A young woman found herself waking up in the body of a stranger.
Her body was aching. Pain invited itself into her thoughts before senses could- Had she fallen off the bed in the middle of the night? Unlikely, she wasn't one to thrash in her sleep. And even if she did fell down from her bed, why was the pain so…earned? As if she was beaten up before she woke.
Then it came crashing onto her, this wasn't her bedroom.
She laid on damp, exhausted grass, blades crisp and dry yet wet beneath her spine, as though the ground remembered rain but had not been touched by it in months. The moisture seeped through thin fabric and clung to her skin. Slowly and suspiciously, she opened her eyes, and calm fled her before she knew it.
She yanked her body to sit up, and her sudden movement made the wound on her sides hurt like crazy. The motion caused her to involuntarily let out a weak hiss of pain. Staring at her bruises, she couldn't understand how it got there. And the unfamiliar landscape made her frozen for a tiny second, before her mind pinned the strangeness towards lucid dream.
"This must be a dream." She muttered. However it felt so real, it felt like reality. Then the pain brought her back from her senses again, her ribs throbbing and her wrists aching- none of this pain belonged to her.
She got up, her body unsteady. Her legs trembled without permission. The aching sensation drained her of any fight nor flight, so she walked and walked, the grass grew damper the further she venture into the unknown.
A limpy pathetic step, then another.
Until she stumbled upon a small pond, the clear water offered her a natural mirror of reflection. Her eyes widened up as she stared at the puddle, a stranger stared right back at her- a face so beautiful, at that moment, she was almost alike to narcissisus, only that the face couldn't be hers. She reached into the water, trying to break the fragile illusion of the layer and realized that the reflection wasn't staring at her, it is her. Her mind recoiled instinctively; No. No, that Face is wrong. It's…not me.
She pinched herself, "Ouch!" It shouldn't have hurt- in fact, it was supposed to wake her up. As if someone had dunk a cold bucket of water over her head, she finally acknowledged the pain on the other parts of her body, the constant aching on her side. She drew a breath and forced her attention inward- ribs, wrists, and throat.
Then she spotted it, an angry red line burned around her neck.
She froze.
Rope.
Rope burn?
She stood unmoving, the world tightened up into a narrow choking fact, someone had bound her throat- not hers, yet felt like it was.
Now it no longer felt like a dream, nor a nightmare, everything has been too real, made too much sense. She leaned over the puddle of water again, this time, really looked at the reflection, she tried pouting her lips and made silly faces- the reflection in the pool showed no inconsistency, it moved in perfect sync with her. Not a trick of sleep, no.
A wave of suspicion grappled her as she struggled to cope with the fact that she wasn't dreaming. Then she saw the star birthmark on her collarbone, and noticed the clothes she had on- a plain and dirty white dress that was torn at the hem, the thin coarse fabric unfamiliar on her skin. Then she stared at her wrist, pulled up her sleeve to reveal a blueish green bruise that rested impatiently on her otherwise flawless her.
The details collected like stones in her stomach. She knew this mark. She knew this dress, not from life- but from a story.
Yeneria Adrie
Not a protagonist, not the villain, not even a character that has more than three page of appearance- she was the plot device- a vital side character in The journey to find salvation, a tragic story that followed the hero, Kealen Thornwright.
The name sounded like a curse on her lips.
Her mouth gone dry.
Yeneria died.
And not gently.
A heavy dread settled through her chest, cold and absolute. She could remember enough to know that the fate of this woman she possessed was not distant. Not escapable.
She swallowed once, throat roaring from the rope burn.
Upon realizing her identity and her future tragic fate, she has an important question;
Has Yeneria lied to Kealen yet?