"You mean nothing to your friends."
"They will never understand your life."
"They think that you are a liar, that you only feel lust."
"Do you truly love Tribune Desertgrave? Or is she just a toy?"
"Will you ever grow up?"
"Do you ever think about what people really see in you?"

Niddhil struggled to keep the voice in the back of her head. But maybe it was right? Maybe she was just a liability to the Commander. Maybe her 'friend' was more of her 'co-worker'. Maybe she was wasting her time. She'd always be the reject. Not that they could ever hear her--let alone understand her. Would it matter even if they knew?

She could not even speak. Muted from birth by unfortunate divinities. The ringing, echoing crack of the voice splintering across her psyche like shattered ice. The clamping of the boots and stamping of the Frost Legion at her back. She couldn't stop her head from spinning as she collapsed to the ground--knowing well she was not in the right place to fight.

She couldn't understand. She just wanted to rest her head and shut her eyes. 'I'm not here', she tried to dream in her mind. 'There must be some mistake. At any moment I will turn to dust and wake in my tent.' Yet as those boots and cheering, chanting--shouting closed in behind her all she could hear were the dark bellows of dishonesty. The wretched, hurtful words of judgment. She could not tell any longer what thoughts were her own and which were tainted and twisted by the voice scratching at the insides of her skull.

Were they true?

If I can't commit to anyone, to anything--

Why start now?

Art by  pegasys