Forbidden

S E V E N

Heavy footsteps stomped outside her door, along with loud and anxious talking filling her ears. She opened the door, healers and guards were rushing to a room, the King's room.

"We need more healers for the Queen!" someone yelled.

"The Queen?" Astoria whispered, her heart pounding against her rib cage as cold sweat ran through her body. She ran to the room as fast as she could, along with some healers holding bags of herbs. The Queen was lying on the bed, her skin was pale and clammy, it was like all of the life was sucked out of her face, her rosy cheeks were now stained in sweat, while six skin healers worked on her, using their powers to mend her, but Astoria didn't see blood or a wound. It must be internal. Internal wounds are much harder to heal than external wounds because the healers cannot see them and be able to tell what is wrong.

"Princess Astoria, you mustn't be here." One of the guards tried to push her out.

"Let go of me," she commanded fiercely. He obeyed. Rowan was standing next to Lilith in a far corner giving as much space to the healers as possible, looking traumatized and anxious.

"Can my blood help?" Astoria asked to no one in particular, rolling up her sleeve as she got out the dagger that was strapped to her thigh under her heavy black dress, holding it in position to cut her wrist.

"We already injected it into her system, but it isn't working," one of the skin healers said.

"Will it work if you inject more?" she shrugged, "It might, but it's risky, you have terrestrial blood in you too, if the terrestrial side of you is more dominant than your celestial side, you might kill her," she explained.

"Are any of the healings working?" The healer shook her head.

"They are working, but I don't think there's enough time to save her."

Astoria brought the dagger towards her skin. As the cold metal connected with her skin, beads of golden blood emerged, she tried not to show any discomfort at the sting. Rowan stared at her in shock, not knowing what to do or say, she ignored him and focused on the more pressing matter; saving Lilith. She lowered her hand to her purple lips, Lilith's veins turned golden as it travelled down to her whole body,

"It's working!" the healer said next to her, but, a few seconds later the brilliant light faded and turned stone cold black.

"No!" she whispered, she saw the light fade from her emerald eyes, those eyes she once found peace and hope in were now glassy and hollow. Lilith's now lifeless body filled with strings of black in her veins. Shades of black were the only colour Astoria saw, as she wept, she had killed the person that treated her with only kindness, and she had repaid her by killing her, she took a stupid risk, that she now regretted. She thought it would work since her magic was the same as her mother's, it was common sense that her Elysium blood was more dominant than her Tartarus side. But apparently not.

Standing there as the healers covered her body with a white cloth, while blood ran down her hand and dripped onto the wooden floor, the world around her was a blur, she heard nothing more than the cold blood as it dripped into a growing puddle of gold.

"I'm going to it tonight," she thought, " I'm going to kill him tonight," if he was her ticket out of this place then why wait? At least now, Lilith would not feel the loss of her son, he could join her, in whatever wondrous place she had gone to. Astoria thought of where she would end up if she was gone, would the world be a better place without her? Or would they mourn her like the beloved queen laying in front of her, covered in a silky white cloth. Would there be an afterlife for a person like her, tainted, halfbreed, corrupted, murder.

The healers helped her clean her wound and wrap it up, she didn't let them heal it, she wanted it to leave a scar, a symbol that she had failed the kind woman who had shown her so much love.