/=|= The Lost Raven =|=\

02

"Distant Memories"

Morning gave way to afternoon to dusk. And just as the sun slipped below the western horizon, Tira came to again. Still lying in the puddle, still freezing, and her skin had wrinkled having spent the whole day in water. She lay motionless (aside from the uncontrollable shivering) and made no sound (other than her tummy growling after days of not eating), staring up through the forest canopy at the starry sky for the better part of an hour while her weary mind tried to figure out how she got here.

Three black birds circled high above. Mere specs going round and round. Ravens. Her ravens. Maybe her only friends in the world. One of them descended through the trees and came to rest upon her head. It gently poked her with its talons and pecked, but not to hurt her. It was his own way of giving an encouraging nudge.

But it was no use. She couldn't remember the past few days. Her long term memory was fine, but the short term? A puzzle at best with dozens of missing pieces. She remembered things from a long time ago such as the Bird of Passage, the guild she belonged to (where she met her black feathered friends). How she loved the guild. She vividly remembered receiving descriptions from anonymous guildsmen, tracking down her mark, setting off with her three pals, them helping her locate her target, her murdering the poor bastard, then returning with proof of her deed (eyes were the best! The windows to the soul!). They never paid her, but rather provided her with everything she (and her friends) could want or need. They provided shelter, food, and other supplies and nifty little trinkets from time to time! Oh, and a ring blade! A circular sword she could dance with, let it encircle her form and her body became a literal whirlwind of death! Nothing was cooler than feeling the cold steel glide harmlessly, caressingly, across her perfect curves, while on the other side the bladed edge shredded her pray and blood rained down upon her. The ring blade was the best!

At any rate, the Guild provided everything for her so commoners would never see her at the market, no inn keeper ever saw her looking for a place to stay, and no stable hand could identify her as the woman securing her horse. No one saw her come, no one saw her stay, and no one saw her leave. She was never there. She didn't exist . . .

. . . and she liked it!

But sometimes she did exist! Rather, a part of her did. Just a part. A small one too. Indeed, her favorite setup was when she posed as a slave. Sold by her own guild on the black market to her intended target. There was something exotic, something thrilling, something sexy about being on the end of a leash, being on her knees, being a mere piece of property, yet simultaneously being a God! Being all powerful in determining how long her "master" would live. Being able to deliver Judgment! Yes, she was a slave, but she was also a God!

And she was a good slave, if a feeble one. A weak slave with a weaker stomach, she was no good for manual labor and fainted at the sight of blood or the slightest pang of pain. "Not very bright either," they would say with a smile, "but what's to be expected from a woman?" But they never bought her for her conversations. They never purchased her for her heavy lifting. No! They bought her for her dance, for her curves, for her soft skin and gentle touch. And she was an obedient slave who knew her place. And so when her master perished, no one would suspect her.

Not Tira, she faints at the sight of a whip. Never Tira, her terror of punishment keeps her obsessively obedient. Only an inhuman monster would kill the master with such brutality, such viciousness, and savagery. It couldn't be her. Not Tira. Never Tira. She was a good slave. The bad Tira, the assassin, the Goddess, didn't exist!

When the master perished, the other slaves always fled, but she stayed like the good little slave she was. She wouldn't stay were she guilty, would she? No! That would just be stupid, and not even Tira was that stupid! So the guards would track down the escaped slaves. Torture confessions out of them, and then execute them for the crime. And all the while she laughed with childlike giddiness inside. She fooled them! Fooled them all! She kept hidden her Godlike superiority! Who's stupid now? Ha! The morons!

And with the master dead, the estate would eventually collapse into debt (creditors gave favors to persons, not their estates.) They'd have to sell her back to the Bird of Passage, never knowing the dark thoughts, the black heart, and the cruel glint in her eye.

The good slave existed, but the evil assassin did not.

But then one day, the Bird of Passage never bought her back. She was sold to a new master, and didn't know what to do. Had the guild abandoned her? Then suddenly being in chains wasn't sexy anymore, eyes tracing her figure made her feel uncomfortable, and the touch of her master made her recoil. They called her dumb, and it hurt her feelings. What did she do wrong? Why did the Bird of Passage leave her? She was confused, and that made her a bad slave. And a bad slave had to be punished, broken, and molded into a good slave. They whipped her, and she forgot to faint. She forgot to play feeble. She wasn't a good slave! She wasn't that pitiful pretty little thing that was good for nothing but entertainment! The Goddess was gone! She was mortal! Mortal and a bad slave … and now they'd suspect her if she tried anything. Maybe they already suspected her! What was she to do? She did nothing. She didn't obey, nor did she rebel. But they called her a bad slave anyway. Her master slapped her, and called for his other servants. They were going to whip her again. Harder than before. They'd make her learn this time. This time would be the last time. This time they'd fix her!

