The Caged Bird’s Last Cry
The night was bitterly cold, the wind howling through the cracks of the broken window in the small, damp room. The flickering candle on the wooden table had long since burned out, plunging the space into darkness. In the farthest corner, curled up on the freezing stone floor, lay a girl—her fragile body covered in bruises, her once golden-brown hair now dull and tangled.
Elise had long since stopped crying.
Tears never changed anything. No matter how much she wept, no one came to save her. No one cared.
Her stomach ached from days without food, and every movement sent sharp pain shooting through her ribs. The last time she had angered her father, he had struck her so hard that she had been unable to breathe for minutes. The memory of it lingered, just like the bruises staining her skin.
A soft creak echoed through the silence. Elise flinched, her entire body tensing. She knew that sound—the door.
Her heart pounded as footsteps approached. Heavy. Slow. Familiar.
Then, the door slammed open.
A tall figure loomed in the doorway, the dim light from the hallway casting eerie shadows across his face. Lord Gareth, her father. The man who was supposed to love and protect her, yet all he ever gave her was pain.
Behind him, another figure stepped inside—her stepmother, Lady Helena. Beautiful, elegant, and cruel. Her golden dress shimmered in the light, her lips curling into a smirk as her sharp eyes landed on Elise’s pathetic form.
“Still alive?” Helena sneered, crossing her arms. “What a shame.”
Elise’s throat tightened, but she didn’t respond. Speaking only made things worse.
Gareth stepped forward, the stench of alcohol clinging to him. “You useless little rat,” he slurred, his voice filled with loathing. “You dare to keep breathing in my house?”
Elise pressed herself against the wall, her body trembling. She had done nothing. She had spoken no words. And yet, she already knew what was coming.
Helena clicked her tongue. “She’s weak and pathetic, Gareth. We should’ve left her in the streets to rot.”
Gareth’s expression darkened, his hands curling into fists.
Elise barely had time to react before pain exploded in her side. A brutal kick sent her sprawling onto the cold floor, her vision flashing white. She gasped, clutching her ribs as agony rippled through her body.
Another kick. Then another.
She tried to curl into herself, tried to make herself small, but the blows kept coming.
She wanted it to stop.
She wanted to disappear.
As Gareth’s final strike landed, something cracked inside her. A sharp, unbearable pain bloomed in her chest, and suddenly—breathing became difficult.
She coughed, blood trickling from her lips, her vision turning hazy.
Helena sighed, brushing off her gown. “Honestly, Gareth. You might have killed her.”
Gareth scoffed. “So what if I did?” He turned, leaving without another glance. Helena followed, shutting the door behind her.
And just like that, she was alone again.
Elise lay there, unmoving, her body screaming in agony. The room felt colder than ever, and even as she tried to draw breath, her chest only tightened. Her limbs were heavy, her eyelids too.
She was dying.
But wasn’t that what she had wanted?
For it all to end?
As darkness crept into the edges of her vision, a single tear slipped down her cheek.
“If only...” she whispered, her voice barely a breath. “If only... I could live again...”
Then everything faded.
The caged bird had sung its last cry.
Elise’s body twitched as a wave of unbearable pain surged through her. Every breath she took burned, each one shallower than the last. The taste of blood coated her tongue, metallic and bitter, and her vision blurred at the edges, growing darker with each passing second.
Her frail fingers dug into the rough stone floor, but she had no strength left to push herself up.
This was it.
She was going to die here, in this miserable, rotting room where no one would mourn her.
The wind howled through the cracks in the walls, chilling her to the bone. She was so cold. The thin, tattered dress she wore did nothing to shield her from the winter night creeping in. Her bare feet, bruised and swollen, had long since lost all feeling.
Her father and stepmother had left, slamming the door behind them, sealing her fate without a second thought.
No one would come.
No one ever did.
Elise let out a ragged breath, her body shaking violently. She tried to move, tried to reach for the broken blanket lying just a few inches away, but her arm wouldn’t lift. The strength had left her completely.
The darkness in the corners of the room seemed to grow, stretching toward her, calling her in.
She thought of her mother—her real mother. She barely remembered her face, just the faintest touch of warmth, a voice humming softly in the background of her memories. A voice that had vanished long ago, leaving her alone with a monster and a woman who despised her existence.
Was her mother waiting for her on the other side?
Would she finally be able to rest?
Tears slipped silently down her cheeks, mixing with the blood on her skin.
She didn’t want to die.
But she couldn’t keep living like this either.
A sharp pain shot through her chest, making her gasp. Her breath hitched, and suddenly, it became harder to breathe. Her body convulsed slightly, but she was too weak to even cough up the blood rising in her throat. It trickled from the corner of her lips instead, pooling onto the dirty floor beneath her.
The agony was unbearable. Every part of her screamed in torment, but no sound left her lips. She could do nothing but lie there, slowly slipping away.
Her mind was fading, her thoughts becoming hazy.
But deep within her, something stirred.
A feeling she had long forgotten—one buried beneath years of suffering.
Hatred.
Not just for her father. Not just for her stepmother.
But for the world itself.
The world that had abandoned her. The world that had never given her a chance. The world that let monsters like her father exist, while people like her—weak, helpless, unloved—were left to rot.
Her fingers twitched.
If there was such a thing as reincarnation if she had even the smallest chance at another life...
She wouldn’t just survive.
She would live.
And this time, she would never let anyone hurt her again.
Her lips parted as she tried to speak, but only a whisper escaped.
“If only... I could be reborn...”
Her vision dimmed completely.
The last thing she saw was the cold, grey ceiling of the place that had been her prison.
Then, there was only darkness.
Her body felt like it was sinking—no, being swallowed by the darkness itself.
