Daisies
Hi everybody !
So uh, it's not the first time I try to translate one of my own stories in english but usually it was only some drabbles. I take some risks with this one which a lot longer but I really wanted to try so here it is.
So as you surely understood english is not my mother tongue and there will probably be some mistakes but I did my best. I know I really should get an english beta but I'm so lazy about it... Sorry. If anyone find this too hard to read and have some time to correct it, my arms are wide open !
I hope you'll like it anyway.
oOo
Around Mourmansk, april 1853
All around, there is nothing. Many don't understand why some call it a desert : the desert is very hot, full of scorching sand, so say the idiots.
Maybe, but what she sees is emptiness, large areas of frozen earth covered in snow and the blizzard which bites her eyes. Except the color, it's all the same.
She doesn't really remember how she landed here in the first place, but she knows her name is Shoshana and if Shoshana doesn't find a shelter soon, she's going to catch death.
Which would only be justice after all, since death already catched her.
She remembers she had parents, a long time ago, a man and a woman from some bankrupt aristocracy who fleed from Prussia to find shelter in the immensity of the russian empire. She remembers she went north, always north and her fear when she thought in the dead of winter that the sun will never rise again.
She was six then. She is fourteen now and she is still terrified when she imagines that one day their star may drown into this ocean of darkness and that unbearable cold flow over the world and her entire being forever.
Her parents are dead, of that, she is sure. She still sees them running on the beach struggling against the squalls and the rain and being swallowed up by the raging sea. Thew were looking for her that day while she was warm and safe savouring vodka with her friends, waiting for the storm to go away. When she catched sight of them through the window of the cabin, she had only been able to scream their name as they probably screamed hers. Useless. So terribly vain. And the tears. How could she see the wave through the rain and her tears? She's not certain, it's like... it was like a dream.
More like a nightmare though, when fearing for her life they lost theirs.
At least, she can tell herself that they loved her but in her actual situation it doesn't help much. She does not believe that they look upon her. She believes that what is dead stays dead and remains in the dark for eternity.
She tries to put order in her thoughts but how to do that when you don't even know where you are or where you're going? So she focuses. She tells herself she's going on the roads far away, on the China or South America's roads, on the roads at the edge of the world and even further if she has to.
"I'm on the road," she sings quietly, making her chaped lips crack. "No, I'm the road which heads to infinity and doesn't wanna die."
She has learned russian in two monthes only. Children easily retain this kind of things but people always told her that she was amazing, that she'll make the difference. Some of them were even whispering that she will marry the local best fisherman's son and he was almost a king around there. She saw things bigger. She used to see herself engaged to some prince's son, to the tsar's son or even to the one of the man who would rule the universe. He had poped up one night in her dreams; she had thought he was funny.
She is out of strenght but she can't stop. If the road ended in the middle of nowhere, how could we travel? Then she walks, one step after another with no assurance that she is not going in circles. The more she pushes back her limits, the more she feels wings growing on her back. Will she become a martyr? Will she become a angel? She doesn't care, she won't give up.
Her sealskin coat is getting heavy and her forehead makes her suffer. She didn't know that frostbites could spread this much. Gradually, the pain become unbearable and she feels with relief some warm liquid slide down her face. It's pleasant.
Before her some little bright red fancies are blooming. Really her road will be prettier if it's flowery and moreover it's cute some red in all this white.
She's delirious. It hurts too bad, she's loosing so much blood. The fever rises out of nowhere. Is that her or her skin's turning grey?
She collapsed but it's okay, the road will keep on living in her dream.
Then the dark and a call, thrown over the howling of the wind :
"Konbanwa !"
oOo
She didn't expect to wake up someday and even less to discover in front of her some boy her age. He's got big black eyes, is slightly snub-nosed and his long hair tickle his pale neck. He smiles too.
The first thing she thinks about him is that he's beautiful when he's smiling.
"Hello," he says with his calm voice, never breaking the charm. "My name is Gabriel. What is yours?"
