Raven Wing: chapter one

Addiction.  Sweet surrendering of the senses.  Cruel fate to make it be that the only thing I cannot have is the drug I long for most.  She was to be married.  Taken away from me before our actual love could blossom.  She was taken away by a knight in shinning armor while I lay here to shrivel.
She was taken by a knight, a man, of all things.  And here she left me to mop up my own tears.  How did this happen to me you ask?  To have my true love ripped away by the confines of a mans arms? 
It all began six very short months ago, we were unacquainted then.



“Clarissa!” my mums’ very shrill voice shrieked throughout the house.  I was sure that our neighbors had gone deaf.  “Clarissa, hither, now!” I sat down the frock I was mending and stood, closing my windowpanes.
“Coming mother, just a moment,” hurriedly, I rushed out of the sewing room, yawning to pop my ears from the noise.  I straightened out my blouse hurriedly as I rushed down the stairs.  A mop lay to the end of the grand staircase, but my mind didn’t register this, I suddenly, I slipped and fell, stumbling down the last of the steps.
I rub my head.  This same routine happened every morning.  She called, I hurried, I fell, and I got hurt.
“Yes Ma’m?”  I asked, smoothing out my morning garments and regaining my balance.  Falling down stairs seemed to have that effect on me.
She eyed me cautiously, as if I was some pig to sell.  I could just imagine her handing me off to some old man who would immediately start by searching my teeth for any cavities.  “Clarissa, I don’t suppose you’ve heard of the banquet coming up, have you?”  She brushed some hair out of my face.  I winced, not liking to have her do that.  Soon it falls back into place and she brushed it aside again.
“No, I haven’t,” I lied.  Of course I’d heard of the ball.  It was the only thing I could think of for the past month.  I loved the dancing and music of a good celebration.  However, my mum liked to feel ‘in the know’ as you could plainly see.  I had quickly learned that it made things pass quicker if you play along.
She smiled and said, “Young Ma’m Mourisette is freshly of the age of sixteen,” she continued, straightening her shoulders and back a little, “So her parents are hosting a banquet, or ball if I must, in her honor.”  I nodded, knowing where the conversation was leading.  This happened at least once a year.
“I should aware you that you are eighteen now, much over the age when you were appropriate.”  I cringed, why did she have to rub my age in my face?  “However, this banquet will have many fine suitors, why even you may find one!” she snidely smiled.  I hid my anger, and blushed as if I were embarrassed.  What was the matter with me getting a husband? I had no idea.
She walked over to the window and looked down upon the street, watching as small carriages and walkers passed by.  Her breath came off the windowpanes, and the glass fogged.  Breathing in it lightens.
“However much I wish for grandchildren, I do wish for you to choose wisely.  You do not want to pick wrongly again.”  A grim tone washed through her voice on this last comment.  I tried to block the painful memory from my head.  I nod and get my mind off of the subject.  But in the back of my mind, it irked at me.
The window was still fogging, and she seemed to have her mind elsewhere also.  Turning back to me she clapped her hands together as if to get my mind back on her.
“So, this evening, we are going to start the shopping for your gown.”  I looked on at her in amazement.  She never had given me a proper gown; usually I borrowed one of hers, even for my sixteenth birthday formal.
My mind was still puzzling over this when a knock sounded on the parlor door.  She motioned for me to sit and then said, “You may enter.”  The maid, a rather large woman, with a stubbornness that would stun a mule, entered.
“There is a young gentleman at the front parlor asking for Mistress Clarissa,” she said rather flustered.  She looked to me, her cheeks very rosy, and her forehead was covered with sweat from either the heat of the day or the harshness of the chores selected for her.
My mum eyed me cautiously like I was some stray dog, and watched my every movement.  I nodded to the maid, and got up dusting my garments off, and heading to the door.
“Clarissa!  Please do not say you are considering going in there like that!”  My mum says, wrinkling her nose at my morning clothes like they were some rags that she had just found on the street.  She was right though; my outfit was not presentable for any young lady to wear before a gentleman. I shook my head embarrassed, and began to head upstairs, looking down at my clothing in disgust, but not for them.
I rushed up after excusing myself from the room.  My room wasn’t very tidy, but I kept what clothes I had well off the floor.  Opening my dresser, I saw nothing for the occasion, and headed over to my closet.  I quickly slipped into a blue green dress I had just finished the collar to. 
