1"Hello? Uncle?" She walked into the dark hospital-styled house. Every piece of furniture looming was an old friend, and painful reminder. She grimaced when she saw the dining table which doubled on many occasions as an operating counter. She touched an old stain, obviously her blood, then squinted into the darkness again. "Hello?"

"Who's there?"

A prick on the back of her neck and her senses screaming. Reyah blinked, gripping the edge of the operating table in front of her tensely. "Uncle?" She swung herself under the table and to the other side where she darted on top of it and held a knife at the ready.

An old man with bright yellow eyes blinked at her before dropping a salad fork. "Reyah!"

"Uncle!" She slid off of the table and embraced the old man, her eyes burning again. Stupid hormones . . .

"My dear little Reyah," her uncle stroked her hair, then took a step back to look at her, "where have you been all of this time? After that night when I had to set your ribs into place and you had that funny ring you just vanished! Where did you go?"

Reyah sat the old man down next to the grisly table, lighting candled and lanterns to light the place up a little bit. She spoke while she worked. "I'm sorry I left. To tell the truth, I'm not sure it was entirely my decision. That ring I had, the gold one with the little spikes, I took it off of a person I had killed."

Her uncle nodded grimly. "The man who broke your ribs?"

"Yes." Reyah sat down opposite of him, smiling grimly. "After that, I don't know. It all seems fuzzy. I remember when my body first started changing." She looked at her green hand with the sharp black nails. "Not a fun night."

He took the discolored hand in his shaking one. "I thought you looked different, but I thought it was just the light."

Reyah shook her head. "No, this is what I am. That ring did this to me. It wouldn't stop." An unexpected tear welled in her eye. She shook her head fiercely to banish it. "I wanted to take it off, but I wouldn't. There was no reason. I don't know, uncle, it made me a monster!" She started crying, grinding her palms into her eyes to hide the ashamedly sad clearness. "Oh-- damn tears!"

The old man shook his head, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Sh, Reyah. It's okay. I see it's gone now. Everything is back to normal."

Reyah looked up, her dirty face streaked now. "No, I killed--" she choked and gasped out, "people!"

He laughed. "I've killed people too. Never liked it, but that's what you do when you're in this line of ninja. Your mother and father were the two fiercest ninjas I have ever known."

"But they didn't kill for fun!" Reyah shouted, her eyes going the red-purple color again before dropping her face into her hands. "I'm sorry, it's a touchy thing. I think the ring was possessed with the two-tailed lizard demon."

Her uncle started and stood up quickly, grabbing the table for support. "Then you--"

Reyah stood, shaking her head fiercely. "No! At least, I don't think so." She sank into her chair, another wave of tears welling up. "I-- I always meant to tell you, I was never brave enough."

"My little Reyah, you are the bravest little ninja I have ever known."

She looked up gratefully, her eyes shining pink. "Thank you. That-- means a lot." She looked away again, staring at a dancing lamp near the fireplace. "Uncle? Do you remember Neliscay?"

He looked up sharply, then let his head fall again. "I do. She was the most darling little girl. Other than you, she was like a daughter to me."

The tears welled again as Reyah fought to get it out. "I-- everyone loved her. Remember? They thought she was such a sweet, innocent little girl. Darling little Neliscay! Don't we all love her?" She clenched her fists so that blood ran freely from her palms. "I hated her! More than once she pointed me out to people on the streets. 'Look, isn't that Reyah the Outcast?' she would yell. Then people would start attacking me. She was the most horrible little girl!"

The old man sat down in front of his niece, looking confused and sad. "Reyah, you should have told me--"

"No!" Reyah shook her head, tears flying. "How could I? She was the one who ran and told you they were beating me, conveniently after they were done and I was a thread away from death. She danced around me once when they had finished. Danced through the little rivers of my blood that flowed through those stained streets."

Her uncle was silent, watching her.

"You thought she was so wonderful! So darling for coming and getting you to help me. I wanted to tell you, but how do you tell your uncle, more like your father, that the sweet little girl drinking tea out of his cup is a monster? That the cute little creature he sweeps up in his arms and thanks so fervently is the reason his niece is lying broken on this table!" She brought a bleeding fist down on the table, hopping up from hot fury. "I hated her, but you adored her! How do you tell the only person in the world you can love and who loves you back-- how do you tell them something like that? What if they stop loving you? What if they hate you and throw you out on the street and you're left with nobody?"

Her uncle knelt next to her as she collapsed and started sobbing. "I'm so sorry. You're right, I would have taken it badly. It's just-- she seemed like such a nice little girl. I thought she was trying to save you, not throwing you to the wolves!"

Reyah sniffed and scrubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand. "She and her family went missing many years ago. They never found the bodies."

The uncle drew back, rubbing his hands together nervously. "Y--yes! But you were gone by then. How could you-- what happened to her?"

