Can we just give props to the FMA fandom as a whole for a moment please?
While everyone gives a wide variety for what Riza went through at the hands of Berthold (ranging from being ignored to physically abused) no one has ever written or hinted that the abuse ever crossed the line into sexual abuse.
Even though the tattoo can be considered a... gray area.
Now, there are some... controversial topics in this story. There are seems that, while not graphic in the slightest, heavily imply/straight up mention child molestation and rape.
There's also a scene that is very realistic to girls in Riza's situation in the 1950's, but idk of it was a solution girls used in the early 1900's when FMA is set.
If anyone has a problem with these events in this story, you have my apologies. Someone here on FanFiction on my story Nightmares said it was a very taboo topic for me to write about, and that I was brave for daring to write about it.
So, after reading her (I'm assuming her gender based on her username) review, it inspired me to write Heaven and Hell and this story.
And I must say, I kind of enjoy writing stories like these. I find it interesting to write stories that have an unhappy beginning and middle and an ending that can be considered up in the air.
Riza's earliest memory is the sounds of blood curdling screams.
She's four years old, sitting on her bed in her room, clutching a stuffed brown teddy bear. She can't understand why her Mama is yelling so loudly. Her Papa won't tell her anything. The two nurses she sees running up and down the hallway from the bathroom back to her parents room won't tell her anything.
The last piece of knowledge anyone gave to her was her Mama, hours before her screams of agony had begun, telling her that she's going to be a big sister really soon.
"Aren't you excited Tereza? You're little brother or sister will be here soon. Your Papa has gone to get the midwife." The young mother cooed, wincing slightly in pain as she cupped her young daughter's cheeks between her hands, giving her a quick peck on the forehead.
But despite being excited over having a little sister named Imogene or a baby brother named Felix, and despite only being a young girl of four, Riza can tell based on the screams coming from her Mama that something is very wrong.
And the fact that no one will her her what is going on only confirms her suspicions.
A loud scream- the loudest by far- erupts from the master bedroom down the hall, and then it's met by silence. No wails of pain from her Mama, no sharp cries from her baby brother or sister. Nothing. The next sound she hears, is the sound of her Papa's anguished sob.
"ELIZABETH!"
The funeral is a simple, quick, and quiet affair. Only Riza and Berthold attend. The little girl is sad and confused.
Why did they put her Mama in the ground?
Why can't she find her little brother or sister anywhere?
Where did her new baby sibling go?
Why has Papa been ignoring her these last few days?
What is going on?
"Papa?" Riza asks in a soft voice, noticing her Papa has already began to walk away from the simple grave bearing her Mama's name.
"Come Riza." He says gruffly.
"But Papa-" She starts, only to be cut off.
"I said now, Tereza!" Berthold yells angrily, glancing over his shoulder.
Blinking back tears, Riza trails after her Papa, who doesn't even bother to slow down so she can catch up to his long strides, as they walk back home from the cemetery.
Tereza Hawkeye will never learn if her stillborn sibling was to be a brother or a sister- at least not during her childhood with Berthold Hawkeye.
The first time Berthold hits her is a week after her fifth birthday and half a year following her Mama's sudden and untimely death.
She doesn't even know what she did wrong.
One moment she's drinking a glass of water, the next thing she knows is the front of her dress is wet, the glass is broken on the floor along with her own self, and her cheek is stinging.
It hurts.
Riza whimpers as she clutches her cheek, her whiskey brown eyes wide as she stares up at her Papa. His blue eyes are narrowed and cold, his hand still raised from the slap he had just given her, and Riza fears he's going to hit her again. He doesn't. Instead, Berthold snarls, tells her to clean up the mess she's made, and storms out of the kitchen and back to his study, muttering under his breath that she's a useless klutz.
She's silent as she takes a rag and soaks up the water. She doesn't cry when a shard of glass pierces her palm as she tries to pick up the pieces from her broken cup, and she most certainly doesn't yelp when she pulls said piece from her skin.
She shakes as she quickly runs to the sink, running cold water over the open cut to wash the blood away. Riza looks over her shoulder, and sighs with relief when she doesn't spy any of her blood on the kitchen floor.
