Yes, I'm back. Sorry for making you wait so long, I promise to be better!

Standard disclaimers apply. I hated writing this chapter, but it had to happen.

I have no idea how I came to be this age almost entirely ignorant about the world. No, that's inaccurate. I know a lot about the world. I know how things work and why things were made and so much about history that I could write my own text. I can speak five languages fluently and my tutors are running out of things to teach me.

I know exactly how the world works, but I didn't for a long time and I still can't figure out why.

I'm not even ten years old yet, but I can't believe it's taken me this long to understand that people outside these walls hate me. I know I'm ugly, I've known it since I was old enough to pick locks and find a mirror, but my father and grandfather were rather adept and making sure I didn't dwell on it too much.

Even when people would shy away from me, and I knew it was because I didn't have the perfect, cherubic faces like their children, even then I didn't realize that they hated me so. Now I understand.

Grandfather has been acting quite strange for several days now. He hardly ever comes out of his room, and Father won't be home for another week at least. His last letter said that he had found an old mandolin that he wanted me to have, and I wanted to find a book about them, because I don't know much about the makeup of them. And we were out of cheese, and the cook wasn't in, so I went out to the marketplace.

I know I'm not supposed to, I know Father said it makes Grandfather nervous to have me running off and disappearing, the same way my stupid magic tricks used to make him pale when Father would laugh and clap, but Grandfather has been so distant lately that I didn't want to ask him to go out, and I didn't feel like hearing him tell me 'no,' so I just went. It seemed a lot easier to ask forgiveness than permission.

The shops were just as busy as can be expected during the early evening on a Friday. I got to the book seller and asked the man behind the counter about mandolins. The bookseller knows me, because Father and I go in just about every Saturday and spend a lot of money. I don't think he likes me, because he doesn't seem to like children in general, but he tolerates me because he needs to eat. I've found that many people seem to do things because they need to eat or otherwise save themselves.

He eyed me suspiciously, because I had never been in without Father before, but quickly found an appropriate book and sold it to me. I noticed some people whispering, but I ignored them.

"Is there anything new?" I asked. It was a standard question. I was always looking for new things to read.

"Nothing you'd be interested in," he said. "No historical texts, nothing about architecture or music."

"Thank you," I said, and left.

The market was much worse. It started when a boy about my age came up to me and tried to grab my book away from me. I glared at him and told him to step off.

"That's a pretty nice bit of authority coming from a monster!" he snapped. I took a step backwards.

"What?" I asked.

"A monster! Why else you got that mask on? Let's have a look!" He moved toward me, and I dodged him, but not quickly enough, and my mask fell to the ground. By this time, a small crowd had formed and I could not get to it.

I was angry. I have never felt so angry in my entire life. I could have killed him, then, and not even cared, I could have killed all of them, the jeering boys and shrieking girls and their stupid, encouraging parents. They called me 'monster' and pointed at my face. They called me 'ugly.'

I managed to win the fight, and I have no idea how. The boy, whose name I still do not know, ran home with a bloody face and clutching his arm. I was largely uninjured, at least physically.

I wish I had known some kind of sorcerer's magic, some spell or words that could have made them all disappear, forget what they had seen.

One woman stood there, looking at my face for a horrified second while I frantically affixed my mask in place. I recognized her as a woman who attended the same Mass as my family. She had a daughter a year younger than I, a little girl named Charlotte with brown hair who wasn't allowed to play with me. She looked at my face and something came over her own, a look I didn't understand.

The next thing I knew, the market owner was out of the store and grabbing me by the arm, telling me that if I was going to come around and start trouble and steal things, then I should just get out now before he called the authorities, and wouldn't they know what to do with a freak like me. I ran all the way home.

Grandfather has remained in his room, and as far as I know, is completely unaware of my transgression at all. I wanted it to stay that way, I didn't want him to see me cry. A boy my age shouldn't cry, it was for babies.

I can sing and play seven instruments, and I could probably perform a Mass on my own, except that the priest told me that was blasphemy. Only a priest can perform a Mass. And I'll never be a priest. I didn't want to, but I know now that I couldn't.

I'm fairly certain that it doesn't matter how much I know or how beautiful my voice is, because now they know what's behind the mask, and no one will want to look at me long enough to find out what wonderful things I know.