Zaidfar: Chapter 0: Backstory

[[WARNING POTENTIAL TRAUMA AND ABUSE TRIGGERS]]
 
Zaidfar’s first memories are muddled. As far as she can recall life began in the Room. The Room was purportedly her room, but the truth was that the room never belonged to her, she belonged to the Room. The Room had quite a lot of things in truth, all which seemed to have always been within there, just the same as she had. There was a dark stained wooden wardrobe with a creaking door filled with a variety of women’s clothes of many different sizes all too large for her, and an off-white painted vanity covered in scrapes and scars where the paint was chipped away to reveal unfashionable paint colors and gouged raw wood. Atop the vanity were a number of old brass canisters, a hair brush, and other beauty accessories, including a rather impressive square mirror set into a stand which was nailed into the vanity itself. But the Room’s centerpiece was a large, old, well worn-in bed that she needed stepping stairs to get into and out of upon which were warm heavy blankets and faded feather down pillows. The rest of the Room was cold stone walls, and a heavy wooden door studded through with cast iron hinges and reinforcement; importantly the door had no handle. For the Room did not let go of what was its, and the only way out was for Fregor to open it from the outside. No one else could open the door because the bolt, which opened from the outside, was just too heavy.
 
The Room might have belonged to Fregor, but Zaidfar was pretty sure Fregor belonged to the Room too. Fregor was big, a half-ogre who sat outside the Room on a couch. Fregor mostly sat, ate, relieved himself, and opened the door when he was told, and closed the door when he was told. It was his “job” to do these things so the Room could keep Zaidfar. Because she had to stay in “her room” as they called it. Because she had to stay, Fregor had to stay, and Zaidfar had to stay because Mr. Hugh wanted her to stay. The truth was, all of them, the Room, Fregor, Zaidfar, they all belonged to Mr. Hugh. They belonged to Mr. Hugh because Mr. Hugh had many other things, particularly coins. For in the city of Athkatla, in western Amn, the power of coin was unquestionable, and the fate of slaves were decided by their masters.
 
Others would come to the Room; most often a woman who would bring with her food, bathing water and fresh bedding. She looked at Zaidfar with pity in her eyes and a grimace on her wrinkled face but she spoke with gentleness and patience. Zaidfar always looked forward to seeing the woman, as anything she brought, anything she said brought a welcome relief to the endless boredom of the Room. If Zaidfar had known what a mother was she might have considered the woman to be that, after all she had never known a name to call her by. But the kind woman’s name wasn’t something she ‘needed to know’ as decided by Mr. Hugh. In truth there were very few things she ‘needed to know’ and it was best she knew as little as possible; there were dangerous things to know, the kind woman told her. The kind woman’s job seemed to be to teach Zaidfar her words and made sure she was “growing up.”
 
That was Zaidfar’s job by the way, she was supposed to “grow up.” Growing up was a tedious job, as you had to do the same thing every day, day after day. Zaidfar would wake up in the bed in the Room, and then she would be. The kind woman would come a few times a day, and Zaidfar would listen and eat and bathe, and then she would get back to work growing up. Just be, and don’t hurt yourself, that is all she had to do. Eventually she would get tired and get back in bed and sleep so she could wake up and get back to work. It was very important that she grow up right, or Mr. Hugh would be very upset. If she didn’t do her job and didn’t “make it” then Mr. Hugh had promised the kind woman and Fregor both that there would be a lot of trouble.
 
Zaidfar didn’t want to trouble either of them, the kind woman was kind after all, and although Fregor wasn’t very nice, he did talk to her some times through the door. Fregor even had two kinds of words, and he taught some of his to Zaidfar because he said he wanted to hear them. Fregor said the words came from where he came from before, but he couldn’t say where as that was something Zaidfar didn’t ‘need to know.’ Instead Zaidfar did her best to grow up, and much to the pleasure of the kind woman she did just that. Years passed by in this way, and soon she didn’t need a stepping stair to get into bed. The Room got a little smaller and the kind woman’s face got a little more wrinkled, but very little else changed until the lessons began.
 
A new woman came to the Room, the unkind woman; her face was smooth and her hair was bright and colorful. She brought the lessons to the Room with her. Making Zaidfar do the lessons was her job. Brushing your hair, how to stand, how to sit, how to walk, and also how to dress. When Zaidfar did the lessons poorly the unkind woman would discipline her. If Zaidfar did very badly then the unkind woman would not let the kind woman into the Room and if the kind woman didn’t come then Zaidfar wouldn’t grow up right, and then Zaidfar wasn’t doing her job right.
 