Riza is six when two slightly older boys from her school- Kyle Jenkins and Grayson David- tackle her to the dirt, hold her down, and cut her braid off with a switch blade Grayson had swiped from his older brother.
They toss her braid by her feet, and run off laughing hysterically, giving each other high fives as they yell over the shoulders, calling her a freak and telling her that her Mama died to get away from her and that maybe if she was a boy like them, her Papa wouldn't ignore her.
They even tell her you're welcome for making her look like a boy.
Riza lets out a whimper, running her fingers through her hair that now rests at the nap of her neck. She picks up her braid, containing the hair that once rested between her shoulder blades, and her slim fingers trace the purple ribbon tied in a bow at the end.
She stands with a sob, brushes the dirt from her no longer nice looking dress, clutches the braid between her fist, and cries the entire mile walk home.
Berthold is so enamored with his work, he doesn't even notice his daughter is covered in dirt or that her braid is grasped in her hands.
Instead, he barks out at her: "Stop crying before I give you a reason to!"
With the sleeve of her cardigan, Riza wipes her tears away, and tosses the braid into the trash.
She doesn't grow her hair back out.
Riza is seven when her Father decides to try and teach her Alchemy.
It does not end well.
The entire lesson lasts two hours, and by the end she's got a busted lip and a dislocated shoulder.
Berthold never attempts to teach her again, and Riza damn sure never tries to ask.
She is eight years old when her Papa's first apprentice shows up on the front porch.
He's thirteen years her senior, with greasy brown hair and grass colored eyes. His name is Mike Wyatt, and the look he gives Riza scares her. It's cruel, but not in the way her Papa stares at her.
He looks down at her, their eyes locked, licks his lips slowly, and smiles at her in a way that Riza just knows is very wrong.
"Why hello there, little lady. Is this the house of a Mr. Berthold Hawkeye?" He asks.
"P-Papa?" Riza calls out with a slight stutter in her voice.
"What is it this time?" He yells from up in his study, and Riza can tell her Papa isn't happy.
"S-someone is here. He's a-asking for you." She stammers.
She can hear him snarling as he stomps down the steps, a glare on his face as he rounds the corner. His demeanor changes when he sees the guest.
"Oh. Mr. Wyatt. I wasn't expecting you until tomorrow. Come in, you have much to learn in the ways of Alchemy. Go make the man something to drink." Berthold orders his daughter, shoving her towards the kitchen.
"Yes, Papa." Riza responds politely, walking quickly towards the kitchen.
Mike Wyatt is there for a week when he enters Riza's bedroom one night, hours after Berthold himself has gone to bed.
He doesn't say a word as he slips underneath her covers, and Riza remains still, pretending to still be asleep, as she feels his cold hands slide up underneath her knee length nightgown.
Mr. Wyatt only lasts a month before her Papa's stubbornness makes him leave angrily. Riza is grateful that she wasn't enough to make him stay. But by the time he leaves, it's too late. What little innocence of her childhood that hadn't be destroyed by her Papa's cruel words were murdered by Mike Wyatt's nightly actions between her bed sheets.
Riza doesn't tell her Father what his former Alchemy apprentice did to her. She doubts he would even believe her, much less care.
After Mr. Wyatt leaves, Berthold calls his daughter into his study.
He informs her that he wants her to help him with his research, bit by bit over the years, when he doesn't have any apprentices studying for him.
Confused, but having the strong feeling that she has no choice in the matter, Riza agrees to her Papa's strange and vague request. He tells her to remove her shirt and lay down on the love-seat in the corner, face down, and for a moment she fears he's going to do to her what Mike has done.
What he does instead hurts much worse and is just as confusing to the young Tereza.
With each failed apprentice, a new part of Berthold Hawkeye's research is added to the skin of his young daughters back.
Mike Wyatt lasts a month; she has a transmutation circle in the center of her back.
George Miller lasts a week; she gets the sun just below it.
Richard and Andrew Towne make it three months; two twin snakes are etched into her skin, intertwining along the length of her full back.
By the time she is eleven, Riza has learned to not only avoid her Papa's apprentices like they're diseased, but to sleep with her bedroom door locked when he's teaching someone.
Riza is ten when she discovers blood in the center of her panties.
