Dangerous Games

Reflections and Royalty

It had been a year since the current Evil Queen from Snow White's tale had pretended to be a student called Mira Shards and had escaped her imprisonment in the mirror realm. It had been a year since she had poisoned the princess Apple White, who still didn't know how she'd awoken from her enchanted sleep. It had been a year since the Evil Queen had been recaptured, and a year since she had threatened to destroy everything Milton Grimm held dear. It had been since everything had changed.

But Chess, the land within the Looking Glass, was the same as it ever was.

Almost.

Chase Redford, the Red Prince of Chess, still sat upon his throne; his sword an arms length away, unaware of all that had happened in the land of Ever After. His mother still clutched the same stack of scribbled notes that she always did, and flicked through her papers with the same reckless, manic energy as always. From an outside perspective, things likely looked normal, if such a word could even be applied to any part of Wonderland. The only real difference from usual was the reason for the Red Queen's crazed behavior, and the reason that Chase had opted to keep his weapons close.

While Ever After dealt with the ever-aftermath of the Evil Queen's reign of terror, Wonderland battled a plague. And Chase and his mother battled their grief.

It was a tradition in Chess that, unlike in the United Kingdoms of the Suits, the children of the two reigning monarchs were always raised together as siblings. The first Red Queen and White Queen truly had been sisters; and when they bore their respective daughters within months of each other they vowed to raise them together as sisters too. Those daughters did the same with their own respective children, and it soon became expected that the Queens and Kings of Chess would come together and raise the heirs to the Red and White thrones together as sisters, even though with each passing generation the biological relation between the two heirs became more and more diluted.

This tradition led to the heirs having an immense reliance on each other. And it made the absence of Queen Bela and Princess Blanche of the White throne all the harder on Chase and Queen Scarlet.

Blood, they say in Chess, is of far less importance than love. The dilution of the Royal lines and the continued closeness of the Queens proved that. Chase was grateful for that sentiment. If Chess had not been so adamant against the importance of blood, the Red Queen may not have adopted him. And had that not happened... Chase didn't know how his life would be. He shifted on his throne uncomfortably, hoping his mother would notice his irritation and break the tense silence that had settled over them, but she didn't lift her gaze from her papers.

Chase didn't much like to consider how things would be otherwise, but given the fact he was trapped in Wonderland- away from his aunt and, more importantly, his sister- he couldn't help the dark thoughts. It didn't help that his mother was set on spending her days in uninterrupted silence as of late.

The world had been right the way it was, before. He liked things to be right, to follow a pattern, and to make sense. The possibility of Chase living a life without Blanche, the current heir to the White Throne, as his sister or Scarlet as his mother made the least sense of anything he's ever considered- and he always has tried to imagine six impossible things before breakfast.

Chase sighed quietly. His mother still did not acknowledge him.

Even though their world was shattered, Chase had opted to continue practicing his Queenly lessons and strategies. He refused to even entertain the thought of him and Blanche never becoming the Queens they were set to be, and so he simply did what he usually did, as he couldn't think of anything else he could do. Even though it killed him to do it alone.