Many moons seemed to have passed by until he was given the chance to leave his confined quarters once again. Though it wasn't something he actually wanted to do , the ladies told him that he needed to move about more and start doing things other than sulking in a corner for what he did.
And what they told him to do in order to get him to be more active , was none other than the thing he dreaded the most now.
Running errands.
They wanted him to go back to the marketplace , where he had been humiliated , where he had been brutally defiled and dehumanised in the public eye. They wanted him to go back to where everyone would look at him with hatred in their eyes now that they knew how he looked , and due to what 'he' did , and just feel the atmosphere of hatred all over again.
As if he didn't feel it enough all ready.
And because of how much that experience had traumatised him , Jellal actually begged them not to make him go. Begged them desperately with all that he could do. With no sense of shame or dignity stopping him.
Begged them with such intense intent,
So that they could truly understand.
He didn't want to go out anymore.
At all.
The world he once thought was colourful and beautiful , it had turned into a dark and vicious nightmare that didn't wish to end. Just the mere pretence of leaving the confines of his stone walls had trembling , as he didn't want to know what else was waiting for him if he was to go out again.
He didn't know what hatred would come and attack him.
What viciousness would be used against him.
How much pain he would come back with.
And so much more that had him nauseated through deep rooted apprehension.
But all those pleads fell on deaf ears. Especially for the older, light haired stone faced ladies. Vera especially. She didn't heed a single word of his desperation or cries , and told him in rebuke that he had to face the brunt of his punishment and shame for what he did so he understood to never do it again.
And though the truth in his mind still remained persistent in the fact that , he truly had no fault in the matter.
Her word won over his , like anyone else's,
And his wishes were completely dismissed.
So he had to follow her orders.
An extension of the already harrowing punishment and judgement he had faced.
The young bluenet looked towards the stony path he was walking on , his large bronze eyes unable to look anywhere other than the floor as the cooler winds from the ending of autumn struck against his dry and cold face like a bitter slap.
His privilege of having his identity concealed had been completely stripped away as he was forced to go back to the traumatic grounds with nothing to hide behind. His free azure locks , which resembled an unruly bush now , were the only thing helping obscure his pitiful expression and stopping him from bringing more trouble to himself.
The only thing that was meant to be some form of relief to the situation was the fact that he wasn't forced to go out alone for the stuff this time around. Rather just like his time before when he would be accompanied on those sparse visits , he had been accompanied by a stone faced lady.
Mika.
Whom instead of holding him tied with a leash and dragging him along like he was some sort of cattle , was now holding his hand and pulling him close to her alike to an impatient mother with her child as she held the bags of groceries in her other free hand.
Most likely to ensure that he didn't go off anywhere on his own for even a split second , and no troublesome distance was created between them , even though he would never have intended so.
He could feel himself being pulled along firmly as the noirette walked along on the quiet roads that lead back to the prison-like property he knew as his home. Her gauze wrapped fingers squeezed firmly onto his when she felt he would be out of pace with her , the young woman not even looking his way when he would trip or be on the verge of falling from being stuck in his own clouding thoughts , probably due to being so disgusted with him.
Just like everyone else.
And that fact was refreshed in his mind before he even took the first steps into Taïr's grounds again alongside Mika. Feeling looks of contempt and utter revulsion being pinned on him as hate would be thrown at him to no end. Spoken or not , practically every person that he went past today made it clear with how much they despise the very existence of him.
Glaring at him shamelessly as he went by , others making crude remarks regarding him and everything related to him , stopping whatever they could be doing to share their callous opinions on him. The Devil's son.
The one who bore The Devil's blood.
And making sure he heard every word , from which his head hung even lower as a result.
Some even went to the extent of spitting at him , shoving him brutally , or even throwing things at him (rocks , paper , sticks etc) , and all whilst that happened , he just remained silent , keeping his suffering a secret to the world as he didn't deserve to share it.
He wasn't worthy to share it.
And just followed the short haired noirette wordlessly like a dog (unless told otherwise), feeling her pull him into her multiple times , with her hold tightening on him as she seemed almost as quiet as he was.
Probably because she had nothing to say as they were all right.
Or perhaps she also agreed with them.
With her being there , he didn't know if anything changed for him in regards to how much hatred was showered over him. To the point that every step he took on those grounds , he was just reminded of what a depraved being he was and how the mere sight of him was sickening to many (if not all).
He felt his heart would clenched on itself with every volley of cruel words he witnessed , one insult was not better than the other as they all made him hurt , they all made him want to cry and disappear , but he wouldn't be allowed to do that.
After all this time of having what seems like the world's sheer hatred plagued on him , some foolish part of him thought that maybe he would start getting used to it. And the words would stop affecting him as much.
But they never did.
