My hands were covered in blood. I looked at Sofia, trembling.
"What happened?"
Sofia just looked at me with sorrowful eyes. "That is the question that I want to ask My Lady."
She was kneeling in front of me, holding both of my bloodstained hands in hers. Behind her, I saw Mother and Father watching with pale faces. To my side, on the floor, lay the shattered remains of a porcelain vase, smeared with blood.
"Is it me who broke the vase?" I asked Sofia, my voice barely a whisper.
While she carefully wiped the blood from my fingers with her handkerchief, she nodded. "Yes… My Lady broke the vase. If you please, can you tell me what happened to you?"
I started to tell her everything I had experienced. For each part of the story, I walked around the room to show the location of the hallucination.
I walked to the table beside my bed. "On the table, there was a white box and a doll that looked like a bear," I explained, gesturing to the empty wood. "The white box was bright—no candles or lamps, just light."
I grabbed Sofia's hand and pulled her out of the room, Mother and Father following close behind.
In the hall, I pointed at the walls. "There was no this and that. No paintings, no vases. It was just plain, but it felt appealing."
We moved to the stairs. "The sides of the stairs were made of glass, not wood like this," I said, tapping the banister.
I noticed some servants lurking nearby, curious, so they started following us too.
In the dining room, I stood by the table. "The table's shape was not a rectangle like this, but a circle made of glass." I pointed up at the ceiling. "And the chandelier… it was a ball of light hanging there, but brighter than any chandelier or candle I have ever seen."
I described the decor, the walls, everything in vivid detail.
"Ah!" I exclaimed, turning to my parents. "Even in the dining room, Mother and Father were changed into people I didn't know. Even the twins were not there. And then… the man who replaced Father dragged me from the seat and carried me to the room. After that, there was an unknown woman who approached me wearing a weird white robe."
Everyone was stunned into silence. I saw expressions of pure disbelief on Mother and Father's faces.
Sofia gently took my arm. "Let us go back to your room, My Lady."
As Sofia and I walked back, Mother and Father stayed behind for a moment, seemingly to give orders to the servants to disperse.
When we arrived back in my room, the broken vase on the floor was gone. Sofia guided me to the bed, and I sat down.
"My Lady," Sofia began carefully, "perhaps you were hallucinating."
"Hallucinating?" I frowned. "But what I saw was real. I even felt it when I touched things."
"How do I tell you about this…" Sofia sighed. "But the truth is…"
Sofia explained to me what had really happened.
The man who dragged me was not an unknown stranger, but my father. She told me that Father was so worried about the blood pouring from my mouth that he carried me to bed. The twins had been there the whole time, even following Father to my room, but they were so scared and worried that they stayed in their own room afterward.
The thing I had hugged was not a fluffy bear doll, but a vase. That was why my hands were bloody and why there was a broken vase on the floor.
And the woman who approached me was my mother.
"You are lying, right, Sofia?" I shook my head. "That is not true."
"It is the truth, My Lady."
"What about the white box that was so bright? I remember that I touched it, and it became bright as the sun."
"There is no such thing like that here."
"But… but… but… I touched it and felt it! There is no way I was hallucinating."
The door opened. Mother and Father walked in. Mother immediately sat beside me on the bed, embracing my head and body protectively. Father stood beside Sofia.
"What has happened to Aurelia?" Father asked Sofia gravely.
"I believe she was hallucinating… but My Lady keeps denying it."
"Is that true, Aurelia?" Mother asked, her voice vibrating against my shoulder.
"Because I felt it was so real," I insisted. "When the man dragged me out of the seat and carried me, I felt the sturdiness of his body. When I hugged the doll, I felt the fluffiness of the fur. It is unreal if that was a hallucination."
"Well, it is what Aurelia believes," Father said, rubbing his chin. He turned to Sofia. "But what is the cause? Why did she experience all that?"
"It is hard to define the cause, Your Grace," Sofia admitted. "But there are some possibilities. The first possibility is the imbalance of the four humors. Before the event, Your Grace told me that blood came out of My Lady's mouth. Maybe the loss of blood from one of the four humors could make her experience the hallucination… especially since some days ago, she already lost some blood."
"What is the other possibility?" Mother asked.
"The other could be that the soul of My Lady was obstructed by demonic spirits. If this is the cause, the people My Lady saw could be the spirits themselves manifesting in her brain." Sofia hesitated. "And the last one… maybe hard to tell Your Grace and Madam."
"What is it? Just say it," Father urged. "You are the physician, not us."
"It is a divine punishment."
Mother and Father were stunned. Mother looked particularly shocked.
"This divine thing again…" Mother muttered bitterly. "How many divine things must Aurelia bear?"
"Madam, even I myself do not believe in the divine usually," Sofia said quickly. "But it could be a possibility that it is a divine punishment. Maybe it was a punishment from what happened in the temple before."
"What happened in the temple was not Aurelia's fault, even though she was the one suffering from it," Mother snapped.
"If it is the cause," Father ventured cautiously, "are you suggesting we take Aurelia back to the temple?"
"Dear, WHAT HAVE YOU SAID?" Mother became agitated, staring at Father angrily. "I will not give you permission to take Aurelia back to that temple."
"But dear, if it can make Aurelia better, isn't it great for her to go there?"
"NO WAY," Mother declared. "I will not let Aurelia take a single step there. If the Goddess of that temple wants to take Aurelia… she better be vis-à-vis with me before she lays a finger on my daughter."
