The Princess Without a Crown -- [COMPLETE]

"I'm taking my crown..."

Hope

There wasn't a sound in the darkness.

No footsteps. No breathing - aside from her own. The entire place was devoid of any other life. It was just Hope and the chilled walls of her prison. Time was a foreign construct here. Hope knew she slept, but for how long she didn't know. She was beginning to forget what the outside sky looked like. It made sense, she supposed. Regardless of how long she'd been chained to this wall, she entered the facility itself it seems ages ago.

The dry swallow of Hope's throat made her cringe, when was the last time she'd had water? Her stomach growled at the prospect of something, anything, filling it. Even that sludge in the upper compound they tried to pass off as food.

"Rise and shine" his voice came down the hall.

Dorian appeared in the doorway with a wickedly crooked grin. His eyes glittered with dark intention.

Approaching her, he unlocked her wrists and they fell into her lap painfully. Needles pierced up and down her arms as new life suddenly flowed through them. Letting out a soft sound of pain, she held her arms to her chest.

"Stand up," Dorian ordered. When she didn't move he grabbed her under her arms and hoisted her to her feet and grabbed her by the back of the neck, dragging her toward the door.

"Let go!" Hope scrambled along, clawing her nails at his arms in a feeble attempt to get free. Her legs wobbled like jello and her brain pounded against her skull, making her jaw throb.

Dorian tossed her to the ground like a sack of nothing and sneered "Then get up and walk. You have a fight to get to."

"A fight?" she looked up, her eyes wide as a cold sweat dripped down her neck. She...she couldn't fight right now. She could barely walk. "I...can't fight right now. You never gave me blood. No food, no water. I can't even-..." she stopped mid-sentence as it instantly became clear. Hope cringed as Dorian lowered himself to sit on his heels, watching her with those dark, angry eyes.

"That's the point, darling." He murmured his whisper a caress that left pinpricks of pain along her spine. "Try fighting back now, Hope Mikaelson original tribrid. You won't last two seconds in this state and the audience wants a blood bath. I intend to deliver. Now..." He looked down at her bare, dirty feet. "On your feet."

For the first time in a long time, true fear seized Hope's chest. All of this time she'd been waiting to be tortured when all along this was the torture he'd intended. She would fall the moment she stepped in the ring. She had no energy physically to fight with her hands and no energy mentally to fight with her magic.

Dorian wasn't telling her to fight. No, he was telling her she was the sacrifice for tonight's main event.

"I know you made me kill him. Flynn died because you forced my hand. You are nothing but a coward. Forcing people to kill for what?!" Her voice grew, echoing further down the cavern path. "For entertainment? For a buck?"

"I didn't." Dorian's voice was soft and slow, dripping sickly sweet honey - and unfortunately, it stuck to her.

The worst part? She believed him.

Nausea crept from her stomach to the back of her throat.

Is this what they had reduced her to? An animal that really couldn't resist its impulse? Had...had she truly torn Flynn's heart out instead of sparing him as she'd planned?

Confusion muddled her brain as Dorian forced her to her feet again and pushed her along the long, dark hallway.

This is it. Fight or die...kill or be killed.