They stung him just as deep and just as fresh when he first heard them. And with every other time repeated , the pain would only throb again the same way , or worm deeper into him to cause more anguish in his shattering heart and soul.
His feet tried to keep up with the taller woman's pacing , his chest feeling tight as he bounced a bit with the rush he made , his bronze orbs heavily glazed over with hidden tears that stung his eyes as shaggy deep blue bangs obscured part of his cursed appearance.
His mind was unable to shake the dread that he was still feeling even though the ordeal was done. Because he was dreading the time that he would have to be back there. Feeling it all over again. Hearing it all over again. Feeling so weak and worthless like he wasn't doing that enough already.
Whether it was with Mika or another of the ladies , or what he feared the most , just himself. He didn't want to go back to that place and live it all again , be reminded of just how wretched he was and feel his heart break more than it already had.
How much longer could he take this?
It was all so cruel.
The world was being so cruel to him.
Incessantly cruel.
For something that wasn't even due to his own action.
That wasn't even due to his own will.
Why?
Mika's onyx orbs came back to focus in the world that she had lost herself from as she felt another buckle from the young boy whose hand she was holding. Her fingers immediately tightening again on his lacking hold , but this time taking a moment to pause in her mindless stride as she waited for the child to catch up with her.
Her attention turned to the azure haired boy for a split second who was in the midst of collecting himself up from the umpteenth trip he had endured on the way back from the market grounds.
Dark eyes became weighted as she watched the boy barely able to stop himself from falling , trying to get up again. His clothing having endured marks and scratches from the concrete and earth he had fallen against (or could just about catch himself against).
She silently took a glance at the young boy , taking in the details of all the changes that had occurred with him as the days went past.
Even though they could get him to eat a bit more than he had been able to , he was still on the frailer side , barely having regained the mass he lost. His skin, having lost it's creamy lustre and warm ivory tone , now looked drained and somewhat sickeningly pale , whether that was from his lack of interaction from the outside world , due to effects of the colder weather or his lack of proper nutrients , she could not tell.
His injuries seemed to be taking much much longer to heal than any time before , both the exceedingly brutal scalding and lacerations that had been made to cover his hands , and the other injuries incurred alongside that.
It was as if his own body was almost refusing to heal properly (or at least as fast as it normally could) with the turn of his behaviour having become so quiet and broken.
Her onyx gaze went downwards as one thought stood out to her in her mind as she thought about the azure haired child. Thinking about that, the boy she was walking alongside now with , was near unrecognisable to the boy that she had known for the past few years when he grew up under her supervision.
Jellal had always been a more quiet and kept to himself kid from what witnessed , and that was obviously due to the circumstances that moulded him to become like that. But , even with how things were always so cruel and unexplained to him , he would always find something to look forward to and keep himself trying to smile.
Whether that be just watching the outside world , reading that children's history book about the founding of the country he seemed to love a lot , or anything else he somehow had the curiosity to drive him with whilst he lived a life alike to prison.
She didn't know how he did it.
At such a young age , and after having experienced so much…
And having so much taken away from him…
Yet the child had always seemed to have something on his mind and that was motivating him.
Something that made him push forward.
At least that's how it was…
Until recently.
Because now the child that she saw , he didn't have that same spark in his eyes that the other boy used to have. He didn't want to watch the outside world in awe with stars in his eyes. This boy didn't even wish to show his face to anyone , and the thought of him giving a smile was nothing but cruel mockery.
Mika could feel his pace steadying as he caught up to her , her heart becoming weighted as an image of the boy she used to know flashed in her mind. His burning curiosity , his excitement for the smallest things , his passion to learn everything and anything , his untainted and blissful ignorance…
Where had it all gone?
Or really she wanted to ask.
Why had it all gone?
They shared the same face , they shared the same past , they shared the same cruelty done to them…
Yet the boy with her now , barely able to walk on his own two feet with his face towards the ground with no intention of looking up , having his uncut messy azure locks obscure everything she could see he deeply hated , not even daring to make a sound…
That boy was not the boy whom she had seen grow up all these years.
This boy was not the Jellal she knew all these years.
He was not Jellal.
And honestly even though she couldn't admit it.
And she didn't know why.
That thought genuinely brought some form of pain to her.
She felt the biting breeze of autumn splash her face again , her short hair blowing back and taking her attention before she looked up around her and was brought back to the world.
Her gaze fell upon the clouded sky that had become deep and dark with approaching velvet tones. Thick haze covered the heavens yet there were points of clearness that allowed the pinpoints of stars that littered the segments in the sky that could be properly seen allowed to shine through. The moon was also peering out from the early evening , illuminating the both of them as she took a few moments to watch the ever changing beauty of the world before another thought struck her weighted mind again.
