The smell of burnt flesh slowly drifted through the air and dissipated under the rain. Both the stench and the natural scent of leaves and grass mixed in the air, making it a little more tolerable. Her ragged breath couldn't help but breath in the air, small legs stumbling through the overgrown roots and greenery, but the sky was dark, turning the beautiful forest monochrome. the pouring rain increased the humidity, as if in an ironic manner, it helped by cooling her body that seem to burst from the heat her rushing blood emitted. Her small voice hiccuped and tears ran uncontrollably down her soft cheeks that had been stained by mud. Combining with the rain, her eye sight blurred and could barely her way. The long fringe that could cover her eyes could no longer soak up her tears, her hair was heavy and she had to pull away her hair back to see and run properly, even so she still stumbled.

She finally ran out of the grass land that was tall as her young body. Whimpering into the clearer and rocky sections of forest. Her hands fell to the ground, her shoulder was hit bleeding and knee was cut, her numb legs couldn't run anymore.

From far behind her, the sound laughter and screams intermixed, even though the sound were fairly faraway, her body still trembled and shook. Forcing her body up, the fear resounded across her body, the last words she heard "run! Run!" Echoed in her mind endlessly and drove her body to keep moving.

Dragging her wrecked body to keep going, further and further away, until the stench disappeared.

Her shivering hand rubbed her eyes and cheeks, her legs kneels on the ground and leaned against a tree. Her eyes hazed ans she tried to focus on the far off greenery.

"...w...who..?" Her slight voice whispered.

An image of a man hazily reflected on her irises, long black coat, black hair, and hands covered his face. She couldn't see him very well, he was standing a little far, and faced sideways, so he didn't see her.

Her ears drowned from the sound of the rain, yet it was unexpectedly calming, but she could only feel despair in her heart.

His palms dropped from his face, revealing the streaming tears flowing from deep purple eyes.

"Eyes... Like mine..." She thought, so beautiful that's it's enchanting, eyes with depth and darkness. He's crying yet he looks so calm, his eyes are calm yet sorrowful. She couldn't understand, you cry when your in pain, you be in anguish and in despair. Yet this man looked so sorrowful that he couldn't even express these simple feelings.

Even so, his sad and serene image, calmed her mind, her breathing huffed and her body knelt tiredly in the ground.

His face turned, and eyes slowly traveled towards the girl, at first it was the ground, then the bushes, her scratched legs, and onto her eyes.

Neither of then seemed even the slightest shocked or reacted when their eyes met.

But a sound rang into the girls ears, neither high, neither low, neither loud, nor ear achingly quiet. It was a resonance that resounded from her core.

A ringing that warmed her heart with content, a ringing that drowned out the sadness, not like bells, not like buzzes, an inexplicable sound rang through her mind.

........

Her eyes slowly opened, through the gaps of her hair, she saw a cream coloured wall, tall and clean, the bright lighting bounced off and shone. She winced, not from the light, but from the pain in her head and shoulder. Her head was hit and seems to have caused a concussion as she briefly fainted.

"Hurry it up! What you dilly dallying for?! Do you want to be whipped?"

A high pitched haughty force, the cruel words echoing through the hallway, did not fit the appearance of the petite girl that couldn't be any older than 8. The high voice hurt her ears and rattled her brain.

"It be nice if it was a little more quiet" she thought

The owner of the voice, had her hand crossed over her hip and long blond hair twisted down to her waist, smirking lips and upturned eyes, the image of the little girl can only be described with a childish arrogance, a spoiled princess one may say.

And reflected through her eyes, was the unusual but pitiful looking girl that had just woken from her brief concussion. Her hair greyed from the dirt that had accumulated over time and had grown in a messy manner, her thin dress was a dull grey, at the very least clean. Her body was frail and hair was sprawled onto the smooth stone floor.

Holding her head that was hit by the haughty girls companions, two boys and a girl that stood proudly behind her, one of the boys, with common brown hair, stood in front of the grey haired girl.

Without even a sound, nor a change in expression, she slowly stood up from the cold stone floor, the steel chains around her seemingly frail legs, jingled as they clattered against each other. Her hair was uncut, thus had widely grown and covered her vivid eyes, though usually people would find it annoying, it was perfect for the girl the emotions reflected in her eyes. Not that she felt much from the injury nor feeling towards her bullies either ways.