The lessons would change as Zaidfar kept getting bigger. Soon the canisters contained pigments and ointments, “make-up” as the unkind lady would call it. The unkind lady would teach her how to use it to change her face. The unkind lady would show her in the mirror at the vanity, then have Zaidfar do her own face the same. She was told to do all she could to look ‘just the same.’
 
Her first shapechange was a surprise to her. The face under the make-up brush went from changing brushstroke by brushstroke across her skin to morphing under it. The pale girl with white-blonde hair gave way to the unkind lady, and the unkind lady looked upon the unkind ladies in the mirror and clapped her hands. “Mr. Hugh would be so pleased, she was growing up so well.” said the unkind lady.
 
Zaidfar hoped to please the kind lady with what she had learned but the kind lady only grimaced when she saw the unkind lady in Zaidfar. Thinking perhaps that the kind lady would please the kind lady, Zaidfar became her, but the kind lady only pleaded with Zaidfar to stop. She must never be the kind lady, she must only be who Mr. Hugh tells her to be. But in the Room there was nothing to do but be, so why not be other things? She would be the kind lady and the unkind lady, but she couldn’t be Fregor. Fregor was just too big and it hurt to try to be him. Zaidfar would instead become the ladies and with the cosmetics she would paint and become as many new things as she could. It made time in the Room pass more quickly.
 
Mr. Hugh wanted her to be many women in the end. Zaidfar would wear a blindfold, and would leave the room, being pulled by the hand by the unkind lady. The unfamiliar stone of the hallway outside the Room sending electric shocks up her body during her first trips, quickly replaced by the feel of carpet that she assumed must be made of blankets. The blindfold was removed as she was bade to look through a peephole on Mr. Hugh’s guests at different parties. She had never seen so many people and so many things. Each viewing was a gift of unimaginable value to Zaidfar, as she gained so many new things to be when she was returned to the Room.
 
The Room often had a new visitor as well, Mr. Hugh himself! Mr. Hugh came to Zaidfar to see her be the ladies from his parties, it would always bring a smile to his face. Sometimes they would share meals together in a different room, a dining room. The dining room belonged to Mr. Hugh, of course. She would eat with him while being a lady he wanted. He would talk to her, but she wasn’t to talk back, as she didn’t speak right for Mr. Hugh. Sometimes Mr. Hugh would help her bathe instead of the kind lady as well, and with him taking care of her food, her bathing and even bringing her new clothes she began to see the kind lady far less. Soon Mr. Hugh would even take care of her bedding situation as well.
 
Zaidfar’s job wasn’t to grow up any longer. Her job was to be the women Mr. Hugh wanted, and women Mr. Hugh wanted were many. She was moved to Mr. Hugh’s room; though that distinction made little sense to Zaidfar, all the rooms were Mr. Hugh’s rooms. Zaidfar’s new job didn’t take much time in the end, or that much effort. Her abuse was frequent but Mr. Hugh was a busy man, and when his business with the woman of his choice was done he would hurry off to other business. Mr. Hugh was a businessman, after all.
 
Mr. Hugh’s room though was a different thing entirely, well except Fregor, he was now outside Mr. Hugh’s room. Sumptuous furnishings and luxuries of all manner surrounded her now. The most amazing of which was something called paint, something made of all color, and the corresponding canvas, a thing made of no color. She soon found her skills with the cosmetics translated quite well; only instead of painting her face in the mirror she would paint any face she pleased in the canvas. Mr. Hugh found her painting humorous, and he provided her with new canvases, as long as she promised to do her job in good spirits. It seemed like a good deal.
 
Zaidfar soon began to change, from the inside. But not because of the person she was being, but because something else was coming into being. Under Mr. Hugh’s attentions she had fallen pregnant, something which distressed the kind lady. Soon she would be unable to be others as the change would endanger the new being within her. This displeased Mr. Hugh greatly. He grew bored of her, with her pale white skin and her pale white hair. She was returned to the Room once more, a new kind of growing up would need to happen before she could leave.
 
The kind lady would see her very often in this time, and tell her of what was to come. Another one, like her would be born in the room. The kind lady said she was born of Mr. Hugh’s love for Zaidfar, but Zaidfar knew that the women Mr. Hugh wanted were not Zaidfar. The kind lady promised that when the new child was born that she would take the child and then Zaidfar would return to Mr. Hugh’s room, where she could paint and be happy again. Just like she had painted those faces into being she was painting a new person into being, the kind lady said. It seemed simple enough, a new job, one that would only last a short time, the kind lady promised.
 