That thought being,
He would have loved to see this sight so openly.
Jellal.
She had caught him many times before watching the celestial sky before his bedtime , in obvious awe because of it. Something that was alike with the mother and son duo as Kaileen was also known to be an avid spectator of heavenly beauty. Being one of her favourite things to do , until that enjoyment had no place in her life anymore due to what she had been reduced to.
A thickness formed in her throat as her mind posed forth thoughts about the midnight haired woman that she always had circling in her hidden mind. Thoughts that also added to her emotions towards her son as she squeezed his hand again and tried to give herself something else to think about through what came from her lips next.
"The sky looks beautiful."
"Don't you think?"
Mika asked the young boy , saying her first words to him the day after she had told him to apologise to the baker for his delinquent behaviour under Vera's orders. She let her words linger in the air , awaiting some response from the bluenet , hoping to engage in some sort of conversation for her own sake as they walked on.
"I think I can even make out some constellations."
"Do you know what those are?"
Though as she kept trying to make an attempt to connect with the child , time went on and told her how futile her efforts were as the boy was too stuck in his own world and words to pay any attention to her's. Her lips lined on themselves in unsaid emotions , stopping from talking to herself as the both of them simply walked the rest of the way back to the stony confinement in silence.
Even though most of the journey had been made quite swiftly , it was like the was a dragging of time and the route they both knew almost seemed endless. But eventually they did get back , even if it did seem like it was taking forever , and thankfully for the both of them there weren't unsavoury guests emerging from the inside like the last time they had come back together.
But that didn't mean that someone wasn't there who either would prefer not to have come in contact with.
Mika stood beside the door with Jellal in hand behind her , tucked away behind her long skirt , feeling the weight of her bags holding her down as she awaited for the man who was emerging through the door to come out.
A guard to be frank.
A guard that had been there to assist with the clients needs that came for the mother's services and had finished his duties for that and was now about to dismiss himself from that post given no more of them would come for her.
The sound of the guard's heavy footsteps rang in both of their ears , the air turned thick with his approaching as Mika's body tensed and her grip on the young boy unknowingly increased with a slight quiver in it whilst her gaze remained looking downwards.
Not out of shame or disappointment , but something else.
Jellal was brought out of his plaguing thoughts as he noticed a tall man standing in front of the both of them , leaving the house with a stoic look on his face as he seemed to glance over at the noirette herself with some sort of emotion he couldn't tell.
Mika's features stiffened as she felt the guard's gaze on her , briefly looking up to meet the man's steely greenish grey gaze before she looked away wordlessly , yet the air still remained just as tense or even more so as the two of them exchanged potent glances.
The young bluenet felt his hand being abruptly released from the young woman's grip as the stone faced guard seemed to now look over the both of them. Though he didn't look up to meet the man's face to know what he looked like entirely , something about the rigid and burning gaze he felt pinning down on him in the moment felt so familiar.
Felt familiar in a way he couldn't completely pinpoint.
But before he could think about that matter more , he felt the guy's piercing gaze intensifying on him for a sharp few seconds , almost like he was picking him apart with his vision alone , before he looked away and started to walk off into the night away from the both of them.
Though of course , that was not before he heard those accursed words being muttered hatefully from the guard's lips in a low tone.
"Fucking devil like bastard…"
From hearing that , Jellal could feel his large bronze orbs glaze over once again. The word he hated the most springing back to the front of his mind and he felt his heart becoming even heavier than it was as he was dragged alongside the noirette into the house after that man's departure.
With the young woman seeming visibly tense in her own actions , she started to immediately put the bags down she had been holding as a pent up sigh left her. Letting go of the boy's hand for good now , she started to tend to doing what was needed for the supplies , and Jellal was just left standing there on his own.
"Go to your room."
She promptly ordered the boy as she turned her back on him , starting to unpack the items , unknowing to the fact that the bluenet hadn't even registered a word she said.
Because her words had been drowned out.
As he was focused on something completely different.
His bronze orbs had looked up from the floor briefly to spot the sight of a rubbish bag that was still in the need of being thrown away. A bag that came from cleaning his mother's room and was filled with all sorts of things that needed to be thrown out. Tissues , sheets and what his mind was singling on the most now.
Bottles.
Bottles of glass , some that were tinted in colour and some that were not. All of them were empty , and he could see them in clear sight as they started to overflow the bag , to the point some of them even fell out. Rolling on the floor on the cold stone with a distant ring.
His eyes darkened with intentions that were not known to him as his mind focused more on the look of these bottles , observing the detail of the thickness of the glass and the curves of the item. Thinking about how easily something like that would smash and how sharp the fragments would be if he-
"I told you to go to your room."