"Ha!" The young boy in front laughed

"A slave will always be a slave, how ugly! What do you want to do with her next? Ms.Beaufort," he turned and asked the haughty girl behind him, Michelle rose.

With a smirk, she talked while mimicking her mothers manner.

"Haha, so ugly!" She said as she stepped in front of the frail girl.

Her eyes stared at the girls half covered face, seeing as her expression did not change in the least, her expression fell, and looked displeased.

"Why you looking like that!?" Shouting incoherently, her hand yanked onto the girls hair, specifically her fringed and pulled hard. Unexpectedly, her action end up revealing the slave girls face. Her different colour eyes, one dark blue with a purple hue another dark black, her irises stood out and greatly contrasted her hair colour and had depths like the night. Beautiful enough to be mesmerizing.

Michelle's expression was bewildered at first, but then twisted into a red and angry colour, without a warning, her remaining hand swung wide and slapped onto the girls face. A loud sound reverberated along the halls, the few servants that walked past completely ignored the violence.

The servants could only ignore as they lacked status, on top of that, they were only children, that can't even be considered preteens, no matter how bad they tried to "bully" another, it wouldn't be worse than the "bullying" amongst the adults.

However, one of the young maids, couldn't help but glance at them as she walked past, her expression was pitying, as well as hesitation. As if she wanted to stop it, her footsteps stopped, but in less than 10 seconds, another maid nudged her from behind. The maid from behind was much older, hair starting to grey and wrinkles forming, she sadly shook her head and pushed the young maid along and they both silently walked away.

The slave girl, even after the slap, did not say a thing, her fringe fell back again and with neither sadness or anger, her eyes peered through her fringe to look at the young miss holding her reddened hand, as if she's in a lot of pain.

It was only a mattered of fact that it hurt, after all, she used the whole of her hand to, both palm and fingers, to slap against her face, but no matter how you look at it, the slave girl should be in much more pain as her soft cheek started to redden, but not enough to swell.

"It hurts! My hand hurts!" The young miss shrieked loudly and a maid quickly came along to cool her hand with a wet handkerchief.

Michelle and her companions glared at the girl, snatching the handkerchief, the girl spoke again,

"You! What you going to do about this!" She unreasonably blamed the young girl that she slapped, her eyes darted at the Browne haired boy that had injured the slaves shoulder before.

"Rand, she's so ugly, why don't you make it better?"

The boy, Rand, immediately understood what she meant, and walked forward, but at that moment, a hand fell onto his shoulder. He turned around and eyed the persona that stopped him.

"Isn't this enough? She may be a slave, but this is too much," behind him was a young boy, no older than eight, like Michelle had blond hair and his eyes were brown with a red hue.

"Huh? Who do you think you are! What's it got to do with you?!"

Rand exclaimed angrily, he was trying to get on Michelle's favour, and this boy was getting in his way!

"That's right! This is Michelle Beauforts slave! Who do you think you are to get in her way!" The other girl, standing behind Michelle, also started to insult the young boy.

The young man looked at her arrogantly and spoke in the same manner.

"My name is Alex Solz-Genus, also miss Michelles cousin! As if I could keep watching my blood relative carry on such a disgusting act!" He looked coldly at Michelle that stood with an angry face.

"You! We may be cousins, but how dare you say that Im disgusting!" Michelle was terribly furious, and felt humiliated by Alexes words. But Alex could have cared less, and snorted at her words.

"My father says that the nobles responsibility is to protect the weak! To abuse your power and bully the weak, can you still be a noble?!" Alex replied, as if trying to mirror his fathers words.

Michelle's fury was further ignited, and her angered repaired became slightly spluttered.

"You... You! Your father is just slightly close to the royalty! I heard from mother, that he just boot licked his way towards wealth! And you say I should be ashamed!?"

At this point, the prideful young man couldn't keep his cool, his respectful father has be insulted as having "boot licked" his way. It was simply unacceptable.

"How dare you insult my father!!" Alex was furious, fiery magic seeped out from him, a redness glowed out from him and shaded his hair red, Michelle's seeing the boy in front of him, as if he may just burst into flames, was terribly frightened by the sight.

