I.
The girl's dress was vibrant - a blue like the painted beads her father brought back from India. It sparkled in the right light, and the collar was made of exquisite velvet. Her shoes were studded with real diamonds.
She walked carefully down the dirt path, stepping on large, flat rocks to avoid the April mud. It was a game - how far could she go without messing up her shoes, her dress. Without tumbling over and messing up her hair. How far could she carry herself.
The sun had been high up from the horizon when she'd left the party, burning the back of her neck. Now, it was almost empty; dropping from the sky, pulling away its harsh luminosity. Soon, all that would be left would be the stars, the tiny pinpricks that would help her find her way home.
And the moon, but it scared her; there were too many stories about too many evils that came out only in the glow of the moon. It wasn't safe after dark. The world was dangerous.
She was almost back to the river that separated her family's land from the land that everyone owned and no one was allowed to go on. There was a quaint little bridge that spanned the river - it was red, and brighter than any room in her house - and she loved to cross it. It marveled her at how secure it was. Such a tiny structure, ideal for such a tiny person.
She could just see the bridge when the sun dipped behind the trees. As if magic, an owl hooted and a couple late night songbirds tweeted. She thought she saw a doe peak around some bushes before disappearing in the darkness.
It was utter beauty, the night - too perfect to remember the next day. She knew the beauty, thrived on it; she needed it. But she needed to be away from it. It was time to go home, before the light was gone completely.
She was sure it was her imagination, but she thought a branch snapped behind her. Bushes rustled - the doe came back, right? She widened her eyes, but didn't look behind her. She was so close to the bridge, and once she crossed it she'd be thoroughly alright. For good measure, she decided to run the rest of the way, even if it meant getting mud on her shoes.
But before she reached the bridge, from nowhere a hand reached out and grabbed her arm, pulling her back. Before she could figure out how to scream, a hand was over her mouth and someone tying her up. Two dark figures materialized in front of her, and they pulled her along with them. She struggled to get away, but they were too strong. She was forced to walk along with them.
They walked for a long time without stopping; almost until it was light again. She wasn't sure what direction they went, but it was unfamiliar. Sometime in the night, she tripped over tree roots or undergrowth or something horribly tangled and fell to the ground. Her captors pulled her back to her feet.
She could feel the mud on her face.
II.
She was with those men for eleven years. It was a long time before she realized what had happened, and why - how because her father was so important to the society, she had always been in danger of being taken, and she would have always been in danger. Her kidnappers tried to get money out of her father, but for some reason, none ever came.
So they kept her, used her as a gift for visitors, as a sex slave once she was old enough; she didn't realize it, but she was a very beautiful girl, and she probably could have replaced the night.
It happened that one of her so-called patrons became enraptured with her milky hair, her deep-set brown eyes. And apparently, someone like her could be purchased for the right price.
Today was the last day she would see those men that cut her off from the world. She wanted to scream at them, to ask them if they were proud of what they'd done, proud of what they'd made her. She wanted to slap them until it was hard to tell what was flesh and what was scar. She wanted them to be sorry.
But she left without a word. The servants of the man who bought her arrived in a long, black limousine - she thought she remembered riding in one before, back when she wasn't forced to. She rode with them to his manor, and was brought to a small room in the back of the servants' quarters.
There, she was washed and perfumed and given fakely perfect skin and eyelashes. Strange for a wedding, she was put in a dazzling blue gown; she wasn't sure if this was some otherworldly coincidence, or if somehow they knew and they were being cruel, mocking her.
Her shoes didn't have diamonds.
When she was ready, she was given a bouquet of fresh-cut carnations and was led outside, where white chairs were set up in two rows. At the end of the aisle, that awful man to whom she was almost a little grateful was standing in a white suit.
She thought it must have rained the night before, because everything glistened; the grass glittered and the daytime sky seemed to scream "Aren't I beautiful, as well".
Music played, thought she wasn't sure where it was coming from. She walked, slowly, toward the man who now owned her. Funny how she could finally be free of those monsters - the real terrors she should have been watching for all those years ago - and yet she wasn't really free; she was still someone else's object. She had come to accept that she was never going home.
The music seemed sad, though she was sure it wasn't meant to be. It made her want to lay down and cry. Her mind drifted, and she wasn't paying very much attention. She hadn't noticed the small rock that stood exactly where she wasn't to step. It twisted beneath her weight, and she lost her balance, falling to the ground.
To most people in the audience - which wasn't very large, actually - this seemed unfortunate, but not particularly overwhelming. However, when she stood up, she thought only of one thing.
She could feel the mud on her face.
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