Over time, I got used to my isolation. I don't mean to say I grew to like it, nor do I mean I never felt it. But after some time, I forgot what it meant to have family, friends.

I ended up with a decent system. Through wielding dust, I could make a shelter from stone wherever I pleased. A campfire needed only desert scrub and a snap of my fingers. Luckily, my father taught me navigation through the stars. I've grown to recognize certain landmarks near consistent sources of food and water, and several of Vacuo's more permanent settlements.

I've also crafted a flute from the desert stone, to keep me occupied. I at first sung the songs my mother taught me, but my voice did the melodies no justice. Even so, I could get no more than a handful of notes in before tears began to fall.

As I never learned much more than rudimentary weaving, and the search for gems and stones of value was purely up to chance, I resorted to selling cheap stone crafted into people, animals, whatever I found would sell. They were nowhere near as valuable as the Inyan's cloth and gems, but I was alone, so I didn't need as much money anyway. I would use my money earned for food and water, taking time to bathe whenever and wherever I could. Sometimes, on the luckiest of nights, I could find a cheap inn or a nice family to take me for the night.

It was one of these nights I learned a part of who I am. A part I fear I'll never learn to accept.

I think I was fifteen. I had been travelling most of the day. Summer had long since passed, and so even at the Sun's most intense I was still comfortable travelling, so long as I had enough water. I walked along the edge of a plateau, as I often do when searching for a settlement, river, or even a rare patch of greenery.

The Sun had set, and the countless specks of light painting the darkness began to stretch out above me, Remnant's shattered Moon among them. I held my hands behind me, palms to the ground, and summoned a flat seat of stone. I plopped backward onto it, unscrewing the cap of my remade stone jug.

I drank to the last drop.

I pulled back from my sip, and held my hand out under the lip of my jug.

Nothing.

My heart sunk, and I looked around in desperation. The desert was black. Yet amid this darkness, a single cluster of lights below the horizon.

The walk took about half an hour, during which the skies had turned from dusk to total darkness. As I approached, I saw the lights to be from a farmhouse, one on the front porch and two on the back deck, which overlooked a small field with a shed at the far corner. Two windows facing me gave a warm glow through their curtains.

I considered whether I should knock. After all, it was past dark, and with all the criminals and conmen running round, Vacuo isn't exactly known for its hospitality. But I figured I, a fifteen year old girl, wasn't all too threatening. All I wanted was a refill of water, and if the criminals and conmen were the ones inside the house, I've definitely defended myself against worse.

I heard shuffling inside the house. A shadow passed in front of the peephole, and I heard a voice.

"Cerys, were you expecting a friend?"

A second voice whose words I couldn't make out.

Eventually, I heard the doorknob. The door pulled back a bit, and a grey-haired woman's face peeked around it.

I smiled. "Hi! I'm... well, I'm a nomad. I live in the desert, and I was just wondering if I could stop in to refill my water?"

The old woman's eyes narrowed. I began to strategize my route to the hose I saw coiled up in back of the house.

From behind her, another woman. She was much younger, perhaps only a year or two older than myself. Curly fuschia hair tumbled past her shoulders, and was matched by a basic tee shirt. Her baggy, tough overalls were light blue, tinged tan by years of farmwork. My heart fluttered when we made eye contact.

"Let her in, gran! She won't hurt us, I'm sure of it!" Cerys pleaded. She stepped over to me, arms outstretched as if seeking an embrace. "Come on in. I'll feed you too. Do you need your clothes washed?"

"How long do you plan to keep her?" Cerys's grandmother questioned, as if I was some mangy dog that had wandered into their living room.

"Gran, this girl lives out in the desert, alone! She deserves a bit of hospitality from time to time!" Cerys protested. She started with sudden realization. "We have that spare bed we never use!"

"Fine. She's your responsibility," the old woman concluded with a dismissive wave of her hand.

I was caught off guard by the girl's kindness, my eyes widening and words having trouble escaping my lips. "Oh... thank you, but if it's too much trouble, I can really just get water and go," I finally offered. "Maybe, well, there is that shed in the back..."

Cerys shook her head, and bounded over to me. "I won't have you sleep with the pigs!" she protested. She smiled brightly, pushing up her rosy, freckled cheeks. "Come on, I'll show you around!"

She took my hand in hers, and guided me around her modest home. She then allowed me to shower, taking my dress and cloak to be washed. The machine rumbled in the background as I ate the meal she prepared for me, a steak of ham, with a side of canned beans and fruit. It was the heartiest meal I could remember eating, perhaps in my entire life. The clothes she gave me to wear while mine washed were rough and scratchy, a few sizes too big. But I didn't mind.

