The Legend of Sariolla

Hadeon

Bursting through the doors, everything inside me is fueled by adrenaline. There is a wrath in my veins that I've been forced to contain for years, now it demands to be unleashed. Everything is red. I'm seething with it, my eyes glazed from the high of it. I need to kill.

Except there is no one here. The only thing that wasn't part of the plan.

This can't be possible! Destroying every inch of that room from top to bottom in a heap of enraged chaos, I struggle to form any coherent thoughts. My eyes turn to Xuzik, my mightiest warrior, who looks at me wearily, cautiously, and with pity. I want to kill him for it. Grabbing him by the armor on his shoulders, my spit shoots out of my mouth as I growl "WHERE ARE THEY!!!?"
He looks at me with a calm expression, "I don't know. But we'll find them."

Dropping him before I do kill him in the midst of it all, I go towards the open window on the left corner of the little, dusty stone room. Looking out to the sea below I see no route for an escape. The impossibility of the situation refuses to register. After living this moment in my mind for years, this was never a version I depicted. Never a plausible outcome.

How could they possibly know I was coming? How could they have escaped!?

Screaming bloody murder, I relight my torch and set the entire room ablaze. Ordering my men to search every corner of the kingdom, and destroy everything in their wake. If anyone had information on the whereabouts of the Royals, we will get it out of them. Or, they'll be tortured and executed. Anybody.

My men need me to lead them, to finish this night off as planned regardless of this unexpected and enraging outcome. But I can't calm down, my control hanging on by a thread. I'm slipping and I can't afford to do so until I've finally succeeded in this war.

The Sun begins to set as I watch the fast destruction of Callaya, the precious, impenetrable Golden Castle engulfed in flames. We took all the books, the art, artifacts and jewelry. I let my men take whatever and whoever they wanted. We defiled the kingdom. There is no structure here anymore, no place for a home. No room for families. A dead city. In that respect, we had been successful.

I should've anticipated such cowardly actions from these Royals. Of course Ariol would flee his Kingdom when it needed him most.

My blood boils to an explosive degree with the direction of my thoughts. If they're out there, I will search every corner of the Earth for them. This ends with their blood on my hands.

"Hadeon" Eno calls my name wearily. "You need to see this." Walking with him, he leads me down a corridor towards the East corner of the Square Hall, inside a door on the right.

Inside, the room is a soft white, with white carpets, dressers and mirrors. An extravagant chandelier hangs low and a white silk curtained bed lays in the middle. Eno looks at me one last time, his expression unreadable as he nods for me to approach the bed. Walking towards it, I pull the white curtains back and freeze for a moment, not expecting what I see.

A girl, thin and young, lays before me. Her blue dress is ripped, muddy and burned. Her hands are tied in front of her and so are her feet. Her dark, long hair has escaped her braids and falls chaotically around her, engulfing her. She stares up at me with unfiltered fear in her wide hazel eyes. Her mouth is taped shut. There is a deep looking cut by her mouth that the tape has been directly placed over. My hand moves to remove the tape when Eno speaks. "She's Ariol's daughter." My hand falls. The famous Princess. Taking a step back, too many thoughts flood my mind.

They left their daughter? As evil as they are, this was not intentional. It couldn't have been. But they certainly knew the severity of this situation, how could they let their daughter out of their sight? Are they using her as a distraction. I wouldn't put it past the vileness of Ariol.