He was taken out of his spurn of creeping thoughts as he blinked in response. Turning his head slightly to the woman and giving her a silent nod as he started to make his way back to his room , his eyes trained on the sight of the bottles for a little while longer until they were completely out of his sight and he closed the door behind him.
Immediately starting to release that which had been building up inside him throughout the day as he slumped against the door for a few moments of weakness before throwing himself onto his rigid mattress after dragging his weight.
From there his cries could be held back no more.
And the watching dark world remained witness to the intensity of the broken heart that revealed it's self finally as the boy allowed himself to feel that which had been hiding.
To feel that which felt forbidden.
He didn't know how long he had been crying to himself this time.
All he knew was his tears kept seeping down his face and into the rough bedding underneath as the words which kept circling around in his hopeless mind from the incessant insults and rebuking he faced plagued him.
His throat was rough and weighted as he choked with raw sorrow to himself. His small bandaged fingers clutching desperately at the sheets underneath him for support as messy dark azure bangs covered his tear stained face and faded pale moonlight washed over through the barred windows above him.
And in the midst of that breaking moment of weakness , he recalled every single thing that was done and said to him in the span of this dreaded day. Every single severe gaze he felt on him. Every single sneer and murmur which made no intention of hiding from his ears. Every single heartless word spat in his way.
For what his eyes couldn't bear to witness then , his mind made up by conjuring the sight of the vicious monsters looking down at him and wanting to take him under from the hatred they seethed.
And the image created just haunted him incessantly.
Growing more morbid and frightening with the more it was left in his mind to develop.
All whilst the dreadful scenes would play over and over again.
And they would call him that same name he simply despised but could not escape.
Devil.
And all that which related to it too.
The silver rays scarcely breaking through illuminated his increasingly paled skin as the trembling tips of his fingers folded deeper into the crumpled bedding as his cries sounded more apparent against the stone walls , whilst he looked through the obscuring strands of his unkempt bangs at the surrounding darkness.
The only thing which lived in his mind in the moment was the question that was ceaselessly eating away at him.
The question being,
Was that all he really was?
A devil?
Someone deserving of hatred and the world's wrath? Someone that deserved nothing but anger and venom spewed at him? But why? What had he done to be a devil? What had he done for everyone to call him as one? To keep claiming that wretched label as if that was the only meaning to his existence?
He wasn't anything like his father. He was nothing like that man from what he heard. He never wished to hurt anyone. He never wished people pain. He never wanted to cause people torment. Or break the rules and do crimes.
And he never did anything with his father.
Or was in support of what he did either.
So then why?
Why couldn't the world understand that he was not him? That he was nothing like him? That he was not influenced by him?
Just the fact that they shared an appearance shouldn't have been a reason for him to be treated this way. How could everyone just deem him a devil for something that he couldn't control? For something that he didn't choose?
It wasn't fair!
Wasn't fair at all!
And the gods too.
He was not happy with them either.
None of them.
He wasn't going to deny that anymore.
How could they allow this to happen to him when he was asking for their help like they wanted? Believing in their powers like they wanted? When he had been so patient and trusting in their ways?
Why were they allowing him to be so hated and tormented for something he didn't even do? For something he had no fault in?
The world didn't believe him and all saw him as a devil in the making , but the gods did too now?
Why?!
Didn't they know everything in the hearts of the people? Didn't they claim justice for those in the land? Didn't they promise to fulfil the prayers and desires of those who asked for him?
So then why were they letting this happen to him?
They should have known he did nothing wrong to anger them.
That he was not bad.
That he was NOT a devil.
That these claims against him were all lies , and being proclaimed for a reason he couldn't understand.
Yet they were allowing him to suffer?
Someone who was completely innocent and did no harm to anyone.
Nor ever wished to.
Yet the world wished nothing but to spew harm and hatred upon?
Why?!
This wasn't fair?!
What was this meant to be in the grand scheme of things? He couldn't see what this was all supposed to amount to. Was this another brunt of misfortune before ease would come again and make it all better? Another rock bottom he thought he would hit before their doings would transform his life for good again.
Or…
Were his grim thoughts showing in truth?
And they had truly abandoned him?
He really could not tell anymore.
With anything.
He was so muddled and he just wanted it all to stop.
It all was so dark and confusing. It all gave him unending pain and was dragging him under with each moment he was made to witness. All he wanted was for some form of relief amidst this harrowing time , all he wanted was to know that his fate hadn't been truly sealed by these cruel remarks and that the hatred would come to an end.
That change would happen again.
And this nightmare would finally come to it's cease.
But now as he lay sprawled out on his bed , his body numb from all sobs that wracked him and his throat dry as he wearily stared up through the wisps of his bangs at the darkness that was increasing and he had become accustomed to.
He was beginning to doubt if it ever would.