking men and women who glared after them. They ran across streets avoiding hypercars as they zoomed past. They ran past crumbling apartment buildings and long-abandoned business towers.

Ravenna looked back at a pedestrian flipping them off as they ran past her and bumped into Emlyn as she made a sudden stop. She flung out an arm to balance her off as Emlyn stared at a shorter apartment building in front of them.

The paint of the reddish bricks was peeling to show that it wasn't even a brick building. Concrete peeked through the shoddy paint job and several large cracks were spiderwebbing away from the top-center of the side of the building like the building was once a cannonball target.

And a giant metal fork was sticking out of the top of the building.

Emlyn saw Ravenna watching the metal fork and grinned, "We call our home the Forkenator for obvious reasons. Wanna come in?"

Ravenna hesitantly returned her smile and nodded.

Emlyn skipped over to the glass revolving doors and Ravenna caught her reflection in the glass panes. She looked absolutely horrid—like the devil and a literal poop had a baby, that's how she looked. She was covered in bleeding cuts and she realized with an extremely low amount of horror that there was literally a hole in her leg from where she was stabbed.

Oh well, whole legs were overrated anyway.

She strode through the doors and grimaced at the blood leaking onto their hardwood floor.

Emlyn turned around and found her frowning at the blood on the ground and she shrugged, "It's easy to clean up, you won't believe the number of fights we get. Do you want to clean yourself up first? Or first-aid?"

"Could I—clean first?" Ravenna asked and Emlyn chirped an "of course" before leading her up the stairs.

"There are a bunch of other homeless kids in this building along with a crazy lady up in the attic, just ignore them. Well, unless you want to talk to them, then, prepare to be offended. I swear, no one knows how to talk nicely."

And Ravenna realized that if she abandoned Blacke Farms, she would be homeless as well.

"Anyways," Emlyn said like a tour guide. "Up ahead is the common room area where we all do stupid shit and—oh, look! Aerial! Come!" Emlyn beckoned for a tree-like girl to run over and she—Aerial—skipped over and saw Ravenna looking like a rat.

"Oh! Hi! I'm Aerial, who are you?" she asked, eyeing her leg.

"I'm Ravenna," she said, trying to sound nice, but just ended up looking constipated probably.

"Ooh, hi! Did Emlyn find you? Y'know, she found this whole building of kids? The lady came with the building, so we don't worry about her. She's literally a witch, she can survive up in her attic and literally never come down." Aerial smiled at her. "Do you want me to get—uh—band-aids?"

"No, it's fine. I'm good," Ravenna responded.

"She's going to clean herself up and then we'll get her . . . um, cloth wraps? What the hell do we get?" Emlyn asked herself as she stared at Ravenna's arm.

"You're going to make her a mummy? Yeah, no, I have a better idea. Ravenna! Go to the washroom and get cleaned up, meet us here. The wet towels are up the hall and just enter a stall, and yeah," Aerial instructed. "GABRIELLO!! Come here and actually do what we're not paying you for! Ignore him, Ravenna, he's our manservant that's richer than most of us here. He's no help, he'll show you to the restroom."

A scrawny young boy ran over to them and grinned up at Ravenna with two missing front teeth.

"Hi! I'm Gabriello! Allow me to lead you to the . . . " he trailed off and looked at Aerial for help. She whispered something into his ear and his eyes brightened. ". . . restroom. I'm your servant now!"

"Okay?" Ravenna said hesitantly, not sure how to respond to that statement.

"I'm six!" Gabriello grinned through his missing teeth. Ravenna still didn't know what to think. Gabriello was an orphan and homeless at six?

"Follow meeee," Gabriello sang as he skipped ahead down the hole-filled corridor. Everything was badly treated and rusty, but it seemed to be home to Emlyn, Aerial, and Gabriello. Ravenna had to walk fast to catch up and soon, Gabriello stopped outside of a shiny room.

Ravenna paled as the white tiled floors and peeling white walls brought back a sense of deja vu. She shuddered and shakily took a step into the restroom.

Don't relent. Don't give in. Don't back down. Keep fighting.

Her mother's words kept her going and she took another step.

Gabriello, completely oblivious, just grinned again and pointed towards the door, "I'll be outside! Just call when you're done!" Gabriello then ran out of the room giddily.