Shes confused and scared and only learns what this means two days later, when she mentions it to her school's nurse in quiet terror.
The elderly woman smiles at Riza warmly.
"Oh sweetie, this is nothing bad. It just means you're a woman now."
A woman.
That word scares Riza more then any other word she's ever heard, read, or spoken.
According to her Papa, a woman becomes a wife. She cooks and cleans for her husband, submits to him, and gives him heirs. A woman becomes a wife, and a wife becomes a Mama.
Riza is only ten.
She doesn't want to be a wife. She doesn't want to be a Mama. She doesn't want to spend the rest of her life with someone like Mike Wyatt, who laughed when the action of him pushing himself inside of her made her cry.
"Please don't tell anyone." Riza whispered softly to the nurse.
"Oh don't worry, dear! The only people who will know about this are the ones you decide to tell." She cooed, holding Riza's small hands between her wrinkly ones.
For the first time in over half of her life, Riza Hawkeye sighs with relief.
Roy Mustang arrives when she's twelve, and he unintentionally scares the shit out of her.
He didn't mean to, she knows this. But when he rests his hand on her shoulder to inform her that he's there, she lets out a scream, grabs him by the wrist, and flings him over her shoulder and flat onto his back.
"Ow..." He whimpers, face scrunched up in pain.
Berthold Hawkeye, who had witnessed the events from the kitchen doorway, laughs. The sound of his laughter frightens Riza more then his anger.
"You've made quiet the impression on my daughter, Mr. Mustang." Berthold informs him between cackles, before leaving to go up to his study.
"... I think you broke my back..." Roy groans.
Riza snorts, rolling her eyes. "You are not his first apprentice. You will not be his last. The longest to make it were a pair of twins, and they were gone after three months." She informs him.
Riza is quiet for a moment, studying him. "I give you two weeks."
"Betcha I'll last longer. What's your name?" Roy asked her, wincing as he sits up.
"You are allowed to call me Ms. Hawkeye, Mr. Mustang." Riza informs him.
"If I make it longer then two weeks will you tell me your name?" Roy asks, standing up.
"Make it a year, and I will inform you of my name."
Riza learns that Roy is a few months shy of being three years her senior. She learns that his parents died when he was a young boy, that his Mom was from the country of Xing and that his Dad's family came from here in Amestris, and that his Paternal Aunt raised him in Central City.
She does not ask him to give her any of this information.
Roy Mustang actively seeks her out when he isn't studying. At first, it scares Riza. But she quickly learns it isn't in an attempt to bully her like the boys at school, or to do... things... to her like Mike had.
No, Roy just wants to be her friend. He's a complete and utter chatterbox, and wants someone to talk to, learning fairly quickly that Master Hawkeye isn't one for small talk.
But apparently, neither is his daughter.
Riza has to give him props though; he makes it four months before she finally- finally!- gives in to his pestering and joins a conversation with him.
"My foster sister Clara is getting married." He states, studying Alchemy formulas while Riza cleans the dishes in the sink.
"Good for her. I don't understand why girls are so obsessed with getting married." She states, rolling her eyes as she dries the dishes.
"What? You don't want to get married one day." He asks in a slightly teasing tone.
"Nope." Riza answers, clicking her tongue.
"Why not?"
"So I can do this for the rest of my life? No thank you. I would rather not." The newly thirteen year old scoffs, waving a hand to motion towards her daily chores, before walking over to grab the broom.
"Well what do you want to do with your life instead, Ms. Hawkeye?" Roy questions, curious. He's never met a girl that didn't babble on and on about her future fairy-tale wedding before.
Riza tenses up, pondering the question. "I... I don't know. I've never really thought about it before." She mumbled with a shrug.
"Well I want to join the military and become a State Alchemist." He grinned at her.
Riza lets out a snort through her nose. "I wouldn't let Papa hear those plans. He'll throw you out on your butt."
And I'll get more of his prized work carved into my skin.
"Why not?"
"He is very anti military, Mr. Mustang." Riza responds, leaving the kitchen to sweep the living room.
Riza is thirteen and Roy is newly sixteen the first time Berthold leaves them alone for the first time.
He needs to travel to a small town outside of South City for supplies, and he informs them that he'll be gone for five days.
