Eight years ago

The harrowing cries of an innocent little girl radiated at the back of her mind as her head pulsated with unimaginable pain. Nothing could quiet those screams of terror and betrayal the little girl wailed, not even her own howls of fury as she lunged at the man responsible for the child's pain. Like a wild anime she tore into the target of her aggression, the grown man who held the tattered pieces of a young girls dress in his hands. The feral girl sunk her teeth and nails into him as he wrestled her off him. 

With a mighty amount of effort he threw her into a mirror hanging on the wall, shattering it against her fragile young body, before turning his sights back on his dormant son who stood expressionless beside the sobbing girl, his dress torn and his body bruised. With hungry eyes he leered at the child, like a wolf on the hunt, only to find a shard of glass lodged into his arm by the wild child. 

She began screaming, "get away from her!" Over and over as she stabbed his limb again and again, his blood mixing with her own wounded hands blood. 

"Demon! Seize him! Guards!" The old man fell back, screaming on the top of his lungs, while he kicked his feet trying to keep his attacker off him.

"I'll kill you!" The demon child yowled, attempting to stab him again despite her own throbbing pain caused by the glass shard she gripped tightly in her hand. "Die, die, die!" She made quick shallow cuts in his kicking legs, before landing a solid stab in his calf.

"Guards!" The man cried out, desperation and agony echoing through his voice.

Before she could cause him any more harm a slew of guards barged into the room, "your majesty!" One shouted.

"A demon!" Another cried.

"Capture him!" A third commanded. 

They pulled into the room cornering the girl, but as one lunged at her she bit hard into his arm, her teeth sinking deep into the flesh. He railed back allowing her space to run between them. She spit blood on the king as she crawled into him and attempted one more stab to his throat. Another guard intervened, pushing her off the king, her glass weapon missing his neck and leaving only a shallow wound in his shoulder instead.

Not allowing the guards a chance to seize her, she sprinted out the door, running down the hall slipping past more guards as one cried out, "that demon attempted to kill the king and prince, stop him!"

She pushed past a guard who attempted to grab her, stabbing him in the abdomen with her glass shard, then slid between the legs of another. She scurried down the halls, taking twists and turns, till she found a door that was just barely held ajar. Slipping inside she pressed her body to the wall, panting as she struggled to remain silent.

"He went this way!" She heard a guard yell on the opposite end of the hall outside the door.

She held her breath as best she could, then gasped as she saw a woman standing in front of her. 

"Shhh," the woman placed a finger to her lips, and nodded at the girl.

Confused, but cautiously hopeful, nodded back and watched as the woman stepped to the door.

"Captain Nioto, a demon is loose in the manor, have you seen him?" A guard asked her from outside the door.

"No, don't be foolish," she answered the man, "hurry and search the western side of the manor, don't let him escape!" She ordered him.

"Captain!" The guard affirmed, "search the western hall, now!"

After a moment the commotion died out as the guards followed the lady's false lead. The demon child choked as they gasped for air. 

"Child, go out my window, and head straight, you will find a garden there, follow the rose bushes to a small pond, then dive on the east side where a a willow tree grows, you will find an underwater tunnel that will lead you out of the manor grounds," she instructed the girl, "do you understand?"

The child nodded, "why are you helping me?"

"We are the same child, broken fragments of someone who was hurt, I only fear to know who's fragment you are."

"I don't understand,"

"And you won't for a long time, but if you survive, then seek out a woman who looks like me, in the red light district, she will be able to give you the answers you need," the woman crouched down and removed a handkerchief from her apron, wiping the blood from the girls face, "be strong and never give up, he'll need you one day."

Not fully grasping her words, the girl nodded and scurried to the window, "thanks," she said as she opened it and crawled outside.

"Goddess, please do not let that be who I believe it to be," Nioto prayed silently to herself as the girl disappeared into the garden outside. 

The girl ran in the direction she was told, till she could see the deep red of the flowering rose bushes. Immediately she followed them, her blind faith in the woman leading her to the pond just as she had said. 

She looked around and saw a large tree that was practically falling into the water. She hesitated, not knowing if she'd be able to swim, but leapt into the icy cold water the moment she heard a guards voice. Her body nearly seized with the sudden drop in temperature, but she managed to stay conscious long enough to find the tunnel, burrowed into the ground by the roots of the willow. Streams of light flashed behind her as guards came closer to the garden. With no other options, she inhaled a deep breath and submerged herself beneath the surface, pulling her body into the tunnel and frantically flailing her limbs to propel herself forward. 

Adrenaline alone fueled her as she swam out the tunnel onto the other side of the garden wall. The girl gasped for air as she crawled onto the muddy bank beside the stream. Solid stone now separated her from her pursuers, but she knew that she still was not safe. With no other heading she drudged herself along the stream, hoping it could lead her wet tired body to a much warmer drier place.