"Road," she answers instinctively and that name rolls on her tongue on a familiar way, like it has always belonged to her.
"It's a funny name," he notices, laughing. "But I like it. So welcome in the family, Road."
The second thing she thinks about him is that he's even more beautiful when he's lauging.
"Family?" she asks, surprised.
"If my father brought you here, it's because he expects you to stay with us forever."
The third things she thinks about him is that she would like to kill him. She tells him just that and adds that the road will never be a prisoner, that she will engulf anyone who will be on her way. He laughes again and reassures her about their purposes. She would be free as a bird but bound to them by an unbreakable link. He tells her the story of the Noah family and how his dad had become the first of their generation and how much he would want to be one of them himself. He tells her she is the second and many others will follow to help them purify the world.
She kisses him immediately : she knew it, she finally found the son of the man who would rule the universe.
oOo
She looks with delight at this grey skin which offered a new identity to her. She likes it because it's not white as the cold nor black as the darkness. Perfect for her who has always sailed between both without falling in either of them.
It conforts her, she is angry. She discovered that there is a second son named Mana and she hates him. He's too... human, he doesn't understand any part of their plan and it makes Gabe and the Earl incredily sad. She flirts everyday with murder urges and she yields to them sometimes. She found a new passion for red and she loves watching it seeping from the wounds she gives but none of these pathetic cockroachs she kills without regrets succeed in satisfying her.
She gets over it by playing with Lero : it's so easy to drive him crazy. Time to time she plays some other forbidden games with Gabe in the castel's rooms. It's their secret.
She likes his company. He just confessed to her. Sure, love is grey, it's okay with her anyway.
oOo
The years pass by. Gabriel's getting old, she's not. She never regretted joining the family but still she would have liked to know these ages when women are so beautiful.
Gabriel says he doesn't care so she keeps hope.
And one day the miracle happens.
She would like to ease his pain. It's been a long time since she understood that she cheated because the cold had anesthetized hers. Even so she can do nothing but hold his hand as the marks come out one by one.
Suddenly, he's one of them. He's getting up straight away and start to waltz with her across the room and let her go only to improvise some hymn to joy on his piano. She listens to him, her breath taken away and for the first time she thinks she truly loves him.
The same night, Mana goes away. He wears an awful clown outfit which represents the joke his life had become according to him. He tells Gabriel he loves him but cannot follow him in those dark waters. He tells him he will never stop going onward but will wait for him at every crossroads until they meet again.
When he's gone, Gabriel or rather the Fourteenth is devastated. Afterward, he will remain haunted by the ghost of a clown who vanished on a summer night.
That's what will cause their fall.
oOo
When they betrays them by neutralizing the Ark, neitheir the Earl or Road is surprised but it hurts nonetheless. While fighting against him, she thinks of all the good moments they had together and this happiness which could have lasted beyond the end of the world. When he dies, they loose a son and a lover. When she stares at his corpse, later, she decides she didn't love him : the sight of his blood doesn't satisfy her either.
oOo
The Fourteenth is replaced by others and Road finds in Tyki a new playmate. She forgets him and tries less and less to confort the Earl who didn't.
Then they hear that he's still alive. The Earl is mad. She doesn't really care but she looks for Gabe to please him.
Everyone's going nuts, she knows the end is near. Her dreams are each day more greedy for blood.
oOo
Allen Walker. The vessel of the traitor's name is Allen Walker. The first time she lays her eyes on him, she already knows she loves him.
Inevitably she reminds her of Gabriel. She realizes she should have loved him a little and since she doesn't know what hatred is, she's happy to see him after all this time.
But above all he reminds her of the reason why she chose this name, this pure white road dotted with little crimson daisies.
And in her dream, the only thing she wants right now is to taint this white-hair boy with some blood.
Oh yes, that would be so cute.
oOo
That's all.
Thank you for your time ! Please let me know if you liked it anyway =D