This is one I started ages ago and then came back and re-wrote from a different perspective. It involves quite a few charries, so I'm not sure whose name deserves to head it, so I've left it blank. Hope you guys like! Ooooooh, plot! XD. Blaze is Anni's, not mine x
Bedtime Stories
The night is stormy and dark. The girl creeps slowly up the stairs, the wood creaking softly under her feet on the weaker slats. She gently pushes a door open and steps inside, closing it behind her with a small click, before turning to face the room. She steps towards the wooden cradle by the window, staring down at the child within. The child stares back with curious blue eyes, curling and uncurling her tiny hands like starfish, blinking up at this oddity. Lightning flashes outside the window and the baby trembles and opens her mouth to wail, but the girl reaches down and easily plucks her from the crib, holding her up against her shoulder. "Shhh…" the girl whispers, walking to the window and staring out at the storm. "Don't cry."
The baby gulps and whimpers, but doesn't wail, to the girls contentment.
"Do you want me to tell you a story, hmn?" the girl murmurs to the baby, swaying slightly. The baby gurgles in answer. "Here's a story then…" the girl says, sitting down on a wooden chair, and gazing out the window, her eyes growing slightly misty. "Once upon a time, there was a queen who longed to have a baby…"
The baby fidgets slightly, her hand curling around the girls hair. The girl gently pulls the child's hand away.
"The queen had tried everything, but no one could help her, not even the best physicians in the land. But one day, the queen visited a small town she has been too as a child, and that night a magical voice came to her, whispered to her and led her to a well." The girl smiles, jiggling the child gently, getting into her stride. "And from the well, a magical voice whispered to her that it would give her children, in return for a small price. The queen asked what the price was, and the voice told her that if it gave her the ability to have children, then in return it must bring her first daughter back to the town and give it to the well." The girl strokes the baby's head softly, her eyes gleaming. "The queen agreed, and left. And the voice kept its promise. Soon after the queen returned home, she fell pregnant and gave birth to a baby boy.
"However, the queen was treacherous. Remembering her promise to the voice, she sent her husband to the physician to ensure he wouldn't give her anymore children, in case she gave birth to a daughter. The voice, on discovering this was enraged with the queens betrayal." The baby whimpers, and the girl realises her grip has grown too tight and relaxes it. "As her husband could no longer have children, the voice enchanted the queen, and whilst her husband was away on a long trip, the queen had an affair with her sister's husband and became pregnant.
"Terrified, the queen begged her sister to take in the child, and her sister agreed. However, after the child was born, the queen's sister, on discovering her husband's infidelity, left, abandoning the child with her former husband." The girl shifts the baby to her other shoulder, checking to make sure the child hasn't fallen asleep. She hasn't; her blue eyes are still as alert as ever. The girl smirks slightly and continues. "However, that child was a boy. The voice still hadn't made the queen pay for her betrayal. Once more the queen was led into an affair with her sisters former husband. Once more the queen became pregnant. But this time her husband found out. Betrayed, he abandoned the queen and she was left alone. And this time she gave birth to a daughter. For two years she struggled to raise her son and her daughter alone. For two years she resisted the voice whispering in her mind. But she eventually gave in. She travelled to the town to deliver her daughter to the well, as she had been instructed."
The baby makes noises of discontentment, and the girl shushes her, jiggling her up and down. "She was too weak, however, to go through with it. She ended up abandoning the child on the doorstep of the local police station, before returning home, thinking she'd never see her again. The baby was taken to the local orphanage where she was raised without ever knowing her mother's identity. But the voice wouldn't give up its prize so easily. For the girl had a great power inside her, a power the voice needed in order to fulfil its plans. From a young age it spoke to the girl, whispering in her mind, contacting her in her dreams, laying down the foundations for what she was destined to become. And it nearly succeeded. By the time she was fourteen, the voice believed the girl ready. It initiated its plan, and waited for the girl and the others it had chosen to play their parts. However there was something the voice had not anticipated. How love can change a person."
The girls teeth clench slightly and her mouth takes on a mocking twist. "The girl fell in love and all the work the voice had down, the hard, unbreakable shell it had created melted away. The girl ended up helping to defeat the voice, perhaps for good. Only my master isn't defeated that easily. It found her again, and this time, when she wouldn't listen to reason, it bought about her death." The girl smiles triumphantly. "But the voice does not forget and it does not forgive. For it knew that the children she had carried were already infected with it, as the girl herself had been. It knew how susceptible they were, and if it could only find them when they were young, lead them in the right direction…lead you in the right direction…"
The baby begins to whimper, struggling against the girls grip, but the girl just holds her tighter. "You'll join your brother soon, Catherine." She murmurs, kissing the baby's forehead. The child begins to scream, flailing her tiny fists, and the girl quickly places her back down in the cot, hearing footsteps. She melts away into the shadows in the corner of the room and watches as a man bursts in.
"Cat?" he calls, panic in his voice, the panic of a new parent who thinks, at every cry, that something has gone wrong, that their child is hurt…
The baby wails louder, her face screwed up, her skin almost the same shade of red as her vibrant hair.
"Shhh…shhh…" the man makes calming noises, scooping up the child and holding her close, jiggling her gently. "Shhh…" The baby gradually calms, her shrieks descending into hiccups and the odd whimper.
The girl watches as he goes to put her back in the crib, and then quickly picks her up again at the shriek of protest the baby emits as soon as he lets go. The man leaves the room with the child, intending to keep her with him until the storm had passed, to stop any harm coming to her. The girl slowly steps out of the shadows, watching the doorway, before her eyes flick back to the now empty crib. "Soon, Catherine." She murmurs. "It will start soon. You'll come to us soon enough."