His Elven Crown (An Aladdin Retelling)

Part 7

"Hey, Janie."

Adeline smirked, rocking the diadem back and forth in her hands.

"Lina, wait," Janelle said as she walked towards her sister.

Adeline plopped the diamond out of its place with a bored expression, and threw the diadem behind her. "Well, I'm waiting."

"Please don't do this. It's not worth it. If anything happens to you-"

"Granny will be so heartbroken over me." She interrupted, scoffing. "No one will mourn my death any longer than a day. Not even you."

"That's not-"

Before Janelle could say anything, Adeline interrupted her again, her face quickly distorting into a scowl. "Oh, cut it, Janelle. I am not dying because of that stone. I can handle power. I know what I'm doing." She huffed, trying to contain her anger. "We've talked about this before. Now, if you don't mind.."

Janelle immediately ran towards her sister, reaching to grab her arms, but she got there only a second too late. Adeline pushed the diamond into her chest before Janelle could snatch it away from her, shoving her sister to the ground in process.

Dian stared, wide-eyed, at the diamond that had so easily penetrated her flesh. He watched as Adeline fell to her knees with a scream. However, she was smiling widely, reveling in the power.

Janelle crawled towards her, trying to wrestle her down and pull the diamond out. But Adeline pushed her so hard she was blown into the air and landed with a painful thud.

Dian rushed towards Janelle and luckily, Adeline was too busy to pay him any attention. She pushed herself up, and as she did, her leg seemed to catch fire, and then her arm, and soon she was all covered in flames.

Janelle stared desperately. The way she'd attacked her sister up until this moment, she tried nor to hurt her. But now that she was a walking figure of flames, that was no longer an option.

"I can distract her. You know how to fix this, right?" Dian whispered.

Janelle nodded. He took off running towards Adeline. He hauled a stone at her. It hit her and crumbled into ashes. He threw another one. She frowned at him, annoyed. She almost had no features now. Only two holes for eyes, and a bigger one for a mouth. Her only prominent detail was the black diamond in the middle of her chest.

He raised his arm, ready to throw something else at her. Suddenly, a tree branch wrapped around her neck. She screamed, visibly irritated, and easily burnt it down.

"Oh, so you want to play." She bellowed at him, her voice mixed with Avak's. She thought he had done this. But he hadn't. He looked at the trees behind her. It was Janelle. She was moving small branches in the air, prepared to catch her sister. She motioned at Dian forward with her hand. He gave a small nod, and gathered all his courage, then lunged at Adeline with a piece of wood he picked up. She stepped backward as she grabbed it from his hand, burning it down. Her flames brushed against his skin as he did. He flinched away, but then realized it didn't truly burn. It only stung a little, like the fire he felt when Avak tried to control him.

He lunged again, this time pushing her with both hands. Taken aback by his reckless attack, she staggered into the tree, although she managed to shove him to the floor with ease.

"I never intended to hurt you, Dian. Just get out of my way."

In this moment, Janelle's branches wrapped themselves around her arms, legs, and torso. Hundreds of branches restraining her, pulling her into the tree. Janelle lunged at her sister, trying to rip the diamond out of her chest.

The branches were turning into ashes one by one. Dian jumped at Adeline, restricting her almost-free arm with all his might. He was pushed again to the ground in a matter of seconds. He looked up frantically, just to see Janelle pulling away, with the diamond in her hand.

Adeline's body was no longer made of flames now. There were patches of human skin showing all around as her shield of flames started falling apart, but then it suddenly went ablaze, swallowing her whole. Dian backed away, unable to take his eyes off the giant fire as it grew brighter, losing its human shape. And then, in a blink of an eye, it spiraled around itself, disappearing from sight without leaving anything behind.

Unable to process what just happened, he looked at Janelle. She staggered to the empty space where her sister stood just a second ago, and picked something up. Dian came closer to see her holding a small yellow pendant in some old brown rope. She clutched it to her chest as tears rolled down her face. Dian put his arm around her, trying to offer her comfort.

Janelle let out small muffled sobs, trying to hold back the tears and calm herself down. Dian held her gaze, worried. She looked back, her eyes welling up with tears, and she started crying her heart out. He held her close and rubbed her shoulder as she buried her face in his neck. They stayed like this for some time, until she had collected herself enough to stand up.

She pulled out the yellow pendant again. It was a small power stone. "Grandma had given each of us one of those when we started learning magic. I didn't know Lina still had it. She always thought of power stones as an inconvenience." She stifled back another sob.

"Will you be alright? If there's anything I can do.."

"I'll be fine. I had a feeling it might come to this, although I dared hope for the better." She wiped her tears away, as more came down. She picked up the black diamond from the ground, where it had been laying all this time, and pulled out a case from her bag to store it.

"Are you still giving it to the elves?" He asked.

She nodded, "I'll drop by an elven village and hand it to them, then go home."

"Would you like a travel companion?" He suggested.

She smiled and thought for a while. "I mean.. I wouldn't mind one. But it'll be a longer way for you to travel back home."

"That's fine. Besides, I promised to come by some time, so I'd like you to show me the way."

"You promised to bring your mother and come live with us." She reminded him.

A wide grin spread across his face as he remembered their little conversation in the cave. "Yeah, I think that's what I'll do."