—You could not think of yourself as anything more than ugly.

In human terms, you were aware—by sole virtue of your likeness to your brother alone, and by sole virtue of the praises you were given—you were aware, yes, that this appearance was acceptable. Even with your scars and your marks, your blemished skin, some would even go so far as to call you beautiful—

But you could not say the same for yourself. Beyond what was skin-deep, beyond your outer appearance, you could feel with disgust the blood that coursed through your veins; the faint, unpleasant pulse against your forehead and the back of your skull; skin touching skin, thin packaging for the flesh and meat underneath; the strain of your eyes; the beat of your heart, thudding so loudly you could hear it behind your ears; your lungs as they pumped desperately; the beads of sweat on your brow that only grew with the pain; your throat and lips parched, a terrible reminder of the single need your body still has left. You still remember the lesser need—you still remember how your stomach twisted and craved, how the offending organ threatened to eat itself alive if you didn't find sustenance, how your traitorous mouth would grow moist to the thought of entertaining the demands of your greedy body just for a few hours of peace only to start all over again before the sun even made much headway through the sky. That hateful need, that base instinct—if you never had to consume another thing besides air and pure water again in your lifetime it would still be too soon.

In this cage that you so deeply resented, of course you could not stand to endure another humiliation. If only it was painful—then perhaps you could grin and bear it, but this was no injury; it was only insult. The white, white wings that sprouted from your back—you did not need to be told its likeness resembled the silhouettes of the heavenly messengers; your silhouette reminded you just fine—they weighed heavy on you, yet beyond the initial growth which you hardly remember there was yet to be very much pain whatsoever.

If it were painful, then you could say, "This is painful," and be understood; but it was not, and you could not. The pain was in your heart, in your sense of self; you could never call this body beautiful, nor could you ever understand this body to be anything beyond ugly, but now it was, to you, grotesque—and more than anything, you knew. Not one person would understand.

When you returned you spent a long time in front of the mirror, dragging your fingers through to pluck and tear—not pointlessly, of course.

You only needed enough to grip, so that when you took the sword to your back, you could have a better handle on the invading appendages—so that you could hold them properly when the blade went down.