Forsaken Scarlet

Scarlet was a young and cheerful girl, about 8 years old with shining long reddish brown hair and blue eyes that sparkle like clear water on a summer day. Her parents were wonderful spellcasters, and she always loved to learn spellcasting from them in a dense forest by the village they live in. They spent most of their days in that forest where they can use their magic whenever they want since the village only has sword wielders and archers, and they fear any magic users that set foot in their village and anyone that uses magic would be sentenced to death. This wasn’t a problem for Scarlet and her family, however, since with the help of their magic, they were able to conceal their aura of magic and their identities and live a normal life like the rest of the villagers. A couple months before her ninth birthday, Scarlet managed to successfully use fire magic like her parents, and to celebrate, they decided to make a feast in the forest out of the many fruits and berries they could find, and they cooked it all with Scarlet’s new fire magic. When they finished eating, they saw a hunter that stood in shock and anger at the magic they possess. “DAMN WITCHES!! YOU PLAN ON DESTROYING OUR VILLAGE, DON’T YOU?! I’LL SHOW YOU!!” the hunter yelled out with fiery eyes and he began to charge at them with a large knife. Before the hunter could slam the knife down at her dad, he burned his hand and made him let go of the knife. “You’ll all pay for this, you hear me?!” he yelled out as he ran back to the village, screaming in agony and attempting to cover his burn. “Don’t worry, sweetie.” Her sad softly said to her “Your mother and I will be alright. Hide somewhere in the forest for now, right now, all that matters is your safety.” Scarlet’s eyes began to fill up with tears as she yelled out “I don’t want to leave you! Why won’t you run away and hide as well?!” Her mom picked her up and held her in her arms with tears running down her eyes as well. “This whole thing was our fault, not yours, and we also don’t want to leave our home or kill any innocent people. We love you, sweetie, all we want is for you to be safe.” Despite their talk to her, Scarlet was still persistent on staying by her parents’ side no matter what bad things will happen. Shortly after their talk, all the villagers surrounded them wielding anything they could find, from swords to pitchforks and sickles. Before any of the villagers could say anything to them, Scarlet’s father walked up a few steps towards them and calmly said “We will freely go with all of you, but on one condition. Please, please leave my daughter out of this, she’s innocent and had nothing to do with the incident.” Many of the villagers stared at her like they were expecting an innocent 8 year old girl to trick them and burn all of them. But out of the crowd, the elder of the village appeared. He was a short man with a little fat on his belly and very skinny arms and legs, and with a sincere look on his face, he said to the villagers “Don’t get hasty, all of you, I’m sure they had a good reason towards their action. Magic users aren’t very different from us, so why do you want to kill them so much?” One of the villagers came out from the crowd and yelled “Don’t you remember when a single spellcaster nearly destroyed our entire village?! That’s why we can’t trust these magic using bastards anymore!” “Not all of them are evil, and we live in an amazing world full of spellcasters, humans with powers of dragons, and valkyries” the village elder responded “I say they should be left unpunished, so we should all head back to the village.” All of the villagers were furious and they charged in and grabbed Scarlet’s parents and took them back into the village to be executed, completely ignoring what the elder said. When the villagers dragged her parent’s out of the forest, the elder noticed that the villagers actually accepted their plea and left Scarlet untouched. Scarlet on her knees, bawling, knowing that there was nothing she can do to save her parents, not even the use of her new fire magic that was still weak and using it would cost her her own life as well. The elder slowly walked up to her, and he felt like he could hardly walk from his melancholy at the sight of Scarlet’s sadness. With the last bit of energy he could find, he bent down to Scarlet and whispered in her ear “Don’t worry, my child, the executions won’t start until morning, so I can possibly set up a way for them to be safe, but who knows if it’ll work.” Scarlet began to hold onto the elder’s arm and didn’t want to let go of him until she fell asleep several minutes later with tears still slowly coming down her face. The next day was bright and beautiful, but the day’s beauty would soon be gone by the shadows of the execution. All the villagers were at the center of the village, roaring anxiously for the executions to start. The village elder stood on a high platform with Scarlet standing beside him holding his hand very tightly. With a depressed look on his face, he slowly began his speech. “Even if I let them go, your rage will take over your judgments and you’ll want to kill them even more, and that will get you all possibly killed. So by the majority of the village and for the safety of every one of you, I have no choice but to sentence them to death.” All of the villagers hollered in excitement, cheering as if they just won the war against spellcasters. Then the executioner slowly came up to the platform and stood by the elder. He was a behemoth with a dark hood, wearing a thick, black coat covered in dry blood and wielding a distorted scythe with a shining, clean blade and a handle still covered in dry blood. “However” the elder began to talk again. “For your safety in case they attack any of us again, they will be executed in the forest and we will all stay here and wait until the executioner returns.” Many of the villagers got furious again, but it didn’t