Her companions, likewise was shocked and feet were already stumbled backwards.

The slave girl, did not say a word, her covered eyes reddened as it reflected the flames that was covering the boy like amour. Without saying a word, she just stood there, as if the sight wasn't all that rare to her. No, perhaps it's more correct to say, it wasn't all the frightening.

At that moment a deep voice boomed through the hallways.

"What is all this commotion!?"

A middle aged man, with a straight back and tall figure, strode into scene, though his body was not "macho" nor was it wide, his straight and oppressive atmosphere overwhelmed the people around.

At this sight, Alex immediately cooled down and his magic was finally suppressed,

"Father!" He exclaimed in a shocked manner.

"Alex! You should know better than to use magic in a place like this!" His father scolded strictly.

"I'm sorry father, however I only lost it, due to my cousin here bullying a weak slave and insulting you father!" Alex, replied and tried to desperately justify the reason he lost control of his magic.

His father narrowed his eyes at him, and spoke in a low tone.

"Even so, you shouldn't lose control of your magic, I told you, losing yourself, is losing your power, a power that is not controlled can only bring chaos, don't tell me you've forgotten my words?"

Alex, lowered his head, to him, his fathers words are law, as they always held some truth, he felt ashamed that he allowed himself to lose control and could only reply so.

"No father, I have not forgotten your words."

After seeing his son truly regret his actions, he nodded his head, only to scan over Michelle's and her companions thereafter. His eyes were cold and reprimanding, Michelle and the others, could only shut their mouths and cower under him as they teared.

His eyes then swept over the slave girl standing only some steps away.

"This must be the bullied slave Alex talked about" he thought to himself.

It was not obvious, but a small amount of pity appeared in his heart, even though they are relatives, he lives in an entirely different kingdom where slavery is banished, a scenario where there are slaves or abused slaves are a rare sight for him.

The slave girl neither flinched or cowered, but she did not emit arrogance or fear, she held her hands together and looked a tired, no, lifeless. Her cheek was now bright red from the slap, but still kept her mouth shut.

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"Sir Solz-Genus, what's the matter? Were you not waiting in the guest chamber?"

Not far, came another tall man, his figure as tall as Alex's father, but but was slightly fatter, not enough fat enough to comment on, but enough to be discerned by the eye.

Michelle immediately ran up to her father and clutched onto her faiths clothes, with tears in her eyes, she looked up to her fathers face.

"Chelly? my dear, what's the matter?" Seeing his daughters teary expression, he became worried.

"dad... Daddy, cousin Alex is bullying me!" Michelle exclaimed while acting frightened.

"What!?" Sir daddy was immediately shocked and locked his eyes with Alex.

"Young Alex! Even if you are my half brothers son, but it does not mean you can bully my daughter!" He immediately scolded in fury, Alex stood his ground and did not cry or flinch. In front of his father, or for himself, he did not feel that he should cower or apologies for correcting the wrong.

Seeing that he did not seem to regret a thing, Michelle's father grew furious, he stepped forward as grab Alex, but in an instant, Alexes father blocked his way.

Standing firm in front of his son, Edan Solz-Genus spoke.

"Sir Beaufort, whether or not my son had wronged your daughter, I believe it's still not in your place to reprimand my son." He glared icily at his brother.

"Furthermore..." He carried on

"I heard from my son that your daughter was abusing this weak young girl..." He gestured at the slave that had yet to say a word.

"For your daughter to be flaunting her authority like that, and hurting the weak, looks like you have not been educating the younger generations properly. How disgusting."

His insults was like a smack in the face, humiliating his character, Michelle's father could not help but flare up.

"WHO ARE YOU TO JUDGE HOW EDUCATED MY DAUGHTER IS, THAT...!" With his skin fuming red like its on fire, he jabbed his finger at the slave girl.

"THAT! IS MEARLY A SLAVE, WHAT DOES IT MATTER HOW MY DAUGHTER TREATS IT, REMEMBER SIR Solz-Genus, THIS IS THE COUNTRY OF RANZION, PEOPLE LIKE YOU, FROM THE COUNTRY OF ZEICHTERRA, IS NOT WELCOME HERE, TAKE YOUR EQUALITY GIBBERISH SOMEWHERE ELSE."

