Her Oblivion…

[NinjaQueen 74]

Her Oblivion…

________________________________________
 

________________________________________

 

Tirza had always hated listening.

 

Yet listening was all she had ever known.

 

Since birth the world had been denied to her, leaving her trapped within endless dark while others spoke of things she could never understand. Sunsets. Smiles. Sorrow painted across a face. Such things were meaningless to her. She knew people only through the trembling of their voices, the rhythm of their footsteps, and the silence that followed cruel words.

 

And there had been many cruel words.

 

She still remembered her father’s breathing.

 

Shallow, Weak, Dying.

 

She had sat beside his bed as a child, listening to sickness hollow him from the inside while his trembling hands searched desperately for hers. He had fought for her until the very end, but sickness was a crueler beast than any one could hope to slay.

 

When he died, her hope died with him.

 

Only her mother remained.

 

And whatever kindness that woman once possessed had long since rotted away.

 

Tirza never understood why she was hated so deeply. Perhaps blindness disgusted her mother. Perhaps grief had curdled into cruelty. Or perhaps some people simply needed something weaker than themselves to wound.

 

At seven years old, Tirza learned pain came easiest from those meant to love you.

 

That was the year her mother marked her.

 

The scar stretched along Tirza’s wrist even now, hidden beneath cloth like something shameful. The skinning knife had left behind twisted skin — a permanent reminder of what her mother called her.

 

“Wretch.”

 

Afterward, Tirza had fled into the forest sobbing, rain soaking through her thin clothes as she stumbled blindly between roots and stone.

 

That was where she found him.

 

A wolf pup.

 

Wounded, Alone, Afraid.

 

She remembered the sound first — soft whimpering hidden beneath rainfall. Tirza had dropped to her knees instantly, sweeping trembling hands across wet earth until her fingers brushed against fur slick with blood.

 

The pup snarled weakly.

 

Not threatening.
Terrified.

 

Tirza understood that sound.

 

She had wanted to help him more than anything, yet she was only a blind little girl with shaking hands and no understanding of healing. Still… she tried. Tearing cloth from her dress, fumbling clumsy knots around his wound while whispering apologies every few seconds whenever he whimpered.

 

The wolf eventually stopped growling.

 

Not because he trusted her.

 

But because he realized she was hurting too.

 

From that night onward, the creature never truly left her side.

 

She named him Koa… After her father.

 

Years passed cruelly.

 

By sixteen, Tirza had become little more than a wandering beggar surviving off scraps and pity. Most people ignored her. Others mocked her openly. “Blind girl,” they called her, as though blindness were her only name.

 

She wandered from village to village with Koa beside her, sleeping beneath ruined shelters and half-dead trees. Some nights she wondered whether she was truly alive at all.

 

Perhaps this was what death felt like.

 

Cold, Endless, Empty.

 

It was during one of those nights that everything changed.

 

Rain poured endlessly from the heavens, drenching both girl and wolf alike as Tirza stumbled through unfamiliar woods. Her lungs burned violently with sickness, each cough wracking her frail body harder than the last.

 

Koa paced anxiously nearby, whining softly as Tirza reached blindly for the nearest tree to steady herself.

 

Her fingers brushed bark before her knees finally gave out beneath her.

 

She sank into the mud trembling.

 

Exhausted.

 

Alone.

 

Maybe if she rested for only a moment…

 

Maybe then the world would finally grow quiet.

 

Tirza lowered her head weakly against the tree, pale sightless eyes half-shut as rainwater streamed down her face.

 

Then

 

Silence.

 

Not natural silence.

 

The forest itself had gone still.

 

No wind.
No insects.
No movement.

 

Even Koa stopped breathing.

 

Tirza’s brow furrowed.

 

And for the first time in her life…

 

she saw something.

 

A faint light appeared somewhere beyond the darkness of her blind eyes.

 

She gasped sharply, stumbling backward in terror.

 

Another light appeared.

 

Then another.

 

Four pale spheres drifted soundlessly around her, hovering between the trees like distant moons. Their glow was wrong somehow — too dim to be fire, too alive to be lantern-light.

 

Koa bared his teeth,

 

Not in anger.

 

But fear.

 

The lights slowly circled Tirza as thunder groaned overhead.

 

Then a voice spoke.

 

Not aloud.

 

Inside her mind.

 

“You listen,” it whispered softly.

 

The words felt ancient. Neither kind nor cruel.

 

“You hear what others refuse to hear.”

“yet you choose to fall to sorrow?” 
 

“have you no shame?” 

 

Tirza shook violently, pressing trembling hands against her ears.

 

“No…” she whispered hoarsely.

 

The lights drifted closer.

 

And suddenly a horrid vision struck her mind.

 

She was in the dark… only she was drowning in it, black liquid that moved like ink drowning her in its depths, it filled her mouth, her lungs, she was choking on it. 
 

she cried for help, but suddenly felt a pang of dread… hadn’t she done this before?

 

the quiet grew so intense she could hear not but a faint buzzing behind her ears.

 

All she could do was scream. As she sank deeper, and deeper…

 

she pleaded and pleaded to see the light again, to see anything at all, if only to break free from this darkness, this pain, if only for a moment.
 

Then came the final whisper.

 

“Ah, there’s hope for you yet.”

 

The world vanished.

 

When Tirza awoke the storm had ended.

 

The forest breathed once more.

The sound of crickets and owls came alive.

 

she still sat against the tree from before…. Had it been a dream all along?

 

She let her slender hand brush Koa’s damp fur. Her breath coming fast and uneven.

 

She slowly turned her sightless gaze to the sky a look of desperation in her pale eyes as she whispered—

 

“Show me.” 

 

Edited May 21 by NinjaQueen