Underestimate Me

She looked at herself. Saw herself falling down that cliff, her dark hair pulled up in the air and her arms scratching the emptiness. She watched as she felt that same quenching of her stomach as she had felt then. The moment her feet had stepped off that cliff, entering the nothingness of the air. She had not flown, but she felt weightless. Searing down that cliff, feeling the water that fell down with her splatter on her skin, she had felt delightful in her terror. Josselyn could finally feel again. Her numbness was broken as she’d pierced the water below her like an arrow.

Josselyn was watching herself as she fell from that cliff all that time ago. She gazed upon her rebirth as if it was played before her like a dream. She saw how her stone cold and wet body had emerged from the water. Reincarnated and stronger than ever. She had given her life to Maa, she had obediently dropped from that cliff, and she was granted a second life for it. A second chance and a second beginning. Maa had taken the empty vessel that was left and filled it. Filled it with her vengeance, her strength and her passion.

Josselyn felt the water streaming from the waterfall surge past her legs. She dropped in the water and let her ears be filled with the cold. Nothing was to be heard but the sound of the waterfall. It dominated the sound of her thoughts and she closed her eyes, Josselyn could just float. She floated on the weight of the water and she just was. She was being cleansed of her sorrow; she was being cleansed of her conflicting emotions. She could not feel anything here, anything but the icy water freezing her body. In a single sigh, the weight she had been carrying was lifted for just those moments.

She turned herself in the water and submerged under the water. Swimming towards the bottom, feeling life passing around her. She was just Josselyn. She had no past, she had no future. There was just the present. She didn’t feel that knife upon her like she did looking in Rowen’s eyes. That never happened. She did not feel the anxiety that took her when thinking of days ahead. The responsibility of caring for her sisters, keeping them safe, keeping them alive. She did not have those worries here, because here she did not exist. She was naked and alone. She just was.

As she came up for air, she cleared her face of the drops spilling over it. The wind played with her wet hair and the sun was trying to warm her up.

“Maa, mother, I need guidance.” she whispered to the wind. “You appointed me, you made me your chosen; please guide me now that demons are haunting me from inside.”

Josselyn had killed every man on her path. Every man that had wronged her sisters, she had easily slit his throat and she had not shed a single tear. Maa had housed her and through her the Goddess had found the vengeance she searched for. Balor’s sons had suffered under the wrath of Maa; they had been given their own medicine and found it not to be healing. The sisters had left no guilty man alive, though the most deserving of them all was still bound against that pole. The way he had hung from it, on his knees. The way his damage shoulder had turned in that position, stretching out his muscles in his neck and his jaw line. She had almost felt a pinch of pity. She had felt how Maa had been pushed away and her foolish younger self had tried taking over. It had taken the memory of those knives against her flesh, the memories of how they had touched her, to wake Maa up again.

“He should die,” she whispered to herself. “Though his father, his Balor, has saved him from that fate and condemned me once again.”

“Death is mercy,” The wind howled around her. “Mercy,” it sighed.

Josselyn emerged from the water, and sat down to dry in the sun. Her naked body was draped in little pearls of water. The sun made them sparkle and blinded her eyes. Sitting on a bolder next to the water, she watched it flow. The sound of flapping wings made her look up. A smile appeared on her face as the little falcon dropped down beside her. His head cocking to the side and making quick movements, keeping close watch of his surroundings.

“Hello little fellow,” She said as he let her graze his little head. “Did you break your fast?” The little bird let out a little cry and she shook her head laughing.

“I bet you have eaten, but I guess you can stuff some more?” She got up and clothed herself in the sheer white gown again. Wrapping it around her curves it stuck to the parts of her body not yet dried by the sun. Her fair skin shimmered through the fabric, coloring the wet white textile to a softer pink. The bird was watching her from a branch he had flown to. She did not wear any leather patches on her dressing gown and the thin fiber would be easily cut by his sharp claws. As would her skin.

Josselyn raised her fingers to her lips and filled the air with a sharp whistle. Falcon knew. He knew he was allowed to travel with her. His strong and gracious wings unfolded and he flew to her shoulder, landing on the left one. She felt as his claws pierced her skin and anchored in her flesh. The pain was soothing. As she walked back to camp, little droplets of blood dripped on her white dressing gown and colored it red.

“You are the only male who will ever hurt me,” she whispered to him as they traveled back. Half-way back she stopped. Something had caught her eye and caught her breath. The bird looked at her with curiosity of the sudden halt. As he was to say: ‘mother, why are we stopping?’ She crouched down and bent her knees, Falcon remaining on her shoulder. She was suddenly well aware of the knife that was bound to her thigh, she was aware of its presents as she watched. The dress was too thin, it was too vulnerable. What had she been thinking, going alone and in such a state?

Her hands graced the imprinted ground she had stumbled upon. These were not her sisters. The tracks were too big. They were too deep. Not a single one of her sisters would have made these; they did not possess the mass or the stupidity to leave such behind.

The iron hit her stomach, pressing the air out of her lungs and folding her double. She gasped for air, grunting as the leg collided with her midriff. The man had strong legs, muscles coiled around his bones, as hard as steel. She felt the tugging at her wrists and pain shot through her shoulders. She had been hanging in that position for what seemed like hours and hours. It could have been days even. She did not notice the passing of time anymore. All she could notice was the pain going through her as the foot collided with her abdomen again.

Her fingers traced the footprint again and as she touched it she could feel the hatred boiling up. Her passivity was gone. She was not just Josselyn anymore.

She was Maa.