And the child knew pain. And she knew hate, rage, turmoil murder darknesshatehatehateshadowsagonyevil. She knew death.

Her face growing paler than that of the face of the moon, she dropped to her knees like a limp doll, falling free from the man's cruel grasp. From the threshold of her home, her mother screamed, but did nothing, unable to do anything at all, the harm already having been done. Hearing the scream, the man stood, turned, and faced the child's parents, winking as he spoke to them.

"Believe me. She will turn out beautifully." And laughing insanely, he walked calmly away from the scene.

Enjoying what he saw fully, Antonn fled back to his own world.

The man was gone. Antonn was gone.

Sunrise, was left alone, twirling in the eye of agony itself, her mind ripping itself to shreds with what it had just experienced. And screaming, she teetered on her knees, the pain she knew too much for perhaps anyone to handle, nonetheless an innocent child. For now, purity had been tainted. She would grow up cursed. She would -be-, in a wash of blood.

And she grew up fast.

But she hadn't Turned… yet.

She grew up beautiful, a more stunning sight was rarely seen, even in her land.

But the Darkness still lurked.

Fate threw its troublesome hand in again. She met Star Shadow. She fell in love. And the cycle of events was begun yet once again, unable to be broken. She fell hard, never once guessing the truth. Never once realizing that perhaps, that ethereal visage with black hair and black eyes is not truly real. Never even thinking of such.

Perhaps she should have.

In her dreams, she can still remember her wedding. She can still remember the euphoria she felt being inexorably tied to him, and no one else. The thrill of hearing him say he loved her and none other.

She still yet remembers the one event in her long life that made that one day… night… pale in comparison. The birth of her baby… her beautiful Sunshine…

But perhaps it isn't the excitement she felt that makes her remember. Perhaps it isn't the one moment of sheer, utter, happiness she felt, holding her child within her arms.

Perhaps it is the change that came with that.

The craving for death that immediately followed.

Perhaps, it is the catalyst that she continues to dream of.

She had Changed. Of that, there was no doubt. In the space of one small turning of the night to day, she had changed forever. Her eyes no longer shined. They knew only hate. She no longer smiled. Only sneered in contempt. And, where once she found joy in all, now only her husband and already growing child (I won't delve into the aspects of time - or lack of such - in the Elder's land here) could spark some fading emotion of love within her heart of death. But even they could not save her from the future that awaited her with bleeding claws and sharpened fangs. Even they could not stop her rampage, or the tide of blood that followed.

That week is still constantly mourned in her homeland.

Knowing only a thirst for pain, for torture, she set out to sate her mind of the strange desires it had suddenly wished to consume. By the time she had finished, over a hundred of her people lay dead in a mountain of gore. She would have continued, if she could. But she had been stopped. How they had managed to capture her still mystifies her to this day.

She was put on trial.

She was found guilty.

She was given a sentence more than she deserved.

"Life without death. For eternity."

Her name was changed, so all may know the atrocities she had committed.

"Bloody Sunrise."

And through it all, she only grinned, still adorned in the blood from her multitude of victims, her hair streaked with dark crimson strips. But they didn't blame her. Not once. They had known what had happened. And, perhaps, they had let it - made it happen. But she never knew that. She never will. Of all the secrets she will know, she will never know the full truth of her life. Only the snippets she will manage to figure out.

And insolent, she continued to grin, even as they read her sentence. Until they had said the last word. Then her grin faded. Then she knew the true anguish that was to rip itself throughout the core of her being.

"Banished."

She would never see her daughter again. She would never see her husband again. She would never see the dearest being held to her heart. She would never see her daughter again. Never. The one being she truly held to her heart, she would never see once more. The one being she held closer to her, inexplicably, than her Shadow. Her dearest daughter. Sunshine… They hadn't even been allowed to witness the sentencing, lest Sunrise - Bloody Sunrise - was provoked into a rage. In shock, her glassen heart shattering into a myriad of sparkling, glittering, shards, she was blindly, limply, led away. She only dumbly nodded when they had asked if she was ready. With pity in their hearts, they Vanished her to the Land of the Living. To where the mortals play in their daily games. Secretly, they banished another with her. The man, from so long ago. They couldn't keep him in their land. The act he had committed was equal in sheer horror to hers, if not worse.

