M E L I T A
What would have happened if she preserved her innocence, her guiltlessness? The inquiry shuffled its way through her mind, meandering there in the stillness, in the shaking, quivering palm of Samuel’s hand. She might’ve been the same, a little lost, guarded, trying desperately to be good and kind, to salvage each and every thing, to hold peace in her arms instead of a shield, instead of a sword. She might’ve been more like Clementine, beholden to a higher power, dancing on the edge of fairy lights and humming sweet nothings, a gallant, compassionate soul with nothing scandalous, nothing sinister, folding into her soul. But Melita hadn’t – because reality had thrown them into dungeons and corridors, into oblivion and condemnation, and she’d given no thought to protecting those she cherished, extinguishing those who threatened her own. She hadn’t mourned any demons. She hadn’t cried when the blood soaked her hands, her clothes, her skin. She’d always done what she had to do; commitment through sedition, through revolution, through mutiny against a false god, insurrection from all those beatific moments from before. She wasn’t gone, she wasn’t destroyed – she was just altered, morphed, and sculpted differently.
But if he craved the sanctity of his beliefs for a little longer, the girl would oblige, would grant, would give him those instances. She made no comment about the quivering fingers as the stick was passed into her grasp, didn’t throw him any insults, didn’t contort her quiet platitude into a feral wake. “Absolutely,” passed along her lips, and she held the spear as if she’d done it a hundred times before. Her commitment had always been an illuminating thing, vows and pledges, assurances and convictions, made brighter by the spark in her eyes, by the dominion of her obstinance. “You’re not imposing,” the youth promised, the grin working its way back across her mouth. “Hold it like this, and very still.” The direction was a bit scandalous in that she told someone else to remain motionless, a girl who never ceased to maneuver, but she cast the notion aside, took a breath. “Then you have to be quick, so they can’t detect your movements.”
In a flash, for she was swift, she was keen, she was quick and sharp, the spear descended into the water. “Make sure you angle it accordingly; looks can be deceiving.” The light often played tricks on a hunter’s eyes; she had to approach it from the glittering of scales, along to the side, so she wasn’t deceived by the sun’s leisurely measures. When she raised the spear once more, there was a fish, caught in the middle, flailing in its final moments, before it became immobile, deceased.
