The Crow's Nest is Destroyed
I stood in the scattered remains of my childhood home, looking dead in the face of my older brother, his eyes were cold and had a manic glint in them. “Isn’t it beautiful Pandora? To watch it all crumble before your very eyes?” He asked, sending a cold rush of fear into my veins. The man that now looked to me for an answer to an impossible question was a far cry from the charming little boy that did a fair share in raising me when our parents failed to. “What have you done Rudolphus?” I asked him, placing my pale hand to his shoulder. He looked down at it as though he had been waiting a long time to feel the weight of my hand since I left. “Isn’t this what you wanted Dora? This place was so horrible that you simply had to leave. I would have thought you would have enjoyed seeing it in ruins.” He said, his voice still with the same hint of insanity that it held the last time I had spoken to him a month ago. “What have they done to you?” I asked, finally bringing myself to meet his eyes.
The eyes that I found there were no longer the kind gray eyes that I had grown used to in my childhood. They now spoke of a man who was lost, he was only scraping for power and validation. This caused me to draw my hand away from him, stepping back. “They have shown me who I was meant to be. They have shown me the peace that comes with power. You of all people should know how it feels to be powerless. We were powerless for so long.” He spouted in an eerily calm voice. “YOU REMEMBER HOW THAT FEELS!” He suddenly shouted. “Of course, I remember how that feels! You know that I could never forget that, but you don’t see me killing people for a rush!” I felt true anguish every time I remembered what went on in this house, so very long ago. The nights that curses were shot at the three of us in the study after Rudolphus and I had taken the fall for our younger brother, but he had been caught crying. “It’s a shame, truly. You, Rab, and I could have made quite the team.” He said, shaking his head a bit. “You have so much potential, little sister, why do you refuse to accept it?” He seemed to plead for an answer from me, just like he had the night I left. I gave him the same that I had that night. “I refuse to hurt people for my own gain or anyone else's.” “I love you Pandora, but I will never understand you.” with that, he was gone, leaving me in the ruins. I fell to my knees, finally allowing the tears to stream down my face. That was the night I knew I had lost my brother to madness. I had no blood family left, I had lost my younger brother long ago.