Riza is scared. What if he's just like Mike Wyatt?
"You, boy, had better study the chapters I've given you." He said sternly, pointing a finger at Roy.
"Yes Master Hawkeye." Roy nods.
"And you, little girl, do what you're supposed to." He snarls at Riza, putting his finger to her chest and pushing her down to the floor.
"Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes Papa." Riza replies, as her Papa turns to leave.
It's only after he's gone that Roy helps her stand.
"A-Are you alright?"
"I'm f-fine." Riza mutters, pushing him away as she stands.
"Why don't you leave to go stay with a different relative?" Roy asks her.
"I can't."
"Why not?"
"Because there is no one else! I only have him!" Riza snarls.
"You don't have a Mom?"
"No."
"What happened to her?"
"She died giving birth to my little brother or sister when I was four." Riza pouts, crossing her arms and looking down at her feet.
"And your sibling?"
"They died, too."
Roy is stunned, and frowns at the young girl standing next to him.
"Were they a brother or a sister?"
"I don't know. Papa never told me. I suggest you get to studying, Mr. Mustang." Riza says, turning to go do her chores.
As promised, when Roy makes it a full year studying under her Papa, Riza tells him her name.
"Riza."
"Riza. That's a pretty name. Is it short for anything?"
Tereza.
"Make it another year and I'll tell you." Riza smirks.
Riza's classmates have crude and insulting nicknames for the pair of odd friends.
The Town Freak and the Town Chink. Where there is one, the other is almost never too far behind.
The nickname doesn't bother Riza, and if it bothers Roy, he keeps it to himself.
Riza is fourteen when a seventeen year old Roy asks if he can kiss her.
"What?" She gasps.
"May I kiss you?" He repeats his request.
"Why?"
Roy shrugs, face flushed. He doesn't know how to explain that he's been overcome with the urge to know what her lips feel like pressed against his. But he's known her long enough to know that walking up to her and smooching her will do nothing more then cause her to have a panic attack.
Riza thinks it's ironic. She's had sex been raped, and yet, she's never kissed anyone before. But Roy Mustang is nice and kind. He's given her no reason to believe that he would ever purposefully harm her.
"Yes. You may kiss me, Mr. Mustang, if that's what you would like. But nothing more!" She adds sternly, crossing her arms behind her back.
Kissing is an odd sensation, and Riza finds she enjoys kissing Roy very much.
Berthold leaves again a week after she turns fifteen.
"Behave, little girl. I'll be back in ten days." He snarls, once again pushing her down to the floor.
"Bastard." Roy growls under is breath when he shuts the door. He helps Riza stand, and this time she lets him. He shakes his head with a sigh, kissing her cheek.
Ever since their first kiss five months prior, they've both found themselves sharing quick pecks every chance they got, but nothing more. Never anything more. They know it won't go on much longer; he turns eighteen two weeks after Berthold is set to return, and three days after that he will leave to join the military academy.
And Riza knows, as soon he's gone, her role as her Papa's notebook will begin again.
Riza turns her face and kisses him on the mouth. And it causes something to happen. They can't stop kissing each other. Not as they drag each other up the stairs to his room, locking the door behind them. They don't stop when Roy lifts her up, wrapping her legs around his hips, pushing her against the wall. They only stop when Roy tries to take her sweater off.
"N-no!" She gasps, remembering the secrets along her spine and her Papa's orders regarding them.
"You are to tell no one about my work, Tereza. That is to be my decision and mine alone."
"I'm sorry!" Roy stammers, pulling away from her. He didn't mean to upset her, that was never his intentions.
"My sweater stays on. Everything else, I'm okay with." Riza states simply, gripping the front of his shirt to kiss him again.
He lays her on his bed, and for the first time since she was eight years old, being in bed with an older boy doesn't make Riza want to jump through a window.
Sex with Roy Mustang doesn't hurt. Not like being raped by Mike Wyatt does.
He's gentle and caring, kisses her like she's glass, makes absolutely sure she's okay with what's going on, and is respectful of her rule regarding her top not being removed.
Riza quickly learns there's no greater feeling then his head against her womanhood, but she decides to keep that tidbit to herself.