Ravenna shut her eyes tightly as her head started burning with the start of a headache. White walls covered in blood . . . dead bodies littering the white stone floor—

Ravenna sobbed as she dropped to the floor. Why was she so weak? She didn't want to cry, but she couldn't stop. And she hated that.

Don't relent. Don't give in. Don't back down. Keep fighting.

Her shoulders started shaking with the force of her sobs and she tried to get a breath down, but a new sob would choke out any breathable oxygen.

Don't relent. Don't give in. Don't back down. Keep fighting.

Her stomach started hurting and she pressed her arms against her abdomen trying to stop the sob pains.

Don't relent. Don't give in. Don't back down. Keep fighting.

Her heart was aching from the force of her sobs and mental images of the bloodiness of the dungeon room flashed across her vision.

Don't relent. Don't give in. Don't back down. Keep fighting.

She sucked in breath after breath until minutes—maybe hours later, her sobs subsided and left a hollow coldness behind. She wrapped her arms around her knees and stayed in that position until someone knocked on the door.

"Ravenna? It's Aerial, are you done yet?"

Ravenna forced out a steady voice as she called back, "I'm almost done!" Quick footsteps outside of the door faded away and Ravenna was left alone again.

Her eyes darted towards the shattered mirrors and found a shard still attached to the mirror frame. Her eyes were red and puffy and she looked horrible.

She found a stack of towels on the floor and dunked one into a bucket of cloudy water. She didn't care if it was clean or not, but she had to get the blood off of her. She gently rubbed the corner of the towel against her arm with the dried blood and it came off red.

Ravenna shuddered again and kept dabbing at her many scars until no signs of the blood were seen, but she could still feel the oily sheen of blood still on her.

She wanted to scrub herself until every single blood cell was off her, but she knew that would only reopen the wounds.

She washed the blood off the towel and put it under the large stack of towels, hoping no one noticed an extra pink one.

She stepped outside of the bathroom and found Gabriello rocking back and forth on his heels waiting for her to reach him. Her cheeks reddened and she hoped he didn't hear her crying.

"Emlyn and Aerial are waiting downstairs!" Gabriello said simply and led her down a flight of stairs—cracked and crumbling—and into a "kitchen."

The make-shift cooking space was made of wood, the most burnable material out there. The stove was fashioned out of planks of wood and there was a pot currently boiling . . . soup? There were countless cardboard boxes holding cans of food—anything that wouldn't expire quickly.

Emlyn and Aerial were leaning against the wooden table set in the center of the brightly lit room. Emlyn looked up just as Ravenna walked in and Aerial followed.

"You look better!" Emlyn exclaimed. "We have the bandages for you, just sit down." Emlyn motioned for her to take a seat on a stool and Ravenna limped over. 

She had tried to staunch the flow of blood from the dagger-hole in her leg, but the scar went through bone and . . . well, that wasn't easily healed. After cleaning out the skin around it with a towel, the wound became more sensitive. Like a delayed reaction.

"We . . . we can start with the wound on your leg? How did you get that?" Emlyn asked. Ravenna didn't feel like explaining and she was afraid Emlyn would be disgusted so she kept her mouth shut and let Emlyn and Aerial tightly bind her leg with linen torn from some poor shirt.

They kept on wrapping her arms, but with significantly less fabric because of the fact they had stopped bleeding a long time ago.

Emlyn was trying to figure out how to wrap the bandages around her cheek without wrapping her whole head when a male walked into the room.

He had red hair and green eyes and swaggered right into the room like—nope, not gonna think it. Ravenna shuddered as he walked in and his sharp eyes darted right to her.

She stilled and mentally scolded herself. Lots of people had red hair. What are you going to do? Start a revolution and force redheads to dye their hair? Yeah, no thanks. She'd rather not start an uproar of hair rebellion or something.

"Hey guys, who's the newbie?" he asked. He nodded at her—why, WHY, did boys think that was cool? It's really not, it's just weird—and plopped down in the stool across from her.

"She's Ravenna. Ravenna, that's Ajax, ignore him," Aerial said with an air of annoyance.

"Dang, what happened?" Amax asked as he took in her overabundant amount of bandages.

"They happened," Ravenna said dryly.

"No, Ajax, you ignore her. She got cut up in something, maybe a brawl and we're so graciously helping her," Aerial sniffed authoritively.

Ajax reached over the table to pat her hand and grinned, "Sure, Aerial." Ravenna glanced between them, at their casual, friendly, and yet condenscending platonic relationship.

