Everything changed when She was born.

Jori was only the age of two, but there was an innate instinct, a fear that kept her away from her sister’s birth. Her mother’s death only made that feeling stronger, and even more than that was the Cold that followed. A chill that threatened to pull the very breath from her lungs should she linger near it too long, one that made her brother, only a year younger than her, cry in panic. It had only touched them for a moment before her father took her sister away, put her into that shack, and kept her out of sight. She was crying then, her voice loud, screeching, pushing the chill further down to their bones before she was finally gone. The cries had finally stopped.

But Jori remembered them, heard them like some far off echo that refused to fade.

She did not have many memories of her father before her sister was born. She could remember a tired, yet happy face if she thought long enough, but for most of her life there was a dark look that hung over Jorge’s face ever since her mother passed. A hollow, vacant expression that made him look as if he was staring off into the distance no matter what he did. He would spare Jori and her brother a smile every now and then, encourage them, even teach them when he had the mental capacity to do so. Jori could not say that her father was horrible to her, but she would always overhear the townsfolk talking about him, speaking of the kindly expression he once had. They never said what caused it to be lost, but she knew who they blamed.

Her sister.

Beyond the times that he would step out to give her sister food, Jorge acted as if the girl never existed. Even when he would work in the fields outside his gaze would never look towards the shack, as if its presence was invisible to him entirely. He never spoke of her to Jori and her brother either, only telling them that they were not to approach the shack under any circumstances. They agreed, of course, too young to raise any questions about what lay within that shack. Still curiosity would pull at Jori, and at the age of eight it proved to be too strong to ignore. When everyone was busy, she walked to the shack. To her surprise, the door was open, which only piqued her curiosity even more. The Cold bit at her as she drew close, but interest overpowered caution and she went to the door, pushing it open.

Her sister stood in front of it, looking directly at her.

Jori’s breath froze at her throat, skin turning to gooseflesh in an instant. Her eyes locked as they fell upon the icy blue of her sister’s irises. Her cold, vacant stare stared both past her and into her at the same time. Jori felt a sharpness in her neck under her sister’s gaze, like blades of ice pressed against her throat from the inside, threatening to slice it open should she dare to speak. In a panic she managed to look away, but when her eyes fell upon her hands she saw that frost started to form on them. She tried to move them, and finally felt a flare of fear when she could not feel them at all. She ran from her sister, stumbling back and scrambling away as the girl continued to stare at her, gaze following Jori even as she stumbled back into the house. She could still feel her sister’s eyes on her through the door, but the Cold started to fade. The feeling in her fingers returned as a sharp pain once she felt warmth starting to spread across her body once again, yet even that did not stop the trembling that shook her body. A deep, primal fear had been triggered then, an instinct that could only be formed by encountering something that she knew was unnatural. 

It told her to stay away, so stay away she did. Jori would follow her father’s example, performing her chores and paying no attention to the hovel that was at the corner of their land. She was not immune to curiosity, but whenever her thoughts fell upon the shack there was always one image that would come with it.

That of her sister, of the cold gaze that froze her in place.

Chills would tremble down her spine then, and she pushed curiosity away in favor of safety. When she noticed her brother’s gaze wandering towards the shack in the same way that it had for her, she was quick to smother the impulses before he could indulge it. She had to keep him away from her, away from her cold, unforgiving eyes. Thankfully, her brother was never the rebellious sort, and did not question her or their father when told to never approach the where their sister stayed.

After that, life returned to normal. Her father was the only one that would feed her sister, and eventually the memory of that night grew more and more distant. Jori would live her life; helping on the farm, going to school, making friends, and for a time she believed that life would continue that way, that she would forget about her sister entirely, forget the chill that now only rested in her nightmares.

Then the Chosen arrived.