He also knows what Mike Wyatt had done to her when she was a child, even if she was vague with the details.
"Are you a- I mean have you ever done anything like this before?" He asked, panting softly, his member pressed against her inner thigh, twitching against her skin.
"Does it count if I didn't say yes last time?" Riza asks quietly.
Roy tenses up, eyes wide as what she said sinks in. "Your F-Father?"
"No. Not him. He's not that much of a monster. It was one of his earlier apprentices. He doesn't know, and I don't want him to." Riza explains quickly.
"But this? This I want. This I'm okay with happening."
They didn't mean for Berthold to walk in on them.
It wasn't their fault he came back two days early. They hadn't planned for him to barge into Roy's room and discover his barely fifteen year old daughter straddling his apprentices waist, her dress hiked up around her hips and his jeans pushed down to his knees, his shirt tossed on to the floor.
"What the fuck is going on here!?" He hollered at the top of his lungs.
The two horny teens yelp in fear, scrambling off of each other and frantically fix their clothes. Roy barely has his jeans buttoned before Berthold grabs him by the arm.
"Get the hell out of my house!" He snarls, nails digging into the teens skin.
Roy hesitates. He doesn't want to leave Riza behind, not with her abusive Father. It's only after he hears Riza yell "Go before you make things worst!" that he finally leaves, grabbing his already packed suitcase and walking down the steps and out of the Hawkeye Manor.
He didn't even make it two years, but he came close. One year and ten months.
Berthold watches his former apprentice leave the property, counts to one hundred once he can no longer see Roy Mustang to ensure he's long out of ear shot, before grabbing Riza by her short hair, dragging her out into the hallway.
"Did you show him my research?"
"No, Papa!" Riza wails, feeling herself being lifted up, her feet barely touching the floor.
"Did he see it!?" Berthold roared, not believing her.
"No! He would've said something to you if he had! You know he would have, Papa!" Riza cried, tears falling down her cheeks.
Her answer seems to satisfy Berthold, as he lets her hair go. Only to then punch her in the face, knocking her down to the floor. She whimpers, knowing she'll wake up in the morning with a black eye.
"You had better pray that stupid boy didn't put his half breed bastard in your belly, you useless whore." Berthold snarled at her, stomping down the hallway.
Riza sits up, and she's finally brave enough to scream the words that have been on the top of her tongue since the first time her Papa has ever hit her.
"I wish you died instead of Mama!"
Her words have Berthold turning around, his foot roughly landing in a sharp kick to Riza's lower ribs, before he grabs her by her hair and drags her, kicking and screaming that she hates him, back to his study to add to his research.
The kick to her ribs causes two of them to crack and another three to bruise.
Roy is gone a month when the first way of nausea hits her.
No please no. Anything but this.
Riza isn't stupid, despite what her Papa tells her. She knows this will get her killed. Being his human notebook won't be enough to save her. Not from this.
She doesn't have a lot of time. She's a scrawny little thing, barely eighty pounds on a good day. Any bump she develops will be noticed immediately.
Riza struggles to keep her vomit back, swallowing it down every time it comes up, as she tries to think of what to do.
The little life her and Roy made together can't survive. It will get her killed. And because he left so abruptly, Riza has no way of telling Roy about the pregnancy. There's no way for him to know so he can maybe rescue her, or at the very least give her suggestions on how to take care of the problem.
Her Papa tells her he's going into the next town over, and that he'll be back the next day, and Riza nods in understanding. She hasn't said a word to him since the day Roy was thrown out. She refuses to. Riza uses the short time of freedom she has to figure out a solution. She doesn't have a lot of options, and she knows that if she doesn't figure out a solution, her only feasible outcome is suicide.
You can't runaway when you have no money, even if you have teetered on the edge of becoming homeless for the majority of your life.
Falling down the stairs is what ends up working for her. The fall causes her to break her ankle, but the cramping and bleeding start within an hour of her landing.
As she sits on the shower floor, scrubbing the blood from her thighs, she sobs, apologizing over and over again. Whether it's to Roy or their unborn child who's life she was forced to end because of the circumstances of her own life, she isn't sure.
Berthold becomes bedridden when Riza is sixteen.
