Cursed Banshee

"Liecia, wait?"  I giggle, running faster to hide before Ariadni can catch up with me.  My wild brown hair catches on a branch and I yelp.  "Liec?"  Ariadni is walking in this direction as I dis-entangle my curls from the branch and tip-toe to the nearest sturdy tree.  Hopping onto the lowest branch, I pull myself up just in time.  She walks right under the tree, not even looking up once.  I stifle a giggle.  "Liecia?!"  She yells from a few feet away.  "I'm scared."  The tremor in her voice tells me that if she doesn't find me soon, she'll give up and start crying.  I hop down, creep towards her.  She's standing in a small clearing, next to a creek, watching the fireflies dance across the water.  "You'll never find me if you don't look."  Her head slowly, reluctantly turns in my direction, before focusing back on the fireflies.  "I know."  She sighs as I move next to her and grab her hand, pulling her to the grass.  "Liec, where's father?"  "Oh, um...  Ari, he's dead.  He died in the great monsters war, remember?"  I've told her this before, countless times, but she refuses to believe he is really gone.  Even after (3 years - medieval equivalent), she still thinks one day she'll wake up and he'll be home.  She only vaguely remembers him, and even those memories are fading, for both of us.  "What if he didn't die?"  She turns to me, her big blue eyes brimming with tears.  I hug her close, not wanting to explain again that his conroi had brought his body home for the pyre burning.  He was given a hero's funeral, as he had sacrificed himself to save 2 of his brothers.  "Ari, father isn't coming home.  I know you miss him, so do I, but he died saving his men.  He was a hero.  And one day we will find him again, in Parthylon."  I look up, startled to see the stars coming up in the sky.  We are so dead if we don't get home now.  "We have to go now.  It's late and we don't want to get in trouble."  Jumping up, I lean down to pull Ariadni up with me.  "Race you home."  She yells this over her shoulder, already running.  With a laugh, I run after her, making sure she takes the right path.  When we get home, we sneak into the back door of the tiny two-story cabin.  I let Ariadni upstairs as I lean into the kitchen, where mother is making stew.  We might not have much, with father gone, but we still have each other.  Only, when the back door opens, and a hulking man walks in, I know we will never really be a family.  "You!"  His hard eyes find me in the doorway, but before he can get close, mother steps into his path.  Gomel stops, flicking those eyes to her.  "Woman, those daughters of yours have been in the forest all day.  They need to learn to pull their weight.  They need discipline."  Once he said it, I look towards his hands, and the long stick in one makes my knees go weak.  When mother isn't home, he always finds reasons to be alone with my little sister, and I have been working hard to ensure we are never around when mother has to go into town.  But today we lost track of time, and mother is home.  He moves around her, but she grabs the offending hand.  "You will not touch my daughters."  Her voice is hard.  "Liecia, go upstairs.  Now."  She didn't raise her voice, but they cut into my heart anyway.  Because now he will...  I turned, hearing the whoosh of the whip.  I tense, waiting for the blow, but when it didn't come, I turn back.  She had stopped the swing with her arm.  He is shaking with fury and before she can move, he puts his entire weight into shoving her away.  She stumbles, then crashes down, her head hitting the table with a loud thud.  I scream, before I can think to stop the sound.  He lunges, but I'm already halfway up the stairs, where Ariadni is standing, white and shaking.  She buckles, but when he charges up behind me, she turns for her room.  She already knows that we have to hide, I've been teaching her to stay safe since he came to live here.  When Ariadni turned 6, he started looking at her in a predator's way.  I shove her room door closed, and drop the thick plank into place to shut us in.  Then I grab the two small packs I've kept hidden in her closet, Ariadni watching me from inside her chest next to her bed.  "Come Ari, we have to go see if mother is alright?"  I cannot seem to find the words yet to tell her that mother might not be alive anymore.  And if that's the case then we need to leave, before he finds her.  I cannot allow him near her.  She will not get hurt.