Rose Petals by Sassy C

Prologue

Rose Petals:
Prologue:

Once upon a time, there was a rich nobleman and his beautiful wife.

They lived with their hundreds of servants and slaves in a fortress placed strategically two miles off of a busy road, visible to all who traveled by.

This nobleman was so rich, it was rumored he was the most handsome, most powerful being known to man. His wife was gifted with an equally beautiful face, one that was lusted after by several kings from different lands.

This nobleman and his beautiful wife were happy and carefree; they were unaffected by the poor economy outside of the tiny, imaginary world in which their fortress lay. The beautiful wife believed the world was as beautiful as she, although still incomparable to her own magnificence. The nobleman imagined the world to be how he lived - expected it that way.

They were proud, ignorant, and conceited nobles. Raised on gourmet foods and servants, neither had truly worked a day in their lives. Neither had ever lifted even their pinky to help another.

They didn't want to see the world as it was. They didn't want to see plague, fatigue, or death. This nobleman and his beautiful wife were content to believe the lies they fed themselves, so ignorant were they.

They had not the courage to taint their lives with the truth.

They lived happily, blissfully, for many years.

Then, during a torrential downpour one evening, a knock sounded from their front entrance.

The servant that answered the door gasped at the sight of the old woman who stood on the other side, drenched and shivering, seemingly on the brink of death.

"Please," begged the wrinkled hag, "Please, give an old woman shelter from a storm?"

The servant knew the nearest refuge, a dying village, lay west a few miles out. She was kinder than her masters, who were currently entertaining dignified guests further inside the fortress, and ushered the woman into a nearby room, where a fire sat patiently waiting.

 "Come warm yourself by the fire," she said.

"You are most kind," the old woman whispered as she sat on a chair.

The servant bowed and excused herself, saying she would try and fetch some bread and warm porridge for the woman to eat.

When the servant girl returned, she came not alone. Aside her walked a manservant, who was shaking his head at the girl. "Are you daft?" he whispered outside the door after they delivered the food, "You will get us all punished!"

"The masters don't have to know," the servant girl replied quickly. "She can stay in the servant's quarters for the night and be gone before sunrise tomorrow! I could not just leave her to sit in the rain all night."

"It would have to be the slave holdings," grunted the man, crossing his arms. "Mistress tends to walk into our rooms unannounced when she wants something badly."

The servant girl bit her lip nervously. "They will not find out," she assured him once more, after a long silence.

Inside the room, the old woman sopped up the last bit of brown porridge with bread. She had heard every word and knew at once what was going to happen. She would not be staying here this night. Just as she finished off the last scrap of bread, the woman heard a gasp from behind the door.

"My Lady!" It was the servant girl.

There was a silence and then: "You look guilty. What have you done?"

"Is there anything you require?" It was the man speaking this time.

"My husband's favorite novel is in this room, I was just coming to fetch it myself seeing as all the servants should be busy preparing for our late-night supper." The accusation was clear: she knew the two standing before her were not working. They were dawdling. As usual, for lovers.

The doorknob was turning and the old woman on the other side of the door stood in expectation. The servant girl's feeble attempts to keep her mistress out of the fire-lit room went ignored, and the door swung open, revealing a gaudily beautiful woman standing in the arch.

There was a prolonged silence, heavy with shock. "Who in the seven hells is this?" the woman demanded, her voice calm in a most frightful way.

The servants were given no chance to reply, as the old woman stepped forward. "I am but a mere traveler, seeking shelter from a most horrid spring night."

"Is that so?" the nobleman's beautiful wife drummed the manicured fingers of one hand against the wood of the doorway casually as she sized the old lady in front of her, "You will not find that shelter here, old hag."

"Is that so?" whispered the older woman, a bit disappointed.

"Yes. Now, the door is here. Leave this instant before my husband finds you." She stepped from the doorway and motioned the old woman out. When she refused to leave, the nobleman's beautiful wife turned to the manservant and demanded he show her the way.

