Reflections of a Satyr: Rafael | 39 | Scars

Damn near everyone has scars. Whether it is because of physical brands upon their form, or because of the lasting touch of someone’s cleverly sharpened tongue, most people were, in some way, flawed. So Kassandra often puzzled over the speculation of her bodyguard, Rafael, and why on the surface he seemed so well-adjusted. He was patient and sociable, and you could even mistake him for clever. It just didn’t add up in the mind for someone so young and weathered as she was in equal parts. Did that carefree oaf simply not let anything bother him? Was nothing lasting on his features?

 

Of course, there came some rumor about the cut in his brow. The skin there has long since taken to nearly seamlessly blend in with the rest of his skin. A few centuries and being a very proficient healer would do that, one would suppose. The only remnant of it now was a stripe in his eyebrow where the hair was absent, the salted land on the canvas of his face that refused to grow.

 

Rumors were abundant as to what the scar might have once looked like. Some of the staff in their idle gossip suggested that he had once been sliced, by the claws of some horrible wendigo, or perhaps by the dagger of a lover’s knife. They wondered aloud as they unfurled the linens and turned the bed down about the legitimacy of his eye. His eye? Another questioned. His eye! Perhaps the one that he has is fashioned from glass, meant to cast the illusion that he had two. As venerable as he was in years, and with very little showing in his age otherwise than some faint silver fox whiskering, it wasn’t unusual to think perhaps not all of him was authentic, per se. 

 

Kassandra remembered watching quite idly as these younger staffers dealt with and served Rafael during their stay, some of the bolder and more curious watching his gaze studiously to see if one eye ever gave credence to this theory. From what she could tell, they came up empty-handed.

 

She heard from the higher-ups in the family that they believed his old scar to once have been a remnant of war. He had seen a great many in his days, that was why she was entrusted to his care. He had seen the shaping of their country and not only lived to see the tale written of it in this enterprising period of history, and he only seemed to sport one scar ‘visibly’ for his efforts. There were talks over dinners and in the inner circles about his heroic deeds, tall tales spun exaggerating his altruism and bravery. It all had felt like pretty little lies to Kassandra.

 

And so, it was humorous that on one of the first days of having met the man formally, Kassandra asked him quite bluntly “So what really happened to your eye?”

“What really happened? I’m sure you’ve heard plenty.” He expressed disarmingly, his timbre graveled and deep, a well of patience.

“I have.” She brooked stiffly. “But I am not a farmer, nor do I have any background proper in agriculture or any similar field. So you’ll forgive if peddling bullshit isn’t something I purport.”

He laughed. “Even so, you’re presumptuous to think that I owe you an explanation. Perhaps I like the air that precedes me, Miss Kassandra. Let them talk.” He licked his thumb and smoothed over the offending brow. Kassandra wondered if she should take this as a slight, but didn’t have to ponder long as he continued. 

 

“After all, where is the fun in life without a little bit of healthy rumor?”