Emlyn glanced toward her and mouthed, Siblings. Ah, that makes more sense.

Ajax's green eyes darted back to her and she shrunk under his gaze. The fractured pieces of her soul stirred under those eyes and her mind darted back to those initial torture sessions.

Blood, gore, kneecaps broken—

Ravenna sucked in a breath while Ajax continued watching her.

Screaming, bloody daggers, poison-dipped maces—

Her eyes became unfocused as Ajax cocked his head, refusing to back down in their one-sided staring contest.

Tazer shocks, magic initiated pain, skin slit—

Ravenna shot up and balanced on her right leg as her left leg teetered off center. Aerial and Emlyn jumped up as well and she was dwarfed by both of them by at least a foot. Ajax continued staring at her with some sort of . . . hatred? She excused herself, barely hearing anything over the buzzing of her head.

Red hair with red blood, demons screaming, rush of pain—

Ravenna ran down the corridors, not paying attention to the amount of turns and continued to run, trying to find a hidden corner, some place where no one will find her.

Daggers sticking out of skin, screams of pain—

Ravenna shuddered as she slumped against a dark corner at the edge of the apartment building. Peeling layers of concrete dug into her back as she wrapped her arms around her knees.

Please please please please please, not again . . .

Flares of light burned across her eyes as she continued staring at the wall across from her.

Stop stop stop stop stop or else I will make you think about that stupid toothpaste commercial, brain.

Heat bloomed across her body and when Ravenna opened her eyes she gasped and planted her feet on the floor firmly, preparing to get up and bolt.

Purple flames whipped around her in a dark wind. The whole corrider—which used to be dark—was lit up in a purple hue.

"Well, shi—" Ravenna cursed as she tried spitting and blowing on the flames. "Could you not right now? I don't want to burn this building down. That'll break at least five health code violations and not to mention I might get tried for this. Do you think they'll give me juvy?"

Ravenna scrunched up her face in concentration to try to stamp out the flames mentally.

Now, I know what you're thinking. How the hell do you expect to get rid of a whole inferno with your brain power? Brain waves don't make a dent in elements dummy.

Ravenna started panicking, but that only gave the flames more fuel. They flared and spread, latching onto the moth-eaten curtains and the tendrils of fire licked at the windows.

"Imma get kicked out and get a restraining order the size of Nebraska. I swear, fire, I'll jump right into a volcano and kill your stupid ancestors," Ravenna threatened harshly trying to violently spit into the flames three times her size. Great idea, Ravenna. Gee, thanks.

"Seriously, stop."

Have you popped a screw? Ravenna stood up taller as she scanned her surroundings. Where the hell was the voice coming from?

"Seriously, stop"? You've gone crazy haven't you? Good thing that works in our advantage.

"Who are you?" Ravenna asked aloud. She had no idea if the creepy voice could hear. "Do you happen to be Miss Dark Wind Lady?"

No, we're your worst nightmare.

"Wow, you're so smart. That was such a good one-liner," Ravenna said sarcastically.

I don't need your sass. We have finally located you once again, and we will spare no opportunity arguing with a child.

"Um, you do realize you're arguing with me right now?" Ravenna responded. Her eyebrow raised as she concluded the voice was the result of either two options: she has finally gone psycho or . . . well, she didn't know what else.

Thank you, Heir, for the magic-burst. You have given us your direct location. See you there. And try not to get killed.

"Wait, wait, wait!" Ravenna cried as she felt the ghostly presence retract from her mind.

What is it? Begging for us to not kill you?

"No, of course not. I'm not going to bow down to any mortal being. I was just going to ask, who are you? I'm also not dumb enough to ask what you want with me, cause then you'll sever the connection with me and I'll have a 10% higher probability of dying today. And I very much like living. Sort of. Well, good enough."

Ravenna could have sworn she felt the dark shadow in her mind sigh.

We're D.A.R.Q.

"What does that start for? Dweebs Alienation Rights Quartet?" Ravenna asked, half hoping she  was right.

You listen here, Heir. Do not think we'll give you any more sympathy. I will admit, we regret not killing you when we had you drugged and in our warehouse/dungeon. But this time, I will kill you, along with everyone else in that dingy hideout of yours. Our identity is not secret, we are well known, so don't try to blackmail us.

We're coming heir, and you best hope you are prepared, because we'll turn your precious little world upside down.