OtRnT #01 - Fields of Innocence

 It’s a big house that speaks of ancient power and better times, still beautiful in its latent decay, rather isolated from the village. Somewhere among the dark spacious rooms, two voices, a man’s and a woman’s, are arguing bitterly about war, defence, military forces.
Then, a tiny figure appears, hidden in the shade of the silence otherwise covering the wooden floors. She moves furtively through the corridors, barely glancing at the direction where those voices are coming from. She’s used to hearing those discussions, but never really pays attention to them: she can’t understand those words, that only seem to weave obscure and distant sentences... She sneaks through the dim-light of the old rooms, at times illuminated for a fleeting moment by the nearly forgotten golden glares of countless decorations in the elegant shape of majestic dragons, until she reaches the front door and comes out in the warm sun.

She’s only a girl, dressed in the hues of blue. She looks back for a moment, smiling, in love with those times when she can go out and run and listen to those voices she not only loves, but that also speak a language she can truly understand. She sets forth along the sunny road of well-trod soil, until she leaves the village behind, and then starts running among the rice fields, fast, happy, headed for a beautiful meadow not far. Only when she gets there she slows down, then stops, contemplating the breathtaking sight around her. Then a pale blue butterfly appears, flying nearby, getting closer and closer and then fluttering about her face before going on, dancing in the air. She watches it, elated, following it with her eyes, until it lands softly on a blade of grass, drawing her ecstatic looks. She stays still for a little while, then faintly moves  its wings... and when it takes off again, the child follows it, slowly at first, then running, thus releasing a glittering cloud of bright butterflies taken by surprise in the peaceful grass, running in that seemingly infinite sea of green and freedom...

Meanwhile, something strange and indistinct is flashing among the shady branches of the woods at the far end of the vast field. Blazing-fast figures, barely recognizable; the quick rustle of pale robes and raven silk, that almost seem to be fleeing from something, closely followed by another silhouette, as nimble and elusive as the other, a flash of purple and flickering silver... no more than a boy. They sneak away through the darkness of the forest. Sooner or later, mercilessly, their path will cross that little girl’s, who’s running so free and carefree now, far from her parents’ arguments about war and distrust... and they will change everything.