The shadows darted in and out in front of her. Wherever she turned, they were there. Omnipresent. Like dangerous predators stalking her, ready to strike. Her bare feet lightly touched the ground as she ran through the palace. The beautiful marble walls were splattered with blood. White on red. Red on white. White on red. The fiery red locks she possessed had long since tumbled out of their barrette and flew along behind her. The crimson rays of sunset drifted down from the oculus in the domed roof and dappled her pale neck, reminiscent of something else altogether.
Every door she reached was locked. Her frail hands grasped the knobs with a wild, feral desperation, clawing like a frightnened animal. Tugging until energy drained out of her, like colour bleeding out of her; she was as ghostly as an apparition of war, an angel of death. The blood red ringlets cascaded down her back, akin to a waterfall of the very liquid that flowed through the veins. And each room, the monster was there, what is to come over what it is now.
Andromache's delicate wrists shackled together as she cradled the broken body of her son. (The crown princess was tenderly rocking her newborn son, who wailed like any other newborn child.) Hektor's eyes closed for eternity, grand garments of battle sullied by the dust he was dragged through. (Her heroic brother strode purposefully forwards, kissing his wife goodbye and readying himself for the trials of the day.) King Priam, kneeling in the filthy muck, pleading sadly for his son's corpse, to bury his pride and joy. (Her father stood and the castle's walls, smiling at their momentary victory, proud as ever.) Queen Hecuba chained to the walls, her fine robes dirtied by the filth on the wooden deck, face bent in sorrow and arms straining to reach out and comfort her daughters. (Her mother was seated primly in the banquet hall, haughtily greeting the guests.) Polyxana laid dead upon Achilles' grave, blood pouring from her throat. (Her sassy little sister was dancing through the crowds, delighting everyone.)
Screaming till her throat was raw did her no good. There was no one to hear her, none to sympathise with her, to understand. They were so painfully blind. Couldn't they see it? There was no use locking her in this tower, like an exotic pet. Her job was out there. They only had to listen. (The city was used to hearing her shrieks echoing through the still tranquility of night, her little palms banging on the unforgiving stone walls until the thin skin bled profusely, and still she would not stop.)
She tried to escape again and again, but it never worked. She could not run from herseld. It was ever around her, next to her, beside her, in her, taking over her mind. It gripped her throat tightly to prevent her from making any sounds, extended its tendrils over her mind. It was her. She understood that. In this godforsaken tower, it sealed away old pretty, charming Cassandra, clever blessed Prophetess, and left behind only her, and it. Its bloody maw was gaping, and it waited, and waited, and waited, for the perfect moment, before it rushed forward and swallowed her, picking her apart from the seams until she was not human anymore.