She knew, though. Of all the things that evaded her mind, she knew he had fallen to this plane of existence with her.

She hadn't forgiven him. She never will.

With a fervor, she lent herself to the mortal ways. She learnt all she could. The occult… oh, she learned magick with a natural ease. Swordsmanship - the quickness with which she mastered the blade frightened even her teachers. And torture, oh, that perhaps, was the most intriguing one of all. She learned of tortures so sublime, one would think them pleasure. Until, of course, they died from a horrendous loss of blood. She learned of tortures so cruel, they would have made even Stalin turn and retch. But yet, she enjoyed them fully. To the horror of those that had taught her.

With these skills, she hunted that one man down, unknowing that he, like her, was not to blame.

Unknowing, of so very much.

She found him quickly. He had decided there was no use in running. He would be found anyway. No use in hiding, for she would surely find him. He never even put up a fight. What was the use? She would beat him all too quickly.

Now, maybe, with the fate he faces, he wishes he had tried to die.

She captured him. And brought him to Hell. And in the darkest pit of Hades, she chained him, shackled him in a pit of shadow, with nothing but oblivion surrounding his suspended, chained, form. Such environments can make one go quickly insane. Such environments do not make one die. He still hangs there, screaming piteously. Wishing for a freedom that will never be cast his way.

Her hate continued. Her need to kill went unsated. Oh, the multitude of bodies that line her past. The pretty princesses, with the lovely smiles upon her neck. The small band of highway robbers, strung up from the very trees in which they hid. But she no longer killed recklessly. Only the wicked fell before her. A pity then, that in her eyes, all were wicked. All needed to be judged. And all needed their sentence paid out to the fullest. She paid them all one respect, though. She, at least, knew their names. She, even in the cruelty that is her, still remembers their names. She still remembers them all, even if history has not.

And so, time passed on its bloody way.

Until, yet a third time, fate tested its irony upon her.

She came upon the Inn of the Weary Traveller.

Such poor misfortune.

She met many, she befriended few, and came across the pitying luck to meet Atleey Marshe. A priest from the Holy Land. He was all too easily entranced. That same night, another man entered the Inn, of whom whose identity she was unaware. Antonn Cali. Unabashed, he watched her converse with the priest. Perhaps he remembered her from the countless years before. Maybe he recognized that hair, those eyes - the strange color of whom she shares only with her daughter. Maybe she was just another face in the crowd, more interesting than the rest.

In time, she became wicked in the priests eyes.

He hunted her.

She, for once, needed help, and so, she turned to the only other person she knew to implore of, to be her ally. Still so very unaware of whom he truly was. Antonn helped her keep Atleey at bay. And, if she would dare admit, even befriended her. Until another fateful day.

How much Fate must love to tamper with this life.

The memories had been too much for her. She couldn't banish them from her mind, not today. She needed to release them. To perform a trick she had learned years before. To allow the memory to play itself like a video upon the surface of water. She found a small pool within the nearby forest. The memory began to play. The small child, running from her home, the man, cursing her with malicious intent. The day she learned true Pain. Little had she known, she had been followed.

By Antonn.

He saw the memory, played so clearly upon the water, he saw how wretched it made her, even now, so many years past. How it sent shivers up her spine. How it made tears come to her tearless eyes. Startled… frightened, perhaps… he ran. The memory stopped. She had heard him go. Frightened that he knew her true self, she followed him, as swiftly as she possibly could, through the forest. She caught up to him. He told her the truth. He shouldn't have. He had to. He was, perhaps, even sorry.

She had to hate him. She made herself.

What a terrible mistake.

She was lost.

Atleey, at this very weakest moment in her life, kidnapped her to the Marble Palace. The one place, where, perhaps, she could truly die. The one place, where she is powerless. He tried to make her repent.

She refused.

He had her caged, within columns of marble, and still, she would not take back all the blood she had spilled. She reveled in it. He took her before his god, and she laughed in the beings face. The Elders had been first. She would not bow to something she considered below her. She would not bow to a younger sibling.

His god sent her to be executed. But she still refused. She still would not purge her soul clean so that they could take it from her. She refused, still, to bow before such a petty thing as a god.