Standing under the intricate, rich awning outside, just managing to dodge the droplets of rain that showered over her, the old woman placed her calculating eyes once more upon the mistress of the fortress.

"Is this your final decision, my Lady?" she asked, her voice mockingly polite.

"Do not come back, you filth," the woman said arrogantly, brushing her long, wavy auburn hair behind her shoulder. "Someone as ugly, as old as you does not belong in such a rich and new world."

Fear made the nobleman's beautiful wife speak so harshly; fear of the look that crossed the old woman's shrewd gaze.

"You will regret this," the old woman said firmly, her previously cracked voice growing strong under some unseen magic. "I see you are expecting a child," at the noblewoman's surprised gasp the old woman chuckled darkly, "Yes, it is true. But be not so eager, for your idyllic days will end with its birth.

"The child will be cursed upon its first breath. Your pompous, self-righteous attitudes have doomed you, your household, and your future family. So racked with guilt will you be that not even your putrid imaginary world will save you."

As the old woman began to sink into the darkness behind her, eyes gleaming as purple as the lightning that flickered across the sky above, these parting words echoed heavily in the air: "Only one can save her, she who breathes the salty air of truth and craves the waves of love. Only one can save her, she who smells of roses. Only one can save her, it is not you, nor is it he. It is him, the one who brings forth terror and fear, but carries the precious moon upon his back."

The nobleman's beautiful wife stood, awe-struck and horrified and unable to move. It took more than a few minutes for the shock to fade, although the fear remained, and she swung around to face the servant girl and boy. "Do not breathe a word of this to anyone," she threatened angrily, "not even my husband."

The servants nodded together quickly and with a wave of the mistress' hand, they were dismissed. And so, with that flimsy motion, was the curse.

And eight months later, a baby girl was born. Despite the assurance that she was, indeed, healthy, the babe's panicked parents refused to believe a monster like that could possible be in good physical shape.

The child was grotesque because she was just much too plain. She was born to a couple known for their god-like appearances. However, her eyes were dirt brown, her skin the color of dirt and papery to the touch. Her ebony hair lay unruly down her back, unmanageable, in wicked waves. She was scrawny, as flat as the walls she clung to despite her mother's many womanly curves.

Her personality was a disappointment as well. Her desires were a mixture of wanting to please her unloving parents and to be her own person. She wanted to be molded by her mother, become a young lady her wealthy parents would be proud to call daughter. At the same time, she wanted to roll in the mud, to ride horses and play with the servant children. She wanted to be herself; a person she continuously felt was being displaced in the need for affection.

Needless to say, the nobleman was astounded by their misfortune from the day the child took its first breath of air. His beautiful wife, however, remembered the words of the old woman and the last words she had spoken. It had undoubtedly been a curse; one the nobleman's beautiful wife had stubbornly refused to warn her husband about the night it happened - and every night afterward.

When the pair realized that their daughter was, in fact, ugly and hideous and there was just no changing it, the nobleman's beautiful wife informed her husband of the witch's curse.

With hesitant determination, they fought to make it work - taught the girl to politely keep to shadows, to speak only when spoken to. They told her to wear a veil, cover her unsightly skin with long fashionable clothing. They kept her life a secret from other dignitaries; when guests arrived, she was to stay in her rooms.

And the little girl lived only to please her ungrateful parents, hoping that one day they will realize their love for her.

For a time, they lived in tense harmony. And then, one day, a noble guest arrived and the child answered the door without her customary veil. The invisible daughter of the nobleman and his beautiful wife became a spectacle.

Furious, the nobleman and his beautiful wife could turn on nobody but themselves. The war between the married couple waged for three months until one morning the child awoke to find they had disappeared completely.

She was all alone in the fortress save for a handful of servants loyal only to her and the sunshine she carried in her pocket.

The child's name was Kagome.

Kagome Higurashi.

-----[Chapter End]----

Notes: This came to me the other day, and I've been working on it. I was curious as to what people think of it so if you could review and tell me your true and honest opinions I'd be most happy. Have a nice day/evening! -Sassy C