The Price of Silence

It was midnight when the general heard a voice calling him. It wasn’t a quite a person, more like a child, a baby girl. General Caraway slipped out of bed and grabbed his robe which he wrapped haphazardly around his weary shoulders. He shoved his feet into the age flattened leather slippers and proceeded to walk to his daughter’s room. He didn’t turn the light in his bedroom on for fear of waking Julia. She needed her rest, his poor overworked wife.

“An artist’s life is never easy,” she had told him, trying to excuse her hours. That was just yesterday, if he remembered correctly. Little Rinoa was fussing in her mother’s arms as Julia flipped her hair back and smiled secretly at her piano, as though the two of them shared a secret the husband would never know.

However as the general something interrupted his trail of thought.

There was no crib. It was a four post bed.

One for a grown woman.

It was then that the general realized, that it was not yesterday that Julia said those words to him.

 It had been fifteen years ago.

And in those fifteen years, his wife had died, his daughter had turned against him, Deling City had seen the reign of two brutal dictators and his darling daughter had fought in the second sorceress war.

 Now, she was dead.

It was a dead baby that had been crying in that cradle.

The general walked over to the empty bed and stroked the covers, imaging the form of his daughter huddling under them. It was hard to believe that her head would never again imprint on that pillow, that her hand would no longer hang over the edge of that bed, that she would never again cuddle those covers against her chest waiting for her dead love to come back to her empty embrace.

The general sat down on the empty bed and began to pray.  He never did pray back then, in his youth. But now he was doing it more and more often. There comes a time when a father can no longer protect his daughter: when she wanders outside of the playground and into the realm of terrorism, warfare and witchcraft.  He could not chase away the bullies this time, he could not hold her hand and tell her that as long as he was here, the ogre hiding under her bed couldn’t touch her. Because, in this world, ogres are very real and they came under the banner of death, bullets and dictators. These things that did not care if the little girl they claimed for their own had a father that loved her more than life itself. So now he prayed, hoping that someone, more powerful than himself, would take care of her wherever she was now.

Daddy?  

Yes honey?

I’m scared. There’s something outside my room. I keep hearing its footsteps.

That’s just the floorboards squeaking, dear. Go back to bed.

Can I sleep with you?

He wished that he had said yes. But he was too tired, too impatient, too ungrateful then, and now he could never. The general was broken from his reverie suddenly. He jerked his head up, something, there was something fleeing from the corner of his eye. It almost looked like it was dressed in blue.

“Rinoa?” Caraway asked vainly into the darkness. He was going insane, truly insane but he lacked the effort to care anymore. Caraway got up form where he sat and walked over to the door where he had seen the shape disappear.  He did not expect to find anything but the sanctuary of his madness and even that was too much to hope for.

But he saw it again, that shape fleeing from the parlor, out the back door.

Caraway rushed after it, nearly tripping on the carpet in the hall.

“Stop!” Caraway yelled as he rushed through the house following the shade wherever it was going. He came to a stop at the doorway into the garden. There he saw Rinoa sitting by the fountain, alone. He hand was around her neck, holding those two rings, anxiously twisting them around her index finger.

“Who. . .” The general began but trailed off in mid thought. He walked up to her slowly, trying not to scare the image away.

She looked up, her eyes large and brown in the nightlight.

“Daddy?”

The general caught his breath. He could not speak.

“I thought. . you were. . “

“Dead?” Rinoa asked quietly.

The general suddenly felt his relief replaced by rage.

“Those imbeciles! They told me-“

“I am dead, daddy.” Rinoa interrupted calmly.

“What do you mean?” The general asked, suddenly grave as he caught hold of her arm, feeling that she was very much solid. Cold, she was so dreadfully cold but she did not dissipate in his grasp which was enough to bring him a measure of comfort.

“I’m not alive, anymore.” The girl stated once again. “I-“

“Then what are you?” The general asked, firmly but without a trace of anger. “A vampire? A werewolf? Whatever you are Rinoa, why did you keep yourself from me?”

“I was af-“

“Afraid of your father?!” The general asked with incredious rage filling his voice.

“I’m here now.” Rinoa replied equally angry. “I’m here for you now. Isn’t that enough?”

“Yes.” The general replied realizing his folly. “Yes that’s more than enough.” Caraway replied with emotion filling his voice. He reached out to embrace his daughter and held her tight against his breast. “That bastard, Leonhart. He’s behind all this isn’t he?”

“I missed you too, daddy.” Rinoa replied.

Beyond the garden, in the shadows, the red flicker of a cigarette could be seen. The bearer flung the butt to the ground and crushed the remains under his toe.  “Yes,” he replied. “It’s good to be back.”

A woman stood next to him. She frowned disapprovingly at his newly found habit.

“I always knew she was the Hyne. From the moment I saw her.” She replied.

“And you kept it to yourself. A lot of good that did for the rest of us.” He replied.

“Why should I have told you, Draven?” She asked with bitterness in her voice. “Why should I have desired to share this truth with any of you?”

“Careful, there.” He replied. “You just be might need me one day. Her too,” Draven replied gesturing to the girl in blue. “You don’t want to make enemies of us, not like the way you did long ago. Be glad she met you as a friend in her mortal wandering. Be grateful.”

“Grateful?” The woman asked. “I’ll show you grateful, knight.”

The man chuckled as he walked away from her.