Finishing his words, Michelle's father huffed and puffed, as if he bellowed all that in one breath.

Alex's father scowled at him, whilst Alex felt deep anger at his words, he truly felt the disgusting character in his so called uncle for the first time. But his father didn't speak, so it was not place for him to speak either.

"Looks like talking to you is worthless." Alex's father swiftly turned around, he looked at his son that clenched his mouth shut despite the anger in his eyes.

Then moved his eyes towards the young slave girl, Alex's followed his eyes and looked at the slave as well. He felt pity for her and wanted to bring her out of here, but knew that even his father couldn't do much unless his uncle decided to let her go. This is after all a different country, whilst in it, he had to abide to its laws. Taking away as slave is the same as stealing, and he couldn't yet afford to do that.

His father shook his head.

"Alex, we're leaving. Sir Beaufort, about our matters... I'll come back next month during the party."

Alex reluctantly nodded and walked away with his father. The plump looked furious, but he couldn't afford block his way either, the matter on hand was too important and he could only wait till tomorrow.

Before he left, he glanced at the young slave girl, that observed him through the peeks of her hair, he caught the last glimpse of her deep, yet vivid eyes, engraving that colour in his mind, he left with his father.

Michelle's father, after they left, saw the girl looking towards their direction, the fury in his heart had not settled yet, he stomped towards the girl and smacked her face hard, unlike Michelle, he was a full grown man, the force of his slap cannot compare, the girl immediately fell to the ground, her cheek swelled and bruised, the pain squeezed tears out of her and she clenched her teeth, enduring he pain.

"DAMN SLAVE, WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT?! SOMEONE! SEND HER TO BE..." As he was about to exclaim his punishment, a hurried voice came from behind.

"Ma...master, a letter from the capital has come..." The owner of the voice was a young maid, she hastily bowed and presented the letter on a silver tray with both hands.

"QUIET! CANT YOU SEE THAT I'M BUSY!!" He bellowed angrily at the unwelcome interruption.

But the maid keep talking as she stuttered.

"It! It's from the Brandon family!" She trembled, if this didn't work, then she'll probably be punished.

"The Brandsons?" Hearing the name, he was momentarily shocked, and quickly gestured the maid to hand the letter to him.

"Hurry give the letter to me!" He exclaimed and snatched the letter out from the maids hands.

He looks at the seal and signature, verifying that the crest was valid, he took the letter knife from the maid and quickly opened the letter.

Looking through the letter, his face suddenly beamed, as if all that happened had washed away in an instant.

"Haha, good news! This is certainly good news! Wheres my wife, we must prepare leave immediately!"

"Daddy, what's the good news?" Michelle blinked her eyes and asked.

"Oh, Chelly, it's certainly good news, come! Come with me!" He cheerily said.

But Michelle frowned slightly.

"But daddy, you promised to bring me and my friends to shopping today! You said you would buy anything I want since it's my birthday party next month!!" She complained whilst pouting.

Seeing his daughters expression, he became a bit flustered,

"It's alright Chelly, we're not going right away, there's a specific date. And it's not until a few months, we can go shop to your hearts content." He beamed at his daughter.

Michelle's smile brightly and pulled his dad's sleeves.

"Then let's go! Now!"

Dragging his dad away, her friends followed after, leaving the slave girl behind in the hall.

She had already stopped crying and staggered from the floor, she touched her cheek, on to reflexively move her hand away.

"Ouch!" Her cheek not only swelled but the colour had changed to purple. The fact that a 7 year old managed to not pass out showed her endurance.

The elder maid that had handed in the letter, quickly jogged to her side and held a wet cloth against her face.

"Mika, don't touch it, we have to cool it down first." She softly said.

" miss Julia, I've brought the first aid kit," behind her came a young man, dressing in a butler suit. His eyes landed onto Mika, where her hands shivered and clenched onto her skirt.

"Good, quickly Mika, come with me, we go to another room to treat your injuries, it's not appropriate here. Chris, you come too," She quickly pulled the young girl along to one of the servants room in the east side of the mansion.

The east side is mainly where the servants reside, so the nobles and aristocrats are unlikely to go there.

Sitting on a short wooden stool, Mika allowed the old maid to treat her. With Julia's movements were swift as she placed the bruise on her cheek as first priority.