As I looked into the mirror and saw how loosely it hung off of my frame, I quickly grabbed another.  Soon I had already gone through my entire wardrobe, and not a dress seemed wearable.
My mind raced and soon I remembered the frock I had been repairing in the next room.  Maybe I could borrow that for a little, I thought.  Quickly I rushed into the next room and slipped it on, hoping my mum wouldn’t notice.  I slid it over my head, the smooth silk on my body.  I shivered with excitement. 
Silently I slipped back into my room and examine myself in the large mirror above my dresser.  The frock was so perfect.  I felt so beautiful.  Pinning up my hair, I searched for a pair of earrings to match the pale blue-silver piece.
My hair has always been my best feature.  Halfway down my back and as dark and sleek as a raven wing against snow.  I got it from my father.  My mum had said a long time ago that she envied it herself.  Me, I loved it.  It wasn’t too straight, yet it wasn’t uncontrollably curly.  It hung loosely and lavishly down the center of my back.
I slid into a pair of comfortable low-heeled shoes and began down to the front parlor.  The stairs were welcoming and, the windows were so bright this time down.  My house was large and roomy.  I used to love hiding in the stairs from my nanny as she went ‘searching’ for me in one of our games.    Passing down the small hallway I knocked on the parlor door and enter.
Oh what young gentleman awaited there for me?  I thought to myself.  Perhaps a handsome mysterious one with a soft voice and dark eyes awaited me.  Or a cute one who is so adorably shy, or maybe (I gulped, scared) an ugly brilliance. 
Instead was a boy of only about fourteen, redheaded and pink cheeked. 
“Are you Clarissa Façade?”  he says, I could tell he didn’t want to be anywhere near here. 
I nodded disappointed. 
“I am here to relay a message to you from an Alicia Mourisette.”  He closed his eyes as he said this, as if recalling it from his distant memory.  About two minuets pass and my patience begins to wear thin.
“Well?”  I ask, wanting him to hurry up and leave, I was too embarrassed to bear this for much longer.
“Well,” he said as he opened one eye, leaving the other shut “ you have to pay me before I go on.”  Opening my coin purse, I hoped he wasn’t going to charge me more than I had.  I quickly tossed him a few gold coins, trying to get him to hurry.
Smiling wide he said it as if he’s practiced a thousand times.
“Now at the age sixteen Miss Alicia, of the household of Mourisette, is throwing a masque ball in her honor.  You are now cordially invited to said engagement.  Please bring a gift, to welcome her into the new world.”  He took a few rolled pieces of parchment from under his arm, and quickly found the one with my name on it.
“Please accept this invitation.”  I smiled, falsely, and nodded, leading him to the door.
The moment the door closed I sighed.  Why me? 
I hurried up to my room too embarrassed to make even the slightest apology to my mum when I walked past her and she chastised me for taking her frock.
I ignored the maid, whom was my nanny until I was sixteen, as she swept off the top landing of stairs.
I went into my room and I wept.
Why, when I was ready for the opportune moment, did something happen so that I did not get what I wanted?  Why was there a child there?  Why couldn’t there have been a red headed pink-cheeked man?    Sitting up, I brushed my tears aside with my sleeve. 
Gazing into the mirror again I was no longer intent with the way I looked.  My face was pail, and sickly looking.  My hair looked messy, halfway up halfway down.
I lay on my stomach and buried my head in my arms.  Maybe if I just lay there I could disappear…

“Clarrisa Sara Façade!  How dare you!”  I jumped.  The screech seemed to echo forever in the emptiness of my consciousness.
My mum stood beside me, her face red with ferocity. 
“How dare you sleep in day clothes?  And worse than that, in my garments!”  She opened her mouth to say more, and then shut it, only to open it again.  If not for the situation I would have laughed at how fish-like she seemed.
Her face only darkened when I dully asked, “what?”  Grabbing my wrist she throws me to the floor.  Why would you do such a thing- why would you disrespect me like this!  I could just imagine her saying this.  Instead she was silent, giving me the look that only a mother knows how; which, in my household, was much worse. 
She dragged me down the corridor, I prepared to walk down the stairs, but instead she continued down the hall, past the stairs.  Clutching at my wrist toward the guest room.  Opening the door she shoved me in, I heard her lock the door and walk away.
I leaned on the door and listened, finally she was gone.  The frock she was angry with me for sleeping in was now streaked with dust the maid hadn’t quite gotten to yet.  Dusting myself off, I stood up.
Turning around, I lost my breath, it was beautiful.