Father sighed, surrendering. "If it is what you want, dear, I will not force her to go. But for now, let's settle and not immediately diagnose the cause."
"I think what Your Grace said is right," Sofia agreed. "We need to see more in the future about My Lady. For now, I suggest My Lady take a rest, and hope this thing does not happen again."
Two weeks passed. A lot of things happened.
The three children—Alicia, Alecia, and Aelia—became my personal maids, as Adel was still absent. Lady Laura took over as my tutor, as her daughter, Lady Octavi, was also still absent.
In these two weeks, I experienced five more hallucinations like before. Because of this, I stayed in my room all the time. When it was dinner time, a servant brought the food to the door, and one of the three girls brought it in.
The hallucinations appeared randomly—first in four days, then two days, then three days. Each time, just like before, I spat blood from my mouth and nose.
When I was hallucinating, I walked around and explored every corner of that other world. I even tried to go out of the room and walk everywhere, but someone unknowingly always prevented me from going.
After the hallucination ended, Sofia told me everything I had done in the real world, and I told her what I had experienced in the vision. The three girls beside me never appeared in my hallucinations.
Each hallucination was different. Sometimes the bear doll appeared; sometimes the white box was open, sometimes closed.
In the third experience, there was a book on the table. I opened it, but the words were strange; I could not read what was written.
However, in the next hallucination, the words changed into something I could read. The first page was still unintelligible, but the next page was clear.
20/01/2005
Today, it's the first time I write something in this book. My father gave me this book, he said "it will be fun if you write something in this book everyday…". I don't know what the fun of writing something in this book is, but he called it "Diary.."
I turned to the next page and read on. Some pages were torn out. Every time I read, something new appeared in the room.
The bear doll appeared in a clean, untouched condition beside the book after I read:
My uncle gave me a doll, it's a teddy bear. He said it came from overseas, so I need to take care of this doll..
So the doll was called a "teddy bear."
A weird stick appeared hanging on the wall with a net of snares after I read:
My first day in the club was so harsh, the coach always ordered me to run back and forth, even though he was not letting me play, if it's like that for what father gave me the racket…
On every page, something new manifested in the room. I read until the pages became unreadable again. I closed the book and looked around. I didn't touch anything else, because Sofia had warned me, and I didn't want the broken vase incident to repeat.
After the last hallucination in these two weeks, I immediately told the three girls to bring Mother to me.
Moments later, Mother arrived and sat beside me on the bed.
"What is the matter, Aurelia?" she asked gently.
"I have a favor, Mother."
"What is this favor?"
"Maybe it… is hard for you."
"Just tell me your favor."
"Can you bring me to the temple we went to?"
Her face immediately frowned. "Why do you want to go there?"
"There is something that I want to know."
"Why in there? Is Sofia not capable of that?"
"It is not like Sofia is not capable," I explained slowly. "But I want… to.. try… communicate… again."
"Communicate? You mean with the Goddess in that temple?"
"Yes, sort of like that."
"But you said you experienced nothing there. Is that exactly what you wanted?"
"It is harmless to try it again, right, Mother?"
"Harmless?" She scoffed. "Back then, you spat a lot of blood. How was that harmless?"
"Come on, Mother," I pleaded. "I have been in this room for two weeks without getting out. Moreover, in these two weeks, I haven't seen a single face of the twins. It is like a cage in here."
"Aurelia! You can't say that. Why do you say your room is a cage?"
"But Mother, it is the truth, right? That in these two weeks, I was forbidden to leave the room."
"It is not forbidden, but it is better for you," she sighed. "Your favor… I will think about it again with your father. But for now, you will stay in the room."
"But…"
"No buts."
She stood up and left the room. After she left, I immediately flopped back onto the bed, frustrated.
On the next day, Father and Mother arrived in my room bringing splendid news: they would take me to the temple.
The three girls prepared me for the occasion. For two weeks, I hadn't stepped a single foot on the first floor, let alone outside the house. In front of the manor, a carriage and two horses for guards had been prepared.
After arriving in the city, the carriage went immediately to the temple, skipping the square unlike the last time.
At the temple, we went inside immediately, Father and Mother holding both my hands tightly. Inside, just like before, I was offered the drink by one of the priests. I drank it. In a moment, I became dizzy and sleepy. I fell unconscious, and someone carried me to the platform in the middle of the room.
… .. .
I opened my eyes.
I found myself in the emptiness again.
I started walking in the white void. After some time, I spotted a figure in the distance. I immediately ran toward it.
"Gennaia!!" I shouted as I approached her back.
She turned around.
It was not Gennaia.
When I looked closely, she had long red hair. Her right eye was orange, and her left eye was red.
I gasped in surprise and took a step back. But for every step I took back, she took a step forward.
"Who are you, mortal?" she demanded.
"Who are you?" I retorted.
"This is my realm and my domain. Why are you here?"
"Your domain and your realm? Does it mean you are Delios?"
"Yes, it is me, Delios. So what reason brings you here?"
"I want to meet Gennaia."
"Why do you want to meet her? ...Ah, you are the anomaly."
"Anomaly??"
"She didn't really tell you about that, huh?"
She immediately snapped her fingers, just like Gennaia did.
Snap!
A table and a chair suddenly appeared in front of us.
"Please, take a seat first," she said. "I will tell her about your arrival here."
Out of nowhere, she disappeared right in front of me.