They forced me to speak. Those voices ripped the words from my unwilling throat. They wrenched words from my mind where I held them. I did not want the words released. Words should NEVER be released! Words that say what they should not say and create noise, hateful noise. I had vowed never to speak but those horrid voices took me over and made me!

"Eat, eat, you must eat!" The attendant told me. They endlessly told me things like that. A spoon was placed in my hand. I automatically began to eat, lifting the tasteless corn mush into my mouth. I would do almost anything to get them to shut up, anything to further the silence I wanted.

I averted my eyes from the boy next to me. He drooled into his corn mush, drooling out more than he took in. He began to laugh hysterically at nothing. His dinner sprayed everywhere. Oh that I could not see, speak, or hear. I dropped my spoon and rocked back and forth, back and forth.

"Crystin, Crystin, stop rocking and eat, Crystin. Crystin, do you hear me, Crystin?" the attendant asked this body I unwillingly inhabit.

"Kallen! Come here, it's important," another attendant called.

"In a moment! Crystin! Eat, damn you, eat!" Kallen's fist shot out and rammed into my face before the other attendants could stop her.

"You fool!" the other attendant shrieked just before chaos broke out. Tables flew across the room, people were pushed away from me, benches flew out the window, lightning flashed in the middle of the room, and the wind howled drowning out the attendants screams. "This is what happens when you hit Crystin, never, ever, hit her!" She dove for the floor as lightning flashed two feet away from her.

Kallen howled in pain when a heavy oak bench landed on her foot. She huddled close to the floor when abruptly the chaos stopped.

"Don't hit Crystin, it's a very bad idea," a male attendant said. "If she wants to rock, let her rock. If she wants to eat she'll eat, if she doesn't she won't. Don't force her to do anything she doen't want to, or else it results in this; and especially don't hit her or something rotten will happen to you and everybody else in the room. I'll take Crystin to her room." Kallen sobbed in pain. The attendant, who had tried to get Kallen to come away, came up.

"Thanks, Thomas. I'll take care of Kallen." she said.

"Come on, Crystin, you beautiful gem. Let's go back to your room, where you can rock in peace and quiet, sort of." Thomas told me soothingly as he picked me up. It's never peaceful or quiet here, it's always, always noisy in this place. My room is no exception. Thomas' statement was absolutely ridiculous. Even I realized that. Even with the "Sort of" at the end it was a ridiculous statement. Thomas carried me to my room. It had soft, white, padded walls, and bars on the door and window. He placed me in the center of my bed where I continued to rock.

The voices warred with my mind with the sole intention of taking it over . I whimpered soundlessly as they pounded insistently on my brain. I didn't want to hear, I didn't want to see what the voices would dig out of the deepest recesses of my mind. What's more I didn't want to tell what the voices would make me tell. I fought back and as always, I lost.

"Watch for the one who will free the gem. She will be free and wrongs will be righted." I said tonelessly.

"Gem? We don't have any jewels here " Thomas looked surprised. In all the times the voices had made me speak I had never said one word about jewels.

"The gem of power will be freed by the barbarian and her companion." I replied.

"A female barbarian?" Thomas sounded skeptical. The voices hadn't meant that the barbarian would be female but they couldn't and I wouldn't correct the misinterpretation. "What's this jewel called?" Thomas asked curiosity filling every ounce of his being.

"The Crys...." my voice faded away as the voices left me. Apparently that was all of the prophecy they were going to force me to give away.

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