Twenty-two years later.
Nelyn's bare feet stroked the floor as her body raced with adrenaline. Swathed fists clenched in defence – and indeed, defiance – she angled them, aimed...and they met their mark. The large, red, beaten bag sagged in defeat, the biggest crease in the middle further splitting, like a smile. She slumped back, rocking on her heels, then suddenly caught herself in the mirror. Her daily workout was over. She always ended with a session on the punchbag – it kept her calm. She peeled off her gloves, grabbed a towel and headed for the shower.
She was 17 years old, almost 18, almost a woman. This meant she would have to leave her parents to do service in the Red Army for a year. God knows she'd trained hard for it – her body was such that she was often mistaken for a boy. Additionally, she was tall, tall for her age, tall even for a woman. No wonder she couldn't get a date. Although, if she asked Deimin, she was sure he'd be interested...but he was more concerned with challenging her to fights than taking her out. Not that she minded. He was her best friend and she loved him like that.
After the shower, she was drying her long hair in the mirror when she noticed her roots were coming through. Damn it. This meant she would have to fork out a 20 for a dye-job on her hair. It wouldn't be so bad if one, her roots weren't a stark contrast to her hair and two, hair dye was sold separately. Her parents, rulers of Haven, had (rather stupidly, Nelyn thought) outlawed that sort of thing years ago. A blonde Havener was a rare thing, not seen since the days of Mar.
She stopped.
Mar.
She shook her head, wondering why that name struck her to the core, both chilling her like the winter winds and warming her like the hot sun. The dreams hadn't returned, not yet. They hadn't made an appearance in a while, much like Mar himself. He had another name – a more common, human name – but as to what it was it was lost to the winds. She'd learned about him in Final School History (Advanced); it was the only thing that stuck with her, and indeed, the only thing she learned. Nelyn wasn't a scholar by nature; that much she knew.
She left after dressing, wrapping a towel round her hair, covering the roots especially.
~x~
"We need to tell her," Archduke Zainen stated calmly.
"No, we don't need to tell her," his wife, the Archduchess Roah, replied.
"She's nearly 18. She's going to find out from someone – so why not us?"
"Because she'll turn! She will turn –"
"She's our daughter. You wouldn't...you wouldn't condemn her, would you?"
"You know how it is." The ageless woman's voice was as hard as her expression. "Enemies of Haven die. That's the way it's been for 30 years, and that's the way it'll always be."
Zainen sighed inwardly. Roah, his wife, the real ruler of Haven – a more matriarchal society since Veger, though no less of a dictatorship – was once again exercising her stubborn resolve. They had to tell Nelyn something without shattering the delicate relationship they'd cultivated with her over the past five or six years. They definitely had to tell her before she turned 18 and did her compulsory year's service. But how to tell her without losing her, and indeed, when.
He looked up and jumped saw Nelyn there, her face wearing a thousand expressions, her hair in a towel. Zainen saw her shoulders slump, her mouth twist, but she didn't move. Not an inch.