So she did the one thing she knew how to do. With viper-like speed and precision her hands flew, grabbed her master's face, and snapped his neck. Taking his dagger before the corpse hit the floor, she flew to the shadows by the door, and when the servants entered she slit both their throats before they ever realized the danger. But there was no power in this murder. She still wasn't the Goddess of before. She was just a bad slave, a coward, fighting and fleeing for her life. A God has no reason to run. She was mortal. A bad slave, and a coward. She darted through the hallways, through the corridors, and made it out the back entrance long before anyone found her handiwork. She existed. The dark assassin existed, and they'd know it. She'd have to not-exist. At least around here. She'd have to cease to exist.

But how could she if she were no longer a Goddess? The Guild? Yes! The Bird of Passage could fix her! They'd make her a God again!

Then her hopes came crashing down, for she sought the guild and found nothing. Her safe house was inhabited by strangers not associated with the guild. Her contacts had vanished, and she had no idea where they could be. They left her! Not only her, but they disowned her black feathered friends too! What did she do that was so bad that they'd abandon her raven friends too? And that really made her feel bad. They could do what they wanted to her, but leave her ravens out of it! Oh, but it was hopeless. The Guild was gone. She was damned to stay mortal. Cast out of paradise! She fell to her knees and cried, for her heart and soul had fled her. She existed, and her whole world had vanished.

She didn't bother retrieving her beloved ring blade from its secret resting spot (obviously, she couldn't take it with her while posing as a slave.) The guild had abandoned her and her friends. They wouldn't let her use it. They probably took it back already anyway. Oh what was she to do? Without the Bird of Passage she was lost. A fallen Goddess forced to walk with mortals. And that's where the vivid memories end and where the puzzle begins.

From village to village she wandered, trying to find a new home but the world outside the Guild was so strange. Sure, she passed among these people before, but never really interacted with them. At least, not beyond a surface level. They made no sense! They were concerned with weird things, and their treatment of her was so random. One minute they smiled at her, the next they screamed and yelled and said mean things. One moment they offered friendship, but the next they made fun of her and the whole room pointed and laughed. Men boasted lies about their escapades, women whispered lies in quiet circles about their neighbors, but Tira couldn't lie. No, Tira couldn't even ask questions about those other people's lies. They could take things from her, but she couldn't take things from them. They could be mean to her, but she had to be polite or else they'd arrest her. They could hit her, but she couldn't fight back or she'd be arrested and put in the stocks. It wasn't fair. It didn't make sense.

And thus she couldn't remember because it was all so confusing.

Village to village, the people rejected her. If she was lucky, they just all refused to help her, were mean to her, mocked and laughed at her until she left. When she was unlucky, they put her in jail or the pillories for days on end and sometimes they even beat her. Nobody was nice. Nobody. Even the children were rotten! They threw rocks at her friends for no reason. What did a raven ever do to them?

Now she lay here in a puddle on the outskirts of town with no idea how she got here. Well, that's not true. She knew they threw her out of town, but she didn't know why. By this point all of their mistreatment of her just sorta blurred together. By morning, she won't remember if these people just refused or abused her. Did they keep her in the stocks for hours? Days? A week? She didn't know. Probably days with how her tummy growled at her. But it didn't matter anyway. It would all become one bad experience in a never ending nightmare.

They hurt her feelings because they knew she used to be a God. They wanted to boost their egos, and they couldn't get away with it before. But now the tables had turned. Now they could hurt her, and so they did.

I don't want to go on like this. She thought, and then said aloud, "the Goddess is dead."

No one heard her, and no one helped her.

Still laying in that puddle of water, still shivering, her tummy still growling, Tira cried.

Please let me die.

Writer's Note:

For this story, I imagine Tira looking like my version of her from SCIV's editor. Link to My Tira pictures located in my profile. (I would link here, but won't let me for some reason.)