last too long and they accepted his words knowing what happened to the hunter. The executioner escorted Scarlet’s parents into the forest, and none of the villagers decided to run up and kill her parents themselves, fearing not only them, but fearing the deathly look of the executioner. As they were walking into the forest, the elder bent down to quietly talk to Scarlet again “Your parents will be fine, I told the executioner to let your parents go somewhere and he’d say that he got threatened by them and that they got away. I just hope he doesn’t actually kill them.” An hour past since they walked off into the forest, and Scarlet was still crying and tightly holding onto the elder’s hand. Right before one of the villagers would go into the forest to check things out, the executioner finally returned. As soon as he came out of the shadows in the forest, everyone noticed the fresh blood dripping from the tip of his scythe and the new blood stains on his dark coat. “The deed is done…” the executioner said in a very low and ominous voice. At that moment, all the villagers began to cheer and celebrate in the middle of the town. However, the village elder began to shed some tears as he looked at Scarlet, bawling on the ground and cry at the top of her lungs. Scarlet then began to throw out waves of fire towards the sky, and everyone became quiet as soon as they saw the flames began to listen to her cries. “WHY DID YOU HAVE TO TAKE MY PARENTS AWAY FROM ME, I LOVED THEM WITH ALL MY HEART!! THEY DIDN’T DO ANYTHING WRONG!! WE MAY BE ABLE TO USE MAGIC, BUT THAT DOESN’T MAKE US LESS HUMAN LIKE ALL OF YOU!!” As she continued to bawl, everyone began to feel sad and felt so sorry on what they took away from her. The village elder suddenly spoke with sadness in his voice to everyone. “I hope you all learned today that no matter what gifts we have as a human being, we are still no different from everyone else. Unfortunately, we had to sacrifice the lives of two innocent people trying to raise a family. All I pray for now is a better future and humanity to everyone.” After everyone applauded from his speech, the elder turned his head towards the forest, and he noticed the executioner still standing by the shadows of the forest and he noticed that the blood from the executioner’s scythe was gone and that the fresh blood stains from his dark coat were gone as well. The elder bent down to Scarlet, her face full of tears, and began to calmly talk to her with an excited look on his face. “Knowing your parents, they’re probably still alive and perfectly safe somewhere. However, I don’t know where they could be now or where they’re planning to go. I think it’s best if you stay in the village for now, you can stay at my home for the time being; you can learn more about your fire magic and other amazing spells.” A small smile began to appear on her face and began to hug his body, as if she just saw her parents walking towards the village. As the years slowly pass, Scarlet taught herself on mastering her fire spells and was also learning a few healing spells as well. She became friends with several villagers and became so friendly and happy towards everyone. Scarlet managed to live a normal life while the elder took good care of her, but she would oftentimes have a melancholy thinking about her parents that she misses so much. When she was 13, she perfected many fire spells and can use all of them expertly; however, at that same time, the village elder died from old age, and she was left with the entire home herself and no one to lead the village. It was soon after the elder’s death that all the villagers began to neglect and hate her again like they did to all the other spellcasters in the past. She tried to be friendly and kind to them again, but they were completely ignoring her and shoving her out of their way. When she first saw everyone hating her again as she was walking around the village, she thought to herself “What the hell’s going on here? Why does everyone hate me again so much now? I guess they truly didn’t change forever in the end…” A few years past, and she began to feel very lonely again and would isolate herself in her home most of her days learning more fire and healing spells. Then one day, a few young warriors came to the village and asked Scarlet if she’d like to go with them on a journey to fight the dark monsters in the land and find the people they miss so much. Scarlet was adamant about her thought on every normal human being selfish and non-accepting, but she knew they weren’t normal people; they had normal weapons of swords and a hammer, but they each had unique spells and wondrous powers with them; and in a way, they were like her with feelings of loneliness and the need to do something great with their gifts in their lives. After letting her sad emotions out about her past and wanting to find her parents, she decided to go with them and leave the village for something even greater, and before leaving, she decided to become friendly to all the villagers despite everyone still ignoring and hating her existence. While the sun was setting as she was leaving the village with her new friends, she put her hands on her breasts, felling a painful strain going on in her heart. “Dammit! What’s this feeling I’m having now? It’s making me feel like I want revenge on everyone in the village for what they did to my parents 8 years ago. To kill every last one of those bastards and destroy their homes, like what they did to me. I guess I’m glad I’m leaving that hellish village for their safety and for me to have a better life. Besides, I have a new family now, and I’m sure they’ll help me through thick and thin.” She thought to herself, and with one last look at the village, she shouted out to her friends “I won’t be forsaken anymore!!” and started slowly walking away with them as her long reddish hair waved smoothly and majestically with the gentle and cool evening wind.