Navalla

Chapter 1

I felt the blood on my arm dry up as the seconds passed. The feel of it made me feel dirty and made me regret my actions. But I had to remind myself that I needed to slaughter that creature to become the next queen of Navalla. But was it really the only way? It is, so I need to focus and go away. Now that I had killed a pixie, I needed to kill two more creatures and then I would finally rule over my kingdom and make it a better place. Although there has to be some time between the kills, there has to be exactly one month and two days between the killings, otherwise the goddess won't accept it and there's no chance of me ever becoming queen.

Suddenly I heard Rodriguez calling my name as I was snapped out of my daze. "Princess Willow, we must leave now. We have to get out of these woods before the other pixies get to us." I thanked him and put my sword Shadowfang away after wiping the blood of of it. "Let's get going then, shall we?" I asked while getting on my beautiful black horse Aspen. Not long after we started our one-hour ride back to the palace of Navalla situated just on the border of the Navallan woods.

When we were about halfway on our ride back to the palace, I suddenly heard a shot fired from the right from us. Aspen began to panic and ran away from it while I tried to calm her. "Aspen, please calm down. Rodriguez, can you please check who fired the shot and if no one is hurt? I'll try to calm Aspen and will find you again." I shouted behind me as Aspen ran harder. Rodriguez nodded and began to trail the noise of the shot. When I had finally calmed Aspen, I saw a person standing in the middle of the way we were going. Because of this, I had to pull her reigns very hard causing Aspen to neigh and me to shriek. By the time I had finally gotten over the shock, the person had disappeared. Who was that and why did they go away? I asked myself.

"Princess Willow," Rodriguez shouted, "here you are! I tried to chase the person, but they suddenly disappeared, and you really scared me when I heard your shout. I thought the pixies had caught you."

"Rodriguez, no need to worry. I think the person that shot the arrow went a different way actually, because when I tried to calm Aspen down there suddenly was a person standing on the road. I didn't see their face and they just disappeared. I think it's best if we just go back home now, the sun is starting to set, and you know what happens then."

"Yes, of course princess. And you know you can just call me Adriel."

"You keep saying that, but I feel more comfortable when I call you Rodriguez."

"Yes of course, I just wanted to make sure. Let's get back on the road then."

As we're riding home, I couldn't stop thinking about the mystery person. Hopefully they won't get in our way again, it is absolutely necessary for me to get back home before the sun is down and the moon is out. The last time I went out when the sun was down, I accidentally killed my best friend Maeve. I had known her for my entire life and secretly had loved her my whole life. I didn't mean to kill her, it just happened. Since then, I haven't dared to go out again after dark. I still miss her very much, but there was nothing I could have done to save her.

When we finally reached the palace, my mother was standing outside the gates with a worried expression on her face. The bright red hair, that I inherited, was pushed out of her face with a hairpin. On her head stood a crown with emeralds, mirroring my eyes. "Darling, what took you so long? If you had been here like an hour later, something bad may have happened. We don't want what happened to Maeve to happen again, do we now?" My mother kept rambling.

"No mother, of course not. After I killed the pixie, we heard some noise and we got distracted. But I'm here now, so no need to worry."

"Well okay darling, at least you've killed the pixie. Now you only need to kill two more creatures to take my place as the queen of Navalla. Let's go inside now, yes? We don't want you to freeze now, do we darling."

We went inside the palace and immediately went to the dining room to eat. The table was set with all sorts of food, from smoked mushroom bake to barbecued vanilla pork. Luckily my favorite food was also there: Orange Studel. My father Egbert and my brother Hjalte were already seated at the table.

"Hello Willow darling, what took you so long. I thought you would have been home an hour ago, you only had to kill one pixie anyway." My father said.

"Well father dearest, there were some uninvited guests, but they disappeared and won't be of any trouble. Hjalte, how was your day?" I asked after I took a seat and started putting food on my plate. My parents already started a conversation between the two of them.

"If you really want to know, Bub," I rolled my eyes as I heard the nickname, "I finally asked Adriel out before you went to hunt together."

I was shocked by this news. I had known that my brother has a crush on Rodriguez since Rodriguez arrived in our palace, but I never thought he would actually ask him out. Furthermore, I can't believe Rodriguez didn't say anything on our hunt about my brother's question.

After a while I finally ask Hjalte, "And what did he say? Also why didn't he say anything when we went out together? I know he's a knight and all he isn't really open about his emotions, but still, it is a big deal."

"He said yes." My brother answered with a big smile on his face. His smile is so contagious that I immediately start smiling too. I went over to him and hugged him.

"I'm so happy for you oh my goddess I still can't believe he didn't say anything to me. But he did insist I started calling him Adriel, so maybe I should start doing that."

He began laughing and said, "Well yeah, I think that's for the better. It'd be kind of weird for you to call your future brother-in-law by his last name, wouldn't it?"

I nodded and finished eating. After dinner I immediately went to my room and got ready to go to bed. While I was looking over my bedroom, I could not help but think about Maeve. The painting we made together of a purple dragon hangs next to my bed, making it almost impossible not to think about her and all of the what ifs.

What if I didn't go out that night to go skinny dipping in the lake? What if I had known about my powers before it was too late? What if she was still here?

With these thoughts on my mind, I began to fall asleep.