Prologue

She tucked her hands deep inside her pockets and tried to make herself as small as possible. It was a fable attempt, the wind still found her, swept right through her and made her blood freeze.

The chill brought back memories of a different time and the pain that seared through her veins was so grueling it almost made her cry out. She shut her eyes as tight as she possibly could, trying her hardest to keep the images from invading her mind, but it was no use, she was already too far gone…

The sound of the horn, the bright lights, the horrible, crashing, heartbreaking sound of metal against metal. The old blood mixing with the new. The voices, the loud voices and the piercing pain. A body breaking. A heart breaking. A soul breaking.

She was standing probably twenty feet away, not being able to force herself to walk any closer. She remained where she was as she slowly lifted her head and let her eyes rest on every single person in front of her. They were so many, so different, yet they had this in common, but to her, from where she was standing, they all looked the same. They had the same look in their eyes when they looked at her, the same pity seeping from their every word, the same ignorance to what she was feeling. She couldn't feel, she was too young, she didn't know how she was supposed to feel about all of this.

That was what they all thought of her and she knew it, she could read all of them so well. If they only knew how little their supposedly comforting words were helping maybe they would say nothing. Maybe they would just shut up and leave her alone.

"I understand this must be hard for you…I know how you feel…"

She wished that they would just leave her alone.

As the wind swept her hair in front of her eyes again she made no effort to remove it. It's just one more wall for me to hide behind, she thought, and just one more thing for them to disapprove of.

She watched as six of them walked closer. She watched them grab the straps and she watched the lower the coffin into the ground. She watched every single moment so thoroughly that she knew that she would be able to replay the day's events in her head for years to come, but she didn't look away. She couldn't look away.

The coffin was lowered slowly and for every inch she felt like a piece of her soul was going with it. It was like someone reached out from the grave and grabbed her heart, pierced it with their nails, gripping and tearing, trying to break it as much as possible.

The only thing though, it couldn't do much more damage to her. She was broken, shattered, and the pieces had scattered in the wind many days ago. She remained, but only as a shell, as a fragment of her old self, of the way she used to be, and at that moment, it felt like it that part of her would stay buried forever.

It took another hour for the earth to swallow the coffin completely and only then could she look away. She had no idea of where she was going or how she was going to get there. She knew that despite everything, she wanted someone to save her. She wanted someone to find the pieces and put her back together again.

She knew all of this but she didn't believe that it would happen. Her faith had disappeared along with that coffin. The last remaining piece had left her and now she was all alone. Completely alone.