Reyah sniffed. "I'm not proud of what I did, of most of what I've done. I had to leave the town, but my ribs were still hurt. The moment they healed and I had learned how to be stealthy I snuck back into the town and broke into her house." She looked away, gazing through a window at the sliver of moon hanging in the star-speckled sky. "First I tied her up and put a gag on her mouth so she couldn't scream. Then I broke her arms and legs so she couldn't get loose."

The old man took another step back, looking at the flooring and barely listening, but still registering every word out of curious need.

"Her parents woke up." Reyah closed her eyes, reliving the bloody night. Her eyes had turned a funny black color with flecks of purple and rings with red. "I knocked them down and tied them to each other so they couldn't get away. I was laughing a lot." She swallowed as if the laughter was still bubbling in her throat. "I started with the father, gutting him and choking him with his own intestines. The mother was screaming. I knelt next to her and told her that this is what she gets for bringing such evil into the world. Then I slit open her stomach and bled her to death, burying the knife inside of her stomach so the officials could pull it out as if she had another baby." Reyah looked away and shuddered, every detail springing to life.

Her uncle was sitting flat on the floor, obviously in shock but not wanting to miss a word or even a whisper.

"I turned on Neliscay, who was sobbing as loudly as she could through her gag. The first thing I did was grab those blonde little curls and cut them off, peeling off most of her scalp as I went. Then I slit open her nostrils and gouged out her big blue eyes. She was screaming and her whole body was shaking."

She stopped and burst into gasping sobs, tears racking her entire body. "I-- I'm sorry! I enjoyed it though. Her pain was the most amazing thing I had ever experienced." Reyah stopped and sobbed for a few more moments, then struggled on with the commentary.

"She was completely disfigured, so I began killing her. I dug into her stomach and began pulling out organs, some still trying to function outside of her body. I remember every noise she made when I started pulling out her heart and her lungs."

Her uncle pitched forward onto the floor, moaning. "Reyah . . . keep going. Tell me everything."

She took a gasping breath and plunged on. "I held her beating heart in my hand for a moment. I remember wishing that I hadn't gouged out her eyes so I could see the last rays of light leaving them. But I felt the heart stutter to a stop, which was possible ten times better. Her body was completely still beneath me and I-- I . . ." Her eyes had turned a shining, insane red. She covered them frantically and tried to stem the burst of tears that had begun to flow again. "I don't know what came over me! It was the demon-- I swear! I ate her heart, still hot with her blood that had been pumping a moment ago. I laughed as the blood ran down my face, the rest of me already soaked."

Her uncle gagged, putting a hand to his mouth. "What then?"

Reyah shuddered, grinding her teeth and clawing at the floor with her claw-like nails. "I took the bodies and burned the house, burying them inside a cave by collapsing it. I secretly hoped someone would find her and see how sweet and pretty she was now that I was done with her! Then--" she stopped and slumped against the wall, exhausted. "Then I left and went to wander, satisfied with myself. That's it, that's my crime in this town. That's their just deserts for what they, and she, did to me."

The old man sighed and wrapped an arm around her shoulder as she sobbed pitifully. "I know it wasn't easy, my dear little Reyah. It was a long time ago. I forgive you. I have a harder time forgiving her."

Reyah sighed and hugged her uncle. "I killed auntie too."

"What?" He withdrew violently, ashen.

She sighed. "Tonight is a night of confession, so I'm going to spill everything. It was a mercy kill, uncle!" She saw how white he was. "She was in pain! She was sick. Plus, she made me her servant. I-- hated her for it. I was unstable. Half of me said kill her because she's sick and in pain. The other half said kill her because she abuses you. I followed both but went with the first."

He sighed and dropped his head into his hands, listening on.

"I slipped more and more medication into her food until she overdosed, then spilled a bottle of her pills next to her bed. It looked like an accident, but I always knew the truth. I thought you should too."

He looked at her grimly. "Is there anything else you need to unload on me? I suppose the reason you actually needed to stay with me here was because you killed your mommy and daddy for giving you a time out."

Reyah sighed. "I deserve that. No, don't talk about mother and father. Their deaths were the start of all of this. It's their fault I was so bloodthirsty in the first place, that stupid ring not helping and their deaths driving me to the brink of insanity!"

"Well, I suppose you'll need a place to sleep for the night, or do you want to talk some more?"

Reyah shook her head. "No, that's all I needed to tell you. I-- I just wanted you to know."

He nodded understandingly, taking her hand and helping her up as if she were still a tiny girl. "Come, I always keep your bed clean and made in case I have company. Your room is just the way you left it."

She hugged him enormously, completely drained from the emotional night. A late tear squeezed out of one of her clear eyes as she hugged her uncle tightly. "Thank you, uncle."