Victoria Finds Florid

This is a scene from my story, “Ballad of the Black Rose”, which is told in Victoria’s point of view.  It reveals a lot of Florid’s character through her eyes.

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I was overjoyed to be able to see a beloved relative of mine after my own death.  The cousin, Sophia.  But her eyes did not share my same happiness; instead, hers tried desperately to hide her encumbering sadness.  My mind questioned this, but as I opened my mouth to ask, she raced to interrupt me.  “You have somewhere you need to be.  My Mistress needs to speak with you.”  She lifted her open hand towards me, and I quietly accepted it.  Then she led me down the long hall before we arrived in an enormous, foreboding room.  Sophia immediately released my hand and turned her body away from mine, perhaps to avoid eye contact.  I was puzzled at such bashfulness from my own family member, until I heard her speak up:  “My Great Mistress, your guest, Victoria, has arrived at your command.”  Her voice lacked emotion and confidence.  She then proceeded to sit on the wooden floor and envelop her face into her hands.

“Loyal work as always, Sophia,” a startling voice boomed.  My hand darted to the handle of the sword on my hip.  I turned my head around and looked in vain for the owner of the voice.  “Don’t bother,” it continued, “you will not find a body attached to my mind.”

“Who are you?” I barked.  In the midst of a stranger, I was eager to reaffirm my authoritative status.

“Sophia must have already introduced me.  I am known as Mistress Entity.  I do not entirely exist in this realm.  But that is about to change; I must thank you for your kindness.  I was quite looking forward to meeting the famous angel Victoria.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Cursed without a body, I am simply a gathering of thoughts, energy; and pure, feared power.  However, without a completed existence, I am incapable of extending my powers to its true potential.  But you shall help with that.”

My hand still at my sheathed sword, I called back towards the ceiling: “You misunderstand who I am.  My name is Victoria, yes, but I am merely an angel of death.  My only ability and duty is to redirect the souls of the deceased to their desired heaven.”

“Neither do you understand a thing about me,” the Mistress voice echoed.  “You see, a creature of death is the key that will unlock my inanimate soul into freedom.  But, in my expanded wisdom, I predicted your persuasion would be close to impossible.”

“You would be correct.  I refuse to assist you; I have no doubt of your corruption.  Bringing you to exist would cause only harm.”

Suddenly, a bellowing explosion of laughter crashed upon me from all directions.  I shuddered in its wake.  “So stubborn!  Not surprising, from the legends I have heard about you.  But despite that, also so naïve!  You must still be a child.  Yet you face quite serious consequences at the moment.  In my prediction, I acquired something that would ensure your submission.”  A quick wisp of a breeze reached me from behind and continued in its targeted direction.  “Look here, angel.”

I complied with the Mistress.  My eyes struggled to adjust in the dim light of the room, but they followed the wind as it ran across a deep pit and landed on solid ground.  What looked at first like a pile of ash and garbage, I soon realized, to my horror, was actually my darling Florid collapsed on the floor.  It was difficult to recognize him behind a face of shame and helplessness.  I faceted my jaw shut just to keep myself from screaming.  His body laid weakly in a bundle of steel chains and his own blood.  Just then, he opened his eyes and struggled through aching pain to do as simple a task as lifting his head to look at me.  It was too difficult to tell if seeing my arrival had brought either hope or sorrow for him.  My eyes bled uncontrollably with tears of utter heartbreak, and somehow I felt responsible. 

That was the first time I saw genuine, raw fear in Florid’s eyes; terrified either of dying, or worse, that I would betray him.  Through my own tears I witnessed him disappear—the overpowering creature that had once attacked me—and instead regress into the small child he was so long ago.  I could imagine the vulnerable baby crawling through the dark forest and wailing out to the mother that simply was not there.  I saw his tiny claws scratching at the dirt, desperate to find even the faintest scent remnants of his siblings, who each had run away into their own loneliness.  I saw the frail child that was going hungry because no one had yet taught him to hunt.  And I heard the weeping from every cold night.  I heard the sobs because no one else ever had.  This was the real Florid that I never met before, and I was concerned that this encounter would forever be tainted by Mistress Entity’s treachery.

I held back my sobs just enough to roar at her in my obvious fury.  “Let him go!”  I then continued to release my sword from its scabbard and pointed it straight up into the air.  “Or else I’ll…”

“You’ll what, angel?  Your threats are hollow.”  The Mistress scoffed.  “I am a non-physical being.  Metal weapons are useless against me.  But what I do have is authority.  I commanded my followers to track down and capture your partner.  He is nothing more to me than an object with which to trade for your life.”

I slowly brought my sword back down to my side.  Then I looked back at Florid, who was still fixated on me—with those eyes still screaming of infantile innocence.  “And if I refuse?”

“Then I will trade your freedom for his death.  You expect any less of me?”

In truth, I did not.  Another tear rolled down my cheek and into my open mouth.  I was the teenager who never completed physical maturity.  Florid was 38 years my senior.  And yet, in this moment he had become the helpless child, and I was the mother upon whom he depended for every bite and breath.  He was standing defenselessly in the dark woods hoping not to be abandoned again.  His lifetime of fear was epitomizing into this present moment; not one of the bleeding gashes or bruises on his adult body could bring him as much pain as what was evident in his stares.  I answered with my own gaze.  In my mind I battled the inevitable, torturous heartbreak: I could choose either to abandon him by dying at Mistress Entity’s hands, or to forsake him by allowing him to die in my place.  Eventually I realized that, despite the fame that fell upon me for my triumph in the war, it was a battle I was never able to win.

I dropped by sword onto the gray floor, shut my eyes tight, and raised my head to the ceiling.  “Mistress Entity,” I called out painfully, “I submit.”