He's sneezing and wheezing and constantly coughs up blood against his handkerchief. Riza is silent as she tends to him. Doesn't say a word as she serves him his meals and his tea. Refuses to acknowledge him when she gathers his dishes.
"I suppose it's a good thing I finished my research. And that you didn't become swollen with that failures spawn." Berthold mumbled coldly.
Riza refuses to tense up. She won't cry in front of him. Her baby is dead. She had to kill her and Roy's baby, the child growing inside of her womb, because of him and his cruelty towards her. And the worst part? The bastard doesn't even have the balls to tell her why.
Riza leaves his room in silence, shutting the door behind her.
A week after Tereza Hawkeye's seventeenth birthday, her Father dies. And on the same day, Roy Mustang returns to Hawkeye Manor.
They're both stunned to see each other. Riza didn't think he would ever come back; Roy thought her Father had murdered her.
"H-Hello Mr. Mustang." She says quietly, too scared to call him Roy.
"It's very wonderful to see you again, Ms. Hawkeye. Uh, current circumstances aside." He said, scratching the back of his neck.
Riza nods in understanding. "I shall, go call the doctor." She muttered, leaving the room. Roy follows her down to the living room, and is silent as she calls the doctor that resides in her small hometown, explaining that her Papa has passed away. It's only after she's hung up the phone that Roy wraps his arms around her.
"I thought he had killed you." He mutters into her hair.
"I'm still surprised he didn't." Riza sighed, hugging him back.
The funeral is quiet, like her Mama's had been.
"I'm sorry I had to rely on you to pay for the funeral. I can't thank you enough." Riza exhales solemnly.
"Don't worry about it. Least I could do after what he taught me." Roy shrugged.
They make small talk, Roy assumes she thinks him enlisting is a mistake like her Father did, and he tells her it's his dream to help make the country he cares about a better place. He blushes, calling it childish.
"Not at all." She cooes, smiling at him.
It's then that the thought occurs to Riza. Berthold Hawkeye is dead. He can't hurt her anymore. He can't tell her what to do any longer. He can't determine who sees the secrets on her skin.
"Can I trust you Roy? Can I trust you with my Father's research?"
A mix of emotions course through Roy when he sees the tattoo on Riza's back. First he's confused, then angry, and finally heartbroken.
He wraps his jacket over her shoulders, before turning her around to pull her in for another hug.
"Was this how he punished you? For what he caught us doing?"
Did he turn you into a notebook because he caught us having sex?
"No. This is why he was so angry. He thought I had let you see it." Riza mumbled against his shoulder blade, smiling as she felt his arms wrap tightly around her waist. They pull apart and share the first kiss they've been able to in over two years, not bothering to ask the other if they've found someone new.
They fall back into bed together, and Roy uses the opportunity to kiss every inch of bare skin he hadn't been able to before.
"God, I missed you so much." Riza gasped between thrusts, her nails leaving scratches down his shoulders and upper back, her legs wrapped around his hips. She is glad a twenty year old Roy Mustang has a preventative on him.
"I've been so worried about you." He groaned against her neck, leaving kisses along her skin.
Roy wakes up the next morning to the sight of Riza sleeping against his chest, her arm slung across her shoulder. In that moment, as he watches her sleeping peacefully against him, he falls in love. He wants to relive this moment every single morning for the rest of his life.
He wants to marry her.
But he remembers what she said to him, years ago, that she never wants to get married. Growing up as a maid for her Father destroyed any desire she might've had to become a wife, and because he loves her, Roy Mustang does not ask Riza Hawkeye to give him the honor of becoming his bride.
He cannot bear to hear her say no, so he never asks.
Instead, he studies the secrets on her skin, and masters Flame Alchemy. And three months after Berthold Hawkeye's death, they part ways, kissing each other goodbye.
They both have the feeling they'll never see each other again, even though they both hope that they are wrong.
Riza is eighteen when she sees a flyer for the military in her towns grocery store.
She reads the flyer, studies the slogan and the number, and it intrigues her. Perhaps she can help Roy fulfill his dream for the future? It's not like she has anything better to do with her life either way.
Besides, she thinks to herself. Even if I die, I can't go through anything worst then what's already happened to me.