Truthfully, Jori held no desire to know what he would do to her sister. Part of her wished he would take her away, remove her from their lives entirely. Curiosity once again reared its ugly head, however, and though she thought she knew better, she could not resist its call. She looked out her window when the Chosen had cast his spell, saw her sister wreathed in a golden light. Her eyes were still cold then, uncaring as the light enveloped her, but when it faded there was a change. Gone was the vacant stare, replaced first by confusion, then wonder.

Then tears.

Jori looked away then, that brief glimpse shattering the image she’d held of her sister for all these years. What was once a fleeting memory came crashing back to the forefront of her mind, only to break under the realization that her sister was no longer the person that she remembered. The cries that she heard from the backyard, the tears that fell from her sister's face told Jori that she’d been wrong, that her sister was not a monster.

She was just a girl.

The Chosen left soon after, and left her sister with them. Her father did not know what to do, how to treat her after only doing the bare minimum to keep her fed over the years. Jori did not know either, and in their confusion they still acted as they had before. Her brother would follow their lead, as he always did, but despite their best efforts they could not continue on as before. Her sister had started to act like the little girl she was never allowed to be. Jori could feel the girl’s stares when she worked, but no chill would accompany them. No, what followed was worse. It was the weight that started to drag down her heart, the realization that what she was doing was wrong, but that she could not stop herself from doing it, for the moment that she fully accepted what the town, what her family… what she was complacent in, was the moment that she accepted that she’d done something that could not not be forgiven. So she pressed on, her heart growing heavier.

She heard the slap not too long after.

Her father rushed into the house after, locking the door behind him. He urged Jori and her brother to not open it soon after, and the reason why was soon evident. Her sister struck the door soon after, her cries still clear even through the house’s wooden make. Jori tried to think of that night, to convince her that the cries she heard came from that cold, vacant stare from so many years ago. Despite her best efforts, all she could see was the tears from that day.

Of the scared girl that was outside her door.

Jori ran to her room then, hiding in the corner furthest from the window. She covered her ears, but she could still hear her sister’s cries. No one opened the door that day, but even when the crying stopped Jori could still hear them, just like they had all those years ago. This time, however, she was no longer an infant. She was grown now, well aware of what she was, but she did not speak it out loud for fear of breaking her entirely.

 

---

 

A month passed since the Chosen’s arrival, and since that incident with their Father the family did not speak of her sister again. Her father had stopped delivering food entirely, choosing to hole up in his room as Winter’s grasp rendered the fields empty. In his absence, Jori delivered the food instead. She wanted to believe that it was both pity and guilt that drove her actions in equal measure, but she knew that the act was more for herself than her sister. It was a small comfort, a thread that she chose to cling to lest she lose herself within the darkness of her own thoughts.

At the very least she ensured that the food was fresh this time, and she tolerated the Cold that hovered around her sister’s shack the best she could, but she could not bring herself to open the door.

There were a few nights where she would see her sister leave her hovel, a curious look to the girl’s face as she wandered off into the forest. At first, she would return only after a few moments, but as time passed her sister would disappear for hours, only returning to the shack in the dead of night. Jori would stay up, waiting for her to return, a gnawing feeling at her chest that would only leave when she saw the girl returning. At times there would be a happy look on her face, while at others Jori could see a downtrodden expression as she returned, though she did not know the cause. Jori would continue to watch, and for a time she thought that things would continue this way for quite some time.

Then the adventurer’s arrived.

She did not know them, did not hear of them through any tales or rumors that had passed through Redhaven, but she’d heard the anger in their voices when they spoke to her father. A cold anger, one that gave her pause as she was about to approach them, making her watch them through the window as they examined her sister’s dwellings. She did not know what was said, but it was clear that they were growing increasingly agitated the more that they saw. The men in black cloaks left first, and when the others started to leave she saw them stop and look into the forest.

Right at her sister.

They rushed after her, and her sister never came back home.

