By all accounts the clever scoundrel knew she should not have turned the handle and done "an Alice", but she'd always been fond of White Rabbits and the keyhole had tempted her something fierce. Still clutching a tangle of darkest brown curls in a filthy nailed hand, chipped and bitten raw, her stormy eyes were glossy in wonder.
It was late afternoon when she had fled the house with a basket over her arm promising berries and a fairytale for supper, in that miser household, poorer minds and ill-stomached. She had stayed quiet and in her room these long years and escape was victory. She found doorways and windows a pleasure to chance upon for they sustained a hopefulness in her that had bled dry when she had been taken out of school and fed on a staple diet of roots and beans daily with meat, dry and tough, twice a week, and all her books taken away. No, Ava did not feel bad for herself, but once she had tasted the air through a barred window on a sultry summer evening she knew adventure was what she would Thrive on forever more, that her real family, the family of luxury in the Hills, though her blood, to send her here she did not miss. Did not envy. If only dollshouses to collect woods paraphernalia for. Kings with thorns for crowns (she knew the dark humour to it and her Religion Tutor had not been impressed) though she had insisted thorns would be crowns and twigs pitctforks as Satan and the Holy Spirit had nightly wars in a four story dollshouse in the attic of that ridiculous house; in size and inhabitant.
Here, alone, barefoot, intrigued, she was alive. Tingling. All over. She marched into the City of Changlings, courteous and unusual, magnetic and abrupt, stealing shiny pocketwatches and golden chains from unsuspecting pockets. Strung about her neck, waist and wrists, face drawn and eyes moist, she held out a locket to a legless man playing the lyre, by an apple stand. He accepted it, with a careful eye, perplexed at her glittering, enchanting and wild looking self. That white dress, covered in dust, and scarlet ripped stockings. She ran off a blink later and he was left near ecstatic at the cold burn of a treasure all his own.
Into the gathering throng of villagers, where music and food and magic was hidden and revealed intermittedly as folk passed and her senses reeled, she turned around and around, arms raised to the side, dizzy thief, and smiling. A short summer rain fell lightly, fragrant with straw and moss and incense. Of itchy grasses and warm torch light, evocative of Pagan ceremony, a remnant from a page taken from her in one of the many books locked away three years ago.
People passed and stared, some smiled, some laughed, some shook their heads, some urchins ran for her, caressing her waist, touching her hands, slipping stolen article from bit by bit, and she finally fell, a wobbly heap, oblivious one, still smiling, and light as the rain. The children ran away in the mist of fading rain and eerie setting sun and Ava, having perchanced upon an equally mad looking companion enjoying this surprise weather and her whirly manuever through the crowd, took his face and kissed him hard. Teeth hit, lips bled, and smiles grew large. The dark came and his hand found her breast, her thigh, the fire inside. And then torches were lit and with quick kisses more and polite farewells they went separate ways, and all she could taste was musk and the taste of woodsmoke. The town welcomed her. Dreamy as it was..
It was late afternoon when she had fled the house with a basket over her arm promising berries and a fairytale for supper, in that miser household, poorer minds and ill-stomached. She had stayed quiet and in her room these long years and escape was victory. She found doorways and windows a pleasure to chance upon for they sustained a hopefulness in her that had bled dry when she had been taken out of school and fed on a staple diet of roots and beans daily with meat, dry and tough, twice a week, and all her books taken away. No, Ava did not feel bad for herself, but once she had tasted the air through a barred window on a sultry summer evening she knew adventure was what she would Thrive on forever more, that her real family, the family of luxury in the Hills, though her blood, to send her here she did not miss. Did not envy. If only dollshouses to collect woods paraphernalia for. Kings with thorns for crowns (she knew the dark humour to it and her Religion Tutor had not been impressed) though she had insisted thorns would be crowns and twigs pitctforks as Satan and the Holy Spirit had nightly wars in a four story dollshouse in the attic of that ridiculous house; in size and inhabitant.
Here, alone, barefoot, intrigued, she was alive. Tingling. All over. She marched into the City of Changlings, courteous and unusual, magnetic and abrupt, stealing shiny pocketwatches and golden chains from unsuspecting pockets. Strung about her neck, waist and wrists, face drawn and eyes moist, she held out a locket to a legless man playing the lyre, by an apple stand. He accepted it, with a careful eye, perplexed at her glittering, enchanting and wild looking self. That white dress, covered in dust, and scarlet ripped stockings. She ran off a blink later and he was left near ecstatic at the cold burn of a treasure all his own.
Into the gathering throng of villagers, where music and food and magic was hidden and revealed intermittedly as folk passed and her senses reeled, she turned around and around, arms raised to the side, dizzy thief, and smiling. A short summer rain fell lightly, fragrant with straw and moss and incense. Of itchy grasses and warm torch light, evocative of Pagan ceremony, a remnant from a page taken from her in one of the many books locked away three years ago.
People passed and stared, some smiled, some laughed, some shook their heads, some urchins ran for her, caressing her waist, touching her hands, slipping stolen article from bit by bit, and she finally fell, a wobbly heap, oblivious one, still smiling, and light as the rain. The children ran away in the mist of fading rain and eerie setting sun and Ava, having perchanced upon an equally mad looking companion enjoying this surprise weather and her whirly manuever through the crowd, took his face and kissed him hard. Teeth hit, lips bled, and smiles grew large. The dark came and his hand found her breast, her thigh, the fire inside. And then torches were lit and with quick kisses more and polite farewells they went separate ways, and all she could taste was musk and the taste of woodsmoke. The town welcomed her. Dreamy as it was..