Elise lay motionless, her cheek pressed against the freezing stone floor, her breath coming in weak, uneven gasps. Every inch of her was in agony. The bruises, the cuts, the bones that might have been broken—it was all blending into one unbearable storm of pain.
Her vision had nearly blacked out, but the cruel reality of her suffering wouldn’t let her slip away so easily.
Her father’s words still echoed in her ears.
“You dare to keep breathing in my house?”
As if she had a choice.
Breathing had become harder, each inhale sharp and shallow, as though knives were lodged deep in her ribs. Her chest felt too tight, and she knew—she just knew—something inside her had been damaged beyond repair this time.
A violent cough racked her fragile frame, sending another mouthful of blood spilling past her lips. The warm liquid trickled down her chin, staining the stone beneath her.
She was dying.
And they had left her here to do just that.
A pathetic, unloved creature, abandoned in the filth of a forgotten room.
Tears welled in her eyes, but they were slow to fall as if even her body had grown too weak to cry properly.
It hurt. It hurt so much.
But worse than the pain was the suffocating loneliness.
No one would mourn her. No one would search for her body when it finally went still. By tomorrow, they would step over her lifeless form like she was nothing more than a discarded rag.
Would her father even care? Would he even remember her? Or would he simply pour himself another drink and laugh?
Her stepmother’s cold, sneering face flashed through her mind.
“Still alive? What a shame.”
Elise clenched her fists, her broken nails digging into her skin.
What had she done to deserve this?
What cruel fate had cursed her to be born into a life where she was never wanted?
She had tried—tried so hard—to be good, to be quiet, to be useful, thinking that maybe, just maybe, they would finally accept her.
But no matter how obedient she was, no matter how much she endured, it was never enough.
She was still nothing.
Another cough tore through her, this time more violent than before. Her body convulsed, and fresh blood dribbled from her lips, pooling beside her in a dark, crimson stain.
It was getting colder.
Or maybe it was just her body shutting down.
Her fingers twitched weakly as if trying to grasp onto something—anything—to hold her here a little longer. But what was there left to hold onto?
Her memories were all filled with suffering.
She couldn’t remember warmth.
She couldn’t remember kindness.
She had never known a mother’s love.
Never knew what it felt like to be held.
Never knew what it meant to be someone’s daughter, not in the way that mattered.
She had lived her entire life unloved.
Her throat tightened, the sobs she wanted to release locked deep inside her chest. No one would hear them, anyway.
No one ever had.
Her trembling lips parted as she tried to whisper something—maybe a prayer, maybe a plea—but the words never came.
Because deep inside her, where only darkness had existed before, something flickered.
A spark.
A whisper of something greater than the pain, greater than the suffering, greater than the miserable fate she had been given.
A desperate, unyielding wish.
“If I had another chance...”
Her lashes fluttered, her vision swimming.
“If I could be reborn...”
The words were nothing but a breath, slipping into the cold night like a dying ember.
And then, silence.
Her body stilled.
Her fingers loosened.
The last of her warmth faded.
The caged bird had sung its final cry.
And the world did not care.
As the wind rattled through the broken window, carrying away her final breath, something unseen stirred in the darkness.
A force far greater than human cruelty.
A fate far greater than death itself.
And somewhere, in the vast, endless void beyond, Elise was heard.
Her suffering would not end here.
She would rise again.
And this time—she would never be powerless again.
The room was silent.
The only sound was the faint whistle of the wind slipping through the cracks in the walls, a soft, lonely lullaby to a girl who had never known kindness.
Elise’s body lay motionless on the cold, hard floor, curled in on itself like a broken doll. Her fragile limbs, too thin, too weak, were stained with bruises—some fresh, some faded into sickly shades of yellow and purple. Blood pooled beneath her, soaking into the stone, unnoticed by a world that had long since abandoned her.
She could no longer feel anything.
Not the pain.
Not the cold.
Not even the weight of her own body.
The numbness had settled in, wrapping around her like an old friend, whispering that it was time to let go.
But wasn’t that what she had wanted?
For it all to finally end?
For the agony to stop?
For her to stop existing?
Yet, as the darkness wrapped its fingers around her, her heartbeat slowed, and her last breath threatened to slip away... something inside her screamed.
“No.”
She didn’t want to die like this.
Alone.
Unloved.
Forgotten.
A hollow sob caught in her throat, but she no longer had the strength to cry. The tears pooled in her eyes, blurring the ceiling above her, but they never fell.
She thought of her father.
Would he even notice she was gone?
Would he spare her a second thought?
Would he—
No.
He wouldn’t.
The man who had beaten her starved her, spat cruel words at her as if she were nothing more than a parasite—he wouldn’t care.
Neither would her stepmother.
They wouldn’t grieve.
They wouldn’t mourn.
They would sigh in relief, glad that the burden of Elise had finally been lifted.
Her small fingers twitched, her body weak, her soul clinging onto the last fraying thread of life.
It wasn’t fair.
She had never been given a chance.
She had never been given love.
Was she so easy to throw away?
Did she mean nothing?
Her vision darkened, the final moments of her life slipping between her fingers like grains of sand.
A soft, shuddering breath left her lips.
“If I could live again... I’d want to be loved.”
It was the last wish of a broken girl.
A plea no one would ever hear.
And then—
The caged bird fell silent.
The world moved on.
And Elise was no more.
Yet, in the vast, endless void beyond, something stirred.
A force greater than death itself.
A fate greater than suffering.
And somewhere, in the distant horizon of existence, a new life awaited.
A second chance.
A rebirth.
And this time, she would not be unloved.
She would be Seraphina.
And her story was only just beginning.
TO BE CONTINUED.....