As I ate, we talked. My heart swelled when she spoke, and I found myself seeking her smile, telling jokes and giving compliments and gratitude when I could. She was beautiful, I thought. We talked long after I finished my meal, taking a break only when she moved my dress and cloak to the white box apparently used for drying clothes.

"Want to go somewhere a bit more comfortable?" She asked as she cleaned my plate in the kitchen sink.

"Sure! Is it fine if I sit there?" I asked, pointing to the couch.

"I was thinking we could go to my room," she quietly replied. "It's getting late, after all."

She guided me to her room, and pushed four pillows upright where her bed met the wall. She sat with her back against them, and beckoned me to sit next to her. We began to talk again. Half an hour or so passed, and her arm was around me. Another, and my head rested on her chest. Her hand, so warm and soft, gently took mine.

The warmth from her hand seemed to radiate throughout my body. I felt so incredibly at peace, relieved to be sharing this moment with such a beautiful girl after being alone for so long. A strange feeling arose in my chest as she wrapped her other arm around me, and kissed my forehead.

"Hey, can I admit something?" Cerys finally asked.

"Oh... yeah, what is it?" I nervously answered.

"I want you to stay," she finally admitted. "I know gran won't allow it, but I want you to stay here. The desert is dangerous, and I... I think you're really cute."

"You think I'm cute?" I asked, the strange feeling spreading to my limbs and rising into my throat. It was warm, a kind of tension? I don't remember. I haven't felt it since.

Cerys nodded.

"You're beautiful," I finally admitted. The area was nice enough, I thought. Maybe I couldn't stay in the farmhouse, but I could settle into a smaller territory, a handful of miles in each direction, visiting her whenever I could.

Cerys lifted my chin, and kissed me.

I won't go into detail about what we did. I was too young to be doing it, and writing it out would just make the pain of what happened that much worse. I remember the seconds of panic as we heard the doorknob twist, the rush to cover ourselves as Cerys's "gran" burst into the room, shouting profanities and wielding a fireplace poker.

"GODS, DAMN IT ALL!" She screamed. "I KNEW I shouldn't have let some VAGRANT into my home!"

"Gran, wait!" Cerys protested.

"NOT A WORD!" The grey-haired woman snapped. "This... lesbian freak of nature seduced you!" her head snapped to me. "GET OUT OF MY HOME!"

Tears welling in my eyes, the tumult of confusion ripping through my mind like a maelstrom, I turned to face Cerys.

"Alexandra... You should leave."

I broke down, face coated in my tears.

"Good girl!" the old woman continued. She lunged forward, grabbing a fistful of my hair and wrenching me off the bed. Despite my protests, she continued until she flung me out the front door, across the porch and into the dirt.

All I could do was sit and sob at the corner of the house, my bare skin providing no destination for the tears to flow. Some time later, I heard the door.

Cerys walked out. Without a word, she laid my clothes and water jug before me. She turned back, and the lights in her home flicked off.

I didn't sleep that night. I remembered when I would go to villages, little things about particular girls stuck out to me- their smiles, the shininess of their hair, even their figures. Yet I just... never noticed boys. I had never thought there was anything wrong with me. But the more I pondered, the more I realized. Every single marriage in the Inyan tribe was between a husband and wife. A husband and wife who would become a mother and father.

Maybe that's nature, I thought. There must be something wrong with me. Some unnatural trait, some moral failure.

A moral failure I thought I could correct.

The next several months, I continued as usual. One thing was different. When I found a settlement to sell in, I'd spent the night with any man who would take me. I wanted to prove to the world, to myself, that I could change. Yet every morning I would slip out before dawn, disgusted with myself and physically sick. I regretted these nights so much that the regret began to weigh me down in the form of exhaustion. I would wander just far enough into the desert to get the settlement out of my sight, and have an uneasy, feverish sleep the rest of the day.

I used to look back on these days and think I was stupid. Now I think naive is a better word for it. The first person in years to show me genuine human contact was taken away from me the first night I met her, the same night I was told I was some... freak of nature. I haven't exactly accepted myself, but at least now I know I can't change.

I was naive, but lucky too. Looking back on it, I could have contracted some horrible illness, been abducted and sold off somewhere -probably separated from Crown Jewel-, or had a child. Any one of those things could have been a death sentence to me. I gave up eventually. The nights I would spend alone, just myself and the suffocating silence of the desert at midnight, soon became the nights I preferred. Often, though I'm embarrassed to admit, I would sculpt from stone the form of a woman's body beside me as I slept.

These lonesome nights passed one after the other, blending together as the years passed behind me.