Andrei and Rhian

Lidia Ruza no longer attended market, no longer took her brother to the park, and no longer stopped to watch her lover preach. Forbidden from leaving the house, she tended the chores and her aching back. Each night, her lover stood outside her window—waiting, watching. Days became weeks and weeks became months, and her lover’s visits became fewer. She had girl friends, or so she thought, but none came to call. The brown-eyed boy became her entire world, and oh how she loved him.

You should know, time is a tricky thing when you’re expecting. One minute it’s hardly sinking in, the next you can’t see your toes. Then, time stalls to a halt until you’re flat on your back begging for mercy. Lidia gave birth three weeks late. Poor lass. It was around then her lover stopped coming around. No more waiting or watching and whatnot. And it wasn’t long after that, a fire at the church killed that same priest and many more. “A sad, sad accident,” they’d say, and the story stayed the same for centuries.

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What none of the villagers knew, was that when baby Victoria entered the world, she'd inherited her father’s traits. Not grey hair and a mustache, but the steel-coloured eyes and the iron grip of a Partisan. Lidia Ruza knew she could no longer hide the truth from her family. They would soon learn she had a taste for holy-men, and a few days after that, she'd learn her father had a taste for fire.