She was being lead away in chains. In a shower of gold, the world's most unexpected person appeared. The most perfect angel came to help her away from the horrid place. Even at the risk of her own life. Her most beloved daughter. Sunshine. Sunrise was, indubitably, shocked beyond comparison. Why her daughter had come, mystified her. Why she would wish to help… she didn't understand. Numbly, weakly, in awe of the beauteous being before herself, Sunrise could only dumbly stand there, shackled. Her guards had fled. The god of greed had fled. But Atleey still remained. Her eyes having turned warm but once for her daughter, and her only, they turned cold again for him. How they managed to be free depended upon a suspended chain of teetering luck. But they escaped from that place. And without a word, her daughter went home again.

A sudden ache filling her heart, she wished for her back again.

It was best that wish went unfulfilled.

Her pain was only beginning.

Her memories were truly deadly towards her.

Sitting placidly upon the lakeside, she had been holding her wedding ring, thinking of her dearest Shadow once more. Of what they had had. Still unknowing he wasn't real. Still unknowing that the true Star Shadow had not been her husband. That the true body of whom she had loved was in stasis, frozen in ice, his location unknown to all. She was innocent of the knowledge that whom she had married to was a mere prop, to occupy her time. To try to stall the effects bound to happen, created, with a destructive hope, by the Elders of Age. They couldn't have known it would only help.

It's funny too see how much destruction was created with innocent minds.

She hadn't known. She had believed him to be real, she hadn't even noticed something amiss. And so, within her delusional mass of fallen dreams, she dreamt wistfully of him.

Until, of course, Atleey appeared.

Moving deftly, swiftly, he grabbed hold of the chain to which it was connected. He ran, with the necklace in his hands. But he could not outrun her. So he tortured her. He made her remember. He made her relive the day of separation, when her heart near-literally ripped in two. But it was too painful. She couldn't let herself remember. Her mind would not let the images flash back. The memory of leaving him still cut too deep. And so, she forgot all. She became innocent once more. She knew nothing of the deeds she had done. She did not even know of her banishment. She knew only that she was in love with her husband. She knew only she had a new-born daughter at home. And how she had come to this plane, well, that was only unexplained.

The abuse she endured in that time was appalling… the things the 'good priest' Atleey did… he lied, he pretended, he took her against her will, and then, pinned that blame upon Antonn. She couldn't believe it, for still yet, though her mind wouldn't allow her, her heart wished for Antonn to be innocent. She couldn't blame him, but she had to. How naďve she was at that time. But she learned in time. She found the truth. And with that truth, her eyes were opened.

She was innocent no longer.

What she had been, was once again. And within her wicked mind, she planned out happenings. Atleey would not go unpunished for his deeds.

And he didn't, for he still awaits the day when Death will finally greet him. When She, in her dark justice, will take him away from the constant mental tortures lavished upon him by Sunrise, while he is kept, a simple pet, chained and fettered within her now unused room.

But that is now. Where which she currently plays the wolf, the priest had often taken that role during the early times of his capture. She had still yet to become ruthless. She had yet to cast off her naďve, fragile, butterfly wings. And he had nearly taken her. He had nearly seduced her.

He did not succeed.

She had only meant for it to be one time with Antonn, a mere physical flittance to keep her away from the priest that assaulted her mind ruthlessly. It turned out differently.

Perhaps she had loved him all the while…

She had shaken, trembled before him. She was innocent still, perhaps, in a way. She had kissed him. And, with that simple act, she had become his.

She wouldn't be the same.

She loved him. Even more than she had loved her Shadow - if such a feat were possible. She had sealed her fate with him.

And she didn't care in the least.

But, the priests didn't stay away.

Trenton came. He was easy enough to use, to twist to her own devices. Most likely even more so than her dearest hate Atleey. He wanted her little toy. But she didn't give him up. She was not stupid enough as to let Atleey go. And so, he tried to take her by force to the Marble Palace. He didn't succeed. Once more, a radiant golden angel appeared, an awing sight to behold. With eyes that contained the chill of glacier ice, Sunshine once more saved her mother from the grasp of the Marble Palace. Perhaps that saved her.

Perhaps it didn't. For now, they hunt her, going so far as to sell their very souls to gain hers.

What a pitiful waste of time. Truly.

But she's prepared. She has her weapons. She has the one person within her life she'd do anything for.

Antonn Cali.

Her dearest love. She's forgiven him. She loves him, truly.

Maybe she can make it.

Let us just hope.

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