The next time that Jori was in town, she’d heard that they’d taken her to The Wandering Fowl, a building that everyone decided was best to avoid for the time being. All except Rodney, who’s fondness of the drink was too strong to be dissuaded, much to the chagrin of his wife. Jori herself was tempted to go into the building, but as she stood in front of the tavern’s doors both guilt and fear of the strangers dissuaded her. She would wait for the right time, she told herself, and walked back to her home.

In the midst of this, she’d paid no attention to her brother, and in her lack of focus his curiosity began to grow uninhibited. She kept a watch over the shack in the odd chance that her sister would return, and one night she found her brother slipping into the forest instead.

She followed after him, not knowing what he could possibly up to. Luckily, her brother was not the quietest as he made his way through the woods, and she was able to catch up to him easily.

“Jon!” She hissed at him.

Her brother started, tripping over himself and falling to the forest floor, “Gods Jori! Give me warning next time!”

Jori walked up to her brother and pulled him up, but did not let go of his arm, “You should follow your own word,” she snapped, “what are you doing wandering the woods at night?”

“I saw them,” Jon said as he pointed further into the forest, “the ones that took her away.”

From the way he spoke, Jori could tell that Jon spoke of their sister.

“And you thought it was a good idea to follow them?” she said, “You could wake Aekinder with all the noise that you make.”

Jon’s eyes narrowed, “I could be a good deal quieter if it weren’t for all of your nagging.”

Jori sighed, “Regardless, we shouldn’t be following after them. We don’t know what they would do to us.”

“We don’t know if they would do anything to us,” Jon countered, “If they have been treating ‘her’ well then I can’t imagine they would be inclined to treat us any different.”

Jori remembered the angry expression she’d seen on their faces, the rage at which they addressed their father.

“I’m not so sure about that…”

Jon opened his mouth to say something, but went silent as they heard the leaves around them start to crunch.

Jori whipped her head toward the noise, her voice catching in her throat as a man in a black cloak emerged from the shadows. Both she and Jon stumbled back at his sudden appearance, freezing in place even as he held his hands up, revealing them to be empty. A sliver of moonlight revealed the man’s rough features, framed by the beginnings of a beard and a mess of hair that could be best described as unkempt. Light glinted off the darkened armor under his cloak, but it’s make bled into the shadows, making his figure appear almost boundless as he stepped towards them. He held his hands out as he approached.

“It is not wise for children to be out so late at night,” he said, his eyes looking them over, a sheen of golden light flashing across his irises. After a moment he dropped his arms, “Return to your home.”

He turned to leave.

“What are you going to do with her?” Jori blurted out.

The man stopped and looked back.

“She is your sister?” he asked.

Jori nodded.

“Then it’s best that you forget about her,” he frowned, “though it appears that you’ve done a good job of that already.”

She felt a stab at her chest, but held her tongue. What the man said was not wrong, and her brother’s silence told Jori that he had nothing to say in his defense either.

“I… I have to know.” she forced out. Jon nodded with her.

The man looked at them for a moment, then tilted his head towards the forest.

“Follow me.”

---

Author’s Note: Here we cover Aria's sister, and you've probably noticed that the way the chapter is structured is very similar to Aria's first chapter in this story. I wanted a bit of narrative parallel here to almost frame the same events from a different perspective. I figured that if I mentioned Aria having a family, I should have something from their perspective rather than having them being just some foggy characters in the background. Note that I'm not trying to make Jori into a sympathetic character nor am I trying to justify her actions, I just wanted to relay her perspective of these events to fully flesh out the narrative and to make the audience aware that at least one member of the family realized what they did was wrong, albeit far far too late. Admittedly, this is one of those chapters that could be trimmed out were I going for a quicker pace of the story, but as you're all aware that is not my style haha. 

Let me know what you think! Do you enjoy these different perspectives fleshing out the setting and events more or could you do without them?

PS: I'm currently having to deal with some family stuff this week, so next week's chapter may be delayed. I'll be aiming to get it out by next Monday but unfortunately I can't make any promises, there is just a lot going on atm.