"Miss Julia, how's Mika?" the butler, Chris, had followed along and looked at the girls face worriedly. His hair was a deep brown, and young face clearly showed that he was still in his mid teens.

"The bruise of the face probably won't go for at least 2 months, and the shoulder injury isn't that bad fortunately, and the bleeding has stopped, she has some scratches too, but..." She stopped there and looked at Mika's expressionless face.

"They are already partially healed... as always." She said with an odd expression, since Mika has come, she realised that this seemly frail girl, not only has endurance that an average child or even adult wouldn't have, her wounds heals many times faster than usual.

Chris nodded at her words, he's known Mika since she became the Beauforts property and considering his closeness with Julia, had accompanied her to treat Mika a few times, and he naturally knew. Though it seems that other than them, no one else knew, Chris and Julia didn't mention it to anyone either. They were afraid that if it entered the Beauforts family's ears, that they will do even worse things to young Mika.

He looked at Mikas flurry ears that was tilting downwards, they were not like cat ears or dog ears, usually those were stationed nearer the top of their heads, not right where the human ears usually are. There are also beast men where the ears are at the side of their heads, but those are usually gills of the fish men, or other scaled animals. Elves don't have furry ears either, not to mention Mikas ears are many times larger.

When she was bought, they were told that it was a mutation from when she was born, but Chris couldn't help but suspect that she has a different race that allows her to heal her injuries so quickly.

"With your capabilities, the cheek bruise might heal much quicker," said Julia as she washed the cloth used to cleanse her wounds.

Mika nodded a few times.

"... Thank you" she whispered.

Julia smiled slightly, the girl rarely talked, and when she does, it was short, but honest.

"We've always done this since you've come here, what is there to thank now?"

Mika also smiled quietly, the amount of people she can let her guard down around was few, but she truly felt that the few she has was precious.

"I had that dream again," she said in a hushed voice, as if trying mystify her words,it's was one of the few topics where she talked lengthy about.

"That dream that you have every few months?"

This time it was Chris to reply, Julia listened but focused in cleaning Mikas Injuries instead.

Mika nodded again, and her smiled widened marginally.

"I saw some people this time..."

She spoke with a slight excitement in her voice.

"People? Not dragons, mermaids, talking flowers and the such?"

Christ asked, he's heard of all sorts of weird or amazing things about her dreams, but it's the first time he heard about people.

Mika kept speaking

"Uh huh, they had darker skin and most of them had black hair..."

"Black hair? Could it be the tribe from the south east?" He thought about the image he had of Mikas descriptions.

"Some of them were normal villagers, some where rich, but they all wore robes. I remember seeing some of them diving deep in the waters for hours without breathing."

"Hours underwater? Only people of the fishmen race can do that... Normal people can't..." He churned his brained to imagine what kind of people she was taking about.

"I dove in with them, and fought with all sorts of weird monsters, there was a talking shark even." Mika spoke nonstop, these weird dreams of hers were the only thing that seem to churn her interest to talk about.

For the whole time, Mika kept talking about her recent dream in the most detail as she could, and Chris was spinning his mind into imagining what kind of things she was talking about, this was already a common occurrence every 2 or three months when Mika had her dreams. Even in her slave life, she found people to rely on, and found bliss in this.

On that night, slept whilst thinking about her dreams, the pain on her cheek made her feel bitter about her life, but the bandages re wrapped around her arm, reminded her of Julia and Chris, and all they resentment seem to almost wash away.

That short dream she had when she fainted, she recalled it, the colour, the pain, the scent, the cold, and overall, the man. That short but special experience she had when she lost her family, and before she became a slave.

How she just quietly kept her iris against his.

She didn't know what the man is thinking, who he is or where who's coming from. But she spoke only few words.

"Why are you crying?" Her voice quivered and there and then, she fell asleep, under her fatigue, under the deafening rain, under the dreary clouds that lower her ceiling. she fell asleep.

The next thing she remembered, was that she woke up in a cave, her major wounds were bandaged and she slept with a blanket over her. But the man was no where to be found.

She stopped reminiscing, and cuddled her blanket over herself slightly, focusing on sleeping.

"It be nice if i could have a nice dream tonight," again, she prayed for sweet dreams in the 3 years she spent as a slave.