Title: Stare
Character(s): Theresa, Jack of Blades

"Where is the boy?"

Amber firelight danced around the room, casting a shadow over his masked face. It did nothing to mute the vibrancy of his eyes, a shade of gold so much brighter than the fire rapidly consuming the town. A tattered red cloak billowed around him, just a shade duller than the blood pooling around her father's body. She had seen this man before, just the other night in fact, but then he had been a dream, a nightmare.

The blood dripping to her living room floor was all too real.

His voice, smooth as velvet but twice as dark, spoke again. "Theresa? Where is your brother?" he took a few steps closer, his heavy boots hitting the floor with echoing thumps.

Her eyes were wide, blue, and she hoped terribly that they betrayed none of her emotions. Her brother wouldn't be found by this man tonight, her dream told her so, and so far the dreams had never been wrong. Of course, the only way for him to remain hidden, was for her to remain silent. So she stared, meeting his eyes and dashing worries from her mind.

An unseen frown crossed his lips at the blankness that he found reflected in those cerulean pools, and he raised his blade, placing it lightly against the delicate skin of her neck. A house nearby collapsed, the sheer force of it sending waves of heat into that half fallen room occupied by a young girl, and the man responsible for the destruction. Her pig tails were stirred into a flurry by the rush of hot air, but her eyes remained firmly focused on the masked man before her. Annoyance seeped into his skin at her expression, empty and unrelenting.

"Where is he?" he whispered again.

There was no reaction, not even a twitch, and those eyes just kept staring at him. Her mouth was closed tight, lips pressed into a thin line, and the expression looked far from childish on her face. He tilted his head, regarding her coolly, and brought his blade up. She didn't even glance at it, still kneeling there on the floor and looking up at him vacantly.

"Not going to tell me?" he asked. "No? So be it…"

She gasped, the first of noises she had made in awhile, as the sharp edge of the sword slid seamlessly across her face. From one eye to the other in a single line, in one simple action he had taken one of her senses from her. There was pain, of course there was, and if her eyes were still whole in her sockets she knew she'd be crying. She gasped and coughed as her breaths brought smoke into her lungs. Blood and another, jelly-like fluid hit the floor and fell upon the torn remains of her clothing, and the red cloaked man pulled his sword away from her. He watched dispassionately as she gingerly patted her face, near where her eyes once were, contented that her irritating blank stare had been eliminated.

"Are you going to tell me where your brother is?" he asked her again.

She shook her head and lifted it in his general direction, offering nothing more than an empty stare in response.