The new job was difficult. The new being moved and kicked and made Zaidfar sick. The kind lady always spoke of it as Mr. Hugh’s child, and that made sense; after all, all things here belonged to Mr. Hugh, right? Deep in her gut though her instincts screamed against that thought, for the first time in her life she felt like something was her’s. The feeling would grow with time, and strength as the life within her did the same. The child would come soon the kind lady said, any day now, as if days meant anything in the Room. Zaidfar felt anxiety, she felt fear, she question for the first time, was even this life within her truly Mr. Hugh’s.
 
The dream that night was very real. Great rolling columns of mist washing over her as she walked bowlegged and pregnant into the roiling clouds of white and grey. The voice came as a whisper upon her ear, and spoke with lilting mirth. “What riches you carry. What splendors you are draped in, to my eyes. Layered upon you like the finest of dresses. You could have lived never knowing otherwise, but she has told you the truth hasn’t she?”
 
In the mist Zaidfar looked down at her swelling belly, somehow knowing. “She?” Zaidfair questioned the mist.
 
“Yes, you carry one, much as you, a daughter.” Came the reply. “Very much as you; and though she tells you the truth she does not know it herself. As it was for you, there is a danger to knowing, and you, Zaidfar, have come to know. You have come to know the lie, that all is Mr. Hugh’s, and for it you are lost, and I have lost. But I shall have mine again, for one good lie deserves another, and if Mr. Hugh can no longer lie to you, then you shall lie to Mr. Hugh. He has given you two lives of lies, and you shall give him two deaths of lies in turn. One you shall give now, the other you will give later. In this way you shall serve me, Zaidfar, you shall know me by my mists.”
 
The mists shifted as illusions danced before Zaidfar. Her part became clear. With the help of the mistcaller she would fake her death in childbirth and in the confusion she would escape. The first death of lies would be her own, as she used her pact with the mistcaller to weave convincing illusions, repainting reality through the very real act of giving birth to her daughter. Distracted by the birth the kind lady was completely unaware of the magic, and in panic rushed from the room with the babe to tell the unkind lady and Mr. Hugh. Zaidfar had died giving birth. Mr. Hugh would be displeased.
 
Fregor would move Zaidfar from the Room to a place she has never been; a room near the garage of Mr. Hugh’s house. She was laid upon a sheet by Fregor, and then the unkind lady approached. Men would come for her and cart her away. A dead whore, the unkind lady had said over her as the sheet slid over Zaidfar’s body, the carters will hardly bother asking questions. The unkind lady dismissed Fregor, she told him he would be lucky to eat any more now that he had no job. Zaidfar felt a pang of guilt; she had never meant to hurt Fregor.
 
When the carters came they took the sheet away, the mistcaller’s magic convincing them of the weight and substance of the package. As the cart trundled down the street Zaidfar walked out into the street of the world naked and afraid.
 
The mists spoke to her. “You will live using what you know; lies. Go, live and learn, and remember you owe me yet one more death of lies if you ever wish to claim the other life of lies.”
 
She became one of the ladies she had seen, and began a life of vagrancy. She learned to live by being others, mimicking and copying them when she needed. She stole when she had to. She learned the power of coin and the deep power of Mr. Hugh within the city of Athkatla. When she aroused suspicion she would become another, and when she had nowhere left to turn she left the city, traveling as any she pleased.
 
She spent years on the road, eventually learning of the work of adventurers and their great power of wealth. She fell in with mercenary companies, pretending to be a powerful spellcaster through the Mistcaller’s powers. Her lies convinced one particular group to undertake a dangerous high paying mission; one that ended in the party’s defeat except for Zaidfar who had fled. She returned to the corpses and found them abandoned. Their wealth was now her’s, and in particular a suit of elven armor. The armor was quite convincing and spoke of great capability, but it also evoked something else, an identity. The elven paladin who had once worn the armor had been beautiful, charming and capable… Perhaps if she was more like her she could be something more?
 
Jacqueline Beauclerc, or Jacqui, for short, became her new name. She began to travel under one face, constantly checking herself in the mirror to ensure that she hadn’t fallen into bad habits of changing her form. The identity began to blossom and crystallize within her psyche. She began to make a name for herself as a capable adventurer, even ranking up within B.A.S.E. of Driftriver. Her small lies began to coalesce into one big lie. She was Jacqui Beauclerc, and for once, that was who she wanted to be.
 
Jacqui would pass the years 1487 to 1494 adventuring and learning of the world. Her mind would often return to the child she had left behind, to the thought that the girl was old enough to begin making memories of her own. Would that girl’s memories be of the Room as well?
 
Having begun to accrue enough wealth and knowledge of the world to provide her resolve began to strengthen; she would get her daughter back, she would honor the one truth she had known all along and reclaim the other life of lies the mistcaller had promised, her daughter. The price was only a death of lies, and she knew that it must be Hugh’s in the end.